where did the chinese settled in trinidad and tobago

Chinese-Trinidadian and Tobagonian (sometimes Sino-Trinidadian and Tobagonian or Chinese Trinbagonian) are Trinidadians and Tobagonians of Chinese ancestry. The group includes people from China, Hong Kong and Overseas Chinese who have immigrated to Trinidad and Tobago and their descendants, including those who have emigrated to other countries (especially the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, but also to other countries including China). The term is usually applied both to people of mixed and unmixed Chinese ancestry, although the former usually appear as mixed race in census figures. Chinese settlement began in 1806. Between 1853 and 1866 2,645 Chinese immigrants arrived in Trinidad as indentured labour for the sugar and cacao plantations. Immigration peaked in the first half of the twentieth century, but was sharply curtailed after the Chinese Revolution in 1949. After peaking at 8,361 in 1960, the (unmixed) Chinese population in Trinidad declined to 3,800 in 2000.

Chinese Trinidadian and Tobagonian

The Chinese Trinidadian and Tobagonian community is a diverse mixture that includes first-generation immigrants from China, Trinidadians whose ancestors have lived in Trinidad for many generations, and diasporan Trinidadians and Tobagonians, who have primarily settled in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. The Chinese Trinidadian community includes people of unmixed and mixed Chinese ancestry, although the latter usually appear as mixed race in census figures in Trinidad and Tobago.[1] Most Trinidadian Chinese originate from Guangdong province, especially among the Hakka people and Cantonese people.[2] The Cantonese-speaking Han Chinese of Trinidad and Tobago, numbering 5500[3]

The Chinese community in Trinidad and Tobago traces its origin to the 12 October 1806 arrival of the ship Fortitude carrying a group of Chinese men recruited in Macau, Penang and Calcutta.[2] This was the first organised settlement of Chinese people in the Caribbean, preceding the importation of Chinese indentured labour by over 40 years.[4] It was intended to be the first step in a plan to establish a settlement of free labourers and peasant farmers in what was then a newly acquired British colony.[1] Royal Navy Captain William Layman suggested that it would be cheaper to establish new sugar plantations using free Chinese labour than it would with African slaves. At the same time, British officials concerned in the aftermath of the Haitian Revolution suggested that the settlement of Chinese immigrants in Trinidad would provide a buffer between the enslaved Africans and the whites.[2]

In December 1805, a Portuguese captain recruited 141 Chinese men in Macau and shipped them to Penang where six more men were recruited. Another 53 men were recruited in Calcutta, bringing the total to 200. The survivors of this group arrived in Trinidad eight months later.[1] Kim Johnson reports that 194 men survived the journey,[1] while Walton Look Lai reports that there were 192 men.[2] The group settled at Surveillance Estate in Cocorite, on the western edge of Port of Spain, the capital. Given the lack of farmland near the city, the group requested permission to hire themselves out as labourers. Fifteen were hired to work as seine fishers, and one worked as a shoemaker. After one year in Trinidad, 17 of the migrants had died. Sixty-one of them departed with the Fortitude in July 1807. By 1810 only 22 of them remained in Trinidad, and only seven remained in 1834, the last time that the community was mentioned.[1]

The abolition of slavery in the British Empire led to labour shortages in Trinidad. Indentured labourers were imported from various parts of the world including India and Madeira. Between 1853 and 1866 2,645 Chinese immigrants arrived in Trinidad – 2,336 men, 309 women and 4 children – on eight ships. These immigrants constituted the second wave of Chinese immigration to Trinidad.[1] The third wave began after the Chinese revolution in 1911 and continued until the Chinese Revolution of 1949. Most of these immigrants were brought to Trinidad and Tobago through the efforts of earlier immigrants. The fourth wave of immigration began in the late 1970s and continues.[5]

Additional immigrants settled in Trinidad after initially migrating to other parts of the Caribbean, especially British Guiana which received 13,593 indentured immigrants from China between 1853 and 1884.[1]


who plays the clairvoyant in agents of shield

John Garrett appears in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. portrayed by Bill Paxton. He is a high-level S.H.I.E.L.D. agent/munitions expert who is a former cohort of Phil Coulson and works alongside Grant Ward and Melinda May.[32][33] He is revealed to be a high-ranking member of Hydra (known as "The Clairvoyant") and the mastermind behind Project Centipede in the episode "Turn, Turn, Turn".[34] He is also the first test subject of the Deathlok program. In the episode "Beginning of the End", Garrett engaged Coulson in battle who was later assisted by Nick Fury. Thanks to Skye helping to regain control of Mike Peterson, Garrett was badly defeated by Peterson but evades arrest and upgrades himself, however, is then killed by Coulson using the 0-8-4 weapon.[35]

John Garrett (comics)

John Garrett is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

John Garrett first appeared in Elektra: Assassin #2 and was created by Frank Miller and Bill Sienkiewicz.

John Garrett worked for the CIA and went through special covert training.[1] In 1961, Leonardo da Vinci invited Garrett to the Pieta base in Rome to become a member of the Great Wheel. Leornardo sent Garrett, Vasili Dassiev, Shoji Soma, and Daniel Whitehall to Giza to acquire a power source from a Brood vessel after destroying the Brood inside. Garrett approved the idea of using the power source to run the rejuvenations chambers found by another team. He was present when the chambers were stolen by Russian soldiers led by Victor Uvarov and Dassiev where they nearly murdered him.[2]

Garrett served three months at Dannemora for assault. Then he served two years in Ryker's Island for larceny. Garrett had a history of resisting arrest. After assaulting a police officer in Kentucky, Garrett was sentenced to six months in a prison farm. After his times in each prison, Garrett was recruited to work for S.H.I.E.L.D. where his criminal records mysteriously vanished. He served in Libya with agent Chasity McBride. When Chasity discovered that there were no records of Garrett, this gets brought with ExTechOp where Chasity was swiftly transferred to a minor police action in Venezuela and the complaint to Nick Fury wasn't received.[3]

Garrett has been rebuilt as a cyborg with a six-inch removable portion on his skull (which a recorder can be placed in) and a cybernetic right hand.[4] Three years after the Libya mission, Garrett and his partner Arthur Perry were sent to San Concepcion as part of "Operation: Scrambled Eggs" where they had to investigate the assassination of President Carlos Huevos. Garrett and Arthur interrogated Julio Gonzales confessing to hiring a woman to assassinate Huevos. Then they interrogated a political prisoner who told them about Elektra. During the research on Elektra, Garrett became a victim of a psychic link with Electra where he began to be influenced and manipulated. During Garrett's confrontation with Elektra where Perry was slain, Elektra cut off his hand and blew up the munitions shipments in the harbor building they were in. Garrett's body was recovered by ExTechOp where they began replacing 80% of his body with cybernetics as the S.H.I.E.L.D. engineers successfully replaced Garrett's arms, legs, spine, nervous system, heart, liver, and lungs. During this time, Elektra slipped in and stole the recorder implant from Garrett's skull. Hours later, Elektra raided S.H.I.E.L.D.'s information bank and was apprehended by the S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents. After being reactivated, Garrett filed his report on Elektra where he suspects that Elektra's a Russian agent. This report was not believed and Garrett was reprimanded by his superior Dr. Harold Beaker. Later that night, Elektra sunk her psychic claws into Garrett in order to get out of the chamber that she's being kept inert in. As Garrett worked to fight Elektra's control, Elektra got him to shut down the power to her chamber. After Elektra escaped, Garrett made a false report to cover up his involvement in the escape. Garrett then recalled that Elektra was going after Ambassador Reich (who at the time was possessed by the Beast of the Hand). After Elektra sent Garrett on a wild goose chase, Reich transferred the Beast of the Hand into the USA's presidential candidate Ken Wind. When Garrett prepared to return to the United States, Elektra stole his plane ticket and framed him so that the airport security would discover a bag of drugs during a body cavity search.[5]

Upon returning to the United States, Garrett was subjected to rigorous testing before being brought before Fury. Fury told Garrett that his reports are unlikely and has him redo them or find a way to back his outrageous claims. Garrett was sent to offer his protection to Wind. Due to his previous interactions with Elektra, he was able to detect the Beast of the Hand within Wind. When the Hand trapped Elektra's mind in the body of a young girl named Sandy and planned to dispose of, Garrett came to Elektra's rescue where he fought off his fellow S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents Honda and Minelli at the cost of the Hand framing him for the deaths of Honda and Minelli.[6]

