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James Cook

James Cook

This article refers to the British navigator and cartographer. For alternative meanings, see Captain James Cook (disambiguation). Captain James Cook (disambiguation) Captain James Cook (disambiguation) James Cook (October 27, 1728 (O.S.) – February 14, 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, and map maker. He made three voyages to the Pacific Ocean, during which large areas were accurately charted, and several islands and coastlines recorded for the first time on European maps. His most notable accomplishments were the British discovery and claiming of the east coast of Australia, the European discovery of the Hawaiian Islands, and the first circumnavigation and mapping of New Zealand.

Early Life

James Cook was born in relatively humble circumstances at Marton in North Yorkshire, near what is today recognised as the town of Middlesbrough. Cook was one of five children born to a local woman and a Scottish immigrant farm labourer, Grace and James Sr. As a child, Cook moved with his family to a farm at Great Ayton where he was educated at the local school, his studies financed by his father's employer. At 13 he began work with his father, now the farm's manager. In 1745 when he was 16, Cook left home to be apprenticed in a grocer/haberdashery in the fishing village of Staithes. According to legend, Cook first felt the lure of the sea while gazing out the shop window. After about a year and a half in Staithes, the shop's owner (Mr Anderson) found James unsuited to the trade. Mr Anderson took James to the nearby port town of Whitby and introduced him to John and Henry Walker. John and Henry were prominent local ship-owners and Quakers, and were in the coal trade business. Cook was taken on as a merchant navy apprentice in their small fleet of vessels plying coal along the English coast. His first assignment was aboard the collier Freelove, and he spent several years on this, and various other coasters sailing between the Tyne and London. For this new apprenticeship, Cook applied himself to the study of algebra, trigonometry, navigation, and astronomy, skills he would need one day to command his own ship. His three-year apprenticeship completed, Cook began working on trading ships in the Baltic Sea. He soon progressed through the merchant navy ranks, starting with his 1752 promotion to Mate (officer in charge of navigation) aboard the collier brig Friendship. In 1755 he was offered command of this vessel, but within the month he volunteered for service in the British Royal Navy. In 1755, The Kingdom of Great Britain was re-arming for what was to become the Seven Years War. Cook saw that his career could advance more quickly in military service. However, this required starting over in the naval hierarchy, and on June 17 he began as able seaman aboard HMS Eagle under the command of Captain Hugh Palliser. He was very quickly promoted to Master's Mate.

Family Life

Cook married Elizabeth Bates, the daughter of one of his mentors, on December 21, 1762. The couple would eventually have six children. When not at sea, James Cook settled in the East End of London. He attended St Paul's church, Shadwell, where his son James was baptised.

Start of Royal Navy career

St Paul's church, Shadwell During the Seven Years' War, he participated in the siege of Quebec City before the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759. He showed a talent for surveying and cartography and was responsible for mapping much of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River during the siege allowing General Wolfe to make his famous stealth attack on the Plains of Abraham. Cook's surveying skills were put to good use in the 1760s mapping the jagged coast of Newfoundland. Cook surveyed the northwest stretch in 1763 and 1764, the south coast between the Burin Peninsula and Cape Ray in 1765 and 1766, and the west coast in 1767. Cook’s five seasons in Newfoundland produced the first large-scale and accurate maps of the island’s coasts; they also gave Cook his mastery of practical surveying, achieved under often adverse conditions, and brought him to the attention of the Admiralty and Royal Society at a crucial moment both in his personal career and in the direction of British overseas discovery. Cook's huge achievements can be attributed to a combination of excellent seamanship, his superior surveying and cartographic skills, courage in exploring dangerous locations to confirm the facts (e.g. dipping into the Antarctic circle repeatedly and exploring around the Great Barrier Reef), ability to lead men in adverse conditions, and boldness both with regard to the extent of his explorations and his willingness to exceed the instructions given to him by the Admiralty..

First voyage (1768-1771)

