Description.

The African oystercatcher is a large, noisy wader, with completely black plumage, red legs and a strong broad red bill. The sexes are similar in appearance, however, females are larger and have a slightly longer beak than males. Juveniles have soft grey plumage and do not express the characteristic red legs and beak until after they fledged. The call is a distinctive loud piping, very similar to Eurasian oystercatchers. As the Eurasian oystercatcher is a migratory species they only occur as a vagrant in southern Africa, and its black-and-white plumage makes confusion impossible.

Average Measurements.

Body Length: Wingspan: Mass: ♂ ♀ Tarsus: Culmen:

Distribution and Habitat.

The African oystercatcher is native to the mainland coasts and offshore islands of Southern Africa sometimes occurring as a vagrant in Angola and Mozambique. Its breeding range extends from Lüderitz, Namibia to Mazeppa Bay, Eastern Cape, South Africa. There are estimated to be over 6,000 adult birds in total.  Typically sedentary African oystercatchers rarely leave their territories, which include a nesting site and feeding grounds. These will usually be located on or near rocky shores where they can feed.

Ecology.

Feeding.

African oystercatchers predominantly feed on molluscs such as mussels and limpets, although are known to also feed on polychaetes, insects and potentially even fish. They are adapted to pry open mussels and loosen limpets off the rocks but have been recorded picking through sand to locate other food items.

Breeding.

The nest is a bare scrape on pebbles, sand or shingle within about of the high-water mark. On rock ledges there may be a rim of shells to keep the eggs in place. The female generally lays two eggs, but there may be one or three, which are incubated by both adults. The incubation period varies between 27 and 39 days and the young take a further 38 or so days to fledge. Breeding success is greater on offshore islands where there are few predators and less disturbance than mainland sites.  The eggs average about long, ranging from, and have a breadth of, ranging from.

Longevity and mortality.

The lifespan of an African oystercatcher is about 35 years, of which they are known to pair up for 25 years. Although adults are rarely predated most mainland egg and chick fatalities are due to disturbance by people, off-road vehicles, dog attacks and predation by the kelp gull "(Larus dominicanus)" and other avian predators. Off shore pairs experience similar avian predation although most chicks perish due to starvation.

Status.

As of December 2017 the global IUCN assessment of the African oystercatcher's status is "Least Concern". The population trend seems to be upward as the local community becomes more involved in adopting conservation measures. In South Africa, the species has also been downlisted to Least Concern. A long-term program by the South African Ringing Scheme is tracking the dispersal of ringed birds to keep conservation assessments in South Africa and Namibia up to date.

The African oystercatcher or African black oystercatcher ("Haematopus moquini"), is a large charismatic wader resident to the mainland coasts and offshore islands of southern Africa. This near-threatened oystercatcher has a population of over 6,000 adults, which breed between November and April. The scientific name "moquini" commemorates the French naturalist Alfred Moquin-Tandon who discovered and named this species before Bonaparte.


Early years.

Schenkkan was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, the son of Jean Gregory (née McKenzie) and Robert Frederic Schenkkan, a professor in the Department of Radio-Television-Film at The University of Texas at Austin, and public television executive. He grew up in Austin, Texas. As a Plan II Honors student he received a B.A. in Drama, "magna cum laude", from the University of Texas, Austin in 1975 (Phi Beta Kappa, Friars' Society, UT Texas Exes Distinguished Young Alumnus Award and E. William Doty College of Fine Arts Distinguished Alumnus Award), and an M.F.A. in Theatre Arts from Cornell University in 1977. For many years, he lived in New York City and then Los Angeles, California, working both as a writer and an actor in film, television, and theatre. Since 1990 he has focused exclusively on his writing and divides his time between New York City and Seattle. Schenkkan is of Dutch Jewish (father) and Scottish and English (mother) descent.

Career.

Schenkkan is the author of ten full-length plays. "By the Waters of Babylon" premiered at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in February, 2005. The play is unrelated to the Stephen Vincent Benét short story "By the Waters of Babylon" or its subsequent adaptation. "Lewis and Clark Reach the Euphrates" premiered at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles in December 2005. "The Marriage of Miss Hollywood and King Neptune" premiered at the University of Texas at Austin in November 2005. "The Devil and Daniel Webster" premiered at the Seattle Children’s Theatre in February 2006.  "Handler", a play dealing with a snake handling church, premiered at the Actors Express Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia. "Heaven On Earth" won the Julie Harris/Beverly Hills Theatre Guild Award, participated in the Eugene O'Neill Playwright's Conference, and premiered Off-Broadway at the WPA Theatre. "Final Passages" premiered at the Studio Arena theatre. "Tachinoki" premiered at the Ensemble Studio Theatre in Los Angeles and was designated a Critic's Choice by the LA Weekly. His other play for young audiences, "The Dream Thief", had its premier at Milwaukee's First Stage. Schenkkan has written numerous one-act plays which are collected together and published by Dramatists Play Service as "Conversations With the Spanish Lady". Among them is "The Survivalist" which premiered at Actors Theatre of Louisville's Humana festival, went on to the EST Marathon in NYC, Canada's DuMaurier Festival, and the Edinburgh Festival where it won the "Best of the Fringe" award.  "The Kentucky Cycle" underwent several years of development, starting in New York City at New Dramatists and the Ensemble Studio Theatre. The two part epic was later workshopped at the Mark Taper Forum, EST-LA, the Long Wharf Theatre, and the Sundance Institute. The complete "cycle" was awarded the largest grant ever given by the Fund for New American Plays and had its world premiere in 1991 at the Intiman Theatre in Seattle (Liz Huddle, producer) where it set box office records. In 1992, it was the centerpiece of the Mark Taper forum's 25th Anniversary Season. It was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the first time in the history of the award that a play was so honored which had not first been presented in New York City. It also won both the PEN Centre West and the L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. In 1993 it appeared at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. and opened on Broadway in November of that year where it was nominated for a Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle awards.  His play "All the Way", about the behind-the-scenes political maneuvering of President Lyndon Baines Johnson to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, premiered at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival on July 28, 2012. Schenkkan describes this work as a play about "the morality of politics and power." "All the Way" won the 2012 ATCA/Steinberg Award for Best Play and the inaugural Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired by History. It opened in Boston at the American Repertory Theater on September 19, 2013 starring Bryan Cranston and sold out its entire run. The play had its Broadway premiere on March 6, 2014 at the Neil Simon Theatre, and was awarded the 2014 Tony Award for Best Play, with Cranston also winning a Tony Award for his performance as Lyndon Baines Johnson. A sequel, titled "The Great Society", premiered at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in July 2014 and on Broadway in September 2019.  Schenkkan's film work includes: "The Quiet American", directed by Phillip Noyce and starring Michael Caine (who received an Oscar nomination). For television he wrote four episodes of "The Pacific" (HBO, 2010) for which he was nominated for two Emmy Awards and won a WGA Award for Best Miniseries writing. Other television work includes "The Andromeda Strain" (A&E, 2009), "Spartacus" (USA Network, 2006), and "Crazy Horse" (TNT). In 2005, he was hired by Sony Pictures to develop a script based on Marvel Comics' "Killraven". Schenkkan was also named as the writer for the adaptation of the comic book "Incognito" published by the Marvel imprint Icon Comics. In 2016, his television adaptation of "All the Way" was filmed for HBO, with Cranston reprising his role as Lyndon Baines Johnson, and premiered in May. Also that year, he co-wrote the war drama film "Hacksaw Ridge", directed by Mel Gibson.  Schenkkan is the recipient of grants from New York State, the California Arts Council, and the Vogelstein and the Arthur foundations. He is a New Dramatists alumnus and a member of the Ensemble Studio Theatre and the National Theatre Conference. He was the 2012 Thornton Wilder Fellow at the MacDowell Colony and a member of the College of Fellows of the American Theater.  As an actor, Schenkkan has appeared in numerous roles, including the 1989 film "Out Cold"; he also starred in the 1990 cult drama teen film "Pump Up the Volume", in which he played David Deaver, the high school guidance counselor. He appeared as Lieutenant Commander Dexter Remmick in the "" episodes and.

Personal life.

Schenkkan has been married twice. His first marriage was to Mary Anne Dorward in 1984, and produced two children, Sarah Schenkkan and Joshua Schenkkan. The couple divorced in 1999. His second marriage was to the writer Maria Dahvana Headley in 2004. They divorced in 2012. Schenkkan is an uncle of actor Ben McKenzie.

Robert Frederic Schenkkan Jr. (born March 19, 1953) is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actor. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1992 for his play "The Kentucky Cycle" and his play "All the Way" earned the 2014 Tony Award for Best Play. He has three Emmy nominations and one WGA Award.


Etymology.

The name "Hän" or "Han" is a shortening of their own name as "Hwëch'in / Han Hwech’in", and of the Gwich’in word "Hangwičʼin" for the Hän, both literally meaning "People of the River, i.e. the Yukon River". This word has been spelled variously as "Hankutchin", "Han-Kootchin", "Hun-koo-chin", "Hong-Kutchin", "An Kutchin", "Han Kutchin", "Han-Kutchín", "Hăn-Kŭtchin ́", "Hän Hwëch'in", and "Hungwitchin".  The Hän were often mistaken for just another Gwich'in (Kutchin) band, especially as part of the Dagoo Gwich'in / Tukudh Gwich'in and Teetł'it Gwich'in / Teetl'it Zheh Gwich'in. The French traders called the Hän "Gens du fou", "Gens de Fou", "Gens de Foux", "Gens des Foux", or "Gens-de-fine". The name "Gens de Foux" (and variants) has also been used to refer to the Northern Tutchone (Dan or Huč’an). The Hankutchin were then known as "Gens de Bois" or "Gens des Bois," in association with their forested territory.

History of the Hän.

