Alexander Obolensky
Prince Alexander Sergeevich Obolensky KStJ (russian: Александр Серге́евич Оболенский; 17 February 1916 – 29 March 1940) was a Rurikid prince of Russian origin who became a naturalised Briton, having spent most of his life in England, and who went on to represent England in international rugby union. He was, and remains, popularly known as "The Flying Prince", "The Flying Slav", or simply as "Obo" to many sports fans. Biography A member of the Rurik dynasty, he was born at Petrograd (now Saint Petersburg) on 17 February 1916, the son of Prince Sergei Alexandrovich Obolensky, an officer in the Tsar's Imperial Horse Guards and his wife Princess Lubov' (''née'' Naryshkina). The family name derives from the ancient Russian city of Obolensk; they fled Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and settled in Muswell Hill, London. He was appointed a Knight of St John in 1938. Obolensky was educated at The Ashe boys' preparatory school, Etwall an ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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England National Rugby Union Team
The England national rugby union team represents England in men's international rugby union. They compete in the annual Six Nations Championship with France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales. England have won the championship on 29 occasions (as well as sharing 10 victories) – winning the Grand Slam 13 times and the Triple Crown 26 times – making them the most successful outright winners in the tournament's history. They are currently the only team from the Northern Hemisphere to win the Rugby World Cup, having won the tournament in 2003, and have been runners-up on three other occasions. The history of the team extends back to 1871 when the English rugby team played their first official test match, losing 1–0 to Scotland. England dominated the early Home Nations Championship (now the Six Nations) which started in 1883. Following the schism of rugby football in 1895 into union and league, England did not win the Championship again until 1910. They first played aga ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Oxford University RFC
The Oxford University Rugby Football Club (Oxford University RFC or OURFC) is the rugby union club of the University of Oxford. The club contests The Varsity Match every year against Cambridge University at Twickenham. History Men's team The University of Oxford RFC was founded in 1869, fifteen months before the creation of the Rugby Football Union. The first Varsity Match was played in February 1872 in Oxford at 'The Parks', the following year the return game was played in Cambridge on Parker's Piece. In 1874 it was decided that the game be played on a neutral ground. Oxford, like rivals Cambridge, have supplied hundreds of players to national teams, and was key in spreading the sport of rugby throughout Britain as past students brought the game back to their home counties. The very first international player to be capped whilst at Oxford was Cecil Boyle, who represented England in 1873, one season before Cambridge University. In 1951 OURFC became the first Western rugby ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Imperial Guard (Russia)
The Russian Imperial Guard, officially known as the Leib Guard (russian: Лейб-гвардия ''Leyb-gvardiya'', from German ''Leib'' "body"; cf. Life Guards / Bodyguard) were military units serving as personal guards of the Emperor of Russia. Peter the Great founded the first such units following the Prussian practice in 1683, to replace the politically motivated Streltsy. The Imperial Guard subsequently increased in size and diversity to become an elite corps of all branches within the Imperial Army rather than Household troops in direct attendance on the Tsar. Numerous links were however maintained with the Imperial family and the bulk of the regiments of the Imperial Guard were stationed in and around Saint Petersburg in peacetime. The Imperial Guard was disbanded in 1917 following the Russian Revolution. History Peter the Great first established the two senior units of the eventual Imperial Guard, the Preobrazhensky and Semyonovsky infantry regiments. Peter formed ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tsar
Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East Slavs, East and South Slavs, South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''Caesar (title), caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" in the European medieval sense of the term—a ruler with the same rank as a Roman emperor, holding it by the approval of another emperor or a supreme ecclesiastical official (the Pope or the Ecumenical Patriarch)—but was usually considered by western Europeans to be equivalent to "king". It lends its name to a system of government, tsarist autocracy or tsarism. "Tsar" and its variants were the official titles of the following states: * Bulgarian Empire (First Bulgarian Empire in 681–1018, Second Bulgarian Empire in 1185–1396), and also used in Kingdom of Bulgaria, Tsardom of Bulgaria, in 1908–1946 * Serbian Empire, in 1346–1371 * Tsardom of Russia, in 1547–1721 (replaced in 1721 by ''imperator'' in Russian Empire, but still re ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Officer (armed Forces)
An officer is a person who holds a position of authority as a member of an armed force or uniformed service. Broadly speaking, "officer" means a commissioned officer, a non-commissioned officer, or a warrant officer. However, absent contextual qualification, the term typically refers only to a force's ''commissioned officers'', the more senior members who derive their authority from a commission from the head of state. Numbers The proportion of officers varies greatly. Commissioned officers typically make up between an eighth and a fifth of modern armed forces personnel. In 2013, officers were the senior 17% of the British armed forces, and the senior 13.7% of the French armed forces. In 2012, officers made up about 18% of the German armed forces, and about 17.2% of the United States armed forces. Historically, however, armed forces have generally had much lower proportions of officers. During the First World War, fewer than 5% of British soldiers were officers (partly ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rurik Dynasty