Garrett and Elektra fought off the assassins of the Hand and then were confronted by S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents led by Chasity as he tried to warn them that Wind is possessed by the Beast of the Hand. Chasity knocked out Garrett only for Elektra to forcefully enable Garrett to regain his consciousness. Due to Elektra's hallucination tricks, Garrett thought he shot Elektra to free himself only for him to actually shoot McBride. The other S.H.I.E.L.D Agents present were also affected and ended up bringing Garrett and Elektra to a S.H.I.E.L.D. base for treatment. Garrett finally stopped resisting and states that he was Elektra's.[7]

Garrett and Elektra recovered and prepared for their assault on Wind.[3]

While Elektra communed with the Beast of the Hand, Garrett was nearby as they learned that the Beast of the Hand would orchestrate the annihilation of the human race by launching nuclear missile attacks. At a rally held by Wind, Garrett posed as an ice cream vendor as Elektra hid in the shadows waiting for the chance to assassinate Wind.[8]

Garrett's cyborg systems were identified by McBride leading a group of S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents to converge on him. Elektra took out the S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents as a bunch of Hand assassins attacked. Garrett pulled out a rocket launcher from the ice cream stand a fired at Wind only for the shot to be deflected when Chasity shot him in the shoulder. As a result, Wind was placed in an escape module and was airlifted out as Garrett and Elektra had snagged the helicopter. Garrett and Elektra were then assaulted by the rebuilt and Hand-controlled Perry and Chuck the Dwarf who impaled Garrett with a spear. Garrett hurdled a bunch of grenades at the helicopter that Wind was in which caused it to crash into the Lincoln Memorial enough to strike Perry. Emerging from the wreckage, Garrett charged toward Wind only to end up fighting Perry who dismantled Garrett. Elektra managed to destroy Arthur and drive away the Beast of the Wind. It appeared that Elektra transferred Garrett's mind into Wind's body as he becomes the President of the United States.[9] What Garrett didn't know is that he was actually hypnotized by Elektra when he was really in dismantled form when held in a stasis tube in a S.H.I.E.L.D. facility.[10] Trapped in the delusion caused by Elektra, Garrett believed that he was meeting a Russian leader.[9]

Garrett was still in storage while still believing that he is the President.[10]

Agents from the Snakeroot raided the S.H.I.E.L.D. facility as Tekagi broke Garrett out of his stasis tube during their escape.[11] At the Snakeroot's stronghold, Tekagi revealed that a part of Elektra is in Garrett where it was merged with him on the plane of the mind. Tekagi drew the dark essence out of Garrett and placed into the mind of a new warrior of the Snakeroot as the shadow warriors initiated the process.[12] As the Snakeroot continued the process of transferring the dark essence into a female corpse that was reanimated as Erynys, the technicians present worked on rebuilding Garrett.[13] The rebuilt Garrett and Erynys stood before the Snakeroot where Garrett insulted Eddie Pasim (who was involved with the About Face Virus which the Hand seeks to make the presence of Erynys permanent) until Erynys commanded him to be quiet.[14] Garrett and Erynys are sent to attack Daredevil and Chaste member Stone as Garrett continued to confuse Erynys with Elektra. When the real Elektra showed up, it caused pain in both Garrett and Erynys where Garrett followed Erynys' orders to flee.[15] Garrett and Erynys accompanied the Snakeroot and the Hand into forcing Eddie Pasim to relocate the missing sample of the About Face Virus. Garrett defended Erynys when she was criticized for her failure to kill Daredevil. During the Snakeroot's fight with Daredevil and Elektra over the sample of the About Face Virus, Garrett was still confused over Elektra and Erynys. After Erynys was killed by Daredevil enabling the dark essence to possess Elektra again, Garrett was apprehended by S.H.I.E.L.D. and placed in S.H.I.E.L.D. Detention Cell #7[16] On the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, Fury questioned Garrett about what happened.[16]

Fury reactivated Garrett's status as a S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent and had the cyber-warrior Siege keep an eye on him.[17]

When Garrett attempted for unemployment, he left past employment empty and was thrown out when they thought he was lying about working as a S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent.[18] Garrett then visited Karen Page's apartment where he used his optic lasers to kill the cockroaches as part of demonstrating his credentials to her.[19]

Following the Civil War storyline, Tony Stark considered Garrett a potential recruit for the Fifty State Initiative.[20]

During the Dark Reign storyline, Garrett was listed as an unaffiliated S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s agent files.[21] Garrett had stopped drinking and had moved to Toronto where he opened Natchios' Total Car Pit where he worked under the supervision of another former S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent. Garrett was later visited by Fury who called him out of retirement.[22] Garrett went with Fury to Alexandria, Virginia where they had coffee. During this time, Fury showed Garrett a file of former S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Seth Waters who is now working for the Department of Treasury with his suspicions that he is a double agent. Garrett is sent by Fury to find Seth Waters to see if he is working for HYDRA or someone else.[23] Garrett went to the Department of Treasury to talk to Seth Waters who was surprised that he didn't set off the metal detectors. He told Garrett was he knows.[1] Garrett flew Fury to Avengers Tower in one of the flying cars where Fury had told Norman Osborn that Seth Waters was a national security issue resulting in his capture at the hands of H.A.M.M.E.R. As Bullseye interrogated Garrett and Seth Waters, Fury sniped Seth Waters after he mentioned that he was working for Leviathan. Garrett and Fury then escaped while evading the H.A.M.M.E.R. Agents. Fury and Garrett then traveled to Rome to the Pieta base where they logged into the systems to find out what they know about Leviathan and the Great Wheel.[24]

At the Pieta base, Fury discussed with Dum Dum Dugan, Garrett, and the Professor to discuss their next action against HYDRA and Leviathan. Garrett told Fury not to hesitate because now was not the time to end HYDRA and Leviathan.[25] Garrett traveled to Sudan where he met with former Howling Commandos Steve Rogers, Sharon Carter and Fury at Fury's Sandbox for one last party together.[26] Garrett then listened to the Howling Commandos members' stories and had a good laugh.[27] Garrett then participate in a toast to the fallen members of the Howling Commandos.[28]

Garrett visited Sebastian Druid at his apartment in Hawaii to tell him that there is no out of the Secret Warriors. Garrett got Sebastian Druid into good shape and was allowed to prove himself in the field. He took Sebastian to China to use magic to make two destroyed Helicarriers from a recent battle with HYDRA disappear and then sped up their corrosion. Although he was impressed, Garrett wanted to know if Sebastian Druid was working under the pressure. Then he took Sebastian Druid to Leviathan's Ursa Major base where he created a magic bullet that Garrett used to kill Leviathan's leader Magadane as the magical component of the bullet was sprayed on HYDRA's sign in order sow dissension between HYDRA and Leviathan. At Fury's Excalibur base, Garrett told Sebastian Druid that Hellfire and Phobos died in battle with Daisy Johnson stating Fury's suspicions that Hellfire was a traitor all along. After Fury told him that the Secret Warriors would be broken up, Garrett congratulated Sebastian Druid for his hard work.[29]

Garrett was with Fury when they rode a limo to pick up Dum Dum Dugan and Jasper Sitwell at the UN White Box Facility. Shortly after that, Garrett rejoined the ranks of S.H.I.E.L.D. under Daisy Johnson's leadership.[30]

During the Avengers: Standoff! storyline, Garrett was present during the attack on A.I.M. Island to reclaim Rick Jones from the New Avengers. He served as Songbird's supervisor.[31]

John Garrett was a trained S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. He is a skilled marksman.


how many points are on the star of a standard chinese checkers game board

In "hop across", the most popular variation, each player starts with their colored pieces on one of the six points or corners of the star and attempts to race them all home into the opposite corner. Players take turns moving a single piece, either by moving one step in any direction to an adjacent empty space, or by jumping in one or any number of available consecutive hops over other single pieces. A player may not combine hopping with a single-step move – a move consists of one or the other. There is no capturing in Chinese Checkers, so hopped pieces remain active and in play. Turns proceed clockwise around the board.[4]

Chinese checkers

Chinese checkers (US and Canadian spelling) or Chinese chequers (UK spelling)[1] is a strategy board game of German origin (named "Sternhalma") which can be played by two, three, four, or six people, playing individually or with partners.[2] The game is a modern and simplified variant of the American game Halma.[3]

The objective is to be first to race all of one's pieces across the hexagram-shaped board into "home"—the corner of the star opposite one's starting corner—using single-step moves or moves that jump over other pieces. The remaining players continue the game to establish second-, third-, fourth-, fifth-, and last-place finishers.[4] The rules are simple, so even young children can play.[5]

Despite its name, the game is not a variation of checkers, nor did it originate in China or any part of Asia (whereas the game 象棋 xiangqi, or "Chinese chess", is from China). The game was invented in Germany in 1892 under the name "Stern-Halma" as a variation of the older American game Halma.[6] The "Stern" (German for star) refers to the board's star shape (in contrast to the square board used in Halma).

