|
St. Helen's Gate
St. Helen's Gate ( mt, Il-Bieb ta' Santa Liena), also known as ''Porta dei Mortari'', is the main gate of the Santa Margherita Lines, located in Cospicua, Malta. It was built in the Baroque style in 1736 to designs of Charles François de Mondion, during the magistracy of Grand Master António Manoel de Vilhena. History Construction of the Santa Margherita Lines began in 1638, but works stopped in 1645 and were only resumed in 1715. St. Helen's Gate was built in 1736 to designs of the French architect Charles François de Mondion. The gate is located at the centre of St. Helen's Curtain, a stepped curtain wall between St. John Almoner and St. Helen's Bastions, and it served as the main entrance into the city of Cospicua. The gate originally had an ''à la Vauban'' drawbridge, but this was replaced by a chain-and-tackle mechanism in the early 19th century. The gate also had casemates with two ''corpi di guardia'' which housed the sentries watching the gate. In 1947, under th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
City Gate
A city gate is a gate which is, or was, set within a city wall. It is a type of fortified gateway. Uses City gates were traditionally built to provide a point of controlled access to and departure from a walled city for people, vehicles, goods and animals. Depending on their historical context they filled functions relating to defense, security, health, trade, taxation, and representation, and were correspondingly staffed by military or municipal authorities. The city gate was also commonly used to display diverse kinds of public information such as announcements, tax and toll schedules, standards of local measures, and legal texts. It could be heavily fortified, ornamented with heraldic shields, sculpture or inscriptions, or used as a location for warning or intimidation, for example by displaying the heads of beheaded criminals or public enemies. Notably in Denmark, many market towns used to have at least one city gate mostly as part of the city's fortifications, but during ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
30062 Saint Helen's Gate
3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societies. Evolution of the Arabic digit The use of three lines to denote the number 3 occurred in many writing systems, including some (like Roman and Chinese numerals) that are still in use. That was also the original representation of 3 in the Brahmic (Indian) numerical notation, its earliest forms aligned vertically. However, during the Gupta Empire the sign was modified by the addition of a curve on each line. The Nāgarī script rotated the lines clockwise, so they appeared horizontally, and ended each line with a short downward stroke on the right. In cursive script, the three strokes were eventually connected to form a glyph resembling a with an additional stroke at the bottom: ३. The Indian digits spread to the Caliphate in the 9th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cottonera Lines
The Cottonera Lines ( mt, Is-Swar tal-Kottonera), also known as the Valperga Lines ( mt, Is-Swar ta' Valperga), are a line of fortifications in Bormla and Birgu, Malta. They were built in the 17th and 18th centuries on higher ground and further outwards than the earlier line of fortifications, known as the Santa Margherita or Firenzuola lines, which also surround Bormla. History In 1638, construction of Santa Margherita fortifications began around Bormla but works stopped soon after due to a lack of funds, and they remained in an unfinished state. In 1669, fears of an Ottoman attack rose after the fall of Candia, and a new city, the Civitas Cotonera, named after the reigning Grand Master, Nicolas Cotoner was designed by the Italian engineer Antonio Maurizio Valperga, who also modified the Floriana Lines and some other fortifications of the Grand Harbour. In times of siege, the Civitas Cotonera was meant to offer shelter to the 40,000 island's inhabitants and their animals. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Giovanni Paolo Lascaris
Giovanni Paolo Lascaris di Ventimiglia e Castellar ( Maltese: ''Laskri'') (28 June 156014 August 1657) was an Italian nobleman and Grand Master of the Knights of Malta. Early life Lascaris was born on 28 June 1560, the second son of Giannetto Lascaris and his wife Franceschetta di Agostino Lascaris of the ancient family of the Counts of Ventimiglia, related to the Lascaris who were emperors of the Byzantine Nicaean Empire. In 1584, he entered the Order of St. John of Jerusalem. As a member of the order he lived for over thirty years in a priory and was responsible for a range of monastic functions. He was put in charge of the order's grain supplies and later, in 1615, the order's furnaces across the island. He comported himself well and was promoted to master of the ''"St Anthony"'' prison. In 1632 he was sent as ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain. On the death of Grand Master Antoine de Paule, there were three candidates for election as Grand Master; Lascaris, ''Signori ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vincenzo Maculani