The Hän were one of the last Northern Athabascan groups to have contact with European peoples. In 1851 Robert Campbell from the Hudson's Bay Company was the first known white man to enter Han territory, when he traveled from Fort Selkirk to Fort Yukon. It was not until 1873 and 1874 (after the United States purchase of Alaska), that two trading posts were set up. One was established by Moses Mercier, a former employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, in Belle Isle across the Eagle River. The other, Fort Reliance, was established on the Yukon, just below the mouth of the Klondike River, near Dawson, by two Alaska Commercial Company traders, Leroy N. McQuesten and Frank Bonifield. Gradually trading with whites resulted in the Han shifting from their traditional fishing-hunting economy to a fur-trapping economy, as they grew increasingly reliant on such European goods as guns, clothing, and canvas from 1887 to 1895.  Bishop William Bompas established the first Anglican Church mission in Hän territory, and gradually the people shifted away from traditional religion. They also combined it with Christianity in a syncretic fashion. The Han suffered high mortality during several epidemics of new infectious diseases, to which they had no immunity.

Culture.

Food.

Historically, fish, especially salmon, comprised the main part of the Hän diet. King salmon was caught along the Yukon River in June and chum salmon in August. Fishing tools included weirs, traps, gill nets, dip nets, spears, and harpoons. Salmon was dried and stored for winter consumption.  Between the salmon runs from June–September, the river camps were abandoned. The Han men sought other fish, moose, caribou, birds, bears, and small game. Men hunted game (once after the salmon run and later for caribou in February and March) while women fished (for fish other than salmon.) The women traditionally cooked by stone boiling in woven spruce-root baskets.

Housing.

A square half-recessed house was made of wooden poles and moss insulation (called a "moss house"). This served as the main type of housing.  The people erected temporary domed houses made of skin stretched over tied branches when they were traveling.

Language.

The Hän language is most similar to Gwich’in (Kutchin). It is more distantly related to Upper Tanana and Northern Tutchone. The language was used as a lingua franca by Gwich’in, Tutchone, Tagish, and Upper Tanana peoples toward the end of the 19th century during the Gold Rush in the Yukon. The language is now the most endangered language of Alaska, with only a few speakers (all are over 60 years of age).

The Hän, Han or Hwëch'in / Han Hwech’in (meaning "People of the River, i.e. Yukon River", in English also Hankutchin) are a First Nations people of Canada and an Alaska Native Athabaskan people of the United States; they are part of the Athabaskan-speaking ethnolinguistic group. Their traditional lands centered on a heavily forested area around the Upper Yukon River (Chu Kon'Dëk), Klondike River (Tr'on'Dëk), Bonanza Creek (Gàh Dëk) and Sixtymile River (Khel Dëk) and straddling what is now the Alaska-Yukon Territory border. In later times, the Han population became centered in Dawson City, Yukon and Eagle, Alaska.


Context.

It was first published in 1601 as a supplement to a long poem by Robert Chester, entitled "Love's Martyr". The full title of Chester's book explains the content:  Chester prefaced his poem with a short dedication addressed to the Phoenix and Turtledove. The Phoenix is envisaged as female and the dove as male:  Chester's main poem is a long allegory in which the relationship between the birds is explored, and its symbolism articulated. It incorporates the story of King Arthur, and a history of ancient Britain, emphasising Welsh etymologies for British towns. It culminates with the joint immolation of the Phoenix and Turtledove, giving birth to a new and more beautiful bird from the ashes. It also includes several allegorical love poems within it, supposed to have been written by the Turtledove to the Phoenix.  It is followed by a brief collection of "Diverse Poeticall Essaies" by the "best and chiefest of our moderne writers, with their names sub-scribed to their particular workes". These include, in addition to Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, George Chapman, John Marston and the anonymous "Vatum Chorus" and "Ignoto". All use the same imagery. The poems are introduced by Vatum Chorus and Ignoto, followed by "The Phoenix and the Turtle", which ends with mourning for the death of the perfect lovers, "leaving no posterity". Marston then seems to reply to Shakespeare's "moving epicedium", by referring to the couple's "glorious issue": the being born from the flames. Chapman adds more detail on the relationship, saying that the Phoenix provided every variety of life to the Turtle, "She was to him the Analysed World of pleasure, / Her firmness cloth'd him in variety". Jonson ends with an idealisation of the Phoenix, whose judgement shines as "Clear as a naked Vestal, / Closed in an orb of Crystal."

Interpretations.

In addition to an allegory of an ideal marriage, the poem can be seen as an elucidation of the relationship between truth and beauty, or of fulfilled love, in the context of Renaissance Neoplatonism. It also seems that the roots of this conception of perfect love lie not only in scholastic sources regarding the union of persons in the Trinity, but also in the confluence of three other lines of medieval Catholic tradition: the literary traditions of mystical union, spiritual friendship, and spiritual marriage Shakespeare introduces a number of other birds, drawing on earlier literature about the "parliament of birds", to portray the death of the lovers as the loss of an ideal that can only be lamented.  Several attempts have been made to link the lovers of the poem to historical individuals, though others have argued that the poem should not be interpreted with "appliqué literalism", in the words of James P. Bednarz. Indeed, exponents of the New Criticism such as I. A. Richards and William Empson emphasised the unresolvable nature of the text's ambiguities. Helen Hackett argues that the poem "invites deciphering, but at the same time firmly rebuff it." Some of the more prominent attempted decodings of the allegory with reference to real individuals are listed below:

John and Ursula Salusbury.

Because Chester dedicated the main poem to the Welsh statesman Sir John Salusbury and his wife Ursula Stanley, it has been argued that all the poems in the collection, including Shakespeare's, also celebrate the couple. Salusbury was a courtier at the court of Elizabeth I, and was a member of the powerful Salusbury Family of Wales. His wife Ursula was the illegitimate daughter of Henry Stanley, 4th Earl of Derby. A difficulty with this view is the fact that the couple are known to have had ten children, but the poem refers to the relationship as a childless "married chastity". This is commented on elsewhere in the collection by John Marston, and all the poems in the collection emphasise the chaste and spiritual nature of the relationship, the couple's only child being the mysterious being born from their bodily deaths. The identification of the Salusburys as the subject was first argued in detail by Carleton Brown in 1913. Brown tried to resolve the problem by arguing that it was written after the birth of the couple's first child, but not published until many years later. Later writers have sometimes argued that while Chester's "Love's Martyr" may be intended to celebrate the couple, Shakespeare's own poem does not. John Klause suggests that the "death" implied in Chester's work is symbolic of marriage and "sexual surrender", but in Shakespeare's poem death is literal. G. Wilson Knight suggested that the poem celebrates chaste love because it is about Salusbury's devotion to his sister, for whom Salusbury himself had written a poem.

Queen Elizabeth.

An alternative is to interpret the Turtle as John Salusbury and the Phoenix as Queen Elizabeth I, which would explain the chastity of the relationship and the implication that their "child" is something mystical rather than physical. Elizabeth was often connected to the phoenix, and she is referred to as the "maiden phoenix" in the play "Henry VIII", partly written by Shakespeare (though the "maiden phoenix" passage is typically attributed to John Fletcher). Two panel portraits attributed to Nicholas Hilliard are known as the "Phoenix" and "Pelican" portraits because of jewels the queen wears: her personal badges of the pelican and the phoenix. Both birds appear in Chester's main poem. An objection is that the intimacy between the lovers seems rather too strong for Salusbury and the queen.  Katherine Duncan-Jones and Henry Woudhuysen adopt a variation of the view that the poem refers to Salusbury and the queen, arguing that the "session" mentioned in the poem is the 1601 parliament, in which Elizabeth made a famous speech about the symbolic relationship between herself and her people, sometimes referred to as her. They draw on the earlier work of Marie Axton, who argued that Elizabeth herself is both birds, in her monarchical and human aspects, but that the human aspect (the Turtle) also includes the body of the people as a whole. Duncan-Jones and Woudhuysen suggest that Salusbury represents the people.  Some scholars interpret the child of the phoenix as a reference to Elizabeth's heir, James VI of Scotland. This imagery was used in 1604, when James arrived in London, but this would have been problematic in 1601, when Elizabeth was still alive.  The theory that both Chester's and Shakespeare's poems were intended to refer to the relationship between Elizabeth and Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex was first proposed by A.B. Grosart in 1878, and was revived by William Matchett in 1965. Many authors who reject the identification of the lovers as Essex and Elizabeth nevertheless argue that the events of Essex's rebellion and execution in early 1601 may lie behind some of the more obscure symbolism in the poem and the others in the collection. Sir John Salusbury had been knighted for helping to suppress the rebellion, while his cousin Owen Salusbury was killed while participating in it. Sir John's brother, Thomas Salusbury, had been executed after the earlier Babington Plot against Elizabeth. Duncan-Jones and Woudhuysen argue that Salusbury was "love's martyr" for putting devotion to his queen above his family. Peter Ackroyd and James P. Bednarz both argue that Shakespeare may have written the poem to dissociate himself from Essex, with whom he was implicated because of his links to Essex's main ally the Earl of Southampton, and because his play about the overthrow of a monarch, "Richard II", had been performed at the request of the rebels. For Bednarz "Shakespeare's name, subscribed to his poem in "Love's Martyr" shows his accommodation to the political order without endorsing any specific political position."

Catholic martyrs.

Another interpretation, first proffered in the 1930s by Clara Longworth in the novel "My Shakespeare, Rise!" is that the poem is a cryptic Roman Catholic eulogy and is part of the contention that Shakespeare was a secret Catholic sympathiser. The advocacy of prayers for the dead ("these dead birds") in the final line of the poem corroborates this interpretation. Several critics, including Clare Asquith and David Beauregard, have noted that the poem ostensibly references Catholic liturgy and possibly the writings of the Catholic priest and poet Rev. Robert Southwell, SJ, who translated the Latin hymn "Lauda Sion" and also authored a poem praising the married chastity of St. Mary and St. Joseph. John Klause argued that the poem has various parallels to the "Dies Irae" of the Liturgy for the Dead, but suggests that its Catholic imagery satirises conventional Protestant attitudes expressed in Chester's poem, and that it is a subtle protest against the lauding of Sir John Salusbury, whose imagined death he supposes the poem celebrates.  Proponents of the Catholic interpretation have suggested various identities for the poem's birds, but the interpretation that has the most traction is that the phoenix commemorates St. Anne Line, a Roman Catholic executed at Tyburn in 1601 and subsequently canonised by the Roman Catholic Church as a martyr. St. Anne Line and her young husband Roger were separated when he was imprisoned and then exiled after being arrested at a prohibited Catholic Mass. He died on the European continent a few years later and St. Anne began working for the Jesuits in London. She was arrested at a Candlemas liturgy and convicted of harbouring a Catholic priest, which led to her execution. Her body was retrieved from the common grave in the road and one of the Jesuits who knew her hinted that a secret requiem Mass was later offered for her. It was suggested that this requiem Mass provided the setting for Shakespeare's poem. The identification was corroborated by the belief that, like Shakespeare's couple, the Lines had no children. However, it has been proven since that they had a son named "John", whom relatives adopted.  Clara Longworth first suggested that St. Anne Line is Shakespeare's phoenix and Mark Barkworth, a Catholic priest who reportedly embraced her body as it hung on the scaffold before he was also executed, is the turtle. John Finnis and Patrick Martin argued more recently that St. Anne Line is the phoenix and her husband Roger is the turtle. They concur with Clare Asquith that the "bird of loudest lay" represents the composer William Byrd, who was a Roman Catholic convert, and that the crow is the Catholic priest Rev. Henry Garnet, SJ. Martin Dodwell argued further that Shakespeare used St. Anne and Roger Line to symbolise the Catholic Church itself, as disinherited and rejected by England.