The Rurik dynasty ( be, Ру́рыкавічы, Rúrykavichy; russian: Рю́риковичи, Ryúrikovichi, ; uk, Рю́риковичі, Riúrykovychi, ; literally "sons/scions of Rurik"), also known as the Rurikid dynasty or Rurikids, was a noble lineage founded by the Varangian prince Rurik, who established himself in Novgorod around the year AD 862. The Rurikids were the ruling dynasty of Kievan Rus' (after the conquest of Kiev by Oleg of Novgorod in 882) before it finally disintegrated in the mid-13th century, as well as the successor Rus' principalities and Rus' prince republics of Novgorod, Pskov, Vladimir-Suzdal, Ryazan, Smolensk, Galicia-Volhynia (after 1199), Chernigov, and the Grand Duchy of Moscow (from 1263). Following the disintegration of Kievan Rus', the most powerful state to eventually arise was the Grand Duchy of Moscow, initially a part of Vladimir-Suzdal, which, along with the Novgorod Republic, established the basis of the modern Russian natio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rugby Union
Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its most common form, a game is played between two teams of 15 players each, using an oval-shaped ball on a rectangular field called a pitch. The field has H-shaped goalposts at both ends. Rugby union is a popular sport around the world, played by people of all genders, ages and sizes. In 2014, there were more than 6 million people playing worldwide, of whom 2.36 million were registered players. World Rugby, previously called the International Rugby Football Board (IRFB) and the International Rugby Board (IRB), has been the governing body for rugby union since 1886, and currently has 101 countries as full members and 18 associate members. In 1845, the first laws were written by students attending Rugby School; other significant even ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Russian Nobility
The Russian nobility (russian: дворянство ''dvoryanstvo'') originated in the 14th century. In 1914 it consisted of approximately 1,900,000 members (about 1.1% of the population) in the Russian Empire. Up until the February Revolution of 1917, the noble estates staffed most of the Russian government and possessed a Gentry assembly. The Russian word for nobility, ''dvoryanstvo'' (), derives from Slavonic ''dvor'' (двор), meaning the court of a prince or duke (''kniaz''), and later, of the tsar or emperor. Here, ''dvor'' originally referred to servants at the estate of an aristocrat. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the system of hierarchy was a system of seniority known as ''mestnichestvo''. The word ''dvoryane'' described the highest rank of gentry, who performed duties at the royal court, lived in it (''Moskovskie zhiltsy''), or were candidates to it, as for many boyar scions (''dvorovye deti boyarskie'', ''vybornye deti boyarskie''). A nobleman is call ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rurikid
The Rurik dynasty ( be, Ру́рыкавічы, Rúrykavichy; russian: Рю́риковичи, Ryúrikovichi, ; uk, Рю́риковичі, Riúrykovychi, ; literally "sons/scions of Rurik"), also known as the Rurikid dynasty or Rurikids, was a noble lineage founded by the Varangian prince Rurik, who established himself in Novgorod around the year AD 862. The Rurikids were the ruling dynasty of Kievan Rus' (after the conquest of Kiev by Oleg of Novgorod in 882) before it finally disintegrated in the mid-13th century, as well as the successor Rus' principalities and Rus' prince republics of Novgorod, Pskov, Vladimir-Suzdal, Ryazan, Smolensk, Galicia-Volhynia (after 1199), Chernigov, and the Grand Duchy of Moscow (from 1263). Following the disintegration of Kievan Rus', the most powerful state to eventually arise was the Grand Duchy of Moscow, initially a part of Vladimir-Suzdal, which, along with the Novgorod Republic, established the basis of the modern Russian nation.Excer ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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KStJ
The Order of St John, short for Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem (french: l'ordre très vénérable de l'Hôpital de Saint-Jean de Jérusalem) and also known as St John International, is a British royal order of chivalry constituted in 1888 by royal charter from Queen Victoria and dedicated to St John the Baptist. The order traces its origins back to the Knights Hospitaller in the Middle Ages, which was later known as the Order of Malta. A faction of them emerged in France in the 1820s and moved to Britain in the early 1830s, where, after operating under a succession of grand priors and different names, it became associated with the founding in 1882 of the St John Ophthalmic Hospital near the old city of Jerusalem and the St John Ambulance Brigade in 1887. The order is found throughout the Commonwealth of Nations, Hong Kong, the Republic of Ireland, and the United States of America, with the worldwide mission "to prevent and relieve sickness and ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Repnin Coat
The House of Repnin (russian: Репнин), the name of an old Russian princely family of Rurikid stock. The family traces its name to Prince Ivan Mikhailovich Obolensky (+1523), nicknamed ''Repnya'', i.e., "bad porridge". Like other Princes Obolensky, he descended from Mikhail Vsevolodovich, prince of Chernigov, who, in 1246, was assassinated by the Mongols. Notable members of the family include: *Princess Elena Mikhailovna Repnina ( ru) was the first wife of future tsar Vasily Shuisky. The date of marriage is unknown, although they are mentioned together in 1580 as the witnesses in the description of Ivan IV's wedding with Maria Nagaya. She had no children and died possibly in 1592, hypothetically - as the divorced woman in the monastery. The information about her is quite poor.Репнин М. И. Князья Репнины в истории Отечества. М.2009. С.44 Her grave is unknown. Only in 1608 Vasily took the 2nd wife Maria Buynosova-Rostovskaya who becom ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1936 British Lions Tour To Argentina
The 1936 British Lions tour of Argentina was a series of rugby union matches arranged between the British Lions and various Argentine teams. The tourists played ten matches, nine of which were against club and combined teams while one match took in a full Argentina national team. Despite being sanctioned by the International Rugby Board, no caps were awarded to players from either side. This was the third and final international tour to South America by a combined British team, and although classed as the British Lions, it was predominantly English, with a handful of Scottish and Irish players. The Lions won all the games played, scoring 399 points and conceding only 12. Background By 1936 Argentine rugby was in expansion and growth. Four years earlier, the Junior Springboks had visited the country to play several matches. In 1933 two South African players, Wollie Wolheim and Rybeck Elliot returned to Argentina to play for local team Hindú, which was considered by the Arg ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |