Major declines in insect biomass and diversity, reviewed here, have become obvious and well documented since the end of World War II. Here, we conclude that the spread and intensification of ...agriculture during the past half century is directly related to these losses. In addition, many areas, including tropical mountains, are suffering serious losses because of climate change as well. Crops currently occupy about 11% of the world's land surface, with active grazing taking place over an additional 30%. The industrialization of agriculture during the second half of the 20th century involved farming on greatly expanded scales, monoculturing, the application of increasing amounts of pesticides and fertilizers, and the elimination of interspersed hedgerows and other wildlife habitat fragments, all practices that are destructive to insect and other biodiversity in and near the fields. Some of the insects that we are destroying, including pollinators and predators of crop pests, are directly beneficial to the crops. In the tropics generally, natural vegetation is being destroyed rapidly and often replaced with export crops such as oil palm and soybeans. To mitigate the effects of the Sixth Mass Extinction event that we have caused and are experiencing now, the following will be necessary: a stable (and almost certainly lower) human population, sustainable levels of consumption, and social justice that empowers the less wealthy people and nations of the world, where the vast majority of us live, will be necessary.
How did the later medieval kings of Scotland manipulate their power and alliances after the Wars of Independence?
Power and Propagandais a thematic reflection on the political history of late ...medieval Scotland, that considers the ways in which power was expressed and renegotiated during a crucial period in the kingdom's history. It deals with themes including the nature of the power enjoyed by kings, how that power was maintained and how it was deployed; the interpersonal relations and struggles between kings and the elites within their kingdoms; and, the structures of governance through which power operated and was felt down to a local level.
Late medieval Scotland is especially fertile ground for an examination of all of these themes as two new dynasties - the Bruces and the Stewarts - were faced with the challenge of establishing their own legitimacy and authority.
Key FeaturesAn introduction to a period in history dominated by national identity and independence from English sovereigntyExpert assessment of the period arranged in thematic chaptersGives fresh insights into the period that draw on a wide range of sourcesExtensive further reading lists
La costumbre de coleccionar objetos se remonta a las épocas más antiguas de la humanidad. Sin embargo, el origen de los museos occidentales se suele ver en el stu-diolo de las bibliotecas humanistas ...de la Italia del siglo XV. Más tarde, el studiolo se transformaría en los "gabinetes" que llegaron a América, estando, algunos de ellos, dentro de las bibliotecas virreinales. Similares a los gabinetes europeos, más no iguales, los gabinetes novohispanos tuvieron sus singularidades regionales al estar expuestas, dentro de ellos, las antigüedades mexicanas en lugar de las grecorromanas que se acostumbraba coleccionar en el Viejo Mundo.
It is a little known fact that as early as the thirteenth century, Europe's political and religious powers tried to physically mark and distinguish the Jews from the rest of society. During the ...Renaissance, Italian Jews first had to wear a yellow round badge on their chest, and then later, a yellow beret. The discriminatory marks were a widespread phenomenon with serious consequences for Jewish communities and their relations with Christians. Beginning with a sartorial study - how the Jews were marked on their clothing and what these marks meant - the book offers an in-depth analysis of anti-Jewish discrimination across three Italian city-states: Milan, Genoa, and Piedmont. Moving beyond Italy, it also examines the place of Jews and Jewry law in the increasingly interconnected world of Early Modern European politics.
This contribution examines a heretofore unknown list of books that survived in a manuscript in the National Library of the Czech Republic, with the shelfmark V C 11. The list includes books that were ...probably owned by the Prague burgher Dorota the soap-boiler, which she laterbequeathed to the Lauda College of the Prague University. Besides presenting the content of the manuscripts named in the list, it also examines the owner’s property and social relationships. This analysis provides insight into the little-understood relationships between the urban Utraquist elite, Prague’s clerics, and the Prague University.
The study describes and comparatively evaluates the activities of the Litomyšl bishopric (the bishop and chapters) in exile after the Hussites took Litomyšl in 1421. The administration of the diocese ...was never re-established, nor was the secularised ecclesiastic property returned. This study analysis the economic foundations and the clerical activities of these exiled Premonstratensians, uncovering their tie to other monastic houses from the same order in Bohemia and mainly Moravia, and comparing their situation to the Prague and Olomouc bishopric chapters. These analyses demonstrate a clear similarity between the fates of the Litomyšl chapter and those of many other uprooted monasteries. The Litomyšl canons worked to preserve the memory of the effectively-uprooted bishopric over the rest of the 15th century by maintaining the office of administrator. In light of the post-Hussite events, this office was more of a formality, as the acual materials were vacated in light of the disintegration of ecclesiastic administration on the territory of the Litomyšl dioceses. The study is complemented by the edition of several heretofore unpublished documents.