The name "Chinese Checkers" originated in the United States as a marketing scheme by Bill and Jack Pressman in 1928. The Pressman company's game was originally called "Hop Ching Checkers".[7]

The game was introduced to Chinese-speaking regions mostly by the Japanese.[6]

The aim is to race all one's pieces into the star corner on the opposite side of the board before opponents do the same. The destination corner is called home. Each player has 10 pieces, except in games between two players when 15 are used.[8] (On bigger star boards, 15 or 21 pieces are used.[9])

In the diagram, Green might move the topmost piece one space diagonally forward as shown. A hop consists of jumping over a single adjacent piece, either one's own or an opponent's, to the empty space directly beyond it in the same line of direction. Red might advance the indicated piece by a chain of three hops in a single move. It is not mandatory to make the most number of hops possible. (In some instances a player may choose to stop the jumping sequence part way in order to impede the opponent's progress, or to align pieces for planned future moves.)

Can be played "all versus all", or three teams of two. When playing teams, teammates usually sit at opposite corners of the star, with each team member controlling their own colored set of pieces. The first team to advance both sets to their home destination corners is the winner. The remaining players usually continue play to determine second- and third-place finishers, etc.

The four-player game is the same as the game for six players, except that two opposite corners will be unused.

In a three-player game, all players control either one or two sets of pieces each. If one set is used, pieces race across the board into empty, opposite corners. If two sets are used, each player controls two differently colored sets of pieces at opposite corners of the star.

In a two-player game, each player plays one, two, or three sets of pieces. If one set is played, the pieces usually go into the opponent's starting corner, and the number of pieces per side is increased to 15 (instead of the usual 10). If two sets are played, the pieces can either go into the opponent's starting corners, or one of the players' two sets can go into an opposite empty corner. If three sets are played, the pieces usually go into the opponent's starting corners.

A basic strategy is to create or find the longest hopping path that leads closest to home, or immediately into it. (Multiple-jump moves are obviously faster to advance pieces than step-by-step moves.) Since either player can make use of any hopping 'ladder' or 'chain' created, a more advanced strategy involves hindering an opposing player in addition to helping oneself make jumps across the board. Of equal importance are the players' strategies for emptying and filling their starting and home corners. Games between top players are rarely decided by more than a couple of moves.

Differing numbers of players result in different starting layouts, in turn imposing different best-game strategies. For example, if a player's home destination corner starts empty (i.e. is not an opponent's starting corner), the player can freely build a 'ladder' or 'bridge' with their pieces between the two opposite ends. But if a player's opponent occupies the home corner, the player may need to wait for opponent pieces to clear before filling the home vacancies.

While the standard rules allow hopping over only a single adjacent occupied position at a time (as in checkers), this version of the game allows pieces to catapult over multiple adjacent occupied positions in a line when hopping.

In the fast-paced or Super Chinese Checkers variant popular in France,[10] a piece may hop over a non-adjacent piece. A hop consists of jumping over a distant piece (friendly or enemy) to a symmetrical position on the opposite side, in the same line of direction. (For example, if there are two empty positions between the jumping piece and the piece being jumped, the jumping piece lands leaving exactly two empty positions immediately beyond the jumped piece.) As in the standard rules, a jumping move may consist of any number of a chain of hops. (When making a chain of hops, a piece is usually allowed to enter an empty corner, as long as it hops out again before the move is completed.)

Jumping over two or more pieces in a hop is not allowed. Therefore, in this variant even more than in the standard version, it is sometimes strategically important to keep one's pieces bunched in order to prevent a long opposing hop.

An alternative variant allows hops over any symmetrical arrangement, including pairs of pieces, pieces separated by empty positions, and so on.

In the capture variant, all sixty game pieces start out in the hexagonal field in the center of the gameboard. The center position is left unoccupied, so pieces form a symmetric hexagonal pattern. Color is irrelevant in this variant, so players take turns hopping any game piece over any other eligible game piece(s) on the board. The hopped-over pieces are captured (retired from the game, as in English draughts) and collected in the capturing player's bin. Only jumping moves are allowed; the game ends when no further jumps are possible. The player with the most captured pieces is the winner.

The board is tightly packed at the start of the game; as more pieces are captured, the board frees up, often allowing multiple captures to take place in a single move.

Two or more players can compete in this variant, but if there are more than six players, not everyone will get a fair turn.

This variant resembles the game Leap Frog.[11] The main difference being that in Leap Frog the board is a square board.

Diamond game is a variant of Chinese Checkers played in South Korea and Japan. It uses the same jump rule as in Chinese Checkers. The aim of the game is to enter all one's pieces into the star corner on the opposite side of the board, before opponents do the same. Each player has ten or fifteen pieces. Ten-piece diamond uses a smaller gameboard than Chinese Checkers, with 73 spaces. Fifteen-piece diamond uses the same board as in Chinese Checkers, with 121 spaces. To play diamond each player selects one color and places their 10 or 15 pieces on a triangle. Two to six players can compete.[12]


what was the form of government in the byzantine empire

The Byzantine Empire had a complex system of aristocracy and bureaucracy, which was inherited from the Roman Empire. At the apex of the hierarchy stood the emperor, yet "Byzantium was a republican monarchy and not primarily a monarchy by divine right".[1] Beneath the emperor, a multitude of officials and court functionaries operated the complex administrative machinery that was necessary to run the empire. In addition to those officials, a large number of honorific titles existed, which the emperor awarded to his subjects or to friendly foreign rulers.

Byzantine bureaucracy and aristocracy

Over the more than thousand years of the empire's existence, different titles were adopted and discarded, and many lost or gained prestige. At first the various titles of the empire were the same as those in the late Roman Empire. However, by the time that Heraclius was emperor (610–641), many of the titles had become obsolete.  By the time of Alexios I reign (1082–1118), many of the positions were either new or drastically changed. However, from that time on they remained essentially the same until the fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1453.

In the early Byzantine period (4th to early 7th century) the system of government followed the model established in late Roman times under Diocletian and  Constantine the Great, with a strict separation between civil and military offices and a scale of titles corresponding to office, where membership or not in the Senate was the major distinguishing characteristic.[2] Following the transformation of the Byzantine state during the 7th century on account of massive territorial loss to the Muslim conquests, this system vanished, and during the "classic" or middle period of the Byzantine state (8th-late 11th centuries), a new, court-centered system emerged. In this, the new titles derived from older, now obsolete, public offices, and dignities of a certain level were awarded with each office. A senatorial class remained in place, which incorporated a large part of the upper officialdom as every official from the rank of protospatharios (Literally "first sword-bearer"; originally the head of the Emperor's bodyguards) was considered a member of it.[2] During this period, many families remained important for several centuries, and several Emperors rose from the aristocracy. Two groups can be distinguished: a metropolitan civil nobility and a provincial military one, the latter remaining regionally based and having large land-holdings, but apparently no military forces of their own, in contrast to contemporary Western Europe.

The 10th and 11th centuries saw a rise in importance of the aristocracy, and an increased number of new families entering it. The catastrophic losses in the latter 11th century again prompted a reorganization of the imperial administrative system, at the hands of the new Komnenos dynasty: the older offices and titles fell gradually into disuse, while an array of new honorifics emerged, which signified primarily the closeness of their recipient's familial relationship to the Emperor.[2] The Komnenian-led Empire, and later their Palaiologan successors, were based primarily on the landed aristocracy, keeping the governance of state tightly controlled by a limited number of intermarrying aristocratic families. In the 11th and 12th century for instance, some 80 civil and 64 military noble families have been identified, a very small number for so large a state.[3] Finally, in the Palaiologan system as reported by pseudo-Kodinos one can discern the accumulated nomenclature of centuries, with formerly high ranks having been devalued and others taken their place, and the old distinction between office and dignity had vanished.[2]

These were the highest titles, usually limited to members of the imperial family or to a few very select foreign rulers, whose friendship the Emperor desired.

In the 8th–11th centuries, according to information provided by the Taktikon Uspensky, the Klētorologion of Philotheos (899) and the writings of Constantine Porphyrogennetos, below the imperial titles, the Byzantines distinguished two distinct categories of dignities (ἀξίαι): the "dignities by award" (διὰ βραβείων ἀξίαι), which were purely honorific court titles and were conferred by the award of a symbol of rank, and the "dignities by proclamation" (διὰ λόγου ἀξίαι), which were offices of the state and were conferred by imperial pronouncement. The former were further divided into three subcategories, depending on who was eligible for them: different sets of titles existed for the "Bearded Ones" (βαρβάτοι from Latin barbati, i.e. not eunuchs), the eunuchs (ἐκτομίαι) and women. State officials usually combined titles from both main categories, so that a high official would be both magistros (an "awarded" title) and logothetēs tou dromou (a "proclaimed" office).

