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John Joseph Merlin
John Joseph Merlin (born Jean-Joseph Merlin, 6 September 1735 – 8 May 1803) was a Freemason, clock-maker, musical-instrument maker, and inventor from the Prince-Bishopric of Liège in the Holy Roman Empire. He moved to England in 1760. By 1766 he was working with James Cox (inventor), James Cox and creating automatons such as Cox's timepiece and the Silver Swan (automaton), Silver Swan. By 1773 he was designing and making innovative keyboard instruments. In 1783 he opened Merlin's Mechanical Museum in Princes Street, Hanover Square, London, a meeting-place for the gentry and nobility. In addition to his clocks, musical instruments and automata, Merlin is credited with the invention of inline skates in the 1760s. He was referred to by contemporaries as "The Ingenious Mechanic". He was friendly with composer Joseph Haydn. Life Jean-Joseph Merlin was born on 6 September 1735, in Huy, in what was then the Prince-Bishopric of Liège and is now in Belgium, Wallonia. His parents ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Gainsborough
Thomas Gainsborough (; 14 May 1727 (baptised) – 2 August 1788) was an English portrait and landscape painter, draughtsman, and printmaker. Along with his rival Sir Joshua Reynolds, he is considered one of the most important British artists of the second half of the 18th century. He painted quickly, and the works of his maturity are characterised by a light palette and easy strokes. Despite being a prolific portrait painter, Gainsborough gained greater satisfaction from his landscapes. He is credited (with Richard Wilson (painter), Richard Wilson) as the originator of the 18th-century British landscape school. Gainsborough was a founding member of the Royal Academy of Arts, Royal Academy. Youth and training Gainsborough was born in Sudbury, Suffolk, Sudbury, Suffolk, the youngest son of John Gainsborough, a weaver and maker of woollen goods, and his wife Mary, sister of the Reverend Humphry Burroughs. One of Gainsborough's brothers, Humphrey Gainsborough, Humphrey, is said t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joaquín Atanasio Pignatelli De Aragón Y Moncayo
Joaquín Atanasio Pignatelli de Aragón y Moncayo (2 May 1724 – 12 May 1776), 16th Count of Fuentes and 4th Marquess of Coscojuela, Grandee of Spain, was a Hispano-Italian advisor and diplomat at the service of the Spanish monarchy. Early life He was born in the illustrious Pignatelli family, connected with the highest Neapolitan and Aragonese nobility. His father, Antonio Pignatelli de Aragon (1700–1746), was a second son of the 9th Duke of Monteleón and Noya, and his mother, Francisca de Moncayo y Blanes (1700-1742), was Countess of Fuentes and Marchioness of Coscojuela. The young count was a Gentleman of the chamber of Ferdinand VI of Spain and Grandee of Spain 1st Class since 1751. Career Pignatelli served as Ambassador in Turin from 1754 to 1758, in London from 1760 to 1762 and in Paris from 1763 to 1773. His stay in London was very difficult during the Seven Years' War. During his embassy in France, he led the Spanish adhesion to the third ''Pacte de Famille'' an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is not a state of its own. It ranks as the 11th-largest city in the European Union. The metropolitan area has around 3 million inhabitants, and the broader Munich Metropolitan Region is home to about 6.2 million people. It is the List of EU metropolitan regions by GDP#2021 ranking of top four German metropolitan regions, third largest metropolitan region by GDP in the European Union. Munich is located on the river Isar north of the Alps. It is the seat of the Upper Bavaria, Upper Bavarian administrative region. With 4,500 people per km2, Munich is Germany's most densely populated municipality. It is also the second-largest city in the Bavarian language, Bavarian dialect area after Vienna. The first record of Munich dates to 1158. The city ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Museum Of Fine Arts, Boston
The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the list of largest art museums, 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 paintings and more than 450,000 works of art, making it one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas. With more than 1.2 million visitors a year, it is the List of most-visited art museums, 79th-most-visited art museum in the world . Founded in 1870 in Copley Square, the museum moved to its current Fenway–Kenmore, Fenway location in 1909. It is affiliated with the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts. History 1870–1907 The Museum of Fine Arts was founded in 1870 and was initially located on the top floor of the Boston Athenæum. Most of its initial collection came from the Athenæum's Art Gallery. In 1876, the museum moved to a highly ornamented brick Gothic Revival architecture, Gothic Revival building designed by John H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Catherine The Great
Catherine II. (born Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst; 2 May 172917 November 1796), most commonly known as Catherine the Great, was the reigning empress of Russia from 1762 to 1796. She came to power after overthrowing her husband, Peter III. Under her long reign, inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment, Russia experienced a renaissance of culture and sciences, which led to the founding of many new cities, universities, and theatres, along with large-scale immigration from the rest of Europe and the recognition of Russia as one of the great powers of Europe. In her accession to power and her rule of the empire, Catherine often relied on her noble favourites, most notably Count Grigory Orlov and Grigory Potemkin. Assisted by highly successful generals such as Alexander Suvorov and Pyotr Rumyantsev, and admirals such as Samuel Greig and Fyodor Ushakov, she governed at a time when the Russian