In 1766, the Royal Society hired Cook to travel to the Pacific Ocean to observe and record a transit of Venus across the Sun. Before starting his first voyage, Cook was granted Lieutenant's "Commission" from the Admiralty. In command of HM Bark Endeavour, he sailed from England in 1768, rounded Cape Horn and continued westward across the Pacific to arrive at Tahiti on April 13, 1769, where the observations were to be made. The transit was scheduled to occur on June 3, and in the meantime he commissioned the building of a small fort and observatory. The astronomer appointed to the task was Charles Green, assistant to the recently-appointed Astronomer Royal, Nevil Maskelyne. The primary purpose of the observation was to obtain measurements which could be used to more accurately calculate the distance of Venus from the Sun. If this could be achieved, then the distances of the other known planets could be worked out based on their relative orbits. On the day of the transit observation, Cook recorded:
- "Saturday 3^rd This day prov'd as favourable to our purpose as we could wish, not a Clowd was to be seen the Whole day and the Air was perfectly clear, so that we had every advantage we could desire in Observing the whole of the passage of the Planet Venus over the Suns disk: we very distinctly saw an Atmosphere or dusky shade round the body of the Planet which very much disturbed the times of the contacts particularly the two internal ones. D^r Solander observed as well as M^r Green and my self, and we differ'd from one another in observeing the times of the Contacts much more than could be expected..." Disappointingly, the separate measurements of Green, Cook and Solander varied more than the anticipated margin of error. Their instrumentation was adequate by the standards of the time, but the resolution still could not eliminate the errors. When their results were later compared to those of the other observations of the same event made elsewhere for the exercise, the net result was not as conclusive or accurate as had been hoped. Once the observations were completed, Cook then departed in order to execute the secondary purpose of his voyage: namely, to search the south Pacific for signs of the postulated southern continent of Terra Australis. The Royal Society, and especially Alexander Dalrymple, believed that it must exist, however Cook had his own personal doubts on the subject. With the help of a Tahitian named Tupaia, who had extensive knowledge of Pacific geography, Cook managed to reach New Zealand, becoming only the second European in history to do so (behind Abel Tasman over a century earlier, in 1642). Cook mapped the complete New Zealand coastline, making only some minor errors (such as calling Banks Peninsula an island, and thinking Stewart Island/Rakiura was part of the South Island). He also discovered Cook Strait, which separates the North Island from the South Island, and which Tasman had not seen. He then set course westwards, intending to strike for Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania, earlier sighted by Tasman) in order to establish whether or not it formed part of the fabled southern continent. However, they were forced to maintain a more northerly course owing to prevailing gales, and sailed onwards until one afternoon when land was sighted, which Cook named Point Hicks. Cook calculated that Van Diemen's Land ought to lie due south of their position, but having found the coastline trending to the southwest, recorded his doubt that this landmass was connected to it. This point was on the southeastern coast of the Australian continent, and in doing so his expedition became the first recorded Europeans to have encountered its eastern coastline. In his journal, Cook recorded the event thus:
- "the Southermost Point of land we had in sight which bore from us W1/4S I judged to lay in the Latitude of 38°..0' S° and in the Longitude of 211°..07' W^t from the Meridion of Greenwich. I have named it Point Hicks, because Leuit^t Hicks was the first who discover'd this land". The ship's log recorded the date as being Thursday April 19, 1770; however, Cook had not made the necessary adjustments when they had earlier crossed the 180th meridian of Longitude, and the actual calendar date was Friday, April 20. The landmark of this sighting is generally reckoned to be a point lying about half-way between the present-day towns of Orbost and Mallacoota on the southeastern coast of the state of Victoria. A later survey done in 1843 ignored or overlooked Cook's earlier naming of the point, giving it the name Cape Everard. On the 200th anniversary of the sighting, the name was officially changed back to Point Hicks. 1843 The Endeavour continued northwards along the coastline, keeping the land in sight and Cook charting and naming landmarks as he went. A little over a week later, they came across an extensive but shallow inlet, and upon entering it moored off a low headland fronted by sand dunes. It was here, on April 29 that Cook and crew made their first landfall on the continent, at a place now known as Kurnell. At first Cook bestowed the name Stingaree (Stingray) Bay to the inlet after the many such creatures found there; this was later changed to Botanist Bay and finally Botany Bay after the unique specimens retrieved by the botanists Banks, Solander and Spöring. This first landing site was later to be promoted (particularly by Joseph Banks) as a suitable candidate for situating a settlement and British colonial outpost. However, almost eighteen years after this first landing, when Captain Arthur Phillip and the First Fleet arrived in early 1788 to establish an outpost and penal colony, they found that the bay and surrounds did not live up to the promising picture which had been painted. Instead, Phillip shortly thereafter gave orders to relocate to a harbour a few kilometres to the north, which Cook had named Port Jackson but had not further explored. It was in this harbour at a place Phillip named Sydney Cove that the settlement of Sydney was established. The settlement was for some time afterwards still referred to generally as Botany Bay. The expedition's scientific members commenced the first European scientific documentation of Australian fauna and flora. At Cook's original landing contact was made with the local Australian Aborigine inhabitants. As the ships sailed into the harbour, they noticed aborigines on both of the headlands. At about 2pm they put the anchor down near a group of six to eight huts. Two aborigines, a younger and an older man came down to the boat. They ignored gifts from Cook. A musket was fired over their heads which wounded the older man slightly and he ran towards the huts. He came back with other men and threw spears at Cook's men although they did no harm. They were chased off after two more rounds were fired. The adults had left, but Cook found several Aboriginal children in the huts, and left some beads with them as a gesture of friendship. Cook continued northwards, charting along the coastline. A mishap occurred when the Endeavour ran aground on a shoal of the Great Barrier Reef, on June 11, 1770. The ship was seriously damaged and his voyage was delayed almost seven weeks while repairs were carried out on the beach (near the docks of modern Cooktown, at the mouth of the Endeavour River). While there, Joseph Banks, Herman Spöring and Daniel Solander made their first major collections of Australian flora. The crew's encounters with the local Aboriginal people were mainly peaceable; from the group encountered here the name "kangaroo" was to be entered into the English language, coming from the local Guugu-Yimidhirr name for a Grey Kangaroo, which was gangaroo. Once repairs were complete the voyage continued, eventually passing by the northern-most point of Cape York Peninsula and then sailing through Torres Strait between Australia and New Guinea, earlier navigated by Luis Vaez de Torres in 1604. At that point in the voyage, Cook had lost no men to scurvy, a remarkable and practically unheard-of achievement in 18th century long-distance sea-faring. He forced his men to eat such foods as citrus fruits and sauerkraut — under punishment of flogging if they did not comply — although no one yet understood why these foods prevented scurvy. Unfortunately, he sailed on for Batavia, the capital of the Dutch East Indies, to put in for repairs. Batavia was known for its outbreaks of malaria, and, before they returned home in 1771, many in Cook's crew would succumb to the disease and other ailments such as dysentery, including the Tahitian Tupaia, Banks's Finnish secretary and a fellow scientist Herman Spöring, astronomer Charles Green, and the illustrator Sydney Parkinson. Cook had named the Spöring Island on the coast of New Zealand to honor Herman Spöring and his work on the voyage. The Endeavour, his ship on this first voyage, would later lend its name to the Space Shuttle Endeavour, as well as the Endeavour River. Cook's journals were published upon his return, and he became something of a hero among the scientific community. Among the general public, however, the aristocratic botanist Joseph Banks was a bigger hero. Banks even attempted to take command of Cook's second voyage, but removed himself from the voyage before it began. Joseph Banks

Second voyage (1772-1775)

Shortly after his return, Cook was was promoted from Lieutenant to Commander (correctly "Master and Commander"). Then once again he was commissioned by the Royal Society to search for the mythical Terra Australis. On his first voyage, Cook had demonstrated by circumnavigating New Zealand that it was not attached to a larger landmass to the south; and although by charting almost the entire eastern coastline of Australia he had shown it to be continental in size, the Terra Australis being sought was supposed to lie further to the south. Despite this evidence to the contrary Dalrymple and others of the Royal Society still believed that this massive southern continent should exist. Cook commanded HMS Resolution on this voyage, while Tobias Furneaux commanded its companion ship, HMS Adventure. Cook's expedition circumnavigated the globe at a very high southern latitude, becoming one of the first to cross the Antarctic Circle on January 17, 1773, reaching 71°10' south. He also discovered South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. In the Antarctic fog, the Resolution and Adventure became separated. Furneaux made his way to New Zealand, where he lost some of his men following a fight with the Maori, and eventually sailed back to Britain, while Cook continued to explore the Antarctic. Cook almost discovered the mainland of Antarctica, but turned back north towards Tahiti to resupply his ship. He then resumed his southward course in a second fruitless attempt to find the supposed continent. On this leg of the voyage he brought with him a young Tahitian named Omai, who proved to be somewhat less knowledgeable about the Pacific than Tupaia had been on the first voyage. On his return voyage, he landed at the Friendly Islands, Easter Island, and Vanuatu, in 1774. His reports upon his return home put to rest the popular myth of Terra Australis. Another accomplishment of the second voyage was the successful employment of the K1 chronometer which facilitated accurate measurement of longitude. Upon his return, Cook was was promoted to the naval rank of Captain and given an honorary retirement from the Royal Navy (as officer in the Greenwich Hospital). But Cook could not be kept away from the sea. A third voyage was planned to find the Northwest Passage. Cook would travel to the Pacific and hoped to travel east to the Atlantic, while a simultaneous voyage would travel the opposite way.