Text of the poem.

The Phoenix and the Turtle  Let the bird of loudest lay, On the sole Arabian tree, Herald sad and trumpet be, To whose sound chaste wings obey.  But thou, shrieking harbinger, Foul pre-currer of the fiend, Augur of the fever's end, To this troop come thou not near.  From this session interdict Every fowl of tyrant wing, Save the eagle, feather'd king: Keep the obsequy so strict.  Let the priest in surplice white, That defunctive music can, Be the death-divining swan, Lest the requiem lack his right.  And thou, treble-dated crow, That thy sable gender mak'st With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st, 'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.  Here the anthem doth commence: Love and constancy is dead; Phoenix and the turtle fled In a mutual flame from hence.  So they lov'd, as love in twain Had the essence but in one; Two distincts, division none: Number there in love was slain.  Hearts remote, yet not asunder; Distance, and no space was seen 'Twixt the turtle and his queen; But in them it were a wonder.  So between them love did shine, That the turtle saw his right Flaming in the phoenix' sight: Either was the other's mine.  Property was thus appall'd, That the self was not the same; Single nature's double name Neither two nor one was call'd.  Reason, in itself confounded, Saw division grow together; To themselves yet either-neither, Simple were so well compounded  That it cried how true a twain Seemeth this concordant one! Love hath reason, reason none If what parts can so remain.  Whereupon it made this threne To the phoenix and the dove, Co-supreme and stars of love; As chorus to their tragic scene.  THRENOS.  Beauty, truth, and rarity. Grace in all simplicity, Here enclos'd in cinders lie.  Death is now the phoenix' nest; And the turtle's loyal breast To eternity doth rest,  Leaving no posterity:-- 'Twas not their infirmity, It was married chastity.  Truth may seem, but cannot be: Beauty brag, but 'tis not she; Truth and beauty buried be.  To this urn let those repair That are either true or fair; For these dead birds sigh a prayer.

The Phoenix and the Turtle (also spelled The Phœnix and the Turtle) is an allegorical poem about the death of ideal love by William Shakespeare. It is widely considered to be one of his most obscure works and has led to many conflicting interpretations. It has also been called "the first great published metaphysical poem". The title "The Phoenix and the Turtle" is a conventional label. As published, the poem was untitled. The "turtle" is the turtle dove, not the shelled reptile.


Related trades.

Many blade smiths were known by other titles according to the kind of blade that they produced:

Historic bladesmithing.

Historically speaking, bladesmithing is an art that has survived and thrived over thousands of years. Many different parts of the world have different styles of bladesmithing, some more well-known than others.

Egyptian.

Ancient Egyptians referred to iron as "copper from the heavens" because their lack of smelting technology limited their accessible iron supplies to what little native iron they could recover from meteorites. Despite iron's rarity, they gained enough familiarity with ironworking techniques to have used wrought iron in the manufacture of swords and blades as early as 3000 BC. They exported this technique to Assyria, Babylon and Greece through trade and as they conquered other lands and were conquered themselves.

Celtic.

The Proto-Celtic Hallstatt culture (8th century BC) were among the earliest users of iron swords. During the Hallstatt period, they made swords both in bronze as well as iron with rounded tips. Toward the end of the Hallstatt period, around 600-500BC, these swords were replaced with short daggers. The La Tene culture reintroduced the sword, which were very different from the traditional shape and construction of the Bronze Age and early Iron Age, characterized by a more pointed tip.

Chinese.

Traditional Chinese blades ("jians") are usually of "sanmei" (three plate) construction, which involved sandwiching a core of hard steel between two plates of softer steel. The central plate protrudes slightly from its surrounding pieces, allowing for a sharp edge, while the softer spine protects the brittle core. Some blades had "wumei" or five plate construction, with two more soft plates being used at the central ridge. Bronze "jian" were often made in a somewhat similar manner: in this case an alloy with a high copper content would be used to make a resilient core and spine, while the edge would be made from a high-tin-content alloy for sharpness and welded onto the rest of the blade.  The swordsmiths of China are often credited with the forging technology that was carried to Korea and Japan, allowing swordsmiths in those places to create such weapons as the "katana". This technology included folding, inserting alloys, and differential hardening of the edge, which historically has been the most common technique around the world. While the Japanese would be more influenced by the Chinese "dāo" (single-edged swords of various forms), the early Japanese swords known as "ken" are often based on the "jian". One-sided "jians" from the Tang dynasty provided the basis for various Japanese forging styles and techniques. The Korean version of the "jian" is known as the "geom" or "gum", and these swords often preserve features found in Ming-era "jian", such as openwork pommels and sharply angled tips.

Korean.

Korea has a history of swordsmithing dating back 3,000 years. Although Korea was in close proximity to both Japan and China, no native systems of swordsmanship and swordmaking developed in Korea.  Korean swords include long swords such as the yeoh do, geom, and hyup do and curved swords such as Samindo. Metal swords of double bladed leaf structure have been found throughout Korea dating back to the Bronze Age. These bronze swords were around 32 cm in overall length, with a short handle.

Japanese.

The technology that led to the development of the Japanese sword originated in China and was brought to Japan by way of Korea. The oldest steel swords found in Japan date to the fourth or fifth century A.D. Although appearing to be ceremonial in nature, samples of these straight blades preserved in the Shōsōin were hand-forged with hardened cutting edges. By the time of the Heian period (794—1185 AD) the Japanese sword took on its distinctive curved shape as a mounted horseman would have more use for a slashing type of blade as opposed to a thrusting type. These swords were known as "tachi".  Due to the quality of metal found in Japan, Japanese bladesmithing became an extremely rigid, precise process, involving folding and forge-welding the steel many times over to create a laminated blade. By the time of the Kamakura period (1185–1333 AD), Japan was under the rule of a military class and repelling Mongol invasions. This became known as the "Golden era" of Japanese bladesmithing under Emperor Toba II, who became a bladesmith himself. After adbicating, Toba II summoned Japan's finest bladesmiths around him in an effort to develop the perfect sword. It was determined that a sword had to be hard in order to maintain a sharp cutting edge, yet hard steel is brittle and can shatter under the stress of a heavy blow. Swordsmiths in Japan found the solution by wrapping a softer low-carbon steel core such as wrought iron, in a jacket of high-carbon steel and then hardening the edge. However, under heavy usage, the edge would be more prone to chipping than its European counterparts, which were typically designed to deal with heavier armor than Japanese blades. This was answered by allowing projections of softer steel known as "ashi" to form in the hardened cutting edge during differential hardening of the blade.  The Mongol invasions brought with them a need for swords also suited for hand-to-hand combat and the smiths began manufacture of shorter blades to meet this need. It was during the Muromachi period that the "katana" and "tantō" came into being. By the sixteenth century, Japanese bladesmithing had become so renowned throughout Asia that the Japanese turned to large scale manufacturing of swords as an export to China. Smiths at Sakai also crafted knives for cutting tobacco, which had been introduced by the Portuguese. The Sakai bladesmithing industry received a major boost from the Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1868), which granted Sakai a special seal of approval and enhanced its reputation for quality.  The Haitorei Edict in 1876 banned carrying of swords in public, which, combined with the decimation of the samurai class caused a heavy decline in the number of swords produced throughout the country. Sword-making was completely banned following World War II and did not resume until 1953, under heavy restrictions to preserve it solely as an art. In modern-day Japan a swordsmith is still only allowed to manufacture two swords a month by law, for example. As a result, many smiths travel to Taiwan or China to make extra swords for the export market as foreign-made swords are also illegal in Japan. Bladesmithing is still practiced in the cities of Sakai (Osaka Prefecture) and Seki (Gifu Prefecture).

Germanic.

The Germanic Migration period peoples also had advanced bladesmithing techniques for their level of technology. Migration Era smiths would often forge-weld blades of multiple materials, and their blades were typically double-edged and straight. Migration Era blades were often forged with a hard steel edge wrapped around a pattern welded core. Pattern welding was adopted from the neighbouring Romans, who had employed such technique since the second century AD.

Indian.

Bladesmithing was common practice in India during the Middle Ages. A special type of steel known as Wootz or Damascus steel was often used in South Asia. The term Damascus steel can refer to two different types of artefacts. One is the true Damascus steel, or Wootz steel, which is a high carbon alloy with tremendous edge retention possibly due to its composition of carbon nanotubes and carbide nanowires, with a wavy surface texture originating from the crystalline structure of alloy metals such as tungsten and vanadium - elements that occur naturally in iron ore from southern India - to the surface during the manufacturing process. This is still in debate as metallurgist John Verhoeven at Iowa State University believes the nanowires to occur in most steels. The other is a composite structure made by welding together iron and steel to give a visible pattern on the surface, called pattern welded steel. Although both were referred to as Damascus steels, true Damascus steels were not replicated in Europe until 1821.

Spain.

Between the 15th and 17th centuries the Toledo sword-making industry enjoyed a great boom, to the point where its products came to be regarded as the best in Europe.

Middle East.

Damascus Steel was commonly used in the Middle East.

