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Erasmus Castle
Erasmus Castle (Erasmuskasteel in Afrikaans), also known as "Die Spookhuis" or "The Haunted House", is an imposing mansion situated on a hill in the Erasmuskloof suburb of Pretoria, South Africa. Originally owned by George Dean Erasmus, it is a unique landmark in the city and rumours of ghosts and supernatural encounters in and around the residence are plentiful. Though the house and its grounds are privately owned by Armscor (South Africa), Armscor, public tours or cultural gatherings at the premises can be arranged. The mansion is said to be haunted, and paranormal activity is claimed to include lit windows in the uninhabited mansion, encounters with Dean Erasmus, and hearing disturbing moans at night. 19th and 20th centuries Construction began in 1892 and it was completed in 1903 and owned by George Dean Erasmus. Early in the 20th century, the house had however fallen into disrepair and ruin. In the late 1960s, the Erasmus heirs were compelled to sell the farm "Garsfontein" to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pretoria
Pretoria () is South Africa's administrative capital, serving as the seat of the executive branch of government, and as the host to all foreign embassies to South Africa. Pretoria straddles the Apies River and extends eastward into the foothills of the Magaliesberg mountains. It has a reputation as an academic city and center of research, being home to the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT), the University of Pretoria (UP), the University of South Africa (UNISA), the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), and the Human Sciences Research Council. It also hosts the National Research Foundation and the South African Bureau of Standards. Pretoria was one of the host cities of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Pretoria is the central part of the City of Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality which was formed by the amalgamation of several former local authorities, including Bronkhorstspruit, Centurion, Cullinan, Hammanskraal and Soshanguve. Some have proposed ch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afrikaans
Afrikaans (, ) is a West Germanic language that evolved in the Dutch Cape Colony from the Dutch vernacular of Holland proper (i.e., the Hollandic dialect) used by Dutch, French, and German settlers and their enslaved people. Afrikaans gradually began to develop distinguishing characteristics during the course of the 18th century. Now spoken in South Africa, Namibia and (to a lesser extent) Botswana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, estimates circa 2010 of the total number of Afrikaans speakers range between 15 and 23 million. Most linguists consider Afrikaans to be a partly creole language. An estimated 90 to 95% of the vocabulary is of Dutch origin with adopted words from other languages including German and the Khoisan languages of Southern Africa. Differences with Dutch include a more analytic-type morphology and grammar, and some pronunciations. There is a large degree of mutual intelligibility between the two languages, especially in written form. About 13.5% of the So ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Houses In Gauteng
A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems.Schoenauer, Norbert (2000). ''6,000 Years of Housing'' (rev. ed.) (New York: W.W. Norton & Company). Houses use a range of different roofing systems to keep precipitation such as rain from getting into the dwelling space. Houses may have doors or locks to secure the dwelling space and protect its inhabitants and contents from burglars or other trespassers. Most conventional modern houses in Western cultures will contain one or more bedrooms and bathrooms, a kitchen or cooking area, and a living room. A house may have a separate dining room, or the eating area may be integrated into another room. Some large houses in North America have a recreation room. In traditional agriculture-oriented societies, domestic animals such as c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ghost
A ghost is the soul or spirit of a dead person or animal that is believed to be able to appear to the living. In ghostlore, descriptions of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to realistic, lifelike forms. The deliberate attempt to contact the spirit of a deceased person is known as necromancy, or in spiritism as a '' séance''. Other terms associated with it are apparition, haunt, phantom, poltergeist, shade, specter or spectre, spirit, spook, wraith, demon, and ghoul. The belief in the existence of an afterlife, as well as manifestations of the spirits of the dead, is widespread, dating back to animism or ancestor worship in pre-literate cultures. Certain religious practices—funeral rites, exorcisms, and some practices of spiritualism and ritual magic—are specifically designed to rest the spirits of the dead. Ghosts are generally described as solitary, human-like essences, though stories of ghostly armies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Reportedly Haunted Locations
The list of reportedly haunted locations throughout the world, that are locations said to be haunted by ghosts or other supernatural beings, including demons. Reports of haunted locations are part of ghostlore, which is a form of folklore. Argentina * Cinco Saltos in Río Negro has been reported to have a number of ghosts, most of them reportedly the result of witchcraft. In 2009, an intact corpse of an 8- to 12-year-old girl who had died in the 1930s was found in a cemetery ossuary. Australia * Ararat Lunatic Asylum, or Aradale, is the largest abandoned lunatic asylum in Ararat. Opened in 1867, Aradale was reserved for many of the incurable mental patients in Victoria during the 1800s. An estimated 13,000 people died here during 140 years of operation. * Beechworth Lunatic Asylum in Beechworth, Victoria is reportedly haunted by several ghosts of departed patients. Open from 1867 to 1995, it has appeared in several books, television shows, and documentaries, including ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voortrekker