Vincenzo Maculani (11 September 1578 – 16 February 1667) was an Italian Catholic Cardinal, inquisitor and military architect. He was known as a severe man, harsh and without compassion, who preferred the black ''cappa'' of his order to the brighter red he was later entitled to wear as a cardinal.''Pope Alexander the Seventh and the College of Cardinals'' by John Bargrave, edited by James Craigie Robertson (reprint; 2009) Early life Maculani was born ''Gaspare Maculani'' on 11 September 1578 at Fiorenzuola d'Arda. He trained as a bricklayer (his father's profession) before entering the Order of Preachers in Pavia in 1594 and changing his name to ''Vincenzo''. He studied in Bologna, becoming a ''lector'' of theology and canon law but also of practical geometry and architecture. He was appointed as an Inquisitor in Padua in 1627 and in Genoa from 1627 to 1629. While he was in Genoa he was also given the task of rebuilding the city's wall, along with Giovanni Battista Balia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italian region and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire. Even after the fall of Western Rome, Latin remained the common language of international communication, science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the 18th century, when other regional vernaculars (including its own descendants, the Romance languages) supplanted it in common academic and political usage, and it eventually became a dead language in the modern linguistic definition. Latin is a highly inflected language, with three distinct genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), six or seven noun cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative, and vocative), five declensions, four verb conjuga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Occupation Of Malta
The French occupation of Malta lasted from 1798 to 1800. It was established when the Order of Saint John surrendered to Napoleon Bonaparte following the French landing in June 1798. In Malta, the French established a constitutional tradition in Maltese history (as part of the French Republic), granted free education for all, and theoretically established freedom of the press, although only the pro-French newspaper ''Journal de Malte'' was actually published during the occupation. The French abolished nobility, slavery, the feudal system, and the inquisition. The only remaining architectural reminder of the French occupation is probably the defacement of most coats of arms on the façades of buildings of the knights. The Maltese soon rebelled against the French and drove the French garrison into Valletta and the Grand Harbour fortifications where they were besieged for more than two years. The French surrendered Malta when their food supplies were about to run out. French invasio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Knights Hospitaller
The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military order (religious society), military order. It was headquartered in the Kingdom of Jerusalem until 1291, on the island of Hospitaller Rhodes, Rhodes from 1310 until 1522, in Hospitaller Malta, Malta from 1530 until 1798 and at Saint Petersburg from 1799 until 1801. Today several organizations continue the Hospitaller tradition, specifically the mutually recognized orders of St. John, which are the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, the Order of Saint John (chartered 1888), Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John, the Order of Saint John (Bailiwick of Brandenburg), Bailiwick of Brandenburg of the Chivalric Order of Saint John, the Order of Saint John in the Netherlands, and the Order of Saint John in Sweden. The Hospitallers arose ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pediment
Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pediment is sometimes the top element of a portico. For symmetric designs, it provides a center point and is often used to add grandness to entrances. The tympanum, the triangular area within the pediment, is often decorated with a pedimental sculpture which may be freestanding or a relief sculpture. The tympanum may hold an inscription, or in modern times, a clock face. Pediments are found in ancient Greek architecture as early as 600 BC (e.g. the archaic Temple of Artemis). Variations of the pediment occur in later architectural styles such as Classical, Neoclassical and Baroque. Gable roofs were common in ancient Greek temples with a low pitch (angle of 12.5° to 16°). History The pediment is found in classical Greek temples, Et ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mortar (weapon)
A mortar is usually a simple, lightweight, man-portable, muzzle-loaded weapon, consisting of a smooth-bore (although some models use a rifled barrel) metal tube fixed to a base plate (to spread out the recoil) with a lightweight bipod mount and a sight. They launch explosive shells (technically called bombs) in high-arcing ballistic trajectories. Mortars are typically used as indirect fire weapons for close fire support with a variety of ammunition. History Mortars have been used for hundreds of years. The earliest mortars were used in Korea in a 1413 naval battle when Korean gunsmiths developed the ''wan'gu'' (gourd-shaped mortar) (완구, 碗口). The earliest version of the ''wan'gu'' dates back to 1407. Choi Hae-san (최해산, 崔海山) (1380–1443), the son of Choe Mu-seon (최무선, 崔茂宣) (1325–1395), is generally credited with inventing the ''wan'gu''. In the Ming dynasty, general Qi Jiguang recorded the use of a mini cannon called the Hu dun pao that was simi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cornice
In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a pedestal, or along the top of an interior wall. A simple cornice may be formed just with a crown, as in crown moulding atop an interior wall or above kitchen cabinets or a bookcase. A projecting cornice on a building has the function of throwing rainwater free of its walls. In residential building practice, this function is handled by projecting gable ends, roof eaves and gutters. However, house eaves may also be called "cornices" if they are finished with decorative moulding. In this sense, while most cornices are also eaves (overhanging the sides of the building), not all eaves are usually considered cornices. Eaves are primarily functional and not necessarily decorative, while cornices have a decorative aspect. A building's projecti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
