William Chaloner
William Chaloner (1650 – 22 March 1699) was a serial counterfeit coiner and confidence trickster, who was imprisoned in Newgate Prison several times and eventually proven guilty of high treason by Sir Isaac Newton, Warden of the Royal Mint. He was hanged on the gallows at Tyburn on 22 March 1699. Chaloner grew up in a poor family in Warwickshire, but through a career in counterfeiting and con artistry attained great wealth, including a house in Knightsbridge. He started by forging " Birmingham Groats", then moved on to Guineas, French Pistoles, crowns and half-crowns, Banknotes and lottery tickets. At various times he also made and sold dildos and worked as a quack doctor, soothsayer, and sham anti-Jacobite "agent provocateur" to collect government rewards. In ''Guzman Redivivus'', a posthumous biography published anonymously in 1699, it was stated that "scorning the 'petty Rogueries of Tricking single Men', he aimed rather at 'imposing upon a whole Kingdom'. Earl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Warwickshire
Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It is bordered by Staffordshire and Leicestershire to the north, Northamptonshire to the east, Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire to the south, and Worcestershire and the West Midlands (county), West Midlands county to the west. The largest settlement is Nuneaton and the county town is Warwick. The county is largely rural; it has an area of and a population of 571,010. After Nuneaton (88,813), the largest settlements are Rugby, Warwickshire, Rugby (78,125), Leamington Spa (50,923), Warwick (36,665), Bedworth (31,090) and Stratford-upon-Avon (30,495). For Local government in England, local government purposes, Warwickshire is a non-metropolitan county with five districts. The county Historic counties of England, historically included the city of Coventry and the area to its west, including Royal Town of Sutton Coldfield, Sutton Coldfield ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Guinea (British Coin)
The guinea (; commonly abbreviated gn., or gns. in plural) was a coin, minted in Great Britain between 1663 and 1814, that contained approximately one-quarter of an ounce of gold. The name came from the Guinea region in West Africa, from where much of the gold used to make the coins was sourced. It was the first English machine-struck gold coin, originally representing a value of 20 shillings in sterling specie, equal to one pound, but rises in the price of gold relative to silver caused the value of the guinea to increase, at times to as high as thirty shillings. From 1717 to 1816, its value was officially fixed at twenty-one shillings. In the Great Recoinage of 1816, the guinea was demonetised and replaced by the gold sovereign. Following the Great Recoinage, the word "guinea" was retained as a colloquial or specialised term, even though the coins were no longer in use; the term ''guinea'' also survived as a unit of account in some fields. Notable usages included professio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the List of English districts by population, largest local authority district in England by population and the second-largest city in Britain – commonly referred to as the second city of the United Kingdom – with a population of million people in the city proper in . Birmingham borders the Black Country to its west and, together with the city of Wolverhampton and towns including Dudley and Solihull, forms the West Midlands conurbation. The royal town of Sutton Coldfield is incorporated within the city limits to the northeast. The urban area has a population of 2.65million. Located in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands region of England, Birmingham is considered to be the social, cultural, financial and commercial centre of the Midland ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Nail (fastener)
In woodworking and construction, a nail is a small object made of metal (or wood, called a tree nail or "trunnel") which is used as a fastener, as a peg to hang something, or sometimes as a decoration. Generally, nails have a sharp point on one end and a flattened head on the other, but headless nails are available. Nails are made in a great variety of forms for specialized purposes. The most common is a ''wire nail''. Other types of nails include ''pins'', ''Thumbtack, tacks'', ''wikt:brad, brads'', ''spikes'', and ''cleat (shoe), cleats.'' Nails are typically driven into the workpiece by a hammer or nail gun. A nail holds materials together by friction in the axial direction and Shear stress, shear strength laterally. The point of the nail is also sometimes bent over or ''clinched'' after driving to prevent pulling out. History The history of the nail is divided roughly into three distinct periods: * Hand-wrought (forged) nail (pre-history until 19th century) * Cut nail (ro ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Apprenticeship
Apprenticeship is a system for training a potential new practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study. Apprenticeships may also enable practitioners to gain a license to practice in a regulated occupation. Most of their training is done while working for an employer who helps the apprentices learn their trade or profession, in exchange for their continued labor for an agreed period after they have achieved measurable competencies. Apprenticeship lengths vary significantly across sectors, professions, roles and cultures. In some cases, people who successfully complete an apprenticeship can reach the " journeyman" or professional certification level of competence. In other cases, they can be offered a permanent job at the company that provided the placement. Although the formal boundaries and terminology of the apprentice/journeyman/master system often do not extend outside guilds and trade unions, the concept of on-the-job trai ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Weaver (occupation)