Third voyage (1776-1779)

On his last voyage, Cook once again commanded HMS Resolution, while Captain Charles Clerke commanded HMS Discovery. Ostensibly the voyage was planned to return Omai to Tahiti; this is what the general public believed, as he had become a favourite curiosity in London. After returning Omai, Cook travelled north and in 1778 became the first European to visit the Hawaiian Islands, which he named the "Sandwich Islands" after the 4th Earl of Sandwich, the acting First Lord of the Admiralty. In Hawaii, he was treated with great reverence, as the natives thought he was an incarnation of the god Lono. From there, he travelled east to explore the west coast of North America, eventually landing near the First Nations village at Yuquot in Nootka Sound on Vancouver Island, although he unknowingly sailed past the Strait of Juan de Fuca. He explored and mapped the coast from California all the way to the Bering Strait, on the way discovering what came to be known as Cook Inlet in Alaska. The Bering Strait proved to be impassable, although he made several attempts to sail through it. Cook became increasingly frustrated on this voyage, and probably began to suffer from a stomach ailment; it is speculated that this led to irrational behaviour towards his crew, such as forcing them to eat walrus meat, which they found inedible. Cook returned to Hawaii in 1779. On February 14 at Kealakekua Bay, some Hawaiians stole one of Cook's small boats. Normally, as thefts were quite common in Tahiti and the other islands, he would have taken hostages until the stolen articles were returned. Indeed, he planned to take hostage the King of Hawaii, Kalaniopuu. However, his stomach ailment and increasingly irrational behaviour led to an altercation with a large crowd of Hawaiians gathered on the beach. In the ensuing skirmish, shots were fired at the Hawaiians and Cook was clubbed and stabbed to death. Clerke took over the expedition and made a final attempt to pass through the Bering Strait. The Resolution and Discovery finally returned home in 1780. Cook's account of his voyage was completed by Captain James King.

Cook's protégés

A number of the junior officers who served under Cook went on to distinctive accomplishments of their own.
- William Bligh, Cook's sailing master, was given command of the HMS Bounty in 1787 to sail to Tahiti and return with breadfruit. William Bligh is most known for having his crew mutiny and set him adrift in 1789. (See: Mutiny on the Bounty)
- George Vancouver, one of Cook's midshipmen, later led a voyage of exploration to the Pacific Coast of North America from 1791 to 1794.
- George Dixon sailed under Cook on his third expedition, and later commanded an expedition of his own.

Legacy

James Cook's 11 years sailing around the Pacific Ocean contributed much to European knowledge of the area. Several islands such as Easter Island and the Sandwich Islands were encountered for the first time by Europeans, and his more accurate navigational charting of large areas of the Pacific was a major achievement. To create accurate maps, latitude and longitude need to be known. Navigators had been able to work out latitude accurately for centuries by measuring the distance of the sun or a star above the horizon with a sextant. But longitude was more difficult to measure accurately because it expands with the Earth's increasing circumferance at the equator. The Earth turns a full 360 degrees about its axis (one sidereal day) once every 24 hours; with the exact amount of time being, 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.091 seconds. This converts to approximately 15 degrees every hour and therefore, 1 degree every 4 minutes. Cook figured that by calculating the time difference from one's starting point at noon, using the position of the sun, one can calculate longitude. Cook obtained accurate longitude measurements during his first voyage due to his navigational skills, the help of an astronomer Charles Green and by using the newly published Nautical Almanac tables, which contained distances between the moon and seven selected stars. On his second voyage Cook used the K1 chronometer made by Larcum Kennedy, which was about the size of a pocket watch. It was a copy of the H4 clock made by John Harrison which proved to be the first to keep accurate time at sea when used on the ship Deptford's journey to Jamaica, 1761-1762. There were several artists on the first voyage. Sydney Parkinson was involved in many of the drawings, completing 264 drawings before his death near the end of the voyage. They were of immense scientific value to British botanists. Cook's second expedition included the artist William Hodges, who produced notable landscape paintings of Tahiti, Easter Island, and other locations. Cook was accompanied by many scientists, whose observations and discoveries added to the importance of the voyages. Joseph Banks, a botanist, went on the first voyage along with fellow botanist Daniel Solander from Sweden. Between them they collected over 3,000 plant species Ever the observer, Cook was the first European to have extensive contact with various people of the Pacific. He sailed to many islands near the Phillipines and even in smaller, more remote islands in the South Pacific. He correctly concluded there was a relationship between all of the people in the Pacific, despite being separated by miles of ocean. Cook ensured his crews had citrus fruits in their diets to control scurvy, a disease caused by lack of vitamin C, which was fatal if not treated.

References

- Aughton, Peter. 2002. Endeavour: The Story of Captain Cook's First Great Epic Voyage. Cassell & Co., London.
- John Cawte Beaglehole, biographer of Cook and editor of his Journals.
- Edwards, Philip, ed. 2003. James Cook: The Journals. Prepared from the original manuscripts by J. C. Beaglehole 1955-67. Penguin Books, London.
- Williams, Glyndwr, ed. 1997. Captain Cook's Voyages: 1768-1779. The Folio Society, London.
- Sydney Daily Telegraph. 1970. Captain Cook: His Artists - His Voyages. The Sydney Daily Telegraph Portfolio of Original Works by Artists who sailed with Captain Cook. Australian Consolidated Press, Sydney.
- Thomas, Nicholas. 2003. The Extraordinary Voyages of Captain James Cook. Walker & Co., New York. ISBN 0-8027-1412-9

External links

- [http://www.biographi.ca/EN/ShowBio.asp?BioId=35939 Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online]
- [http://www.win.tue.nl/~engels/discovery/cook.html James Cook Links Page]
- [http://www.captaincooksociety.com/ccsu1.htm Captain Cook Society]
- [http://www.collectionscanada.ca/explorers/kids/h3-270-e.html Explorer voyage maps including those of James Cook]
- [http://nla.gov.au/nla.ms-ms1 The Endeavour journal], as kept by James Cook - digitised and held by the National Library of Australia
- [http://cuculus.tripod.com/cook.html Captain James Cook: The World's Explorer]
- [http://southseas.nla.gov.au/ The South Seas Project]: maps and online editions of the Journals of James Cook's First Pacific Voyage. 1768-1771, Includes full text of journals kept by Cook, Joseph Banks and Sydney Parkinson, as well as the complete text of John Hawkesworth's 1773 Account of Cook's first voyage.
- [http://www.cooktowns.com/] Cooktown's Official web page
- [http://www.naturespowerhouse.info] Nature's PowerHouse in Cooktown's Botanic Gardens.
- [http://www.barkendeavour.com.au/ The Endeavour Replica] A replica of Captain Cook's vessel.
-
- [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=10951 Find-A-Grave profile for James Cook] Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James Cook, James ja:ジェームズ・クック th:เจมส์ คุก

Captain James Cook (disambiguation)

Captain James Cook may refer to:
- James Cook - British explorer, navigator, and map maker
- Captain James Cook (TV miniseries) - 1987 Australian television miniseries

October 27

October 27 is the 300th day of the year (301st in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 65 days remaining.

