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Tongues Of Serpents
''Tongues of Serpents'' is the sixth novel in the '' Temeraire'' alternate history/fantasy series by American author Naomi Novik. This installment follows William Laurence and his dragon, Temeraire's adventures in Australia. ''Tongues of Serpents'' was released in hardcover and e-Book formats in North America and the United Kingdom by Voyager Books on July 13, 2010. Plot details The story begins in New South Wales, where Laurence has been sentenced to "transportation" for his treasonous actions in '' Empire of Ivory''. With him is Temeraire; Captain Granby and his firebreathing Kazilik Iskierka; Tenzing Tharkay, his half-Nepalese friend; Tom Riley, captain of HMS ''Allegiance'' which sailed them hence; and three dragon eggs, sent by Admiral Jane Roland to form the foundation of New South Wales' Aerial Corps. Dropping by Van Diemen's Land to resupply, ''Allegiance'' discovered William Bligh, late of , exiled there after being deposed in a military coup, and have since borne hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Naomi Novik
Naomi Novik (born 1973) is an American author of speculative fiction. She is known for the Temeraire (series), ''Temeraire'' series (2006–2016), an alternate history of the Napoleonic Wars involving dragons, and her The Scholomance Trilogy, ''Scholomance'' fantasy series (2020–2022). Her standalone fantasy novels ''Uprooted (novel), Uprooted'' (2015) and ''Spinning Silver'' (2018) were inspired by Polish folklore and the Rumpelstiltskin fairy tale respectively. Novik has won many awards for her work, including the Alex Awards, Alex, Audie Award, Audie, British Fantasy Award, British Fantasy, Locus Award, Locus, Mythopoeic Award, Mythopoeic and Nebula Awards. Early life Novik grew up in Roslyn Heights on Long Island. She is a second-generation American; her father's family were Lithuanian Jews, and her mother's family were Poland, Polish Catholics. Displaying an interest in reading at a young age, she read ''The Lord of the Rings'' at age six, and developed a love for Jane Aust ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Van Diemen's Land
Van Diemen's Land was the colonial name of the island of Tasmania during the European exploration of Australia, European exploration and colonisation of Australia in the 19th century. The Aboriginal Tasmanians, Aboriginal-inhabited island was first visited by the Dutch ship captained by Abel Tasman in 1642, working under the sponsorship of Anthony van Diemen, the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies. The British retained the name when they established a settlement in 1803 before it became a separate colony in 1825. Its Penal colony, penal colonies became notorious destinations for the Convicts in Australia, transportation of convicts due to the harsh environment, isolation and reputation for being escape-proof. The name was changed to Tasmania on 1st January 1856 to disassociate the island from its convict past and to honour its discoverer, Abel Tasman. The old name had become a byword for horror in England because of the severity of its convict settlements such as Macq ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bunyip
The bunyip is a creature from the aboriginal mythology of southeastern Australia, said to lurk in swamps, billabongs, creeks, riverbeds, and waterholes. Name The origin of the word ''bunyip'' has been traced to the Wemba-Wemba or Wergaia language of the Aboriginal people of Victoria, in South-Eastern Australia. The word ''bunyip'' is usually translated by Aboriginal Australians today as "devil" or "evil spirit". This contemporary translation may not accurately represent the role of the bunyip in pre-contact Aboriginal mythology or its possible origins before written accounts were made. Some modern sources allude to a linguistic connection between the bunyip and Bunjil, "a mythic 'Great Man' who made the mountains, rivers, man, and all the animals". The word ''bahnyip'' first appeared in the ''Sydney Gazette'' in 1812. It was used by James Ives to describe "a large black animal like a seal, with a terrible voice which creates terror among the blacks". Distribution The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aboriginal Australians
Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia (continent), Australia 50,000 to 65,000 years ago, and over time formed as many as 500 List of Aboriginal Australian group names, language-based groups. In the past, Aboriginal people lived over large sections of the continental shelf. They were isolated on many of the smaller offshore islands and Tasmania when the land was inundated at the start of the Holocene Interglacial, inter-glacial period, about 11,700 years ago. Despite this, Aboriginal people maintained extensive networks within the continent and certain groups maintained relationships with Torres Strait Islanders and the Makassar people, Makassar people of modern-day Indonesia. Over the millennia, Aboriginal people developed complex trade networks, inter-cultural relationships, law ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guangzhou
Guangzhou, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Canton or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, southern China. Located on the Pearl River about northwest of Hong Kong and north of Macau, Guangzhou has a history of over 2,200 years and was a major terminus of the Silk Road. The port of Guangzhou serves as a transportation hub for China's fourth largest city and surrounding areas, including Hong Kong. Guangzhou was captured by the United Kingdom, British during the First Opium War and no longer enjoyed a monopoly after the war; consequently it lost trade to other ports such as Hong Kong and Shanghai, but continued to serve as a major entrepôt. Following the Second Battle of Chuenpi in 1841, the Treaty of Nanking was signed between Robert Peel, Sir Robert Peel on behalf of Queen Victoria and Lin Zexu on behalf of Daoguang Emperor, Emperor Xuanzong and ceded British Hong Kong, Hong Kon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Qing Dynasty