Empire was expanding rapidly by conquest and diplomacy. In the south, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson ( – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' calls him "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". Born in Lichfield, Staffordshire, he attended Pembroke College, Oxford, until lack of funds forced him to leave. After working as a teacher, he moved to London and began writing for ''The Gentleman's Magazine''. Early works include '' Life of Mr Richard Savage'', the poems ''London'' and '' The Vanity of Human Wishes'' and the play '' Irene''. After nine years of effort, Johnson's '' A Dictionary of the English Language'' appeared in 1755, and was acclaimed as "one of the greatest single achievements of scholarship". Later work included essays, an annotated '' The Plays of William Shakespeare'', and the apologue '' The Hist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evelina
''Evelina, or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World'' is a novel written by English author Frances Burney and first published in 1778. Although published anonymously, its authorship was revealed by the poet George Huddesford in what Burney called a "vile poem". In this 3-volume epistolary novel, title character Evelina is the unacknowledged but legitimate daughter of a dissipated English aristocrat, and thus raised in rural seclusion until her 17th year. Through a series of humorous events that take place in London and the resort town of Hotwells, near Bristol, Evelina learns to navigate the complex layers of 18th-century English society and come under the eye of a distinguished nobleman with whom a romantic relationship is formed in the latter part of the novel. This sentimental novel, which has notions of sensibility and early romanticism, satirizes the society in which it is set and is a significant precursor to the work of Jane Austen and Maria Edgeworth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fanny Burney
Frances Burney (13 June 1752 – 6 January 1840), also known as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English satirical novelist, diarist and playwright. In 1786–1790 she held the post of "Keeper of the Robes" to Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, George III's queen. In 1793, aged 41, she married a French exile, General Alexandre d'Arblay. After a long writing career that gained her a reputation as one of England's foremost literary authors, and after wartime travels that stranded her in France for over a decade, she settled in Bath, England, where she died on 6 January 1840. The first of her four novels, ''Evelina'' (1778), was the most successful and remains her most highly regarded, followed by ''Cecilia'' (1782). She also wrote a number of plays. She wrote a memoir of her father (1832), and is perhaps best remembered as the author of letters and journals that have been gradually published since 1842, whose influence has overshadowed the reputation of her fiction, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Horace Walpole
Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (; 24 September 1717 – 2 March 1797), better known as Horace Walpole, was an English Whig politician, writer, historian and antiquarian. He had Strawberry Hill House built in Twickenham, southwest London, reviving the Gothic style some decades before his Victorian successors. His literary reputation rests on the first Gothic novel, '' The Castle of Otranto'' (1764), and his ''Letters'', which are of significant social and political interest. They have been published by Yale University Press in 48 volumes. In 2017, a volume of Walpole's selected letters was published. The youngest son of the first British Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford, he became the 4th and last Earl of Orford of the second creation on his nephew's death in 1791. Early life: 1717–1739 Walpole was born in London, the youngest son of British Prime Minister Sir Robert Walpole and his wife, Catherine. Like his father, he received early educatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spring Gardens
Spring Gardens is a dead-end street at the south east extreme of St. James's, London, England, that crosses the east end of The Mall between Admiralty Arch and Trafalgar Square. Part of the old liberty of Westminster and the current City of Westminster, it abuts Whitehall, Horse Guards Parade, Green Park, and the Charing Cross/Strand/Trafalgar Square locality. It is named after the gardens that stood here. These featured a decorative fountain in the time of Elizabeth I that was set in motion by passers-by treading on hidden machinery, knowingly or unknowingly. Mostly Victorian buildings have been built lining the street. Occupants The Whig playwright and poet Susanna Centlivre (c.1669 – 1723), who has been described as "the most successful female playwright of the eighteenth century", spent the end of her life here, and wrote her most famous work '' A Bold Stroke for a Wife'' at her home at the corner of Buckingham Court, Spring Gardens, in 1718.Hutton, Laurence (1893). L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscription model, requiring readers to pay for access to most of its articles and content. The ''Journal'' is published six days a week by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corp. As of 2023, ''The'' ''Wall Street Journal'' is the List of newspapers in the United States, largest newspaper in the United States by print circulation, with 609,650 print subscribers. It has 3.17 million digital subscribers, the second-most in the nation after ''The New York Times''. The newspaper is one of the United States' Newspaper of record, newspapers of record. The first issue of the newspaper was published on July 8, 1889. The Editorial board at The Wall Street Journal, editorial page of the ''Journal'' is typically center-right in its positio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