Events

- 625 - Honorius I becomes Pope.
- 939 - Edmund I succeeds Athelstan as King of England.
- 1553 - Condemned as a heretic, Michael Servetus is burned at the stake just outside Geneva.
- 1644 - Second Battle of Newbury in the English Civil War.
- 1795 - The United States and Spain sign the Treaty of Madrid, which establishes the boundaries between Spanish colonies and the U.S.
- 1797 - Treaty of Campo Formio is signed between France and Austria.
- 1810 - United States annexes the former Spanish colony of West Florida.
- 1838 - Missouri governor Lilburn Boggs issues the Extermination Order, which orders all Mormons to leave the state.
- 1870 - Marshal François Achille Bazaine surrenders to Prussian forces at Metz along with 140,000 French soldiers in one of the biggest French defeats of the Franco-Prussian War.
- 1904 - First New York City Subway line opens; the system becomes biggest in United States of America, and one of the biggest in world.
- 1916 - Battle of Segale: Negus Mikael, marching on the Ethiopian capital in support of his son Emperor Iyasus V, is defeated by Fitawrari Habte Giyorgis, securing the throne for Empress Zauditu.
- 1946 - First commercially-sponsored television program airs (Geographically Speaking, sponsored by Bristol-Myers).
- 1948 - Léopold Sédar Senghor founds the Senegalese Democratic Bloc (BDS).
- 1949 - An airliner flying from Paris to New York crashes near the Azores. Among the victims are violinist Ginette Neveu and boxer Marcel Cerdan.
- 1953 - British nuclear test Totem 2 is detonated at Emu Field, South Australia.
- 1954 - Benjamin O. Davis Jr. becomes the first African-American general in the United States Air Force.
- 1958 - Iskander Mirza, the first President of Pakistan, is deposed in a bloodless coup d'état by General Ayub Khan, who was appointed the enforcer of martial law by Mirza 20 days earlier.
- 1961 - NASA launched the first Saturn I rocket in Mission Saturn-Apollo 1.
- 1962 - Major Rudolph Anderson of the US Air Force became the only direct human casualty of the Cuban Missile Crisis when his U-2 reconnaissance airplane was shot down in Cuba by a Soviet-supplied SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air missile.
- 1973 - The Canyon City meteorite, a 1.4 kg chondrite type meteorite strikes in Fremont County, Colorado.
- 1981 - The Soviet submarine U 137 runs aground on the east coast of Sweden.
- 1990 - Supreme Soviet of Kirghiz SSR chooses Askar Akayev as republic's first president.
- 1991 - Turkmenistan achieved independence from the Soviet Union.
- 1995 - Latvia applies for membership in the European Union.
- 1997 - Stock markets around the world crash because of fears of a global economic meltdown. The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummets 554.26 points to 7,161.15. For the first time, the New York Stock Exchange activated their "circuit breakers" twice during the day eventually making the controversial move of closing the Exchange early (see October 27, 1997 mini-crash).
- 1998 - Gerhard Schröder becomes Chancellor of Germany for the first time.
- 2002 - Trades unionist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is elected as President of Brazil.
- 2004 - End of the Curse of the Bambino: Major League Baseball's Boston Red Sox won Game 4 of the World Series 3-0, sweeping the series in 4 games over the St. Louis Cardinals on a night featuring a full lunar eclipse, becoming champions for the first time since 1918.
- 2004 - Matti Nykänen, once a very successful Finnish ski-jumper, is found guilty of attempt of manslaughter and sentenced to a two year and two month jail term for stabbing a family friend.
- 2005 - Iran launches its first satellite, sina 1, into space.
- 2005 - Harriet Miers withdraws her nomination to the US Supreme Court
- 2005 - Riots begin in Paris after the deaths of two Muslim teenagers

Births

- 1156 - Count Raymond VI of Toulouse (d. 1222)
- 1401 - Catherine of Valois, queen of Henry V of England (d. 1437)
- 1466 - Erasmus, Dutch humanist and theologian (d. 1536)
- 1728 - James Cook, British naval captain and explorer (d. 1779)
- 1744 - Mary Moser, English painter (d. 1819)
- 1760 - August von Gneisenau, Prussian field marshal (d. 1831)
- 1782 - Niccolò Paganini, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1840)
- 1811 - Isaac Singer, American inventor (d. 1875)
- 1811 - Stevens Thomson Mason, first Governor of Michigan (d. 1843)
- 1842 - Giovanni Giolitti, Italian statesman (d. 1928)
- 1844 - Klas Pontus Arnoldson, Swedish writer and pacifist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1916)
- 1858 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1919)
- 1873 - Emily Post, etiquette author (d. 1960)
- 1877 - George Thompson, English cricketer (d. 1943)
- 1894 - Oliver Leese, British general (d. 1978)
- 1906 - Earle Cabell, American politician (d. 1975)
- 1910 - Jack Carson, Canadian actor (d. 1963)
- 1914 - Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet (d. 1953)
- 1917 - Oliver Tambo, South African freedom fighter (d. 1993)
- 1918 - Teresa Wright, American actress (d. 2005)
- 1920 - Nanette Fabray, American actress
- 1920 - K. R. Narayanan, President of India
- 1922 - Poul Bundgaard, Danish actor and singer (d. 1998)
- 1923 - Roy Lichtenstein, American artist (d. 1997)
- 1924 - Ruby Dee, American actress
- 1925 - Albert Medwin, American inventor
- 1931 - Nawal El Saadawi, Egyptian writer
- 1932 - Sylvia Plath, American poet (d. 1963)
- 1939 - John Cleese, British actor and writer
- 1940 - John Gotti, American gangster (d. 2002)
- 1946 - Carrie Snodgress, American actress (d. 2004)
- 1950 - Fran Lebowitz, American writer
- 1953 - Peter Firth, British actor
- 1957 - Jeff East, American actor
- 1958 - Simon Le Bon, English singer (Duran Duran)
- 1963 - Marla Maples, American actress and model
- 1967 - Scott Weiland, American singer (Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver)
- 1970 - Adrian Erlandsson, Swedish drummer (Cradle of Filth)
- 1972 - Evan Coyne Maloney, American filmmaker
- 1972 - Brad Radke, baseball player
- 1977 - Jiří Jarosík, Czech footballer
- 1978 - Vanessa-Mae, Singapore musician
- 1980 - Tanel Padar, Estonian singer
- 1980 - Jeku, electronic musician Jake Jensen
- 1984 - Kelly Osbourne, English television personality

