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Papillon (book)
''Papillon'' (, "butterfly") is a novel written by Henri Charrière, first published in France on 30 April 1969. ''Papillon'' is Charrière's nickname. The novel details Papillon's purported incarceration and subsequent escape from the French penal colony of French Guiana, and covers a 14-year period between 1931 and 1945. While Charrière claimed that Papillon was largely true, modern researchers believe that much of the book’s material came from other inmates, rather than Charrière himself. Synopsis The book is an account of a 14-year period in Papillon's life (October 26, 1931, to October 18, 1945), beginning when he was wrongly convicted of murder in France and sentenced to a life of hard labor at the ''Bagne de Cayenne'', the penal colony of Cayenne in French Guiana known as Devil's Island. He eventually escaped from the colony and settled in Venezuela, where he lived and prospered. After a brief stay at a prison in Caen, Papillon was put aboard a vessel bound for Sou ...
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Patrick O'Brian
Patrick O'Brian (12 December 1914 – 2 January 2000), born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series. These sea novels are set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars and centre on the friendship of the English naval captain Jack Aubrey and the Irish–Catalan physician Stephen Maturin. The 20-novel series, the first of which is '' Master and Commander'', is known for its well-researched and highly detailed portrayal of early 19th-century life, as well as its authentic and evocative language. A partially finished 21st novel in the series was published posthumously containing facing pages of handwriting and typescript. O'Brian wrote a number of other novels and short stories, most of which were published before he achieved success with the Aubrey–Maturin series. He also translated works from French to English, and wrote biographies of Joseph Banks and Picasso. His major success as a writer came late in ...
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Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni
Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni (, ; ) is a commune of French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France located in South America. Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni is one of the three sub-prefectures of French Guiana and the seat of the Arrondissement of Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni. It is the second most populous city of French Guiana, with 50,250 inhabitants at the January 2021 census. It was a prison commune from 1880, closed in 1946 and made into a normal commune. In 2025 France announced a plan to open a new high-security prison there. History Founded in 1858 by Auguste Baudin, it was formerly the arrival point for prisoners, who arrived at the ''Camp de la Transportation''. The town was near an Amerindian settlement called Kamalakuli named after their chief. On 15 September 1880, the town became the capital city of a special prison commune; the mayor was the Director of the Penitentiary Administration. The Hôtel de Ville was completed in 1907. When Gaston Monnerville was elec ...
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ÃŽle Saint-Joseph
The Salvation Islands ( French: ''Îles du Salut'', so called because the missionaries went there to escape plague on the mainland), sometimes mistakenly called the Safety Islands, are a group of small islands of volcanic origin about off the coast of French Guiana, north of Kourou, in the Atlantic Ocean. Although closer to Kourou, the islands are part of Cayenne (municipality), specifically . Geography Islands There are three islands, from north to south: Devil's Island, the most famous due to the political imprisonment there of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, is better known to French speakers as . The total area is . Devil's Island and Île Royale are separated by , Île Royale and Saint-Joseph Island by . Climate The climate of Salvation Islands focuses on the characteristics of Royale Island. Royale Island () has a tropical savanna climate (Köppen climate classification). The average annual temperature in Royale Island is . The average annual rainfall is with May as the ...
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Solitary Confinement
Solitary confinement (also shortened to solitary) is a form of imprisonment in which an incarcerated person lives in a single Prison cell, cell with little or no contact with other people. It is a punitive tool used within the prison system to discipline or separate incarcerated individuals who are considered to be security risks to other incarcerated individuals or prison staff, as well as those who violate facility rules or are deemed disruptive. However, it can also be used as protective custody for incarcerated individuals whose safety is threatened by other prisoners. This is employed to separate them from the general prison population and prevent injury or death. A robust body of research has shown that solitary confinement has profound negative psychological, physical, and neurological effects on those who experience it, often lasting well beyond one's time in solitary. While corrections officials have stated that solitary confinement is a necessary tool for maintaining t ...
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Barranquilla
Barranquilla () is the capital district of the Atlántico department in Colombia. It is located near the Caribbean Sea and is the largest city and third port in the Caribbean region of Colombia, Caribbean coast region; as of 2018, it had a population of 1,206,319 making it List of cities in Colombia by population, Colombia's fourth-most populous city after Bogotá, Medellín, and Cali. Barranquilla lies strategically next to the delta of the Magdalena River, (originally before rapid urban growth) from its mouth at the Caribbean Sea, serving as a port for river and maritime transportation within Colombia. It is also the main economic center of the Atlántico (Colombia), Atlántico department in Colombia. The city is the core of the Metropolitan Area of Barranquilla, Barranquilla metropolitan area, with a population of over 2 million, which also includes the municipalities of Soledad, Atlántico, Soledad, Galapa, Atlántico, Galapa, Malambo, Atlántico, Malambo, and Puerto Colomb ...