Modern bladesmithing.

Bladesmithing began declining after the Industrial Revolution. With improvements in steel production, bladesmiths no longer had to forge steel and knives could be machined from flat bars of steel. As cutlery companies moved to mass production of blades and machine tools became more available, the art of forging steel began to disappear as knifemakers could grind blades out of existing stock. By the mid 20th century, bladesmithing had been relegated to a cottage industry carried out by a handful of bladesmiths.  One of these bladesmiths was William F. Moran, who forged his knives using a coal forge in the manner of a blacksmith using a hammer and anvil to shape the steel. Moran began trying to revive the ancient process of forging Damascus steel in the late 1960s. However, no living bladesmith knew the exact techniques and without a recipe for the process, it was in danger of being lost; through trial and error he taught himself pattern welding and referred to his end product as "Damascus steel".  In 1972, Moran was elected president of the Knifemakers' Guild. The following year he unveiled his "Damascus knives" at the Guild Show and created a revival of interest in the forged blade, and along with the knives he gave away free booklets detailing how he made them, to encourage other knifemakers to take up the hammer and anvil. In 1976 he founded the American Bladesmith Society (ABS). Despite its name, this was an international group of knife makers dedicated to preserving the forged blade and educating the public about traditional bladesmithing techniques. The handful of traditional bladesmiths in the 1960s rose to several hundred by 2005.

Tools.

The basic art and principles of forging a blade has remained similar for thousands of years and the modern bladesmith uses a variety of tools and techniques in order to produce a blade. Forges formerly fed by wood, coke, or coal are still in use, but gas forges are becoming the standard. Likewise the smith's hammer is being eclipsed by the use of hydraulic forging presses and power hammers.

Steel.

Modern bladesmiths use a variety of steels to produce their blades, most commonly high carbon steel, such as SAE 1075 or SAE 1095 (the '10' representing the 10-series carbon steels, while '75' '85' and '95' reflect the carbon content of the steel), tool steel such as O-1, A-2, D2 other tool or high carbon steels, or a variety of steels welded in layers, commonly referred to as "Damascus".  When forging, the blade material is heated to a high temperature or forging temperature in a forge and shaped with a hammer on an anvil to achieve the desired shape, often to near final dimension, where very little stock removal, if any, is required to finish. Steel can be folded either to form decorative pattern welded steel or to refine raw steel, or as the Japanese call it, tamahagane. Grain size is kept at a minimum as grain growth can happen quite easily if the blade material is overheated.  Swords and longer blades, in modern times, are often crafted of 5160 carbon spring steel, which is not as hard or brittle as a high carbon steel (such as 1095), but is more durable and less prone to breakage, and therefore more suitable for longer weapons. 5160 carbon spring steel is sometimes used for leaf springs in American trucks, making it readily available in the US. In Europe, EN-45 is more commonly used.

Damascus steel.

Many bladesmiths are able to forge a special type of steel using a technique called pattern welding, producing a metal erroneously referred to as Damascus steel. Modern pattern-welded steel can be highly decorative as well as durable (if welded in certain ways with proper steels), and is often used in custom knife- and sword-crafting. Bill Moran is said to be the "Father of Modern Damascus Steel".

Bladesmithing is the art of making knives, swords, daggers and other blades using a forge, hammer, anvil, and other smithing tools. Bladesmiths employ a variety of metalworking techniques similar to those used by blacksmiths, as well as woodworking for knife and sword handles, and often leatherworking for sheaths. Bladesmithing is an art that is thousands of years old and found in cultures as diverse as China, Japan, India, Germany, Korea, the Middle East, Spain and the British Isles. As with any art shrouded in history, there are myths and misconceptions about the process. While traditionally bladesmithing referred to the manufacture of any blade by any means, the majority of contemporary craftsmen referred to as bladesmiths are those who primarily manufacture blades by means of using a forge to shape the blade as opposed to knifemakers who form blades by use of the stock removal method, although there is some overlap between both crafts.


Career.

Recruited by former "sekiwake" Kiyosegawa, he made his professional debut in September 1956 (in the same tournament as Taihō). Initially fighting under the "shikona" of Wakaikuni, he rose slowly up the ranks, eventually reaching the second highest "jūryō" division in May 1963, after 26 tournaments in "makushita". He was promoted to the top "makuuchi" division in November 1963. In just his second "makuuchi" tournament, ranked at "maegashira" 13, he produced a superb 14–1 record, losing only on the final day and finishing runner-up to "yokozuna" Taihō who won with an unbeaten score. (Because he was ranked so low he was not matched against Taihō during the tournament and so never had the chance to defeat him and force a playoff.) He was awarded the Technique Prize and was promoted straight to "sekiwake", sumo's third highest rank – the biggest jump to "sekiwake" ever recorded in the six tournaments a year era. He defeated "yokozuna" in three consecutive tournaments from September 1964 to January 1965, earning promotion back to the "san'yaku" ranks.  After a year or so of being stuck at the "sekiwake" rank, Kiyokuni was finally promoted to "ōzeki" in May 1969 after his second runner-up performance. Although he had scored only 31 wins in the three tournaments prior to his promotion, below the usual threshold of 33, he immediately dispelled any doubts over his worthiness by taking what was to be his only tournament championship or "yūshō" in his "ōzeki" debut. He defeated Taihō for only the third time in 25 meetings on the final day and then beat "maegashira" Fujinokawa in a playoff after both had finished on 12–3. This was to be the last "yūshō" by a member of the Tatsunami-Isegahama "ichimon" or group of stables until "ōzeki" Asahifuji won his first championship in January 1988.  Kiyokuni was never able to make "yokozuna", partly due to neck and spinal injuries from which he never fully recovered. Nevertheless, he was a strong "ōzeki", remaining there for 28 "basho" and finishing runner-up in May 1971, May 1973 and September 1973. He retired in January 1974, due to a heart complaint.

Retirement from sumo.

Kiyokuni became an "oyakata", or elder of the Japan Sumo Association after his retirement, and in April 1977 he became head coach of Isegahama stable following the death of his second stablemaster, former "yokozuna" Terukuni, who had been in charge since 1961. Initially he had some success, overseeing the late blooming Kurosegawa's rise to "komusubi" in 1980 and also producing Wakasegawa who reached the top division in 1983. However, On August 12, 1985 Isegahama's wife and two children died in the Japan Airlines Flight 123 disaster. He was never the same again and the stable began to deteriorate. He was demoted from his position in the Sumo Association after giving an outspoken interview to the "Shūkan Gendai" in 2004 in which he criticised the attitude of amateur college champions and foreigners in sumo and made allegations of match-fixing and steroid abuse. By the time he reached the mandatory retirement age of sixty-five in November 2006, there were just two active wrestlers in Isegahama stable left, compared with dozens when he took over. Much to his chagrin he had not even been able to persuade his nephews, Tamanoshima and to join, the two eventual "sekitori" opting for Kataonami stable instead. With no long term successor to Kiyokuni available, former "maegashira" Katsuhikari took on the Isegahama name, but he dissolved the stable, which dated back to 1859, on February 1, 2007. Its two remaining wrestlers moved to Kiriyama stable. In an attempt to revive the fortunes of the once prestigious Isegahama name, it was assumed by the former Asahifuji in December of that year, who renamed his existing Ajigawa stable to Isegahama stable.

Fighting style.

Kiyokuni favoured techniques were "hidari-yotsu" (a right hand outside, left hand inside grip on his opponent's "mawashi"), "yorikiri" (force out), and "oshidashi" (push out).

Career record.

Kiyokuni Katsuo (born 20 November 1941 as Tadao Sato) is a former sumo wrestler from Ogachi, Akita, Japan. His highest rank was "ōzeki", which he held from 1969 to 1974. He won one top division "yūshō" or tournament championship and was a runner-up in five other tournaments. He also earned seven special prizes and seven gold stars. After his retirement he was the head coach of Isegahama stable.


Pre-War.

Early history.

Alfa Romeo started motor racing almost immediately after it was founded. A.L.F.A. ventured into motor racing in 1911, with drivers Franchini and Ronzoni competing in the Targa Florio with two 24 HP models. The marque's first success came in 1913 when Nino Franchini finished second in Parma-Poggio Berceto race with a 40-60HP. Giuseppe Merosi built a very advanced racing car in 1914, which was named "Grand Prix". In 1920 Giuseppe Campari won the race at Mugello with a 40-60HP, whilst Enzo Ferrari was second in Targa Florio in the same year. A year later Giuseppe Campari won at Mugello again. Ugo Sivocci won the 1923 Targa Florio with an RL and Antonio Ascari took second. Sivocci's car was painted with the green cloverleaf on a white background that was to become Alfa's good luck token.

Grand Prix racing.

In 1923 Vittorio Jano was lured to Alfa from Fiat, designing the motors that gave Alfa racing success into the late 1930s. (When Alfa began to lose in the late 1930s Jano was promptly sacked.) In 1925 Alfa Romeo won the first Automobile World Championship in the history of automobile racing. Over 4 rounds the Alfa Romeo P2 won the European Grand Prix at Spa and the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, and hence incorporated the laurel wreath in their logo. For 1932 Jano produced the sensational P3 which won its first race driven by Tazio Nuvolari at the Italian Grand Prix, 5 more Grands Prix that year were shared by Nuvolari and Rudolf Caracciola. Alfa Corse closed for 1933 and locked the cars in the factory, but they eventually transferred them to Enzo Ferrari's now privatised 'factory' team Scuderia Ferrari. P3s then won six of the final 11 events of the season including the final 2 major Grands Prix in Italy and Spain.  In 1934 Louis Chiron won the French Grand Prix in the P3 whilst the German Silver Arrows dominated the other 4 championship events. However the P3s won 18 of the 35 Grands Prix held throughout Europe. 1935 was even tougher, the P3 was simply outclassed by the remorseless Silver Arrows, but Tazio Nuvolari gave the P3 one of the most legendary victories of all time by winning the 1935 German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring. The P3 managed 16 victories in 1935.

Sportscar racing.