The Great Trek ( af, Die Groot Trek; nl, De Grote Trek) was a Northward migration of Dutch-speaking settlers who travelled by wagon trains from the Cape Colony into the interior of modern South Africa from 1836 onwards, seeking to live beyond the Cape's British colonial administration. The Great Trek resulted from the culmination of tensions between rural descendants of the Cape's original European settlers, known collectively as ''Boers'', and the British Empire. It was also reflective of an increasingly common trend among individual Boer communities to pursue an isolationist and semi-nomadic lifestyle away from the developing administrative complexities in Cape Town. Boers who took part in the Great Trek identified themselves as ''voortrekkers'', meaning "pioneers", "pathfinders" (literally "fore-trekkers") in Dutch and Afrikaans. The Great Trek led directly to the founding of several autonomous Boer republics, namely the South African Republic (also known simply as the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoenicia
Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their history, and they possessed several enclaves such as Arwad and Tell Sukas (modern Syria). The core region in which the Phoenician culture developed and thrived stretched from Tripoli and Byblos in northern Lebanon to Mount Carmel in modern Israel. At their height, the Phoenician possessions in the Eastern Mediterranean stretched from the Orontes River mouth to Ashkelon. Beyond its homeland, the Phoenician civilization extended to the Mediterranean from Cyprus to the Iberian Peninsula. The Phoenicians were a Semitic-speaking people of somewhat unknown origin who emerged in the Levant around 3000 BC. The term ''Phoenicia'' is an ancient Greek exonym that most likely described one of their most famous exports, a dye also known as Tyria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
San People
The San peoples (also Saan), or Bushmen, are members of various Khoe, Tuu, or Kxʼa-speaking indigenous hunter-gatherer cultures that are the first cultures of Southern Africa, and whose territories span Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and South Africa. In 2017, Botswana was home to approximately 63,500 San people (roughly 2.8% of the population) making it the country with the highest number of San people. Definition The term "San" has a long vowel and is spelled Sān (in Khoekhoegowab orthography). It is a Khoekhoe exonym with the meaning of "foragers" and was often used in a derogatory manner to describe nomadic, foraging people. Based on observation of lifestyle, this term has been applied to speakers of three distinct language families living between the Okavango River in Botswana and Etosha National Park in northwestern Namibia, extending up into southern Angola; central peoples of most of Namibia and Botswana, extending into Zambia an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Haunted House
A haunted house, spook house or ghost house in ghostlore is a house or other building often perceived as being inhabited by disembodied spirits of the deceased who may have been former residents or were otherwise connected with the property. Parapsychologists often attribute haunting to the spirits of the dead who have suffered from violent or tragic events in the building's past such as murder, accidental death, or suicide. In a majority of cases, upon scientific investigation, alternative causes to supernatural phenomenon are found to be at fault, such as hoaxes, environmental effects, hallucinations or confirmation biases. Common symptoms of hauntings, like cold spots and creaking or knocking sounds, can be found in most homes regardless of suspected paranormal presences. People are more likely to experience a haunting when they are about to fall asleep, when waking, if they are intoxicated or sleep-deprived. Carbon monoxide poisoning has been cited as a cause of su ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mansion
A mansion is a large dwelling house. The word itself derives through Old French from the Latin word ''mansio'' "dwelling", an abstract noun derived from the verb ''manere'' "to dwell". The English word '' manse'' originally defined a property large enough for the parish priest to maintain himself, but a mansion is no longer self-sustaining in this way (compare a Roman or medieval villa). '' Manor'' comes from the same root—territorial holdings granted to a lord who would "remain" there. Following the fall of Rome, the practice of building unfortified villas ceased. Today, the oldest inhabited mansions around the world usually began their existence as fortified houses in the Middle Ages. As social conditions slowly changed and stabilised fortifications were able to be reduced, and over the centuries gave way to comfort. It became fashionable and possible for homes to be beautiful rather than grim and forbidding allowing for the development of the modern mansion. In British Eng ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Armscor (South Africa)
Armscor (stylized as ARMSCOR), the Armaments Corporation of South Africa is the arms procurement agency of the South African Department of Defence. It was originally established in 1968 as an arms production company, primarily as a response to the international sanctions by the United Nations against South Africa due to apartheid which began in 1963 and were formalised in 1977. History Until the 1970s, South Africa's apartheid government had placed a disproportionate emphasis on civilian law enforcement and the maintenance of internal security. However, a Cuban intervention in Angola, and the escalation of the South African Border War convinced the government that it faced a serious external threat. In 1978, the premiership was accepted by PW Botha, a former South African security chief, and defence expenditure spiraled upwards. Armscor, then a relatively new entity, was charged with modernising the arsenal of the South African Defence Force (SADF). This was a difficult tas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