Deaths

- 939 - King Athelstan I of England
- 1271 - Hugh IV, Duke of Burgundy, French crusader (b. 1213)
- 1312 - John II, Duke of Brabant (b. 1275)
- 1327 - Elizabeth de Burgh, queen of Robert I of Scotland
- 1331 - Abu al-Fida, Arab hitorian and geographer (b. 1273)
- 1430 - Vytautas the Great, Grand Prince of Lithuania
- 1439 - Albert II of Germany, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1397)
- 1449 - Ulugh Beg, Timurid ruler and astronomer (b. 1394)
- 1505 - Ivan III of Russia (b. 1440)
- 1553 - Michael Servetus, Spanish theologian (burned at the stake) (b. 1511)
- 1561 - Lope de Aguirre, Spanish conquistador
- 1573 - Laurentius Petri, first Lutheran Archbishop of Sweden (b. 1499)
- 1617 - Ralph Winwood, English politician
- 1670 - Vavasor Powell, Welsh non-conformist leader (b. 1617)
- 1674 - Hallgrímur Pétursson, Icelandic poet (b. 1614)
- 1675 - Gilles de Roberval, French mathematician (b. 1602)
- 1789 - John Cook, American farmer and President of Delaware (b. 1730)
- 1917 - Arthur Rhys Davids, English pilot (b. 1897)
- 1949 - Marcel Cerdan, French boxer (b. 1916)
- 1949 - Ginette Neveu, French violinist (b. 1919)
- 1953 - Thomas Wass, English cricketer (b. 1873)
- 1962 - Enrico Mattei, Italian politician (b. 1906)
- 1968 - Lise Meitner, German physicist (b. 1878)
- 1975 - Rex Stout, American novelist (b. 1886)
- 1977 - James M. Cain, American novelist (b. 1892)
- 1980 - Steve Peregrin Took, English singer and songwriter (b. 1949)
- 1980 - John Hasbrouck van Vleck, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1899)
- 1990 - Xavier Cugat, Spanish-born musician (b. 1900)
- 1990 - Elliott Roosevelt, American war hero, author, and advertising executive (b. 1910)
- 1992 - David Bohm, American-born physicist, philosopher, and neuropsychologist (b. 1917)
- 1996 - Morey Amsterdam, American actor (b. 1908)
- 1999 - Robert Mills, American physicist (b. 1927)
- 2000 - Walter Berry, Austrian bass-baritone (b. 1929)
- 2003 - Rod Roddy, American television announcer (b. 1937)
- 2005 - Bob Broeg, American sports writer (b. 1918)

Holidays and observances

- R.C. saints - October 27th is the feast day of the following Roman Catholic Saints:
- St. Abraham the Poor
- St. Abban of Murnevin
- St. Capitolina
- St. Desiderius
- St. Elesbaan
- St. Florentius
- St. Frumentius, the saint who introduced Christianity into Ethiopia.
- St. Gaudiosus
- St. Namatius
- St. Odhran
- St. Vincent, Sabina, & Christeta
- Turkmenistan - Independence Day (from USSR, 1991)
- Saint Vincent and the Grenadines - Independence Day (from Britain, 1979)

External links

- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/october/27 BBC: On This Day] ---- October 26 - October 28 - November 27 - September 27 - more historical anniversaries ko:10월 27일 ms:27 Oktober ja:10月27日 simple:October 27 th:27 ตุลาคม

Julian calendar

The Julian calendar was introduced in 46 BC by Julius Caesar and took force in 45 BC (709 ab urbe condita). It was chosen after consultation with the Alexandrian astronomer Sosigenes and was probably designed to approximate the tropical year, known at least since Hipparchus. It has a regular year of 365 days divided into 12 months, and a leap day is added to February every four years. Hence the Julian year is on average 365.25 days long. The Julian calendar remained in use into the 20th century in some countries and is still used by many national Orthodox churches. However, too many leap days are added with respect to the astronomical seasons on this scheme. On average, the astronomical solstices and the equinoxes advance by about 11 minutes per year against the Julian year, causing the calendar to gain a day about every 134 years. While Hipparchus and presumably Sosigenes were aware of the discrepancy, although not of its correct value, it was evidently felt to be of little importance. However, it accumulated significantly over time, and eventually led to the reform of 1582, which replaced the Julian calendar with the more accurate Gregorian calendar. The notation "Old Style" (OS) is sometimes used to indicate a date in the Julian calendar, as opposed to "New Style", which indicates a date in the Gregorian Calendar. This notation is used when there might otherwise be confusion about which date is found in a text.

From Roman to Julian

The ordinary year in the previous Roman calendar consisted of 12 months, for a total of 355 days. In addition, an intercalary month, the Mensis Intercalaris, was sometimes inserted between February and March. This intercalary month was formed by inserting 22 days before the last five days of February, creating a 27-day month. It began after a truncated February having 23 or 24 days, so that it had the effect of adding 22 or 23 days to the year, forming an intercalary year of 377 or 378 days. According to the later writers Censorinus and Macrobius, the ideal intercalary cycle consisted of ordinary years of 355 days alternating with intercalary years, which were alternately 377 and 378 days long. On this system, the average Roman year would have had 366¼ days over four years, giving it an average drift of one day per year relative to any solstice or equinox. Macrobius describes a further refinement wherein, for 8 years out of 24, there were only three intercalary years each of 377 days. This refinement averages the length of the year to 365¼ days over 24 years. In practice, intercalations did not occur schematically according to these ideal systems, but were determined by the pontifices. So far as can be determined from the historical evidence, they were much less regular than these ideal schemes suggest. They usually occurred every second or third year, but were sometimes omitted for much longer, and occasionally occurred in two consecutive years. If managed correctly this system allowed the Roman year, on average, to stay roughly aligned to a tropical year. However, if too many intercalations were omitted, as happened after the Second Punic War and during the Civil Wars, the calendar would drift rapidly out of alignment with the tropical year. Moreover, since intercalations were often determined quite late, the average Roman citizen often did not know the date, particularly if he were some distance from the city. For these reasons, the last years of the pre-Julian calendar were later known as years of confusion. The problems became particularly acute during Julius Caesar's pontificate, 63 BC to 46 BC, when there were only five intercalary months, whereas there should have been eight, and none at all during the five Roman years before 46 BC. The Julian reform was intended to correct this problem permanently. Before it took effect, the missed intercalations during Julius Caesar's pontificate were made up by inserting 67 days (22+23+22) between November and December of 46 BC in the form of two months, in addition to 23 days which had already been added to February. Thus 90 days were added to this last year of the Roman Republican calendar, giving it 445 days. Because it was the last of a series of irregular years, this extra-long year was, and is, referred to as the last year of confusion. The first year of operation of the new calendar was 45 BC.

