Showing posts with label CCCC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CCCC. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Saturday, February 26, 2011
#590 Russia...Thanks Vladimir!
The 15p stamp was issued in 2010 featuring World Cultural Heritage in Russia - Curonian Spit - Dunes and Forest view.
The Curonian Spit is an outstanding example of a landscape of sand dunes that is under constant threat from natural forces (wind and tide). After disastrous human interventions that menaced its survival, the Spit was reclaimed by massive protection and stabilization works begun in the 19th century and still continuing to the present day.
The Spit is a peninsula that separates the Baltic Sea and the Curonian Lagoon in a slightly concave arc for 98 km from the Kaliningrad Peninsula to the town of Klaipeda. The largest settlements in the Lithuanian part are Smiltyne, Pervalka, Juodkrante, Preila and Nida. Dune valleys divide the ridge into separate dune massifs, and capes are generally formed in front of these valleys.
Formation of the Spit began some 5,000 years ago. Mesolithic people whose main source of food was from the sea settled there, working bone and stone brought from the mainland. In the 1st millennium CE West Baltic tribes (Curonians and Prussians) established seasonal settlements there, to collect fish, and perhaps also for ritual purposes. The centre of Kaup is the last unexcavated large proto-urban settlement of the Viking period. The invasion of Prussia by Teutonic Knights in the 13th century was gradually driven out, but armed conflict continued in the region until the 15th century. The Spit had great strategic importance, and in consequence the knights built castles at Memel (1252), Noihauz (1283) and Rossitten (1372). They also settled German farmers around the castles, building roads and clearing woodland for agriculture.
Baltic peoples set up settlements on the Spit and the population increased, however, as their main activities were fishing and beekeeping. In the 16th century a new process of dune formation began and settlements became buried in sand. The works took the form of the construction of a protective bank of sand to prevent further ingress of dunes (a process that took most of the century) and the stabilization of dunes by means of brushwood hurdles, accompanied by reforestation.
Baltic peoples set up settlements on the Spit and the population increased, however, as their main activities were fishing and beekeeping. In the 16th century a new process of dune formation began and settlements became buried in sand. The works took the form of the construction of a protective bank of sand to prevent further ingress of dunes (a process that took most of the century) and the stabilization of dunes by means of brushwood hurdles, accompanied by reforestation.
The most significant element of the Spit's cultural heritage is represented by the old fishing settlements. The earliest of these were buried in sand when the woodland cover was removed. Those that have survived are all along the coast of the lagoon. At the end of the 19th century more elaborate buildings - lighthouses, churches, schools and villas - began to be erected alongside the simpler vernacular houses. This was partly due to the fact that the Spit became a recreational centre: Juodkrante became famous as a health resort as early as 1840 and Nida, Preila and Pervalka were given official recognition in this category in 1933. In the centre, Nida, the largest settlement on the Spit, has a linear plan based on a single main street that runs parallel to the lagoon and which developed spontaneously in the 19th century.
The most northerly part of the Spit, Smiltyne, was not settled until the mid-19th century, when a health resort was created. It is the point where ferries from Klaipeda on the mainland arrive on the Spit. The surviving buildings of cultural significance are the houses of fishermen built during the 19th century. In their original form they were built from wood and thatched with reeds. A homestead consisted of two or three buildings: a dwelling house, a cattle shed, and a smokehouse for curing fish. These were located to one side of the long narrow plot, leaving space for a kitchen garden and for drying nets. The houses were constructed at right angles to the street. In the 20th century the fishermen's houses were enlarged and new ones built with their long sides to the street. As a result, the appearance of the settlements was radically altered.
Other buildings are the sturdy lighthouse at Pervalka and the neo-Gothic Evangelical Lutheran churches at Juodkrante and Nida, both built in the 1880s. The cemeteries of Nida, Preila, Pervalka and Juodkrante are of interest.
The 8p stamp is from 2007 Native Horse Breeds issue showing Don Breed.
The Russian Don is a breed of horse developed in and named after the steppes region of Russia where the Don River flows. Utilized originally as cavalry horses for the Cossacks, they are currently used for under-saddle work and driving.
#583 Portugal...Thanks Andre!
These 2 stamps were issued in 2010 commemorating 200 years of the Peninsular War.
The Peninsular War was a war between France and the allied powers of Spain, the United Kingdom, and Portugal for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars. The war began when French armies crossed Spain and invaded Portugal in 1807 and then in 1808 turned on its ally, Spain. The war lasted until the Sixth Coalition defeated Napoleon in 1814.
Spain's liberation struggle marked one of the first national wars and the emergence of large-scale guerrillas (Guerrilha, in Portuguese), from which the English language borrowed the word. The French occupation destroyed the Spanish administration, which fragmented into quarrelling provincial juntas. In 1810, a reconstituted national government fortified itself in Cádiz and proved unable to recruit, train, or equip effective armies due to being under siege. British and Portuguese forces secured Portugal, using it as a secure position from which to launch campaigns against the French army while Spanish guerrilleros bled the occupiers. Combined, the regular and irregular allied forces prevented Napoleon's marshals from subduing the rebellious Spanish provinces.