The "by award" titles for the "Bearded Ones" (non-eunuchs[5]) were, in descending order of precedence:

By descending order of precedence, the "by award" titles for the eunuchs were:

There is also a single special title reserved for women, that of zōstē patrikia (ζωστὴ πατρικία, "Girded patrikia"). This title was given to the empress' ladies of honour, and, according to Philotheos, ranked very high in hierarchy, above even the magistros and proedros and just below the kouropalates. The title is known from the early 9th century, and disappeared in the 11th century.[17] Otherwise women bore the female forms of their husbands' titles.

The vast Byzantine bureaucracy had many titles, and varied more than aristocratic and military titles. In Constantinople there were normally hundreds, if not thousands, of bureaucrats at any time. Like the Church and the military, they wore elaborately differentiated dress, often including huge hats.  These are some of the more common ones, including non-nobles who also directly served the emperor.

Logothetes originally had some influence on the emperor, but they eventually became honorary posts. In the later empire the Grand Logothete was replaced by the

Other administrators included:

The protasekretis, logothetes, prefect, praetor, quaestor, magister, and sakellarios, among others, were members of the senate.

At the peaceful height of Middle Byzantium, court life "passed in a sort of ballet",[20] with precise ceremonies prescribed for every occasion, to show that "Imperial power could be exercised in harmony and order", and "the Empire could thus reflect the motion of the Universe as it was made by the Creator", according to the Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, who wrote a Book of Ceremonies describing in enormous detail the annual round of the Court. Special forms of dress for many classes of people on particular occasions are set down; at the name-day dinner for the Emperor or Empress various groups of high officials performed ceremonial "dances", one group wearing "a blue and white garment, with short sleeves, and gold bands, and rings on their ankles. In their hands they hold what are called phengia". The second group do just the same, but wearing "a garment of green and red, split, with gold bands". These colours were the marks of the old chariot-racing factions, the four now merged to just the Blues and the Greens, and incorporated into the official hierarchy. As in the Versailles of Louis XIV, elaborate dress and court ritual probably were at least partly an attempt to smother and distract from political tensions.[citation needed]

Eunuchs also participated in court life, typically serving as attendants to noble women or assisting the emperor when he took part in religious ceremonies or removed his crown. Eunuchs in the early Byzantine Empire were usually foreigners, and they were often seen as having a low status. This changed in the 10th century, when the social status of eunuchs increased and members of the educated Byzantine upper class began to become eunuchs.[21]

However, even by the time of Anna Comnena, with the Emperor away on military campaigns for much of the time, this way of life had changed considerably, and after the Crusader occupation it virtually vanished. A French visitor[who?] was shocked to see the Empress going to church far less well attended than the Queen of France would have been.[citation needed] The Imperial family largely abandoned the Great Palace for the relatively compact Palace of Blachernae.


when did the united nations designate henderson island a world heritage site

In 1902 Henderson was annexed to the Pitcairn Islands colony, now a South Pacific British Overseas Territory. It was designated a World Heritage Site by the United Nations in 1988.

Henderson Island (Pitcairn Islands)

Henderson Island (formerly also San Juan Bautista and Elizabeth Island) is an uninhabited island in the south Pacific Ocean. It is one of the world's last two raised coral atolls whose ecosystems remain relatively unaffected by human contact.[1] Ten of its 51 flowering plants, all four of its land birds and about a third of the identified insects and gastropods are endemic â€“ a remarkable diversity given the island's size.[2]

Measuring 9.6 kilometres (6.0 mi) by 5.1 kilometres (3.2 mi), it has an area of 37.3 square kilometres (14.4 sq mi) and is located 193 kilometres (120 mi) northeast of Pitcairn Island. It has poor soil and little fresh water, and is unsuitable for agriculture. There are three beaches on the northern end and the remaining coast comprises steep (mostly undercut) cliffs up to 15 metres (49 ft) in height.

Archaeological evidence suggests that a small permanent Polynesian settlement existed on Henderson at some time between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries.[3] The reasons for the group's disappearance remain unknown, but may relate to the similar disappearance of the Polynesians on Pitcairn Island, on whom the Hendersonians would have depended for many of the basics of life, especially stone for making tools.[4] The Pitcairn Polynesians may in turn have disappeared because of the decline of nearby Mangareva; thus, Henderson was at the end of a chain of small, dependent colonies of Mangareva.[5]

Portuguese sailor Pedro Fernandes de Queirós, leading a Spanish expedition, was the first European to discover the island on 29 January 1606 and named it San Juan Bautista;[6] Captain Henderson of the British East India Company ship Hercules rediscovered the island on 17 January 1819 and named it Henderson Island; and on 2 March 1819 Captain Henry King in the Elizabeth landed on the island to find the king's colours already flying. His crew scratched the name of their ship into a tree.

A sperm whale rammed and sank the Nantucket whaleship Essex on 20 November 1820 (a report of which inspired Herman Melville to write Moby-Dick), and the crew arrived at Henderson on 20 December in three small whaleboats. They found the island's only known drinkable water-source – a brackish spring on the north shore, exposed at half tide – and ate fish, birds, eggs, crabs and peppergrass; but they had largely exhausted the ready food within a week and on 27 December the three boats set sail for South America, leaving behind Thomas Chappel, Seth Weeks, and William Wright who chose to stay, and who survived until their rescue on 9 April 1821. In his account of the ordeal, Chappel reported having seen human skeletons in a cave.[7]

In August 1851 visitors from Pitcairn Island also found skeletons in a cave and wreckage on the adjacent beach. After a party of Pitcairn Islanders collecting miro wood rediscovered the skeletons in March 1958, a medical examination determined that the bones were of Caucasian origin, and they were then buried in a shallow grave inside the cave. An American survey team examined the bones in 1966 and buried them in five coffins in the left-hand corner of the cave, tightly jamming a large cross between the ceiling and the rock floor at the entrance. They concluded the remains were of five or six people, one of whom was between three and five years of age. It was presumed they were the survivors of a shipwreck who died of dehydration.[8]
A final examination in the context of a scientific expedition in 1991 concluded that the human remains on Henderson Island were prehistoric Polynesians.[9]

Henderson, along with Oeno and Ducie, was formally annexed to the British Empire in 1902 by Captain G. F. Jones, who visited the islands in a cutter with a crew of Pitcairn Islanders; and in August 1937, HMS Leander on a journey from Europe to New Zealand carried out an aerial survey of Henderson, Oeno and Ducie, and on each island a British flag was planted and an inscription was nailed up proclaiming "This island belongs to H.B.M. King George VI." [10]

In 1957 a 27 year-old American, Robert Tomarchin lived the life of a castaway on the island for approximately 2 months, accompanied by a pet chimpanzee, apparently as a publicity stunt, until people from Pitcairn rescued him in two longboats.[11]

In the early 1980s, American businessman Arthur "Smiley" Ratliff expressed interest in establishing a home for himself with an airstrip on the island.[12] The Pitcairn Island Council approved his plans in AprilÂ 1981 but the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office overrode the decision and vetoed the proposed development after environmentalist groups had lobbied to protect the natural ecology and environment of the island. Henderson Island was listed as a World Heritage site in 1988.[2]

Since the introduction of aluminium-hulled long-boats in the 20th century, Pitcairners have made regular trips to Henderson to harvest the wood of miro and tou trees. Usually they venture to Henderson once per year, but they may make up to three trips if the weather is favourable. Pitcairners carve the wood into curios for tourists, from which they derive much of their income.[13]

Henderson Island is a raised coral atoll that, with Pitcairn, Ducie and Oeno Islands, forms the Pitcairn Island Group. The nearest major landmass is more than 5,000 kilometres (3,100 mi) away. This coral limestone island sits atop a conical (presumed volcanic) mound, rising from a depth of roughly 3,500 metres (11,500 ft). Its surface is mostly reef-rubble and dissected limestone – an extremely rugged mixture of steep, jagged pinnacles and shallow sink holes – and, except for the north end, the island is encircled by steep limestone cliffs up to 15 metres (49 ft) high.

