GOOD MORNING FATHER IN HEAVEN ; NO SNOW HERE BUT COLD ;

 

December 19 is the 353rd day of the year (354th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 12 days remaining until the end of the year

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/December_19

 

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution

 The Napoleonic Code, or Code Napoléon (originally called the Code civil des Français) is the French civil code, established under Napoléon I. It was drafted rapidly by a commission of four eminent jurists and entered into force on March 21, 1804. Even though the Napoleonic code was not the first legal code to be established in a European country with a civil legal system — it was preceded by the Codex Maximilianeus bavaricus civilis (Bavaria, 1756), the Allgemeines Landrecht (Prussia, 1794) and the West Galician Code, (Galicia, then part of Austria, 1797) — it is considered the first successful codification^{[citation needed]} and strongly influenced the law of many other countries. The Code, with its stress on clearly written and accessible law, was a major step in establishing the rule of law. Historians have called it "one of the few documents which have influenced the whole world."^{[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleonic_code}

 

The French Revolution’s Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen had declared that suspects were presumed to be innocent until they had been declared to be guilty by a court of law. A concern of Bonaparte’s was the possibility of arbitrary arrest, or excessive remand (imprisonment prior to a trial). Bonaparte remarked that care should be taken to preserve personal freedoms especially when the case was before the Imperial Court: "these courts would have a great strength, they should be prohibited from abusing this situation against weak citizen without connections." However, remand still was the normal procedure for suspects of severe crimes, such as murder.

Births

• 1554 – Philip William, Prince of Orange (d. 1618)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_William,_Prince_of_Orange The

Order of the Golden Fleece (French: Ordre de la Toison d’Or) (Spanish: Orden del Toisón de Oro) is an order of chivalry founded in 1430 by Duke Philip III of Burgundy to celebrate his marriage to the Portuguese princess Isabel of Aviz. The Order of the Golden Fleece was modeled on the English Order of the Garter, but dedicated to Saint Andrew. Philip had been elected to membership of the Garter in 1422, but had declined to avoid offending the king of France. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Golden_Fleece

The Spanish Order of the Fleece has been a source of controversy in the past, particularly during the Napoleonic period. The award of the Order to Napoleon and his brother Joseph angered the exiled king of France Louis XVIII and caused him to return his collar in protest. These, and other awards by Joseph, were revoked by king Ferdinand on the restoration of Bourbon rule in 1813.

MEMBERS OF THE ORDER

Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom (b. 1926)

Abdullah, King of Saudi Arabia. Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques^[4] (b. 1924)

Akihito, Emperor of Japan (b. 1933)

Juan Carlos I, King of Spain (b. 1938)

Events

 

1777 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington‘s Continental Army goes into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.

324 – Licinius abdicates his position as Roman Emperor.

1154 – Henry II of England is crowned at Westminster Abbey.

1490 – Anne of Brittany is married to Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor by proxy.

1606 – The Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery depart England carrying settlers who, at Jamestown, Virginia, found the first of the thirteen colonies that became the United States.

1776 – Thomas Paine publishes one of a series of pamphlets in the Pennsylvania Journal titled The American Crisis.

1907 – A group of 239 coal miners die during a mine explosion in Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania.

1912 – William H. Van Schaick, captain of the steamship General Slocum which caught fire and killed over 1,000 people, is pardoned by U.S. President William Howard Taft after three-and-a-half-years in Sing Sing prison.

1916 – World War I: Battle of Verdun – On the Western Front, the French Army successfully holds off the German Army and drives it back to its starting position.

1986 – Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev releases Andrei Sakharov and his wife from internal exile in Gorky.

http://www.answers.com/topic/december-19

 Deaths

401 – Pope Anastasius I   L  1370 – Pope Urban V (b. 1310) 

 Holidays and observances

Liberation day -;  Goa R.C. Saints – O Radix ; Roman festivals – Opalia

 

 

the first attempt at robots ; just add souls ;

CNN) — Archaeologists in Russia have discovered an "extraordinary" group of Stone Age artworks which appear to have been carefully buried in pits and covered with mammoth bones, the researchers announced this week in a newly published paper.

At least some of the 21,000-22,000-year-old objects appear to have been regarded as magical, the scientists surmise.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/12/03/stoneage.art/index.html

 

           Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

                        

Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968), was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement. King was a Baptist minister, one of the few leadership roles available to black men at the time. He became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955 – 1956) and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1957), serving as its first president. His efforts led to the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.

WE ALL HAVE A DREAM

 

      

                            

AND BIRDS TO ; I SEE LOTS OF ANIMAL REFRENCE TO CREST AND COATS OF ARMS ; A REASON I PRESUME ? IT CANT BE CATHOLIC CAN IT ; A KINGDOM ESTABLISHED ?

 

  AND THE WORLD IS NOT FLAT EITHER

Galileo died at Arcetri in 1642—the year Isaac Newton was born.

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same
god who has endowed us with sense, reason and
   intellect has intended us to forgo their use.

                                                                                          —Galileo

http://galileo.rice.edu/

Galileo Galilei was born on February 15, 1564 in Pisa, Italy. Galileo pioneered "experimental scientific method" and was the first to use a refracting telescope to make important astronomical discoveries.
In 1609 Galileo learned of the invention of the telescope in Holland. From the barest description he constructed a vastly superior model. Galileo made a series of profound discoveries using his new telescope, including the moons of the planet Jupiter and the phases of the planet Venus (similar to those of Earth’s moon).
As a professor of astronomy at University of Pisa, Galileo was required to teach the accepted theory of his time that the sun and all the planets revolved around the Earth. Later at University of Padua he was exposed to a new theory, proposed by Nicolaus Copernicus, that the Earth and all the other planets revolved around the sun. Galileo’s observations with his new telescope convinced him of the truth of Copernicus’s sun-centered or heliocentric theory.
Galileo’s support for the heliocentric theory got him into trouble with the Roman Catholic Church. In 1633 the Inquisition convicted him of heresy and forced him to recant (publicly withdraw) his support of Copernicus. They sentenced him to life imprisonment, but because of his advanced age allowed him serve his term under house arrest at his villa in Arcetri outside of Florence.

http://www.lucidcafe.com/library/96feb/galileo.html

 

Beyond the legends of Charlemagne lies a biography worthy of the tales. To the medieval mind, only King Arthur vied with Charlemagne as the finest example of what a Christian king could be. Kind, yet fiercely defensive of his family and Empire, there is much to admire. His exploits spawned both histories and romances, like all good legends it stood firmly rooted in history. The biography offered here was published in Will Durant’s History of Civilization, but a small part of an encyclopedic historical survey. I include it here in the KCT resources because it might prove useful and inspiration to those seeking a basic introduction to this most famous of medieval kings.

http://www.chronique.com/Library/MedHistory/charlemagne.htm