Leap years error

Despite the new calendar being much simpler than the Roman calendar, the pontifices apparently misunderstood the algorithm. They added a leap day every three years, instead of every four years. According to Macrobius, the error was the result of counting inclusively, so that the four year cycle was considered as including both the first and fourth years. This resulted in too many leap days. Caesar Augustus remedied this discrepancy by restoring the correct frequency after 36 years of this mistake. He also skipped several leap days in order to realign the year. The historic sequence of leap years (i.e. years with a leap day) in this period is not given explicitly by any ancient source, although the existence of the triennial leap year cycle is confirmed by an inscription that dates from 9 or 8 BC. The chronologist Joseph Scaliger established in 1583 that the Augustan reform was instituted in 8 BC, and inferred that the sequence of leap years was 42, 39, 36, 33, 30, 27, 24, 21, 18, 15, 12, 9 BC, AD 8, 12 etc. This proposal is still the most widely accepted solution. It has also sometimes been suggested that 45 BC was a leap year. Other solutions have been proposed from time to time. Kepler proposed in 1614 that the correct sequence of leap years was 43, 40, 37, 34, 31, 28, 25, 22, 19, 16, 13, 10 BC, AD 8, 12 etc. In 1883 the German chronologist Matzat proposed 44, 41, 38, 35, 32, 29, 26, 23, 20, 17, 14, 11 BC, AD 4, 8, 12 etc., based on a passage in Dio Cassius that mentions a leap day in 41 BC that was said to be contrary to (Caesar's) rule. In the 1960s Radke argued the reform was actually instituted when Augustus became pontifex maximus in 12 BC, suggesting the sequence 45, 42, 39, 36, 33, 30, 27, 24, 21, 18, 15, 12 BC, AD 4, 8, 12 etc. In 1999, an Egyptian papyrus was published which gives an ephemeris table for 24 BC with both Roman and Egyptian dates. From this it can be shown that the most likely sequence was in fact 44, 41, 38, 35, 32, 29, 26, 23, 20, 17, 14, 11, 8 BC, AD 4, 8, 12 etc, very close to that proposed by Matzat. This sequence shows that the standard Julian leap year sequence began in AD 4, the twelfth year of the Augustan reform. Also, under this sequence the actual Roman year coincided with the proleptic Julian year between 32 and 26 BC. This suggests that one aim of the realignment portion of the Augustan reform was to ensure that key dates of his career, notably the fall of Alexandria on 1 August 30 BC, were unaffected by his correction. Roman dates before 32 BC were typically a day or two before the day with the same Julian date, so 1 January in the Roman calendar of the first year of the Julian reform actually fell on 31 December 46 BC (Julian date). A curious effect of this is that Caesar's assassination on the Ides (15th day) of March in 44 BC fell on 14 March 44 BC in the Julian calendar.

Naming of the months

Immediately after the Julian reform, the twelve months of the Roman calendar were named Ianuarius, Februarius, Martius, Aprilis, Maius, Iunius, Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, and December, just as they were before the reform. Their lengths were set to their modern values. The old intercalary month, the Mensis Intercalaris, was abolished and replaced with an single intercalary day at the same point (i.e. five days before the end of Februarius). The first month of the year continued to be Ianuarius, as it had been since 153 BC. The Romans later renamed months after Caesar and Augustus, renaming Quintilis (originally, "the Fifth month", with March = month 1) as Iulius (July) in 44 BC and Sextilis ("Sixth month") as Augustus (August) in 8 BC. (Note that the letter J was not invented until the 17th century). Quintilis was renamed to honour Caesar because it was the month of his birth. According to a senatusconsultum quoted by Macrobius, Sextilis was renamed to honour Augustus because several of the most significant events in his rise to power, culminating in the fall of Alexandria, fell in that month. Other months were renamed by other emperors, but apparently none of the later changes survived their deaths. Caligula renamed September ("Seventh month") as Germanicus; Nero renamed Aprilis (April) as Neroneus, Maius (May) as Claudius and Iunius (June) as Germanicus; and Domitian renamed September as Germanicus and October ("Eighth month") as Domitianus. At other times, September was also renamed as Antoninus and Tacitus, and November ("Ninth month") was renamed Faustina and Romanus. Commodus was unique in renaming all twelve months after his own adopted names (January to December): Amazonius, Invictus, Felix, Pius, Lucius, Aelius, Aurelius, Commodus, Augustus, Herculeus, Romanus, and Exsuperatorius. Much more lasting than the ephemeral month names of the post-Augustan Roman emperors were the names introduced by Charlemagne. He renamed all of the months agriculturally into Old High German. They were used until the 15th century, and with some modifications until the late 18th century in Germany and in the Netherlands (January-December): Wintarmanoth (winter month), Hornung (spring), Lentzinmanoth (Lent month), Ostarmanoth (Easter month), Winnemanoth (grazing month), Brachmanoth (plowing month), Heuvimanoth (hay month), Aranmanoth (harvest month), Witumanoth (wood month), Windumemanoth (vintage month), Herbistmanoth (autumn/harvest month), and Heilagmanoth (holy month). Translations of these month names are still used to this day in some Slavic languages, such as Polish.

Lengths of the months

According to the 13th century scholar Sacrobosco, the original scheme for the months in the Julian Calendar was very regular, alternately long and short. From January through December, the month lengths according to Sacrobosco for the Roman Republican calendar were: :30, 29, 30, 29, 30, 29, 30, 29, 30, 29, 30, and 29, totaling 354 days. He then thought that Julius Caesar added one day to every month except February, a total of 11 more days, giving the year 365 days. A leap day could now be added to the extra short February: :31, 29 (30), 31, 30, 31, 30, 31, 30, 31, 30, 31, and 30 He then said Augustus changed this to: :31, 28 (29), 31, 30, 31, 30, 31, 31, 30, 31, 30, and 31 giving us the irregular month lengths which we still use today, so that the length of Augustus would not be shorter than (and therefore inferior to) the length of Iulius. Although this theory is still widely repeated, it is certainly wrong. First, a wall painting of a Roman Republican calendar has survived [http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/w/x/wxk116/RomanCalendar/Fasti4.gif] which confirms the literary accounts that the months were already irregular before Julius Caesar reformed it: :29, 28, 31, 29, 31, 29, 31, 29, 29, 31, 29, and 29 Also, the Julian reform did not change the dates of the Nones and Ides. In particular, the Ides are late (on the 15th rather than 13th) in March, May, July and October, showing that these months always had 31 days in the Roman calendar, whereas Sacrobosco's theory requires that the length of October was changed. Further, Sacrobosco's theory is explicitly contradicted by the third and fifth century authors Censorinus and Macrobius, and, finally, it is inconsistent with seasonal lengths given by Varro, writing in 37 BC, before the Augustan reform, with the 31-day Sextilis given by the new Egyptian papyrus from 24 BC, and with the 28-day February shown in the Fasti Caeretani, which is dated before 12 BC.