There are three main beaches, on the northwest, north, and northeast sides, and the north and northwest sides are fringed by reefs. The depression at the island's centre is thought to be a raised lagoon. There is only one known potable (drinkable) water source, a brackish spring on the north shore exposed at half tide, rising from a crevice in flat rock, large surfaces of which compose the face of the beach. The surrounding ocean tidal range is about one metre at spring tide.[2]

Apart from five species bordering the beaches, including coconut palms, the vegetation is undisturbed. Henderson Island is covered by 5–10 m tall tangled scrub forest, more thinly covered in the central depression. It has 51 native species of flowering plants, ten of which are unique to the island (endemic). Dominant tree species include coconut palms, Pandanus tectorius, Thespesia populnea (miro), Tournefortia argentea, Cordia subcordata (tou), Guettarda speciosa, Pisonia grandis, Geniostoma hendersonense, Nesoluma st.-johnianum, Hernandia stokesii, Myrsine hosakae, and Celtis sp.[14]

The island is presently home to four endemic land bird species – the Henderson fruit dove, Henderson lorikeet, Henderson reed warbler and the flightless Henderson crake. Three species of the family Columbidae – the Henderson ground dove, the Henderson imperial pigeon and the Henderson archaic pigeon – were formerly endemic to the island, but became extinct when the Polynesians arrived around 1000 CE. Of the fifteen non-endemic seabird species found, nine or more are believed to breed on the island.[2] Breeding colonies of the globally endangered Henderson petrel formerly existed on Ducie, but were wiped out by invasive rats by 1922. It is believed to now nest uniquely on Henderson island.[15]

Bones associated with prehistoric Polynesian settlement sites dating to somewhere between 500 and 800 years ago include those of the Polynesian storm petrel, Marquesan imperial pigeon, and Polynesian or Pacific imperial pigeon which are no longer found on the island, and two others – Christmas shearwater and red-footed booby – that still visit but no longer nest. It is hypothesized that the Polynesian settlers may have driven these bird species, along with six terrestrial snail species, to local extinction, and this loss of a ready and regular food supply may have contributed to the Polynesians' subsequent disappearance.[16][17] The island has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area for its endemic landbirds and breeding seabirds.[18]

The invertebrate species are largely unknown but a third of the island's known non-marine gastropods and insects are endemic.[2] There are no native mammals but the Pacific rat, introduced by Polynesians 800 years ago, abounds.[19] A skink (Emoia cyanura), and the green sea turtle have been identified, and an unidentified gecko has been reported. There are also crabs.

Land bird populations appear to be relatively stable but there is high risk of introduction to the island of predators, disease vectors and diseases by unauthorised landings of yachts. Introduction of the Eurasian black rat or the domestic cat would be likely to cause almost immediate extinction of the ground-dwelling Henderson crake and possibly other species. The endemic birds may have no immunity to the fatal avian pox which is transmitted by biting flies such as hippoboscidae.[14]

Between July and November 2011 a partnership of the Pitcairn Islands Government and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds implemented a poison baiting programme aimed at eradicating the Pacific rat.[20] Mortality was massive but of the 50,000 to 100,000 population, 60 to 80 individuals survived and the population has now fully recovered.[21]

Research published in April 2017[22] looked at debris on several beaches, and reported "the highest density of plastic rubbish anywhere in the world" as a result of the South Pacific Gyre. The beaches contain an estimated 37.7 million items of debris together weighing 17.6 tonnes. In a study transect on North Beach, each day 17 to 268 new items washed up on a 10-metre section. The study noted that purple hermit crabs (Coenobita spinosus) make their homes in plastic containers washed up on beaches.[23][24][25]

View along the beach

Northwest Beach.


who organized a new political movement known as facism in 1919

The National Fascist Party (Italian: Partito Nazionale Fascista, PNF) was an Italian political party, created by Benito Mussolini as the political expression of fascism (previously represented by groups known as Fasci). The party ruled Italy from 1922 when Fascists took power with the March on Rome to 1943, when Mussolini was deposed by the Grand Council of Fascism.

National Fascist Party

Preceding the PNF, Mussolini's first established political party was known as the Fascist Revolutionary Party (Partito Fascista Rivoluzionario, PFR), which was founded in 1915 according to Mussolini.[1] After poor November 1919 election results, the PFR was eventually renamed the National Fascist Party during the Third Fascist Congress in Rome on 7â€“10 November 1921.[2][3]

The National Fascist Party was rooted in Italian nationalism and the desire to restore and expand Italian territories, which Italian Fascists deemed necessary for a nation to assert its superiority and strength and to avoid succumbing to decay.[4] Italian Fascists claimed that modern Italy is the heir to ancient Rome and its legacy and historically supported the creation of an Italian Empire to provide spazio vitale ("living space") for colonization by Italian settlers and to establish control over the Mediterranean Sea.[5]

Fascists promoted a corporatist economic system whereby employer and employee syndicates are linked together in associations to collectively represent the nation's economic producers and work alongside the state to set national economic policy.[6] This economic system intended to resolve class conflict through collaboration between the classes.[7]

Italian Fascism opposed liberalism, but did not seek a reactionary restoration of the pre-French Revolutionary world, which it considered to have been flawed, and not in line with a forward-looking direction on policy.[8] It was opposed to Marxist socialism because of its typical opposition to nationalism,[9] but was also opposed to the reactionary conservatism developed by Joseph de Maistre.[10] It believed the success of Italian nationalism required respect for tradition and a clear sense of a shared past among the Italian people alongside a commitment to a modernized Italy.[11]

The National Fascist Party along with its successor, the Republican Fascist Party, are the only parties whose re-formation is banned by the Constitution of Italy: "It shall be forbidden to reorganize, under any form whatsoever, the dissolved fascist party".

After the First World War (1914–1918), despite the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946) being a full-partner Allied Power against the Central Powers, Italian nationalism claimed Italy was cheated in the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1919), thus the Allies had impeded Italy's progress to becoming a "Great Power".[12] Thenceforth, the PNF successfully exploited that perceived slight to Italian nationalism in presenting Fascism as best suited for governing the country by successfully claiming that democracy, socialism and liberalism were failed systems.

In 1919 at the Paris Peace Conference, the Allies compelled the Kingdom of Italy to yield to Yugoslavia the Croatian seaport of Fiume (Rijeka), a mostly Italian city of little nationalist significance, until early 1919. Moreover, elsewhere Italy was then excluded from the wartime secret Treaty of London (1915) it had concorded with the Triple Entente,[13] wherein Italy was to leave the Triple Alliance and join the enemy by declaring war against the German Empire and Austria-Hungary in exchange for territories at war's end, upon which the Kingdom of Italy held claims (see Italia irredenta).

In September 1919, the nationalist response of outraged war hero Gabriele D'Annunzio was declaring the establishment of the Italian Regency of Carnaro.[14] To his independent Italian state, he installed himself as the Regent Duce (Leader) and promulgated the Carta del Carnaro (Charter of Carnaro, 8 September 1920), a politically syncretic constitutional amalgamation of right-wing and left-wing anarchist, proto-fascist and democratic republican politics, which much influenced the politico-philosophic development of early Italian Fascism. Consequent to the Treaty of Rapallo (1920), the metropolitan Italian military deposed the Regency of Duce D’Annunzio on Christmas 1920. In the development of the fascist model of government, D’Annunzio was a nationalist and not a fascist, whose legacy of political–praxis (“Politics as Theatre”) was stylistic (ceremony, uniform, harangue and chanting) and not substantive, which Italian Fascism artfully developed as a government model.[14][15]

Founded in Rome during the Third Fascist Congress on 7â€“10 November 1921,[2] the National Fascist Party marked the transformation of the paramilitary Fasci Italiani di Combattimento into a more coherent political group (the Fasci di Combattimento had been founded by Mussolini in Milan's Piazza San Sepolcro on 23 March 1919).

The Fascist Party was instrumental in directing and popularizing support for Mussolini's ideology. In the early years, groups within the PNF called Blackshirts (squadristi) built a base of power by violently attacking socialists and their institutions in the rural Po Valley, thereby gaining the support of landowners. Compared to its predecessor, the PNF abandoned republicanism to turn decisively towards the right-wing of the political spectrum.

On 22 October 1922, Mussolini attempted a coup d'état which was titled by the Fascist propaganda, the March on Rome, in which took part almost 30,000 fascists. The quadrumvirs leading the Fascist Party, General Emilio De Bono, Italo Balbo (one of the most famous ras), Michele Bianchi and Cesare Maria de Vecchi, organized the March while the Duce stayed behind for most of the march, though he allowed pictures to be taken of him marching along with the Fascist marchers. Generals Gustavo Fara and Sante Ceccherini assisted to the preparations of the March of 18 October. Other organizers of the march included the Marquis Dino Perrone Compagni and Ulisse Igliori.