In the 1930s Tazio Nuvolari won the Mille Miglia in a 6C 1750, crossing the finishing line after having incredibly overtaken Achille Varzi without lights (at nighttime). Alfa Romeos won the Targa Florio six times in row in the 1930s. and the Mille Miglia every year from 1928 to 1938 except for 1931.  The 8C 2300 won the Le Mans 24 Hours from 1931 to 1934, with Alfa Romeo withdrawing from racing in 1933 when the Italian government took over, and the racing of Alfas was then taken up by Scuderia Ferrari as Alfa's outsourced team. (Enzo Ferrari drove for Alfa before he went on to manage the team, and after that went on to manufacture his own cars.) In 1935 Alfa Romeo won the German Grand Prix with Nuvolari.  In 1938 Biondetti won the Mille Miglia in an 8C 2900B Corto Spider, thereafter referred to as the "Mille Miglia" model.

Formula One.

Alfa Romeo participated in Formula One, both as a constructor and engine supplier, from to.  The works Alfa Romeo team dominated the first two years of the Formula One World Championship, using the pre-war Alfetta, but withdrew from Formula One at the end of.  During the 1960s, several minor F1 teams used Alfa Romeo straight-4 engines and a V8 Alfa Romeo appeared in McLaren and March cars in the early 1970s.  The Brabham team used Alfa Romeo engines from to, foreshadowing a return by Alfa Romeo as a constructor from to.  For the 1987 season, Alfa Romeo made a deal to supply engines to Ligier, but the deal was cancelled when Fiat took control of Alfa Romeo.  Alfa Romeo also supplied engines to the tiny and unsuccessful Italian Osella team from 1983 to 1987 (1988 branded as Osella engine).  On 29 November 2017, Sauber announced that they have signed a multi-year technical and commercial partnership contract with Alfa Romeo, therefore the team will be renamed to Alfa Romeo Sauber F1 Team for the season onwards. In January 2019 the decision was made to rename the Alfa Romeo Sauber Team to Alfa Romeo Racing for the upcoming 2019 season.

Formula Three.

Alfa Romeo has also supplied engines to Formula Three cars. Piercarlo Ghinzani driving a Euroracing March 793 with 2 litre Alfa engine won straight away its first season in the Italian F3 series in 1979. Michele Alboreto won the European title in 1980 with a March-Alfa Romeo. Altogether Alfa Romeo engined cars took four consecutive Italian titles between 1980 and 1984. Alfa Romeo's new Twin Spark Formula Three engine arrived in 1987 and it continued the success. In all Alfa Romeo took five titles, five European Cups and about twenty national championships in Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland and Scandinavia. Other participation of Alfa Romeo in the Formula Three Championships, was made in South American Championship, where Alfa Romeo won 5 America Championship and 8 Mexican Championship, 1 Brazilian Championship, 4 Argentinian Championship and 3 Chilean Championship.  Alfa Romeo delivers engines to new Formula 3 WSK F3 Regional EM series, F3 Asian Championship and W Series starting in 2019. Italian based Autotecnica Motori tuned Alfa Romeo 1.75 L 4-cyl turbocharged engine produces and its used in Tatuus T-318 racing car.

Formula Alfa Boxer.

After great success of one-make championship Trofeo Alfasud, in 1987 Alfa Romeo launched the new Formula Alfa Boxer racing car which had engine derived from 33 and the Sprint. Amato Ferrari won the debut championship in 1987, followed by Mirko Savoldi in 1988 and by Alessandro Zampedri in 1989.  In 1990 this engine was replaced by more powerful Quadrifoglio Verde engine. In 1992 was launched European Championship (Formula Boxer Europe) and the choice of chassis was liberalized. The last Formula Alfa Boxer series season was in 1995. At the wheel of an Ermolli, Andrea Boldrini was the first champion, followed by Danilo Tomassini, and by Tony Kanaan driving a Tatuus.

Indycars.

From 1989 to 1991, Alfa Romeo supplied engines to the IndyCar World Series. The 2648 cc, turbocharged V8 engine produced 720 bhp, and was partly developed from the unraced Ferrari 637 Indy car. The engine was mated to a chassis specially built by March and prepared by Alex Morales Motorsports in 1989, with Roberto Guerrero at the wheel. Guerrero only managed a best of 8th place at Detroit, before both driver and engine moved onto Patrick Racing for 1990, again with a March chassis. That season proved to be an improvement, as Guerrero finished 16th place in the points standings, with a best finish of 5th place. The next year would be Alfa's last. The team switched to a Lola chassis, and Danny Sullivan took over the drive, finishing 11th in the points, with a best finish of 4th. In the end, Alfa Romeo would finish its Champ Car project without scoring a single podium, pole position or race win.

Rally.

Alfa Romeo cars have also been used in rallying, mostly by private teams. In 1958 the Alfa Romeo Giulietta won the 1000 Lakes Rally. Racing versions of the Alfetta GT and GTV were built by Autodelta in the 1970s, initially with the normally aspirated engine from the earlier GTAm racer, for homologation under FIA Group 2. In this form they were rallied with moderate success in 1975, winning the Elba and Costa Brava rallies overall, as well as winning the Group 2 category in the World Rally Championship's Tour de Corse. In 1980 the Alfetta GTV Turbodelta was already homologated in FIA Group 4, since the required number of production cars had been built. A racing version was campaigned in rallies, but once more the effort was abandoned after a single season, despite scoring a win at the Danube Rally. In 1986 Alfa Romeo GTV6 was one of the fastest Group A rally cars. However FIA reclassified it as a Group B car at the end of 1986, changing it from a winning car to a car which was much less competitive. The GTV6 placed 3rd in 1986 Tour de Corse.

Sportscars.

On March 6, 1963, Alfa Romeo's racing department, Autodelta, was established, to run Alfa Romeo's sportscar programme, directed by ex-Alfa Romeo and Ferrari engineer, Carlo Chiti. Competing with the Alfa Romeo TZ, the team began to collect class wins, but faced strong competition from the Porsche 904 and realised they would need a new design if they were to achieve outright victories. Carlo Chiti and the Audodelta team, designed a new 90 degree V8 engine for their Alfa Romeo Tipo 33 sportscar and ultimately a flat-12 engine for the Alfa Romeo 33 TT 12. These cars were raced in the World Sportscar Championship from 1967 to 1977, with the 3-litre TT 12, winning title in 1975 and SC 12 in 1977. The company developed a Group C prototype in the early 1990s, codenamed the SE 048SP, but this never raced.

Touring cars.

Starting in the 1960s Alfa Romeo won many touring car titles. The Alfa Romeo GTA won the European Touring Car Championship (ETCC) in 1966, 1967 and 1969. The later Alfa Romeo GTAm won further ETCC titles in 1971 and 1972. Among other victories, the GTA won the inaugural Sports Car Club of America's Trans-Am championship in 1966 with Horst Kwech and Gaston Andrey at the wheel. The GTA won the Trans-Am championship again in the 1970 season. The Alfa Romeo Alfetta GTV6 won four consecutive European Touring Car Championship titles between 1982 and 1985. The British Touring Car Championship was won in 1983 by Andy Rouse driving an Alfetta GTV6 and again in 1994 by Gabriele Tarquini with an Alfa Romeo 155. In 1993, the Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft (DTM) series was won by Nicola Larini with an Alfa Romeo 155 V6 Ti, also achieving all-time record wins of championship races. The successor of the 155, the Alfa Romeo 156 won the European Touring Car Championship four times in a row from 2000 to 2003, with Fabrizio Giovanardi and Gabriele Tarquini.  The Alfa Romeo 159 has also won the Bathurst 12 Hour race on three consecutive occasions at the diesel fuel category from 2007.  In recent years, several different teams in different competitions used the Alfa Romeo Giulietta for competing:  In addition, Tecnodom Sport used the Alfa Romeo MiTo in the 2016 season of the Italian Touring Car Championship.

Major victories and championships.

Alfa Romeo has won the following major victories and championships:

During its history, Alfa Romeo has competed successfully in many different categories of motorsport, including Grand Prix motor racing, Formula One, sportscar racing, touring car racing and rallies. They have competed both as a constructor and an engine supplier, via works entries (usually under the name Alfa Corse or Autodelta) and private entries. The first racing car was made in 1913, three years after the foundation of A.L.F.A., the 40-60HP had 6 liter straight-4 engine. Alfa Romeo quickly gained a good name in motorsport and gave a sporty image to the whole marque.


Symptoms.

Many diseases that cause cerebral atrophy are associated with dementia, seizures, and a group of language disorders called the aphasias. Dementia is characterized by a progressive impairment of memory and intellectual function that is severe enough to interfere with social and work skills. Memory, orientation, abstraction, ability to learn, visual-spatial perception, and higher executive functions such as planning, organizing and sequencing may also be impaired. Seizures can take different forms, appearing as disorientation, strange repetitive movements, loss of consciousness, or convulsions. Aphasias are a group of disorders characterized by disturbances in speaking and understanding language. Receptive aphasia causes impaired comprehension. Expressive aphasia is reflected in odd choices of words, the use of partial phrases, disjointed clauses, and incomplete sentences.

Possible causes.

The pattern and rate of progression of cerebral atrophy depends on the disease involved.

Infections.

Where an infectious agent or the inflammatory reaction to it destroys neurons and their axons, these include...

Diagnosis.

Neurofilament light chain.

Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) is a fluid that is found exclusively in the brain and spinal cord that circulates between sections of the brain offering an extra layer of protection. Studies have shown that biomarkers in the CSF and plasma can be tracked for their presence in different parts of the brain—and their presence can tell us about cerebral atrophy. One study took advantage of biomarkers, namely one called neurofilament light chain (NFL), in patients with Alzheimer’s Disease. Neurofilament light chain is a protein that is important in the growth and branching of neurons—cells found in the brain. In Alzheimer’s Disease, neurons will stop working or die in a process called neurodegeneration. By tracking NFL, researchers can see this neurodegeneration, which this study showed was associated with brain atrophy and later cognitive decline in Alzheimer's patients. Other biomarkers like Ng – a protein important in long-term potentiation and memory – have been tracked for their associations with brain atrophy as well, but NFL had the greatest association.

Measures.

CT and MRI are most commonly used to observe the brain for cerebral atrophy. A CT scan takes cross sectional images of the brain using X-rays, while an MRI uses a magnetic field. With both measures, multiple images can be compared to see if there is a loss in brain volume over time.