Year numbering

The dominant method that the Romans used to identify a year for dating purposes was to name it after the two consuls who took office in it. Since 153 BC, they had taken office on 1 January, and Julius Caesar did not change the beginning of the year. Thus this consular year was an eponymous or named year. Roman years were named this way until the last consul was appointed in 541. Only rarely did the Romans number the year from the founding of the city (of Rome), ab urbe condita (AUC). This method was used by Roman historians to determine the number of years from one event to another, not to date a year. Different historians had several different dates for the founding. The Fasti Capitolini, an inscription containing an official list of the consuls which was published by Augustus, used an epoch of 752 BC. The epoch used by Varro, 753 BC, has been adopted by modern historians. Indeed, Renaissance editors often added it to the manuscripts that they published, giving the false impression that the Romans numbered their years. Most modern historians tacitly assume that it began on the day the consuls took office, and ancient documents such as the Fasti Capitolini which use other AUC systems do so in the same way. However, the Varronian AUC year did not formally begin on 1 January, but on Founder's Day, 21 April. This prevented the early Roman church from celebrating Easter after 21 April because the festivities associated with Founder's Day conflicted with the solemnity of Lent, which was observed until the Saturday before Easter Sunday. In addition to consular years, the Romans sometimes used the regnal year of the emperor. Anno Diocletiani, named after Diocletian, was often used by the Alexandrian Christians to number their Easters during the fourth and fifth centuries. In AD 537, Justinian required that henceforth the date must include the name of the emperor, in addition to the indiction and the consul (the latter ending only four years later). The indiction caused the Byzantine year to begin on 1 September, which is still used in the Eastern Orthodox Church for the beginning of the liturgical year. In AD 525 Dionysius Exiguus proposed the system of anno Domini, which gradually spread through the western Christian world, once the system was adopted by Bede. Years were numbered from the supposed date of the incarnation or annunciation of Jesus on 25 March, although this soon changed to Christmas, then back to Annunciation Day in Britain, and the numbered year even began on Easter in France.

From Julian to Gregorian

The Julian calendar was in general use in Europe from the times of the Roman Empire until 1582, when Pope Gregory XIII promulgated the Gregorian Calendar, which was soon adopted by most Catholic countries. The Protestant countries followed later, and the countries of Eastern Europe even later. Great Britain had Thursday 14 September 1752 follow Wednesday 2 September 1752. Sweden adopted the new style calendar in 1753, but also for a twelve-year period starting in 1700 used a modified Julian Calendar. Russia remained on the Julian calendar until after the Russian Revolution (which is thus called the 'October Revolution' but occurred in November according to the Gregorian calendar), in 1917, while Greece continued to use it until 1923. Although all Eastern European countries had adopted the Gregorian calendar on or before 1923, their national Eastern Orthodox churches had not. A revised Julian calendar was proposed during a synod in Constantinople in May of 1923, consisting of a solar part which was and will be identical to the Gregorian calendar until the year 2800, and a lunar part which calculated Easter astronomically at Jerusalem. All Orthodox churches refused to accept the lunar part, so almost all Orthodox churches continue to celebrate Easter according to the Julian calendar (the Finnish Orthodox Church uses the Gregorian Easter). The solar part was only accepted by some Orthodox churches, those of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Greece, Cyprus, Romania, Poland, Bulgaria (in 1963), and the Orthodox Church in America (although some OCA parishes are permitted to use the Julian calendar). Thus, these churches celebrate the Nativity on the same day that Western Christians do, 25 December Gregorian until 2800. The Orthodox churches of Jerusalem, Russia, Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine, and the Greek Old Calendarists continue to use the Julian calendar for their fixed dates, thus they celebrate the Nativity on 25 December Julian (7 January Gregorian until 2100).

External links

- [http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/JulianDate.html Julian-Gregorian Converter]
- [http://webexhibits.org/calendars/index.html Calendars through the ages] on WebExhibits.
- [http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Egypt/ptolemies/chron/roman/chron_rom_cal.htm Roman Dates]
- [http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/calendar/romancalendar.html The Roman Calendar]
- [http://5ko.free.fr/jul-greg.php?e=en Synoptical Julian-Gregorian Calendar] - compare the Julian and Gregorian calendars for any date between 1582 and 2100 using this side-by-side reference. Category:Ancient Rome Category:Specific calendars als:Julianischer Kalender ko:율리우스력 ja:ユリウス暦 simple:Julian calendar th:ปฏิทินจูเลียน

1779

1779 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar).

Events

- The Iron Bridge is completed across the River Severn in Shropshire; the first all cast-iron bridge ever constructed.
- Boulton and Watt's Smethwick Engine, now the oldest working engine in the world, is brought into service.
- The city of Tampere is founded in Finland.
- January 9 - British troops surrender to the Marathas in Wadgaon, India, and are forced to return all terrorities acquired since 1773.
- January 22 - Claudius Smith is hanged at Goshen, Orange County, New York for supposed acts of terrorism upon the people of the surrounding communities during the American Revolutionary War.
- May 13 - War of Bavarian Succession: Russian and French mediators at the Congress of Teschen negotiate an end to the war. In the agreement Austria receives a part of its territory that was taken from them (the Inn District).
- June 1 - American Revolutionary War: Benedict Arnold is court-martialed for malfeasance in his treatment of government property.
- July 16 - American Revolutionary War: United States forces led by General Anthony Wayne capture Stony Point, New York from British troops.
- July 22 - Exactly six months to the day after Claudius Smith was hanged, Mohawk Indian Chief Joseph Brant, completely wiped out the town of Goshen, New York in what was known as the Battle of Minisink leaving at least 33 living women as widows.
- December 13 - Marriage of Alexandre, Vicomte de Beauharnais to Joséphine Tascher de la Pagerie.
- December 25 - Fort Nashborough, later to become Nashville, Tennessee, founded by James Robertson.

Births

- January 5 - Stephen Decatur, American naval officer (d. 1820)
- January 18 - Peter Roget, Scottish lexicographer (d. 1869)
- March 6 - Antoine-Henri Jomini, French eneral (d. 1869)
- March 15 - Lord Melbourne, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1848)
- May 28 - Thomas Moore, Irish poet (d. 1852)
- August 1 - Francis Scott Key, American lawyer and lyricist (d. 1843)
- August 20 - Jöns Jakob Berzelius, Swedish chemist (d. 1848)
- November 14 - Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger, Danish poet (d. 1850)
- Giacomo Beltrami, Italian explorer (d. 1855)

Deaths

- January 3 - Claude Bourgelat, French veterinary surgeon (b. 1712)
- January 20 - David Garrick, English actor (d. 1717)
- January 22 - Jeremiah Dixon, English surveyor and astronomer (b. 1733)
- February 7 - William Boyce, English composer (b. 1711)
- February 14 - James Cook, British naval captain and explorer (b. 1728)
- February 24 - Paul Daniel Longolius, German encylopedist (b. 1704)
- April 24 - Eleazar Wheelock, American founder of Dartmouth College (b. 1711)
- May 3 - John Winthrop, American astronomer (b. 1714)
- June 7 - William Warburton, English critic and Bishop of Gloucester (b. 1698)
- September 12 - Richard Grenville-Temple, 2nd Earl Temple, English politician (b. 1711)
- November 16 - Pehr Kalm, Finnish explorer and naturalist (b. 1716)
- December 6 - Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, French painter (b. 1699)
- December 17 - Giuseppe Carcani, Italian composer (b. ?1703)
- December 23 - Augustus Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol, British admiral and politician (b. 1724)
- Emperor Go-Momozono of Japan (d. 1758) Category:1779 ko:1779년 ms:1779 simple:1779