On 24 October 1922, Mussolini declared before 60,000 people at the Fascist Congress in Naples: "Our program is simple: we want to rule Italy".[16] Meanwhile, the Blackshirts, who had occupied the Po plain, took all strategic points of the country. On 26 October, former prime minister Antonio Salandra warned current Prime Minister Luigi Facta that Mussolini was demanding his resignation and that he was preparing to march on Rome. However, Facta did not believe Salandra and thought that Mussolini would govern quietly at his side. To meet the threat posed by the bands of fascist troops now gathering outside Rome, Facta (who had resigned but continued to hold power) ordered a state of siege for Rome. Having had previous conversations with the king about the repression of fascist violence, he was sure the king would agree.[17] However, King Victor Emmanuel III refused to sign the military order.[18] On 28 October, the King handed power to Mussolini, who was supported by the military, the business class, the right-wing part of population.

The march itself was composed of fewer than 30,000 men, but the King in part feared a civil war since the squadristi had already taken control of the Po plain and most of the country, while Fascism was no longer seen as a threat to the establishment. Mussolini was asked to form his cabinet on 29 October 1922, while some 25,000 Blackshirts were parading in Rome. Mussolini thus legally reached power in accordance with the Statuto Albertino, the Italian Constitution. The March on Rome was not the conquest of power which Fascism later celebrated, but rather the precipitating force behind a transfer of power within the framework of the constitution. This transition was made possible by the surrender of public authorities in the face of fascist intimidation. Many business and financial leaders believed it would be possible to manipulate Mussolini, whose early speeches and policies emphasized free market and laissez-faire economics.[19] This proved overly optimistic, as Mussolini's corporatist view stressed total state power over businesses as much as over individuals, via governing industry bodies ("corporations") controlled by the Fascist party, a model in which businesses retained the responsibilities of property, but few if any of the freedoms.

Even though the coup failed in giving power directly to the Fascist Party, it nonetheless resulted in a parallel agreement between Mussolini and King Victor Emmanuel III that made Mussolini the head of the Italian government. On 15 December, the Grand Council of Fascism was founded and it was the supreme organ of the PNF.

After a drastic modification of electoral legislation (the Acerbo Law), the Fascist Party clearly won the highly controversial elections of April 1924. In early 1925, Mussolini dropped all pretense of democracy and set up a total dictatorship. From that point onward, the PNF was effectively the only legally permitted party in the country. This status was formalized by a law passed in 1928 and Italy remained a one-party state until the end of the Fascist regime in 1943. The new laws were strongly criticized by the leader of the Socialist Party Giacomo Matteotti during his speech in Parliament and a few days later Matteotti was kidnapped and killed by fascist blackshirts.

After taking sole power, the Fascist regime began to impose the Fascist ideology and its symbolism throughout the country. Party membership in the PNF became necessary to seek employment or gain government assistance. The fasces adorned public buildings, Fascist mottos and symbols were displayed in art and a personality cult was created around Mussolini as the nation's saviour called "Il Duce", "The Leader". The Italian parliament was replaced in duties by the Chamber of Fasci and Corporations, solely filled with Fascist Party members. The PNF promoted Italian imperialism in Africa and staunchly promoted racial segregation and white supremacy of Italian settlers in the colonies.

In 1930 came the Youth Fasces of Combat. The 1930s were characterized by the secretary Achille Starace, "faithful" to Mussolini and one of the few fascist secretaries from Southern Italy, who launched a campaign of Fascism in the country made up of a wave of ceremonies and rallies and the creation of organizations which aimed to frame the country and the citizen in all its manifestations (both public and private). In order to regiment youth movements, Starace brought the Opera Nazionale Balilla (ONB) under the direct control of the PNF and the Youth Fasces that were dissolved and merged into the new Gioventù Italiana del Littorio (GIL).

On 27 May 1933, party membership was declared a basic requirement for public office. On 9 March 1937, it became mandatory if one wanted access to any public office and from 3 June 1938 those who did not join the party could not work. In 1939, Ettore Muti replaced Starace at the helm of the party, a fact that testifies to the increasing influence of Galeazzo Ciano, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and son-in-law of Mussolini.

On 10 June 1940, from the balcony of Palazzo Venezia Mussolini announced the entry of Italy into World War II on the side of Hitler's Germany.

On 25 July 1943, following a request from Dino Grandi due to the failure of the war the Grand Council of Fascism overthrew Mussolini by asking the King to resume his full authority in officially removing Mussolini as Prime Minister, which he did. Mussolini was imprisoned, but the Fascists immediately collapsed and the party was officially banned by Pietro Badoglio's government on 27 July.

After the Nazi-engineered Gran Sasso raid liberated Mussolini in September, the PNF was revived as the Republican Fascist Party (Partito Fascista Repubblicano – PFR; September 13), as the single party of the Northern and Nazi-protected Italian Social Republic (the Salò Republic). Its secretary was Alessandro Pavolini. The PRF did not outlast Mussolini's execution and the disappearance of the Salò state in April 1945.

Italian Fascism was rooted in Italian nationalism and Georges Sorel’s revolutionary syndicalism that eventually evolved into national syndicalism in Italy. Most Italian revolutionary syndicalist leaders were not only “founders of the Fascist movement”, but later held key positions in Mussolini’s administration.[20] They sought to restore and expand Italian territories, which Italian Fascists deemed necessary for a nation to assert its superiority and strength and to avoid succumbing to decay.[21] Italian Fascists claimed that modern Italy is the heir to ancient Rome and its legacy and historically supported the creation of an Italian Empire to provide spazio vitale ("living space") for colonization by Italian settlers and to establish control over the Mediterranean Sea.[5]

Italian Fascism promoted a corporatist economic system whereby employer and employee syndicates are linked together in associations to collectively represent the nation's economic producers and work alongside the state to set national economic policy.[6] This economic system intended to resolve class conflict through collaboration between the classes.[7]

Italian Fascism opposed liberalism, but rather than seeking a reactionary restoration of the pre-French Revolutionary world, which it considered to have been flawed as it had a forward-looking direction.[8] It was opposed to Marxist socialism because of its typical opposition to nationalism,[9] but was also opposed to the reactionary conservatism developed by Joseph de Maistre.[10] It believed the success of Italian nationalism required respect for tradition and a clear sense of a shared past among the Italian people, alongside a commitment to a modernized Italy.[11]

Italian Fascism is based upon Italian nationalism and in particular seeks to complete what it considers as the incomplete project of Risorgimento by incorporating Italia Irredenta ("unredeemed Italy") into the state of Italy.[22] The National Fascist Party founded in 1921 declared that the party was to serve as "a revolutionary militia placed at the service of the nation. It follows a policy based on three principles: order, discipline, hierarchy".[22]

It identifies modern Italy as the heir to the Roman Empire and Italy during the Renaissance and promotes the cultural identity of Romanitas ("Roman-ness").[22] Italian Fascism historically sought to forge a strong Italian Empire as a "Third Rome", identifying ancient Rome as the "First Rome" and Renaissance-era Italy as the "Second Rome".[22] Italian Fascism has emulated ancient Rome and Mussolini in particular emulated ancient Roman leaders, such as Julius Cæsar as a model for the Fascists' rise to power and Augustus as a model for empire-building.[23] Italian Fascism has directly promoted imperialism, such as within the Doctrine of Fascism (1932) ghostwritten by Giovanni Gentile on behalf of Mussolini, declared:

The Fascist state is a will to power and empire. The Roman tradition is here a powerful force. According to the Doctrine of Fascism, empire is not only territorial or military or mercantile concept, but a spiritual and moral one. One can think of an empire, that is, a nation, which directly or indirectly guides other nations, without the need to conquer a single square kilometre of territory.

Fascism emphasized the need for the restoration of the Mazzinian Risorgimento tradition that pursued the unification of Italy, that the Fascists claimed had been left incomplete and abandoned in the Giolittian-era Italy.[24] Fascism sought the incorporation of claimed "unredeemed" territories to Italy.