Difference from hydrocephalus.

Cerebral atrophy can be hard to distinguish from hydrocephalus because both cerebral atrophy and hydrocephalus involve an increase in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) volume. In cerebral atrophy, this increase in CSF volume comes as a result of the decrease in cortical volume. In hydrocephalus, the increase in volume happens due to the CSF itself.

Treatment and prevention.

Unfortunately, cerebral atrophy is not usually preventable, however there are steps that can be taken to reduce the risks such as controlling your blood pressure, eating a healthy balanced diet including omega-3's and antioxidants, and staying active mentally, physically, and socially.

Reversibility of cerebral atrophy.

While most cerebral atrophy is said to be irreversible there are some recent studies that show this is not always the case. A child who was treated with ACTH originally showed atrophy, but four months after treatment the brain was seemingly normal again.  Chronic alcoholism is known to be associated with cerebral atrophy in addition to motor dysfunction and impairment in higher brain function. Because some of the behavioral deficits have shown improvement after abstinence from alcohol, a study looked to see if cerebral atrophy could be reversed too. Researchers took CT scans of the 8 study participants in order to measure cortical volume over time. Although decrease in atrophy does not equate clinical improvement, the CT scans of 50% of participants showed partial improvement, giving hope that cerebral atrophy could be a reversible process.

Cerebral atrophy is a common feature of many of the diseases that affect the brain. Atrophy of any tissue means a decrement in the size of the cell, which can be due to progressive loss of cytoplasmic proteins. In brain tissue, atrophy describes a loss of neurons and the connections between them. Atrophy can be generalized, which means that all of the brain has shrunk; or it can be focal, affecting only a limited area of the brain and resulting in a decrease of the functions that area of the brain controls. If the cerebral hemispheres (the two lobes of the brain that form the cerebrum) are affected, conscious thought and voluntary processes may be impaired.


Harassing agents.

These are substances that are not intended to kill or injure. They are often referred to as Riot Control Agents (RCAs) and may be used by civilian police forces against criminals and rioters, or in the military for training purposes. These agents also have tactical utility to force combatants out of concealed or covered positions for conventional engagement, and preventing combatants from occupying contaminated terrain or operating weapons. In general, harassing agents are sensory irritants that have fleeting concentration dependent effects that resolve within minutes after removal. Casualty effects are not anticipated to exceed 24-hours nor require medical attention.

Tear agents.

These sensory irritants produce immediate pain to the eyes and irritate mucous membranes (aka "lachrymatory agent" or "lachrymator").

Vomiting agents.

These sensory irritants are also termed sternators or nose irritants. They irritate the mucous membranes to produce congestion, coughing, sneezing, and eventually nausea.

Malodorants.

These are compounds with a very strong and unpleasant smell, which produce powerfully aversive effects without the toxic effects of tear agents or vomiting agents.

Incapacitating agents.

These are substances that produce debilitating effects with limited probability of permanent injury or loss of life. The casualty effects typically last over 24 hours, and though medical evacuation and isolation is recommended, it is not required for complete recovery. These, together with harassing agents, are sometimes called nonlethal agents. There may be as high as 5% fatalities with the use of these agents.

Psychological agents.

These are substances that produce casualty effects through mental disturbances such as delirium or hallucination.

Other incapacitating agents.

These substances have also been investigated as incapacitants, though they operate more through interactions outside the central nervous system.

Lethal agents.

These substances are for producing chemical casualties without regard to long-term consequences or loss of life. They cause injuries that require medical treatment.

Blister agents.

A "blister agent" is a chemical compound that irritates and causes injury to the skin. These substances also attack the eyes, or any other tissue they contact.

Vesicants.

The vesicants are substances that produce large fluid-filled blisters on the skin.

Urticants.

The urticants are substances that produce a painful weal on the skin. These are sometimes termed skin necrotizers and are known as the most painful substances produced.

Blood agents.

These substances are metabolic poisons that interfere with the life-sustaining processes of the blood.

Choking agents.

These substances are sometime referred to as "pulmonary agent" or "lung irritants" and cause injury to the lung-blood barrier resulting in Asphyxia.

Nerve agents.

Nerve agents are substances that disrupt the chemical communications through the nervous system. One mechanism of disruption, utilized by the G, GV, and V series of chemicals is caused by blocking the acetylcholinesterase, an enzyme that normally destroys and stops the activity of acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter. Poisoning by these nerve agents leads to an accumulation of acetylcholine at the nerve axon, producing a perpetual excited state in the nerve (e.g. constant muscle contraction). The eventual exhaustion of muscles leads to respiratory failure and death. A separate class of nerve agents are related to Tetrodotoxin, frequently abbreviated as TTX, is a potent neurotoxin with no known antidote. Tetrodotoxin blocks action potentials in nerves by binding to the voltage-gated, fast sodium channels in nerve cell membranes, essentially preventing any affected nerve cells from firing by blocking the channels used in the process.

G series.

These are high volatility nerve agents that are typically used for a nonpersistent to semipersistent effect.

GV series.

These agents have a volatility between the V and G agents and are typically used for a semi-persistent to persistent effect.

V series.

These agents have low volatility and are typically used for a persistent effect or liquid contact hazard.

T series.

These agents are related to the puffer fish

A "chemical weapon agent (CWA)" is a chemical substance whose toxic properties are used to kill, injure or incapacitate human beings. About 70 different chemicals have been used or stockpiled as chemical weapon agents during the 20th century. These agents may be in liquid, gas or solid form.


History.

The history of Corvera is linked to the history of Avilés, being a natural extension of it proceeding inland.  Several prehistorical settlements have been found in the county. The most interesting are those belonging to the Astures. They left their traces in two "castros" (fortified villages) that have not been excavated yet: Pico Castiello in Molleda and Castiellu in Camina, Solís. These "castros" were most probably used by the Romans, and we have some traces of their presence there, some of them so important as the Estela Antropomorfa de Molleda (human-shaped figure), nowadays can be seen in the Archaeological Museum of Asturias.In the 10th century the villages of the county of Aviles became together to form an only geographical entity known as the "Alfoz de Gauzzone"; but it is not until the year 1120 that we find the first written references to the county of Corvera in the Liber Testamentorum. In the 15th century, Corvera already appears as a county, independent of Aviles.  In the 19th century, the landscape of the area was mainly agricultural. The population centres were villages with a certain prestige in which we can still see palaces and Indiano houses. In the mid 20th century the iron and steel industry starts functioning in Avilés and the old rural centres begin to shelter the thousands of immigrants working for ENSIDESA (current Arcelor modifying the aspect of the county, due to the building of new districts near the factories, such as Tresona and Les Vegues.

Parishes.

The area of Corvera comprises seven parishes (administrative divisions):

Corvera de Asturias (Asturian: "Corvera") is a municipality in the principality of Asturias in northern Spain. It shares a boundary to the north with Avilés and Gozón; to the east with Carreño and Gijón; to the south with Llanera and Illas and to the west with Castrillón. Its capital, Nubledo, has a population of more than 300 residents.


Taxonomy.

The shearwaters form part of the family Procellariidae, a widespread group containing nearly 100 species of medium to large seabirds. They have long, narrow wings and the characteristic “tube nose”. The large genus "Puffinus" includes several species formerly considered to be subspecies of the Manx shearwater, including the yelkouan shearwater, Balearic shearwater, Hutton's shearwater, black-vented shearwater, fluttering shearwater, Townsend's shearwater and the Hawaiian shearwater. Of these, the Hawaiian and possibly Townsend's shearwaters seem to be most closely related to the Manx shearwater.  Three extinct species appear to be closely related to the Manx shearwater, the lava shearwater, the dune shearwater and Scarlett's shearwater. DNA recovered from the lava shearwater of the Canary Islands suggests that it is the Manx shearwater's sister species despite being significantly smaller.  The Manx shearwater was first described by Danish zoologist Morten Thrane Brünnich as "Procellaria puffinus" in 1764. The current scientific name "Puffinus" derives from "puffin" and its variants, such as poffin, pophyn, and puffing, which referred to the cured carcass of the fat nestling of the shearwater, a former delicacy. The original usage dates from at least 1337, but from as early as 1678, the term gradually came to be used for another seabird, the Atlantic puffin. The current English name was first recorded in 1835 and refers to the former nesting of this species on the Isle of Man.

Description.

The Manx shearwater is with a wingspan and weighs. It has the typically "shearing" flight of the genus, dipping from side to side on stiff wings with few wingbeats, the wingtips almost touching the water. This bird looks like a flying cross, with its wings held at right angles to the body, and it changes from black to white as the black upper parts and white under sides are alternately exposed as it travels low over the sea.

Voice.

This shearwater is mainly silent at sea, even when birds are gathered off the breeding colonies. It calls on its nocturnal visits to the nesting burrows in flight, on the ground, and in the burrows, although moonlight depresses the amount of calling. The vocalisations largely consists of a raucous series of croons, howls, and screams, typically in groups of a few syllables, which become weaker and throatier. The male has some clear ringing and shrieking tones absent from the harsher repertoire of the female, the difference being obvious when a pair duets. Females can recognise the voice of their mates, but not of their young. They do not provide postnesting care, and a chick in their burrow is likely their own, so voice identification is not needed.

Vision.

The vision of the Manx shearwater has a number of adaptations to its way of life. Like other tube-nosed seabirds, it has a long, narrow area of visual sensitivity containing the fovea across the retina of the eye. This region is characterised by the presence of ganglion cells that are regularly arrayed and larger than those found in the rest of the retina. This feature helps in the detection of items in a small area projecting below and around the bill. It may assist in the detection of prey near the sea surface as a bird flies low over it.  Since it visits its breeding colony at night, a shearwater has adaptations for nocturnal vision, too. In the shearwater's eyes, the lens does most of the bending of light necessary to produce a focused image on the retina. The cornea, the outer covering of the eye, is relative flat, so of low refractive power. In a diurnal bird like a pigeon, the reverse is true; the cornea is highly curved and is the principal refractive component. The ratio of refraction by the lens to that by the cornea is 1.6 for the shearwater and 0.4 for the pigeon. The shorter focal length of shearwater eyes give them a smaller, but brighter, image than is the case for pigeons. Although the Manx shearwater has adaptations for night vision, the effect is small, and these birds likely also use smell and hearing to locate their nests.