Cannabis sativa L. (C. sativa) is an annual dioecious plant, which shares its origins with the inception of the first agricultural human societies in Asia. Over the course of time different parts of ...the plant have been utilized for therapeutic and recreational purposes, for instance, extraction of healing oils from seed, or the use of inflorescences for their psychoactive effects. The key psychoactive constituent in C. sativa is called Δ-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (D9-THC). The endocannabinoid system seems to be phylogenetically ancient, as it was present in the most primitive vertebrates with a neuronal network. N-arachidonoylethanolamine (AEA) and 2-arachidonoyl glycerol (2-AG) are the main endocannabinoids ligands present in the animal kingdom, and the main endocannabinoid receptors are cannabinoid type-1 (CB1) receptor and cannabinoid type-2 (CB2) receptor.
The review aims to provide a critical and comprehensive evaluation, from the ancient times to our days, of the ethnological, botanical, chemical and pharmacological aspects of C. sativa, with a vision for promoting further pharmaceutical research to explore its complete potential as a therapeutic agent.
This study was performed by reviewing in extensive details the studies on historical significance and ethnopharmacological applications of C. sativa by using international scientific databases, books, Master’s and Ph.D. dissertations and government reports. In addition, we also try to gather relevant information from large regional as well as global unpublished resources. In addition, the plant taxonomy was validated using certified databases such as Medicinal Plant Names Services (MPNS) and The Plant List.
A detailed comparative analysis of the available resources for C. sativa confirmed its origin and traditional spiritual, household and therapeutic uses and most importantly its popularity as a recreational drug. The result of several studies suggested a deeper involvement of phytocannabinoids (the key compounds in C. sativa) in several others central and peripheral pathophysiological mechanisms such as food intake, inflammation, pain, colitis, sleep disorders, neurological and psychiatric illness. However, despite their numerous medicinal benefits, they are still considered as a menace to the society and banned throughout the world, except for few countries. We believe that this review will help lay the foundation for promoting exhaustive pharmacological and pharmaceutical studies in order to better understand the clinical relevance and applications of non-psychoactive cannabinoids in the prevention and treatment of life-threatening diseases and help to improve the legal status of C. sativa.
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To read accounts of late medieval banquets is to enter a fantastical world where live lions guard nude statues, gilded stags burst into song, and musicians play from within pies. We can almost hear ...the clock sound from within a glass castle, taste the fire-breathing roast boar, and smell the rose water cascading in a miniature fountain. Such vivid works of art and performance required collaboration among artists in many fields, as well as the participation of the audience. A Feast for the Eyes is the first book- length study of the court banquets of northwestern Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Christina Normore draws on an array of artworks, archival documents, chroniclers' accounts, and cookbooks to re-create these events and reassess the late medieval visual culture in which banquets were staged. Feast participants, she shows, developed sophisticated ways of appreciating artistic skill and attending to their own processes of perception, thereby forging a court culture that delighted in the exercise of fine aesthetic judgment.Challenging modern assumptions about the nature of artistic production and reception, A Feast for the Eyes yields fresh insight into the long history of multimedia work and the complex relationships between spectacle and spectators.
In the fifteenth century, there were two different Iskender Bey serving in Rumelia. These two historically important figures, serving in the same century and in the same geography, often caused ...confusion. The main aim of this article is to discuss Iskender Pasha, the servant of Mehmed II and explain his activities in the fifteenth century Rumelia. Iskender Pasha was appointed by Mehmet II. as the Bey of Bosnia Sanjak in 1475. He served in this position until the end of the reign of Mehmed II. and continued his successful raids during the reign of Bayezid II. who appointed him as the Gavernor of Rumelia in 1483. After serving in this position for two years, he was appointed back as the bey of Bosnia sanjak in 1485. The appointment of Iskender Pasha multiple times as the bey of Bosnia sanjak is closely related to his successful raids as well as his knowledge of the region. He was promoted to the rank of vizier by Bayezid II. in 1489 and served in this position for ten years. Towards the end of his life, with the starting of the Ottoman-Venetian Wars, Bayezid II, with the aim of benefiting from his experience, reassigned him once again as the bey of Bosnia sanjak. Iskender Pasha continued his military and administrative activities until the last years of his life and died in 1505. Iskender Pasha is also famous for the intelligence network that he has established. In this context, he gathered information through his spies about the operations of various states in the Italian Peninsula. Through this he tried to change the balance of power in the region in favor of the Ottoman Empire. This study discusses the historical personality of Iskender Pasha and his activities in Rumelia in the light of the documents from the Ottoman archives, chronicles and copyright-review works.
The attempt to poison George Branković during the siege of Selymbria in 1411 provides an opportunity to examine the knowledge about poisons and poisoning in medieval Serbia. The research includes ...few, but diverse sources of genre-determined data. Sources of secular and ecclesiastical legislation have been considered, as well as records from chronicles, annals and histories regarding individual events, both real and legendary. However, the most significant source is the treatise on poisons from the Hilandar Medical Codex, which is a translation of Avicenna’s text on poisons from his Canon of Medicine. By analyzing the data from the surviving sources, we can reconsider the description of George’s poisoning in Constantine’s The Life of Despot Stefan in a broader social context and indicate the imprecise interpretation of the description in modern historiography.
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