The many years of fighting in Spain gradually wore down Napoleon's famous French Army. While the French armies were often victorious in battle, their communications and supplies were severely tested and their units frequently cut off, harassed, or overwhelmed by partisans. The Spanish army, though beaten and driven to the peripheries, could not be stamped out and continued to hound the French relentlessly.
The constant threatening presence of a British force under Arthur Wellesley, which became the most experienced and steady force in the British army, guarded Portugal and campaigned against the French in Spain alongside the reformed Portuguese army. Allied to the British, the demoralised Portuguese army underwent extensive reorganising, retraining and refitting under the command of British General William Carr Beresford, appointed commander-in-chief of the Portuguese forces by the exiled Portuguese Royal family, and fought as part of a combined Anglo-Portuguese army under Wellington.
In 1812, as Napoleon embarked upon an invasion of Russia which ended in disaster, a combined allied army under Arthur Wellesley pushed into Spain and liberated Madrid. Marshal Soult led the exhausted and demoralized French forces in a fighting withdrawal across the Pyrenees and into France over the winter of 1813-14.
War and revolution against Napoleon's occupation led to the Spanish Constitution of 1812, later a cornerstone of European liberalism. The burden of war destroyed the social and economic fabric of Portugal and Spain and ushered in an era of social turbulence, political instability, and economic stagnation. Devastating civil wars between liberal and absolutist factions, led by officers trained in the Peninsular War, persisted in Iberia until 1850. The cumulative crises and disruptions of invasion, revolution, and restoration led to the independence of many of Spain's American colonies and the independence of Brazil from Portugal.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
#564 Tunisia
The 0.60 TND stamp on the right is from 2010 Organic Farming in Tunisia issue illustrating Tomatoes.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
#562 Germany...Thanks Rainer!
The 55c stamp was issued in 2007 commemorating 100th birthday of Paul Klinger,who was a German actor and the German voice of David Niven and Cary Grant.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Sunday, January 30, 2011
#553 Denmark...Thanks Ole!
The 4.4k stamp is from 1989 Europa issue of Children Toys showing Wooden Soldiers by Kay Bojessen.
The 5.5k stamp was issued in 2010 featuring Pladecover: Gasolin' 3.
Gasolin' 3 was the third album from Danish rock band Gasolin', released in November 1973.
Gasolin' was a Danish rock band from Christianshavn in Copenhagen formed by Kim Larsen, Franz Beckerlee and Wili Jønsson in 1969.From 1972 to 1978, Gasolin' was the most popular rock band in Denmark. With producer Roy Thomas Baker, they released classics such as Gasolin' 3, Gas 5 and Efter endnu en dag. Their albums sound as fresh and innovative now as they did then. In that respect Gasolin' may be considered as the Danish Beatles. Each album was a landmark and like The Beatles, they broke up at the pinnacle of their success. The reasons for the split-up was the failure to break the international market and personal differences.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
#543 Denmark...Thanks Poul!
The 2.80k stamp on the cover is from 1980 Nordic Sister Towns issue showing Aalborg Harbour.
Aalborg is a Danish industrial and university city in North Jutland. The city of Aalborg is the fourth largest city in Denmark in terms of population.
Aalborg is a Danish industrial and university city in North Jutland. The city of Aalborg is the fourth largest city in Denmark in terms of population.
Aalborg maintains cultural, economic and educational ties with 27 cities around the globe.Thus, Aalborg has the most twin cities in Denmark. Every four years Aalborg gathers youth from the majority of its twin cities for a week of sports games, known as Ungdomslegene (The Youth Games).There are 4 city names shown on this stamp:
Karlskoga, Sweden
Fredrikstad, Norway
Húsavík, Iceland
Riihimäki, Finland
The 3.00k stamp was issued in 1987 commemorating Ribe Cathedral redecoration from 1982-1987,by Carl-Henning Petersen,showing fresco in the cathedral.Carl-Henning Petersen was a Danish painter and a key member of the COBRA movement. He was known as the "Scandinavian Chagall", and was one of the leading Danish artists of the second half of the 20th century.
The 2.70k stamp was issued in 1984 commemorating 300th birth anniversary of Ludvig Holberg.
Ludvig Holberg (1684–1754) was a writer, essayist, philosopher, historian and playwright born in Bergen, Norway, during the time of the Dano-Norwegian double monarchy, who spent most of his adult life in Denmark. He was influenced by Humanism, the Enlightenment and the Baroque. Holberg is considered the founder of modern Danish and Norwegian literature,and is best known for the comedies he wrote in 1722–1723 for the theatre in Lille Grønnegade in Copenhagen. Holberg's works about natural and common law were widely read by many Danish law students over two hundred years, from 1736 to 1936.
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