To the east of Italy, the Fascists claimed that Dalmatia was a land of Italian culture whose Italians, including those of Italianized South Slavic descent, had been driven out of Dalmatia and into exile in Italy and supported the return of Italians of Dalmatian heritage.[25] Mussolini identified Dalmatia as having strong Italian cultural roots for centuries via the Roman Empire and the Republic of Venice.[26] The Fascists especially focused their claims based on the Venetian cultural heritage of Dalmatia, claiming that Venetian rule had been beneficial for all Dalmatians and had been accepted by the Dalmatian population.[26] The Fascists were outraged after World War I, when the agreement between Italy and the Entente Allies in the Treaty of London of 1915 to have Dalmatia join Italy was revoked in 1919.[26] The Fascist regime supported annexation of Yugoslavia's region of Slovenia into Italy that already held a portion of the Slovene population, whereby Slovenia would become an Italian province,[27] resulting in a quarter of Slovene ethnic territory and approximately 327,000 out of total population of 1.3[28] million Slovenes being subjected to forced Italianization.[29][30] The Fascist regime supported annexation of Albania, claimed that Albanians were ethnically linked to Italians through links with the prehistoric Italiotes, Illyrian and Roman populations and that the major influence exerted by the Roman and Venetian empires over Albania justified Italy's right to possess it.[31] The Fascist regime also justified the annexation of Albania on the basis that—because several hundred thousand people of Albanian descent had been absorbed into society in Southern Italy already—the incorporation of Albania was a reasonable measure that would unite people of Albanian descent into one state.[32] The Fascist regime endorsed Albanian irredentism, directed against the predominantly Albanian-populated Kosovo and Epirus – particularly in Chameria inhabited by a substantial number of Albanians.[33] After Italy annexed Albania in 1939, the Fascist regime endorsed assimilating Albanians into Italians and colonizing Albania with Italian settlers from the Italian Peninsula to gradually transform it into an Italian land.[34] The Fascist regime claimed the Ionian Islands as Italian territory on the basis that the islands had belonged to the Venetian Republic from the mid-14th until the 18th century.[35]

To the west of Italy, the Fascists claimed that the territories of Corsica, Nice and Savoy held by France were Italian lands.[36][37] During the period of Italian unification in 1860 to 1861, Prime Minister of Piedmont-Sardinia, Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, who was leading the unification effort, faced opposition from French Emperor Napoleon III who indicated that France would oppose Italian unification unless France was given Nice and Savoy that were held by Piedmont Sardinia, as France did not want a powerful state having control of all the passages of the Alps.[38] As a result, Piedmont-Sardinia was pressured to concede Nice and Savoy to France in exchange for France accepting the unification of Italy.[39] The Fascist regime produced literature on Corsica that presented evidence of the italianitÃ  of the island.[40] The Fascist regime produced literature on Nice that justified that Nice was an Italian land based on historic, ethnic and linguistic grounds.[40] The Fascists quoted Medieval Italian scholar Petrarch who said: "The border of Italy is the Var; consequently Nice is a part of Italy".[40] The Fascists quoted Italian national hero Giuseppe Garibaldi who said: "Corsica and Nice must not belong to France; there will come the day when an Italy mindful of its true worth will reclaim its provinces now so shamefully languishing under foreign domination".[40] Mussolini initially pursued promoting annexation of Corsica through political and diplomatic means, believing that Corsica could be annexed to Italy through first encouraging the existing autonomist tendencies in Corsica and then independence of Corsica from France, that would be followed by annexation of Corsica into Italy.[41]

To the north of Italy, the Fascist regime in the 1930s had designs on the largely Italian-populated region of Ticino and the Romansch-populated region of Graubünden in Switzerland (the Romansch are a people with a Latin-based language).[42] In November 1938, Mussolini declared to the Grand Fascist Council: "We shall bring our border to the Gotthard Pass".[43] The Fascist regime accused the Swiss government of oppressing the Romansch people in Graubünden.[42] Mussolini argued that Romansch was an Italian dialect and thus Graubünden should be incorporated into Italy.[44] Ticino was also claimed because the region had belonged to the Duchy of Milan from the mid-fourteenth century until 1515.[45] Claim was also raised on the basis that areas now part of Graubünden in the Mesolcina valley and Hinterrhein were held by the Milanese Trivulzio family, who ruled from the Mesocco Castle in the late 15th century.[46] Also during the summer of 1940, Galeazzo Ciano met with Adolf Hitler and Joachim von Ribbentrop and proposed to them the dissection of Switzerland along the central chain of the Western Alps, which would have left Italy also with the canton of Valais in addition to the claims raised earlier.[47]

To the south, the regime claimed the archipelago of Malta, which had been held by the British since 1800.[48] Mussolini claimed that the Maltese language was a dialect of Italian,and theories about Malta being the cradle of the Latin civilization were promoted.[48][49] Italian had been widely used in Malta in the literary, scientific and legal fields and it was one of Malta's official languages until 1937, when its status was abolished by the British as a response to Italy's invasion of Ethiopia.[50] Italian irredentists had claimed that territories on the coast of North Africa were Italy's Fourth Shore and used the historical Roman rule in North Africa as a precedent to justify the incorporation of such territories to Italian jurisdiction as being a "return" of Italy to North Africa.[51] In January 1939, Italy annexed territories in Libya that it considered within Italy's Fourth Shore, with Libya's four coastal provinces of Tripoli, Misurata, Benghazi and Derna becoming an integral part of metropolitan Italy.[52] At the same time, indigenous Libyans were given the ability to apply for "Special Italian Citizenship" which required such people to be literate in the Italian language and confined this type of citizenship to be valid in Libya only.[52] Tunisia that had been taken by France as a protectorate in 1881 had the highest concentration of Italians in North Africa and its seizure by France had been viewed as an injury to national honour in Italy at what they perceived as a "loss" of Tunisia from Italian plans to incorporate it.[53] Upon entering World War II, Italy declared its intention to seize Tunisia as well as the province of Constantine of Algeria from France.[54]

To the south, the Fascist regime held interest in expanding Italy's African colonial possessions. In the 1920s, Italy regarded Portugal as a weak country that was unbecoming of a colonial power due to its weak hold on its colonies and mismanagement of them and as such Italy desired to annex Portugal's colonies.[55] Italy's relations with Portugal were influenced by the rise to power of the authoritarian conservative nationalist regime of António de Oliveira Salazar, which borrowed fascist methods, though Salazar upheld Portugal's traditional alliance with Britain.[55]

In 1925, the PNF declared that Italy's Fascist state was to be totalitarian.[22] The term "totalitarian" had initially been used as a pejorative accusation by Italy's liberal opposition that denounced the Fascist movement for seeking to create a total dictatorship.[22] However, the Fascists responded by accepting that they were totalitarian, but presented totalitarianism from a positive viewpoint.[22] Mussolini described totalitarianism as seeking to forge an authoritarian national state that would be capable of completing Risorgimento of the Italia Irredenta, forge a powerful modern Italy and create a new kind of citizen â€“ politically active Fascist Italians.[22]

The Doctrine of Fascism (1932) described the nature of Italian Fascism's totalitarianism, stating the following:

Fascism is for the only liberty which can be a serious thing, the liberty of the state and of the individual in the state. Therefore for the fascist, everything is in the state, and no human or spiritual thing exists, or has any sort of value, outside the state. In this sense fascism is totalitarian, and the fascist state which is the synthesis and unity of every value, interprets, develops and strengthens the entire life of the people.

American journalist H. R. Knickerbocker wrote in 1941: "Mussolini's Fascist state is the least terroristic of the three totalitarian states. The terror is so mild in comparison with the Soviet or Nazi varieties, that it almost fails to qualify as terroristic at all." As example he described an Italian journalist friend who refused to become a Fascist. He was fired from his newspaper and put under 24-hour surveillance, but otherwise not harassed; his employment contract was settled for a lump sum and he was allowed to work for the foreign press. Knickerbocker contrasted his treatment with the inevitable torture and execution under Stalin or Hitler, and stated "you have a fair idea of the comparative mildness of the Italian kind of totalitarianism".[56]

However, since World War II historians have noted that in Italy's colonies Italian Fascism displayed extreme levels of violence, such as the fact the deaths of one-tenth of the population of the Italian colony of Libya during the Fascist era, including from the use of gassings, concentration camps, starvation and disease; and in Ethiopia during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War and afterwards by 1938 a quarter of a million Ethiopians had died.[57]

Italian Fascism promotes a corporatist economic system. The economy involves employer and employee syndicates being linked together in corporative associations to collectively represent the nation's economic producers and work alongside the state to set national economic policy.[6] Mussolini declared such economics as a "Third Alternative" to capitalism and Marxism that Italian Fascism regarded as "obsolete doctrines".[citation needed] It supports criminalization of strikes by employees and lockouts by employers as illegal acts it deems these acts as prejudicial to the national community as a whole.[58]

The Italian Fascists' political anthem was called Giovinezza ("The Youth").[59] Fascism identifies the physical age period of youth as a critical time for the moral development of people that will affect society.[60]

Italian Fascism pursued what it called "moral hygiene" of youth, particularly regarding sexuality.[61] Fascist Italy promoted what it considered normal sexual behaviour in youth while denouncing what it considered abnormal sexual behaviour.[61] It deemed pornography, homosexuality and prostitution as deviant sexual conduct.[61] The Fascist State also criminalized the dispersion of birth control as well as abortion and created laws that taxed bachelors.[62] Fascist Italy regarded the promotion of male sexual excitation before puberty as the cause of criminality amongst male youth.[61] Fascist Italy reflected the belief of most Italians that homosexuality was wrong and even went as far as to create punitive laws against homosexuals.[62] Instead of the traditional Catholic teaching that it was a sin, a new approach was taken based on then-modern psychoanalysis that it was a social disease.[61] Fascist Italy pursued an aggressive campaign to reduce prostitution of young women.[61]

Mussolini perceived women's primary role to be childbearers while men were warriors, once saying that "war is to man what maternity is to the woman".[63] In an effort to increase birthrates, the Italian Fascist government gave financial incentives to women who raised large families and initiated policies designed to reduce the number of women employed.[64] Italian Fascism called for women to be honoured as "reproducers of the nation" and the Italian Fascist government held ritual ceremonies to honour women's role within the Italian nation.[65] In 1934, Mussolini declared that employment of women was a "major aspect of the thorny problem of unemployment" and that for women working was "incompatible with childbearing". Mussolini went on to say that the solution to unemployment for men was the "exodus of women from the work force".[66]

Italian Fascism believed that the success of Italian nationalism required a clear sense of a shared past amongst the Italian people, along with a commitment to a modernized Italy. In a famous speech in 1926, Mussolini called for Fascist art that was "traditionalist and at the same time modern, that looks to the past and at the same time to the future".

Traditional symbols of Roman civilization were utilized by the Fascists, particularly the fasces that symbolized unity, authority and the exercise of power.[67] Other traditional symbols of ancient Rome used by the Fascists included the she-wolf of Rome.[67] The fasces and the she-wolf symbolized the shared Roman heritage of all the regions that constituted the Italian nation.[67] In 1926, the fasces was adopted by the Fascist government of Italy as a symbol of the state.[68] In that year, the Fascist government attempted to have the Italian national flag redesigned to incorporate the fasces on it.[68] However, this attempt to incorporate the fasces on the flag was stopped by strong opposition to the proposal by Italian monarchists.[68] Afterwards, the Fascist government in public ceremonies rose the national tricolour flag along with a Fascist black flag.[69] However, years later and after Mussolini was forced from power by the King in 1943 only to be rescued by German forces, the Italian Social Republic founded by Mussolini and the Fascists did incorporate the fasces on the state's war flag, which was a variant of the Italian tricolour national flag.

The issue of the rule of monarchy or republic in Italy was an issue that changed several times through the development of Italian Fascism. Initially Italian Fascism was republican and denounced the Savoy monarchy.[70] However, Mussolini tactically abandoned republicanism in 1922 and recognized that the acceptance of the monarchy was a necessary compromise to gain the support of the establishment to challenge the liberal constitutional order that also supported the monarchy.[70] King Victor Emmanuel III had become a popular ruler in the aftermath of Italy's gains after World War I and the army held close loyalty to the King, thus any idea of overthrowing the monarchy was discarded as foolhardy by the Fascists at this point.[70] Importantly, Fascism's recognition of monarchy provided Fascism with a sense of historical continuity and legitimacy.[70] The Fascists publicly identified King Victor Emmanuel II – the first King of a reunited Italy who had initiated the Risorgimento – along with other historic Italian figures, such as Gaius Marius, Julius Cæsar, Giuseppe Mazzini, Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, Giuseppe Garibaldi and others, for being within a tradition of dictatorship in Italy that the Fascists declared that they emulated.[71] However, this compromise with the monarchy did not yield a cordial relationship between the King and Mussolini.[70] Although Mussolini had formally accepted the monarchy, he pursued and largely achieved reducing the power of the King to that of a figurehead.[72][self-published source] The King initially held complete nominal legal authority over the military through the Statuto Albertino, but this was ended during the Fascist regime when Mussolini created the position of First Marshal of the Empire in 1938, a two-person position of control over the military held by both the King and the head of government, that had the effect of eliminating the King's previously exclusive legal authority over the military by giving Mussolini equal legal authority to the King over the military.[73] In the 1930s, Mussolini became aggravated by the monarchy's continued existence due to envy of the fact that his counterpart in Germany Adolf Hitler was both head of state and head of government of a republic; and Mussolini in private denounced the monarchy and indicated that he had plans to dismantle the monarchy and create a republic with himself as head of state of Italy upon an Italian success in the then-anticipated major war about to erupt in Europe.[70]

After being removed from office and placed under arrest by the King in 1943 and the Kingdom of Italy's new non-fascist government switching sides from the Axis to the Allies, Italian Fascism returned to republicanism and condemnation of the monarchy.[74] On 18 September 1943, Mussolini made his first public address to the Italian people since his rescue from arrest by allied German forces, in which he commended the loyalty of Hitler as an ally while condemning King Victor Emmanuel III of the Kingdom of Italy for betraying Italian Fascism.[74] On the topic of the monarchy removing him from power and dismantling the Fascist regime, Mussolini stated that "[i]t is not the regime that has betrayed the monarchy, it is the monarchy that has betrayed the regime" and that "[w]hen a monarchy fails in its duties, it loses every reason for being...The state we want to establish will be national and social in the highest sense of the word; that is, it will be Fascist, thus returning to our origins".[74] The Fascists at this point did not denounce the House of Savoy in the entirety of its history and credited Victor Emmanuel II for his rejection of "scornfully dishonourable pacts" and denounced Victor Emmanuel III for betraying Victor Emmanuel II by entering a dishonourable pact with the Allies.[75]

The relationship between Italian Fascism and the Catholic Church was mixed, as originally it was highly anti-clerical and hostile to Catholicism, but from the mid to late 1920s anti-clericalism lost ground in the movement as Mussolini in power sought to seek accord with the Church as the Church held major influence in Italian society with most Italians being Catholic.[76] In 1929, the Italian government signed the Lateran Treaty with the Holy See, a concordat between Italy and the Catholic Church that allowed for the creation of a small enclave known as Vatican City as a sovereign state representing the papacy. This ended years of perceived alienation between the Church and the Italian government after Italy annexed the Papal States in 1870. Italian Fascism justified its adoption of antisemitic laws in 1938 by claiming that Italy was fulfilling the Christian religious mandate of the Catholic Church that had been initiated by Pope Innocent III in the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, whereby the Pope issued strict regulation of the life of Jews in Christian lands which reduced their status to essentially perpetual slaves, Jews were prohibited from holding any public office that would give them power over Christians and Jews were required to wear distinctive clothing to distinguish them from Christians.[77]

The National Fascist Party model was very influential beyond Italy. In the twenty-one-year interbellum period, many political scientists and philosophers sought ideological inspiration from Italy. Mussolini's establishment of law and order to Italy and its society was praised by Winston Churchill,[78] Sigmund Freud,[79] George Bernard Shaw[80] and Thomas Edison,[81] as the Fascist Government combated organised crime and the Mafia with violence and vendetta (honour).[82]

Italian Fascism was copied by Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party, the Russian Fascist Organization and the Romanian National Fascist Movement (the National Romanian Fascia and National Italo-Romanian Cultural and Economic Movement), whereas the Dutch fascists were based upon the Verbond van Actualisten journal of H. A. Sinclair de Rochemont and Alfred Haighton. The Sammarinese Fascist Party established an early Fascist government in San Marino, their politico-philosophic basis essentially was Italian Fascism. In Switzerland, pro-Nazi Colonel Arthur Fonjallaz of the National Front became an ardent Mussolini admirer after visiting Italy in 1932 and advocated the Italian annexation of Switzerland, whilst receiving Fascist foreign aid.[83] The country was host for two Italian politico-cultural activities: the International Centre for Fascist Studies (CINEF — Centre International d’ Études Fascistes), and the 1934 congress of the Action Committee for the Universality of Rome (CAUR — Comitato d’ Azione della Università de Roma).[84] In Spain, the writer Ernesto Giménez Caballero, in Genio de España (The Genius of Spain, 1932) called for the Italian annexation of Spain, led by Mussolini presiding an international Latin Roman Catholic empire. He then progressed to be closely associated with Falangism, leading to discarding the Spanish annexation to Italy.[85]

Although the National Fascist Party was outlawed by the postwar Constitution of Italy, a number of successor neo-fascist parties emerged to carry on its legacy. Historically, the largest neo-fascist party was the Italian Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Italiano), whose best result was 8.7% of votes gained in the 1972 general election. The MSI was disbanded in 1995 and was replaced by National Alliance, a conservative party that distanced itself from Fascism (its founder, former foreign minister Gianfranco Fini, declared during an official visit to Isræl that Fascism was "an absolute evil").[86] National Alliance and a number of neo-fascist parties were merged in 2009 to create the short-lived People of Freedom party led by then Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, which eventually disbanded after the defeat in the 2013 general election. By now, many former members of MSI and AN joined Brothers of Italy party led by Giorgia Meloni.

Party emblem of the National Fascist Party

Eagle clutching a fasces, a common symbol of Italian Fascism, regularly used on uniforms and caps

Flag of the National Fascist Party