Distribution and habitat.

The Manx shearwater is entirely marine, typically flying within of the sea surface. It nests in burrows on small islands, which it visits only at night. Its nesting colonies are in the north Atlantic Ocean in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, France, the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands, the Azores, Canary Islands, and Madeira. The most important colonies, with a total of more than 300,000 pairs, are on islands off Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Three-quarters of the British and Irish birds breed on just three islands; Skomer, Skokholm, and Rùm. Around 7000–9000 pairs breed in Iceland, with at least 15,000 pairs on the Faeroes. Other populations are of at most a few hundred pairs. The northeast of North America has recently been colonised from Newfoundland and Labrador to Massachusetts; although breeding was first recorded in 1973, populations remain small. Records in the northeast Pacific are increasing, and breeding has been suspected in British Columbia and Alaska.  During the breeding season birds regularly commute between their colony and offshore feeding grounds that can be up to 1,500 km away. For example, adult Manx shearwaters rearing their chick on the west coast of Ireland have been observed to travel all the way to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge to feed when the conditions are right.  The breeding colonies are deserted from July to March, when the birds migrate to the South Atlantic, wintering mainly off Brazil and Argentina, with smaller numbers off southwest South Africa. The journey south can be over, so a 50-year-old bird has probably covered over a million km (600,000 mi) on migration alone. The migration also appears to be quite complex, containing many stopovers and foraging zones throughout the Atlantic Ocean. Ornithologist Chris Mead estimated that a bird ringed in 1957 when aged about 5 years and still breeding on Bardsey Island off Wales in April 2002 had flown over 8 million km (5 million mi) in total during its 50-year life.  Manx shearwaters are able to fly directly back to their burrows when released hundreds of kilometres away, even inland.

Behaviour.

Manx shearwaters are long-lived birds. A Manx shearwater breeding on Copeland Island, Northern Ireland, was as of 2003/04, the oldest known living wild bird in the world: ringed as an adult (at least 5 years old) in July 1953, it was retrapped in July 2003, at least 55 years old.  This is a gregarious species, which can be seen in large numbers from boats or headlands, especially on migration in autumn. It is silent at sea, but at night, the breeding colonies are alive with raucous cackling calls.

Breeding.

Although shearwaters return to the breeding colonies from March onwards, the females often then leave again for 2–3 weeks before egg-laying in early May. Males return to the colonies in which they were hatched, but up to half of females may move elsewhere. The nest is a burrow, often previously excavated by a European rabbit, although shearwaters can dig their own holes. Suitable holes under rocks may also be used. The burrows may be reused in subsequent years.  The single white egg averages and weighs, of which 7% is shell.

Food and feeding.

The Manx shearwater feeds on small fish (herrings, sprats, and sand eels), crustaceans, cephalopods, and surface offal. The bird catches food off the surface or by pursuit diving, and forages alone or in small flocks. It can be attracted by feeding cetaceans, but rarely follows boats or associates with other shearwater species.  Tube-nosed seabirds can detect food items at a distance of several tens of kilometres using their sense of smell to detect offal and compounds such as dimethyl sulfoxide produced when phytoplankton is consumed by krill. They track across the wind until they find a scent and then follow it upwind to its origin.

Rafting.

Manx shearwaters engage in a behaviour termed "rafting", where birds sit, often in large groups of more than 10,000, on the water adjacent to their Skomer Island, breeding colony before and after visiting their chicks. Rafts move closer to the island during the night and further away in the morning which produces a "halo" effect - where no birds are found close to the island during daylight. These day-night cycles of rafting distributions are prominent for Manx shearwaters around Skomer Island and might provide a way of waiting for dusk that reduces predation risk.

Predators and parasites.

Because of their lack of mobility on land, Manx shearwaters are vulnerable to attack by large gulls, such as the great black-backed gull, and great skua. Birds of prey such as the peregrine falcon and golden eagle are also recorded as killing adult birds.  Rats and cats are a serious problem where they are present; the large shearwater colony on the Calf of Man was destroyed by rats that arrived from a shipwreck in the late 18th century. European hedgehogs eat the eggs of nesting seabirds where they have been introduced. Red deer have been recorded killing and eating young shearwaters on at least Foula, Skokholm, and Rùm; on the latter island, 4% of the chicks are killed by deer, and sheep have also been involved. The reason for the carnivorous behaviour is thought to be a need for extra calcium.  Manx shearwaters frequently carry feather lice (Mallophaga) most of which are either the feather-eaters in the groups Ischnocera, or Amblycera, which also consume blood. The most common are the ischnocerans "Halipeurus diversus" and "Trabeculus aviator". The nests of breeding birds frequently contain the shearwater flea; "Ornithopsylla laetitiae" is also commonly present, which shares a common ancestry with North American rabbit fleas. Where their burrows are near those of Atlantic puffins, the tick "Ixodes uriae" is common. The mite "Neotrombicula autumnalis" is often present, and has been implicated in spreading puffinosis. Puffinosis is a viral disease of in which young birds get blisters on their feet, conjunctivitis, and problems with movement. The death rate can reach 70% in infected birds. Internal parasites include the tapeworm "Tetrabothrius cylindricus".

Status.

The European population of the Manx shearwater has been estimated at 350,000–390,000 breeding pairs or 1,050,000–1,700,000 individual birds, and makes up 95% of the world total numbers. Although this species' population now appears to be declining, the decrease is not rapid or large enough to trigger conservation vulnerability criteria. Given its high numbers, this shearwater is therefore classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as being of least concern.  In the north of its range, numbers are stable and the range is expanding, but human activities are affecting populations in the Macaronesian islands in the eastern Atlantic Ocean. These include birds stranded when dazzled by artificial lighting. As with other shearwaters and petrels, newly fledged Manx shearwaters are susceptible to grounding in built-up areas due to artificial light. The moon cycle and strong onshore winds largely influence grounding events in west Scotland, and visibility conditions to a lesser extent. Around 1000–5000 chicks a year are legally taken for food in the Faroes. Introduced mammals are a problem, although populations can recover when rats and cats are removed from islands. Rabbits may try to occupy burrows, but also dig new tunnels.

In culture.

The large chicks of the Manx shearwater are very rich in oil from their fish diet and have been eaten since prehistoric times. They are easily extricated from their burrows, and the annual crop from the Calf of Man may have been as high as 10,000 birds per year in the 17th century. The young birds were also eaten in Ireland, Scotland, and the Scottish islands.  The eerie, nocturnal cries of nesting shearwaters and petrels has led to associations with the supernatural. The breeding colonies at Trollaval on Rùm and Trøllanes and Trøllhøvdi in the Faroe Islands are believed to have acquired their troll associations from the night-time clamour.

The Manx shearwater ("Puffinus puffinus") is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae. The scientific name of this species records a name shift: Manx shearwaters were called Manks puffins in the 17th century. Puffin is an Anglo-Norman word (Middle English "pophyn") for the cured carcasses of nestling shearwaters. The Atlantic puffin acquired the name much later, possibly because of its similar nesting habits.


Biography.

She was born Maria Karoline Flachsland, the daughter of Johann Friedrich Flachsland (1715–1755) and his wife Rosina Catharina Mauritii (1717–1765). Orphaned at a young age, she went to live at the home of her sister Friederike Katharina (1744–1801) in Darmstadt. There, she became a member of the "Darmstadt Circle," which became one of the most important developers of a concept they called "sensitivity." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who soon became her friend, Franz Michael Leuchsenring, Sophie von La Roche, Johann Heinrich Merck and her future husband Johann Gottfried Herder belonged to the group.  Karoline (sometimes spelled Caroline or Carolina) was considered very open-minded, highly educated, and proficient in several languages. Within the Circle, she was called "Psyche." Later, Goethe called her his "sister."  On 2 May 1773, Karoline married Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803) in Darmstadt and took his surname. After the wedding, they moved to Bückeburg where he was named court preacher. In their secluded residence, the couple lived their "happiest" and spiritually fruitful time. There, the young family grew significantly with Gottfried (1774-1806) and August (1776-1838). After moving to Weimar, more children followed, Karl Emil (1779-1857), Luise (1781-1860), and Emil Ernst Gottfried (1783-1855).

Works.

During her marriage, Karoline always took part in her husband's official and literary work and was also an unnamed helper in the creation of many of his works. "No Johann Gottfried Herder without Karoline," poet Johann Gleim boasted of her.  Her identification with her husband's life and work was consistent throughout her life. She worked tirelessly on his reputation not only during his lifetime but also after his death. As secretary and editor of his writings and the author of numerous letters, as well as a biographer and editor of Herder-Werke, Karoline Herder remained one of the female figures in the Weimar circle of Neoclassicists.

Last years.

A year before Johann Gottfried Herder's death in 1802, he was ennobled by the Elector-Prince of Bavaria, and this act permitted him to add the prefix "von" to his last name. At the same time Karoline added it to hers.  Maria Karoline von Herder died in Weimar on 15 September 1809 at 59 years of age and was buried there in the old Jakobsfriedhof (Jacob's cemetery).

Maria Karoline Herder (born 28 January 1750 in Reichenweier, Alsace (then part of Germany), died 15 September 1809 in Weimar) was a German editor who collected and published the works of her famous husband, philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder.


Characteristics.

Figure 8 puffers grow to about long. They are colourful fish, with greenish yellow patterns on their backs. These patterns vary greatly from fish to fish, but the markings either side of the caudal fin resemble the number eight, or eye-spots (earning the species another common name as 'Eye-spot puffer'). Figure 8 puffers are relatively peaceful among Tetraodontidae, and have been kept successfully with other fish such as bumblebee gobies and mollies, but as with all pufferfish there is a risk that tankmates will not be tolerated.  Like all members of its family, the figure 8 puffer is capable of inflating itself with water or air when stressed or otherwise frightened.

In freshwater.