Kingdom of Great Britain

:This article is about the historical state called the Kingdom of Great Britain (1707-1800). For information about its modern successor state, see the main article: United Kingdom. :For other meanings of the terms "United Kingdom" and "UK" , see United Kingdom (disambiguation) and UK (disambiguation). :For an explanation of terms like England, (Great) Britain and United Kingdom see British Isles (terminology). The Kingdom of Great Britain, also known as the United Kingdom of Great Britain, was a state located in Western Europe, from 1707 to 1800. It was created by the merging of the Kingdom of Scotland and the Kingdom of England under the Acts of Union 1707 to create a single kingdom encompassing the whole of the island of Great Britain. A new, single parliament and government, based in Westminster in London, controlled the new kingdom. The two former kingdoms had shared the same monarch since King James VI of Scotland became King James I of England in 1603. From 1707 onward, a joint "British" throne replaced the English and Scottish thrones and a joint Parliament of Great Britain replaced the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England. Scotland and England were given seats in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords of the new parliament. Although Scotland's representation in both houses was smaller than its population indicated it should have been, representation in parliament was at that time based not on population but on taxation, and Scotland was given a greater number of MPs than its share of taxation warranted. Under the terms of the union, Scotland elected forty-five members to the Commons and sent sixteen representative peers to the Lords. The Kingdom of Great Britain was superseded by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in 1801 when the Kingdom of Ireland was absorbed with the enactment of the Act of Union following the suppression of the Irish Rebellion of 1798.
Monarchs of Great Britain

- Anne (1707–1714), previously Queen of England, Queen of Scotland, and Queen of Ireland since 1702.
- George I (1714–1727)
- George II (1727–1760)
- George III (1760–1801), continued as King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until 1820.
See also

- Union Jack
- UK topics
- Style of the British Sovereign
Great Britain, United Kingdom of Great Britain, United Kingdom of Category:History of Great Britain British Isles (terminology) ja:グレートブリテン王国

Explorers

Exploration is the act of searching or traveling for the purpose of discovery, e.g. of unknown regions, including space (space exploration), or oil, gas, coal, ores, water (also known as prospecting), or information. Exploration has existed as long as human beings, but its peak is seen as being during the Age of Exploration when European navigators travelled around the world. In scientific research, exploration is one of three purposes of research (the other two being description and explanation). Exploration is the attempt to develop an initial, rough understanding of some phenomenon.

Main Explorers Since 1 AD

Erik the Red (950 - 1003) - Viking explorer. After being cast out from Greenland, he sailed to Newfoundland and settled. Marco Polo (1254 - 1324) - Italian explorer. John Cabot (c. 1450 - 1499) - Italian explorer. Discovered Newfoundland and claimed it for the Kingdom of England. Christopher Columbus (1451 - 1506) - Italian explorer. Sailed in 1492 and discovered the "New World" of the Americas. Juan Ponce de León (c. 1460 - 1521) - Spanish explorer. He explored Florida while vainly trying to find the Fountain of Youth. Vasco da Gama (c. 1469 - 1524) - Portuguese explorer. He sailed from Portugal to India to rounding the Cape of Good Hope. Vasco Núñez de Balboa (c. 1475 - 1519) - European Explorer. The first European to cross the Isthmus of Panama view the ocean from American shores. Francisco Pizarro (c. 1475 - 1541) - Spanish explorer. Conquered the Inca Empire. Ferdinand_Magellan (1480 - 1521) - Portuguese explorer. Sailed around Cape Horn and named Pacific Ocean. He died in the Philippines which he claimed for Spain but his ship made it back. Giovanni da Verrazano (c. 1485 - 1528) - Italian explorer. Explored the northeast coast, from Newfoundland to about present day South Carolina. Hernán Cortés (1485 - 1545) - Spanish explorer. Conquered the Aztec Empire for Spain. Hernando de Soto (c. 1496 - 1542) - Spanish explorer. Explored Florida, mainly northwest Florida, and discovered the Mississippi River. Francisco Vásquez de Coronado (c. 1510 - 1554) - Spanish explorer. Searched for the Seven Cities of Gold and discovered the Grand Canyon in the process. Sir Francis Drake (c. 1540 - 1596) - English explorer. The first Englishman to sail around the world and survive. Vitus Bering (1681 - 1741) - Danish explorer. Explored the Siberian Far West and Alaska and claimed it for Russia. James Cook (1728 - 1779) - English naval captain. Explored much of the Pacific including New Zealand, Australia and Hawaii. Robert Bartlett (1875 - 1946) - Newfoundland captain. Led over 40 expeditions to the Arctic, more than anyone before or since. Was the first to sail north of 88° N lattitude. Samuel_de_Champlain

Exploration by area

- Asian exploration
- Exploration of Asia
- Exploration of the Pacific
- African exploration
- Native American exploration
- American exploration
- Exploration of the Americas
- European exploration of Asia
- European exploration of Africa
- European exploration of Australia
- European exploration of North America
- Exploration of the High Alps
- Exploration of the moon
- Exploration of Mars

Navigator

A navigator is the person onboard a ship responsible for the navigation of the vessel. On aircraft, the position may also be referred to as a flight officer. The navigator's responsibilities include planning the journey, advising the captain (or pilot) while en route, and ensuring that hazards or obstacles are avoided. In the United States Air Force, the Navigator Badge is earned by officers so qualified. Depending on the aircraft and job responsibilities, navigators in the Air Force may also be referred to as Weapon System Officers (WSO) or Electronic Warfare Officers (EWO). In the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, the equivalent position is known as a Naval Flight Officer (NFO). Shipborne Navigators in the U.S. Navy must be Surface Warfare qualified. In the Royal Air Force, the term navigator is always used for the holder of this position in aircraft, including the backseat crew member in two-seater aircraft. Like pilots, navigators are always commissioned officers. They wear the single-wing aircrew brevet, with a capital 'N' in the centre.

Cartographer

Cartography is the study of map making and cartographers are map makers.

Before 1400

- Dicaearchus (Greece, circa 350 B.C. - circa 285 B.C.), philosopher, cartographer, geographer, mathematician, author
- Hipparchus, (Greece, 190 B.C. - 120 B.C.), astronomer, cartographer, geographer
- Isidore of Seville (Spain, 560 - 636)
- Ptolemy, (Ptolemaic Egypt, Greece, circa 85 - circa 165), astronomer, cartographer, geographer'
- Al-Idrisi (Sicily, 1100-1166) Arab cartographer, geographer and traveller.

15th century

- Martin Behaim (Germany, 1436 – 1507)
- Erhard Etzlaub (1460 – 1532)
- Fra Mauro (Venice, c.1459)
- Sebastian Münster (Germany, 1488 – 1552)
- Piri Re