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Santa Marta
Santa Marta (), officially the Distrito Turístico, Cultural e Histórico de Santa Marta (), is a port List of cities in Colombia, city on the coast of the Caribbean Sea in northern Colombia. It is the capital of Magdalena Department and the fourth-largest urban city of the Caribbean Region of Colombia, after Barranquilla, Cartagena, Colombia, Cartagena, and Soledad, Atlantico, Soledad. Founded on July 29, 1525, by the Spanish conqueror Rodrigo de Bastidas, it was one of the first Spanish settlements in Colombia, its oldest surviving city, and second-oldest in South America. This city is situated on a bay by the same name and as such, it is a prime tourist destination in the Caribbean region. History Pre-Columbian times Before the arrival of Europeans, the South American continent was inhabited by a number of Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous groups. Due to a combination of tropical weather, significant rainfall, and the destruction and misrepresentation of man ...
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Pearl Diving
Pearl hunting, also known as pearl fishing or pearling, is the activity of recovering or attempting to recover pearls from wild Mollusca, molluscs, usually oysters or mussels, in the sea or freshwater. Pearl hunting was prevalent in India and Japan for thousands of years. On the Pearling in Western Australia, northern and north-western coast of Western Australia pearl diving began in the 1850s, and started in the Torres Strait Islands in the 1860s, where the term also covers diving for nacre or mother of pearl found in what were known as pearl shells. In most cases the pearl-bearing molluscs live at depths where they are not manually accessible from the surface, and diving or the use of some form of tool is needed to reach them. Historically the molluscs were retrieved by freediving, a technique where the diver descends to the bottom, collects what they can, and surfaces on a single breath. The diving mask improved the ability of the diver to see while underwater. When the surface ...
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Indigenous Peoples Of The Americas
In the Americas, Indigenous peoples comprise the two continents' pre-Columbian inhabitants, as well as the ethnic groups that identify with them in the 15th century, as well as the ethnic groups that identify with the pre-Columbian population of the Americas as such. These populations exhibit significant diversity; some Indigenous peoples were historically hunter-gatherers, while others practiced agriculture and aquaculture. Various Indigenous societies developed complex social structures, including pre-contact monumental architecture, organized city, cities, city-states, chiefdoms, state (polity), states, monarchy, kingdoms, republics, confederation, confederacies, and empires. These societies possessed varying levels of knowledge in fields such as Pre-Columbian engineering in the Americas, engineering, Pre-Columbian architecture, architecture, mathematics, astronomy, History of writing, writing, physics, medicine, Pre-Columbian agriculture, agriculture, irrigation, geology, minin ...
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Guajira Department
La Guajira () is a departments of Colombia, department of Colombia. It occupies most of the Guajira Peninsula in the northeast region of the country, on the Caribbean Sea and bordering Venezuela, at the northernmost tip of South America. The capital city of the department is Riohacha. Various indigenous tribes have populated the arid plains of the region long before the Spanish expeditions reached the Americas. In 1498, Alonso de Ojeda sailed around the peninsula of La Guajira, but the first European to set foot in what is known today as La Guajira was the Spanish explorer Juan de la Cosa in 1499. During the colonial era, the territory of La Guajira was disputed by the governors of Santa Marta and Venezuela, owing to deposits of pearls. English pirates, Frenchmen, and Germans also fought for control of the territory. Martin Fernandez de Enciso founded Cabo de la Vela, Nuestra Señora Santa María de los Remedios del Cabo de la Vela, the first colonial village in the territory. ...
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Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuela to the east and northeast, Brazil to the southeast, Peru and Ecuador to the south and southwest, the Pacific Ocean to the west, and Panama to the northwest. Colombia is divided into 32 Departments of Colombia, departments. The Capital District of Bogotá is also the List of cities in Colombia by population, country's largest city hosting the main financial and cultural hub. Other major urban areas include Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Colombia, Cartagena, Santa Marta, Cúcuta, Ibagué, Villavicencio and Bucaramanga. It covers an area of 1,141,748 square kilometers (440,831 sq mi) and has a population of around 52 million. Its rich cultural heritage—including language, religion, cuisine, and art—reflects its history as a co ...
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Curaçao
Curaçao, officially the Country of Curaçao, is a constituent island country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located in the southern Caribbean Sea (specifically the Dutch Caribbean region), about north of Venezuela. Curaçao includes the main island of Curaçao and the much smaller, uninhabited island of Klein Curaçao ("Little Curaçao"). Curaçao has a population of 158,665 (January 2019 estimate), with an area of ; its capital is Willemstad. Together with Aruba and Bonaire, Curaçao forms the ABC islands (Leeward Antilles), ABC islands. Collectively, Curaçao, Aruba, and other Dutch islands in the Caribbean are often called the Dutch Caribbean. It is the largest of the ABC islands in terms of area, as well as in terms of population, and is the largest in the Dutch Caribbean. The island's name "Curaçao" may originate from the indigenous autonym of its people; this idea is supported by early Spanish accounts referring to the inhabitants as Indios Curaçaos. Curaç ...
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United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The UK includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland, and most of List of islands of the United Kingdom, the smaller islands within the British Isles, covering . Northern Ireland shares Republic of Ireland–United Kingdom border, a land border with the Republic of Ireland; otherwise, the UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea and the Irish Sea. It maintains sovereignty over the British Overseas Territories, which are located across various oceans and seas globally. The UK had an estimated population of over 68.2 million people in 2023. The capital and largest city of both England and the UK is London. The cities o ...
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