Like the closely related green puffer fish, the figure 8 exhibits euryhalinity, and undergoes epithelial remodeling and changes in the kidneys and gills when exposed to changes in salinity. Accordingly, the figure 8 puffer is often mistakenly regarded as an entirely freshwater fish, and has considerable resistance to freshwater exposure. In a marine environment, it exhibits typical saltwater fish morphological features in its gills, allowing it to secrete sodium chloride across the gill epithelium like a typical saltwater fish. However, acclimated to freshwater, the figure 8 puffer will exhibit specialized cells that do not match any gill ion-regulating cell of a freshwater fish. The other fish known to have these types of cells is the Mozambique tilapia ("O. mossambicus"), but this is a saltwater fish.

In the aquarium.

In captivity, figure 8 puffers require a 15 US gallon tank with temperatures between 24 °C and 28 °C. They are sensitive to nitrites and nitrates and must be introduced into a fully cycled aquarium. Over-filtration is recommended as well as frequent partial water changes. Water pH will reflect the brackish environment to which these fish are best suited; the addition of marine salt will buffer the pH to a range between 7.8 and 8.3. With a salinity of between 1.005 and 1.008 specific gravity (S.G.), the lifespan of this species has been as long as 15 years. As with all puffer fish, they require a complex aquarium set up consisting of many nooks and crannies. This helps figure 8 puffers to behave as they would in nature, and reduce boredom.

Diet.

Pufferfish are classed as molluscivores and feed mainly on benthic organisms which may include mussels, cockles, oysters and krill, though some puffers will take other foods, such as flake, it is not recommended that their primary food is flake. Their teeth, a beak formed from two plates, are capable of crushing shells in order to feed on prey. In captivity many fishkeepers feed snails as a substitute for the aforementioned foods as snails help keep the beak trim; it would otherwise be susceptible to overgrowth.

Bibliography.

Ebert, K. (2001), "The Puffers of Fresh and Brackish Water", p 19. Aqualog,.

Dichotomyctere ocellatus (syn. "Tetraodon biocellatus"), commonly the figure 8 puffer or eyespot puffer, is a pufferfish found in freshwater in Southeast Asia. It is known from the lower reaches of the Mekong (Cambodia), the Peninsular Malaysia as well as Borneo (Sarawak, Kalimantan).


Background.

In June 2002, No Angels released their second album, "Now... Us!", which received critical acclaim from many critics who believed the band would not last past their first album. Another major commercial success for the group, it debuted at number one on the German Album Chart. Following an exclusive swing concert at the Berlin Tränenpalast in October, No Angels soon followed with a swing album, titled "When the Angels Swing", featuring their biggest hits and selected songs from their first two albums, re-arranged by Grammy Award-nominated jazz musician Till Brönner. Critically acclaimed by critics, the album reached number nine of the German Albums Chart, eventually going gold. In November, the girls embarked on their second national concert tour, the "Four Seasons Tour", playing sell-out shows in theatres across German-speaking Europe.  After Jessica Wahls' pregnancy break from the group and the end of the tour, the remaining four members of the No Angels began intensifying work on their then-untitled third studio album. Encouraged to exercise more self-control on the longplayer, the band took over responsibility in composing, recording and selecting songs to guarantee a more personal theme on the album — a step that challenged criticism and growing scepticism among the band's label Cheyenne Records and recording company Polydor. "We selected song for us, which are best pop music, sort absolutely well with us, and represent at best what we want to talk about," band member Sandy Mölling said in an interview during the album's release. Impressed by the intensity of the musical output, the group settled on the album title "Pure". "The music is very, very pure, [...] there's nothing we had to dissemble for, the album shows who we really are [musically]."

Recording and production.

Recording of all vocals on "Pure" took place at the Department-2-Studios in Frankfurt am Main. Unlike with previous sessions, the remaining four band members did not record together. Instead, each member would record on her own in the studio, while vocal mixing was provided by engineers. Vocal production was supervised by frequent collaborator Nik Hafemann, with Nadja Benaissa and Vanessa Petruo contributing to the arrangement of the vocal harmonies. Petruo als penned opening track "Sister", another collaboration with songwriter Alex Geringas and producer Thorsten Brötzmann, both of who had co-written their number-one hit "Something About Us" (2001). The strings-led mid-tempo song chronicles Petruo's fallout with her father, actor Thomas Petruo, and their subsequent reconciliation. Kids voices were provided by Brötzmann's daughters Sina and Lisa-Maria.  Brötzmann produced another five songs on "Pure", including the uplifting latin-flavored mid tempo song "Someday" and the melancholic latin ballad "Angel of Mine" both of which were compared to their 2002 single "Still in Love with You". He also contributed to the up tempo song "So What" and Petruo's solo song "Ten Degrees" as well as an acoustic version of Dutch musician Robbie van Leeuwen's 1969 song "Venus". The band reportedly disliked their Bananarama-influenced original rendition of the song which they had recorded as testimonials for Gillette's "Venus" division of razors for women in early 2003. Production on "Eleven Out of Ten", a cover version of the same-titled 2003 song by Swedish girl group Play, was helmed by Tobias Lundgren, while its songwriters, Swedish production duo Twin, provided production on the beat-driven "Feelgood Lies".  Further six tracks were produced by Peter Ries, another longtime contributor of the band, including the electronic ballad "New Beginning" and the warm acoustic ballad "Washes Over Me". His production on "You Lied" was compared to the synth sounds of British electronic musician William Orbit with whom Cheyenne Records had been in negotiations for a possible collaboration on the song, but plans fell through. "Forever Yours" incorporates slight elements of Arabic music, while "Takes a Woman to Know" combines strings and keyboard arrangements with Italian folk music. Ries also produced, "Soft Place to Fall", Benaissa's solo song, who rejected a self-written but "dramatic and melancholic" composition in favor of his track, as well as Diakovka's solo song, the rock pop-heavy "Confession". Production on another rock pop song, lead single "No Angel (It's All in Your Mind)", was overseen by Perky Park and Hafemann.

Critical reception.

"Pure" was released to generally mixed reviews from music critics, many of whom praised the slower songs on the album but found the rest of the material too generic. "Musikwoche" remarked that the strength of the album was its ballads and cited songs such as "New Beginnig", "Washes Over Me" as well as the band's rendition of "Venus" as the "quiet, rousing highlights" of the album. The Media magazine concluded: "The third studio album of the No Angels is not as 'pure' as the title might suggest. But it is a successful proof of their heavenly vocal power." Marie-Louise Leinhos from Berlin women's magazine "Aviva" felt that "the album is an imaginative work with varied songs [that] is also experimental and open to new influences." She called "Pure" “another solid continuation” to their discography as well as a "classically crafted pop album with danceable parts."  Matthias Reichel from online magazine CDStarts criticized the album for its "overbalancing status of filling material" and rated the album three stars ouf of ten. He commented: "In principle, everything on "Pure" is unchanged: A few 'highlights' are flanked by soulless mass products that are on b-side level at best." However, Reichel felt that single releases such as "Someday", "No Angel (It’s All in Your Mind)" and "Feelgood Lies" as well as "Forever Yours" and "New Beginning" confirmed the songwriters' skills for catchy, radio-friendly tunes. Similarly, laut.de editor Vicky Butscher found that "Pure" was less of a personal album instead of a collection of "typical boy or girl group repertoire". She rated the album two out of five stars and remarked that the album was drawing inspiration from Madonna's 1998 studio album "Ray of Light", particularly on "You Lied", as well as British female groups such as All Saints and the Sugababes. Satisfied with later half of the album though, she concluded: "The best thing would be for the No Angels to focus on ballads in the future. Anyone who listens to "New Beginning" or "Washes Over Me" knows why. Also, the re-arranged "Venus" is much more beautiful, than the pop jingle."

Chart performance.

Released on August 25, 2003, "Pure" debuted at number one in the German Albums Chart in the week of September 8, 2003. It marked the band's third consecutive studio album to reach the top position on this particular chart. Due to the announcement of their disbandment two weeks after its release, promotional efforts for No Angels soon shifted to their first compilation "The Best of No Angels" (2003) after the release of "Pure"s third single "Feelgood Lies" in late September 2003. "Pure", however, fell out of the top ten in its sixth week of release but remained on the chart until late December 2003. While not as commercially successful as its predecessors "Elle'ments" (2001) and "Now... Us!" (2002), both of which had been promoted significantly longer and spawned several reissues and special editions, it was eventually awarded a gold certification by the Bundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI) for selling more than 100,000 copies. In Germany, "Pure" ranked fifty-second on the national year-end chart.  In Austria, "Pure" became No Angels's third consecutive studio album to reach the top two of the Australian Albums Chart. Upon its debut week, it was blocked from the top spot by "Dead Letters" (2003), the fifth album by Finnish rock band The Rasmus. While "Pure" failed to place on the national year end chart and was left uncertified, it spent twelve weeks on the chart. In Switzerland, the album became the group's third top ten album. The second highest new entry of the week after American R&B singer Mary J. Blige's album "Love & Life" (2003), it debuted at number nine on the Swiss Albums Chart. While none of "Pure"s singles managed to reach the top twenty of the Swiss Singles Chart, the album would spend one week within the top ten and remain another eight weeks on the chart.  Since the album's promotion ended in September 2003, "Pure" produced three singles only. Lead single "No Angel (It's All in Your Mind)", the No Angels's first release without Wahls, became the band's fourth number-one hit on the German Singles Chart. It also placed tenth in Austria, where it would become the band's seventh and final top entry on the Austrian Singles Chart. Follow-up "Someday" became the band the band's seventh top ten hit in Germany and while it peaked at number five, it would become the album's lowest-charting single. While "Eleven out of Ten" was originally announced as the album's third single, it was eventually replaced by "Feelgood Lies". A top three hit in Germany and the album's only top thirty entry in Switzerland, it became the album's highest-charting single.

Pure is the third studio album by all-female German pop group No Angels. It was released by Polydor and Cheyenne Records on August 25, 2003 in German-speaking Europe. Conceived after the departure of original member Jessica Wahls, the project marked the No Angels's first studio release as a quartet and their final album before their temporary disbandment in fall 2003. The remaining four members reteamed with frequent collaborators Thorsten Brötzmann and Peter Ries to work on the majority of the album, with additional songwriting and production contribution from Tobias Lundgren, Perky Park, Nigel Rush, Stephan Ullman, and duo Twin.