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the Ming dynasty and succeeded by the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China. At its height of power, the empire stretched from the Sea of Japan in the east to the Pamir Mountains in the west, and from the Mongolian Plateau in the north to the South China Sea in the south. Originally emerging from the Later Jin (1616–1636), Later Jin dynasty founded in 1616 and proclaimed in Shenyang in 1636, the dynasty seized control of the Ming capital Beijing and North China in 1644, traditionally considered the start of the dynasty's rule. The dynasty lasted until the Xinhai Revolution of October 1911 led to the abdication of the last emperor in February 1912. The multi-ethnic Qing dynasty Legacy of the Qing dynasty, assembled the territoria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Smuggling
Smuggling is the illegal transportation of objects, substances, information or people, such as out of a house or buildings, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations. More broadly, social scientists define smuggling as the purposeful movement across a border in contravention to the relevant legal frameworks. There are various motivations to smuggle. These include the participation in illegal trade, such as in the drug trade, illegal weapons trade, prostitution, human trafficking, kidnapping, heists, chop shops, illegal immigration or illegal emigration, tax evasion, import restrictions, export restrictions, providing contraband to prison inmates, or the theft of the items being smuggled. Smuggling is a common theme in literature, from Bizet's opera ''Carmen'' to the James Bond spy books (and later films) '' Diamonds Are Forever'' and '' Goldfinger''. Etymology The verb ''smuggle'', from Low German ''smuggeln'' o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blue Mountains (Australia)
The Blue Mountains ( Gundungurra/Dharug: Colomatta or Gulumada) are a mountainous region and a mountain range located in New South Wales, Australia. The region is considered to be part of the western outskirts of the Greater Sydney area. The region borders on Sydney's main metropolitan area, its foothills starting about west of centre of the state capital, close to Penrith. The public's understanding of the extent of the Blue Mountains is varied, as it forms only part of an extensive mountainous area associated with the Great Dividing Range. As defined in 1970, the Blue Mountains region is bounded by the Nepean and Hawkesbury rivers in the east, the Coxs River and Lake Burragorang to the west and south, and the Wolgan and Colo rivers to the north. Geologically, it is situated in the central parts of the Sydney Basin. The ''Blue Mountains Range'' comprises a range of mountains, plateau escarpments extending off the Great Dividing Range about northwest of Wolgan G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Central Europe, between the early 16th and early 18th centuries. The empire emerged from a Anatolian beyliks, ''beylik'', or principality, founded in northwestern Anatolia in by the Turkoman (ethnonym), Turkoman tribal leader Osman I. His successors Ottoman wars in Europe, conquered much of Anatolia and expanded into the Balkans by the mid-14th century, transforming their petty kingdom into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the Fall of Constantinople, conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II. With its capital at History of Istanbul#Ottoman Empire, Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) and control over a significant portion of the Mediterranean Basin, the Ottoman Empire was at the centre of interacti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
His Majesty's Dragon
''His Majesty's Dragon'', published in the UK as ''Temeraire'', is the first novel in the '' Temeraire'' alternate history/fantasy series by American author Naomi Novik. The story is set during an alternate-history version of the Napoleonic Wars, in which dragons not only exist but are used as a staple of aerial warfare in Asia and Europe. The dragons of the story are portrayed as sapient and intelligent, capable of logical thought and human speech. The series centers primarily on events involving Temeraire (the titular dragon) and his handler, Will Laurence. The first book of the series tells how Laurence, formerly a Captain in the Royal Navy, becomes Temeraire's handler, and of their early training in preparation for battles against Napoleon's aerial fleet. It was first published in 2006. It won the 2007 Compton Crook Award for best novel in the science fiction/fantasy genre during 2006 by a first-time author. Plot summary In the winter of 1804 ("the year four" as the charac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Western Europe, with a population of 14.9 million. London stands on the River Thames in southeast England, at the head of a tidal estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major settlement for nearly 2,000 years. Its ancient core and financial centre, the City of London, was founded by the Roman Empire, Romans as Londinium and has retained its medieval boundaries. The City of Westminster, to the west of the City of London, has been the centuries-long host of Government of the United Kingdom, the national government and Parliament of the United Kingdom, parliament. London grew rapidly 19th-century London, in the 19th century, becoming the world's List of largest cities throughout history, largest city at the time. Since the 19th cen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Macarthur (wool Pioneer)
John Macarthur (1767 – 11 April 1834) was instrumental in agitating for, and organising, a rebellion against Governor William Bligh (now known as the Rum Rebellion) in January 1808. Macarthur had been a British Army officer, entrepreneur, landowner, a pioneer of the Australian Merino wool industry and a politician who was a highly influential figure in the establishment of the colony of New South Wales. Macarthur was the brilliant leader or Australia’s first organised crime enterprise, the 'Rum Corps'. Early life John Macarthur was born at Stoke Damerel near Plymouth, England in 1767. His exact date of birth is unknown, but his baptism was registered on 3 September 1767. He was the second son of Alexander Macarthur, who had fled Scotland to the West Indies after the Jacobite rising of 1745 before returning to Plymouth to work as a linen draper and mercery, mercer. In 1782, John Macarthur was commissioned as an ensign (rank), ensign in Fish's Corps, a regiment of the British ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