Weaving is a method of textile production in which two distinct sets of yarns or threads are interlaced at right angles to form a fabric or cloth. Other methods are knitting, crocheting, felting, and braiding or plaiting. The longitudinal threads are called the warp and the lateral threads are the weft, woof, or filling. The method in which these threads are interwoven affects the characteristics of the cloth. Cloth is usually woven on a loom, a device that holds warp threads in place while filling threads are woven through them. A fabric band that meets this definition of cloth (warp threads with a weft thread winding between) can also be made using other methods, including tablet weaving, back strap loom, or other techniques that can be done without looms. The way the warp and filling threads interlace with each other is called the weave. The majority of woven products are created with one of three basic weaves: plain weave, satin weave, or twill weave. Woven cloth ca ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Agent Provocateur
An is a person who actively entices another person to commit a crime that would not otherwise have been committed and then reports the person to the authorities. They may target individuals or groups. In jurisdictions in which conspiracy is a serious crime in itself, it can be sufficient for the to entrap the target into discussing and planning an illegal act. It is not necessary for the illegal act to be carried out or even prepared. Prevention of infiltration by is part of the duty of demonstration marshals, also called stewards, deployed by organizers of large or controversial assemblies.Belyaeva et al. (2007), § 7–8, 156–162Bryan, DominicThe Anthropology of Ritual: Monitoring and Stewarding Demonstrations in Northern Ireland, ''Anthropology in Action'', Volume 13, Numbers 1–2, January 2006, pp. 22–31 (10). History and etymology While the practice was worldwide in antiquity, modern undercover operations were scaled up in France by Eugène François Vidocq in ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Jacobitism
Jacobitism was a political ideology advocating the restoration of the senior line of the House of Stuart to the Monarchy of the United Kingdom, British throne. When James II of England chose exile after the November 1688 Glorious Revolution, the Parliament of England ruled he had "abandoned" the English throne, which was given to his Protestant daughter Mary II of England, and his nephew, her husband William III of England, William III. On the same basis, in April the Convention of Estates (1689), Scottish Convention awarded Mary and William the throne of Scotland. The Revolution created the principle of a contract between monarch and people, which if violated meant the monarch could be removed. A key tenet of Jacobitism was that kings were appointed by God, making the post-1688 regime illegitimate. However, it also functioned as an outlet for popular discontent, and thus was a complex mix of ideas, many opposed by the Stuarts themselves. Conflict between Charles Edward Stuar ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Fortune-telling
Fortune telling is the spiritual practice of predicting information about a person's life. Melton, J. Gordon. (2008). ''The Encyclopedia of Religious Phenomena''. Visible Ink Press. pp. 115–116. The scope of fortune telling is in principle identical with the practice of divination. The difference is that divination is the term used for predictions considered part of a religious ritual, invoking deities or spirits, while the term fortune telling implies a less serious or formal setting, even one of popular culture, where belief in occult workings behind the prediction is less prominent than the concept of suggestion, spiritual or practical advisory or affirmation. Historically, Pliny the Elder describes use of the crystal ball in the 1st century CE by soothsayers (''"crystallum orbis"'', later written in Medieval Latin by scribes as ''orbuculum''). Contemporary Western images of fortune telling grow out of folkloristic reception of Renaissance magic, specifically ass ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Quackery
Quackery, often synonymous with health fraud, is the promotion of fraudulent or Ignorance, ignorant medicine, medical practices. A quack is a "fraudulent or ignorant pretender to medical skill" or "a person who pretends, professionally or publicly, to have skill, knowledge, qualification or credentials they do not possess; a charlatan or snake oil salesman". The term ''quack'' is a Clipping (morphology), clipped form of the archaic term ', derived from a "hawker of salve" or rather somebody who boasted about their salves, more commonly known as ointments. In the Middle Ages the term ''quack'' meant "shouting". The quacksalvers sold their wares at markets by shouting to gain attention. Common elements of general quackery include List of diagnoses characterized as pseudoscience, questionable diagnoses using List of questionable diagnostic tests, questionable diagnostic tests, as well as untested or refuted treatments, especially for serious diseases such as alternative cancer trea ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Dildo
A dildo is a sex toy, often explicitly phallic in appearance, intended for sexual penetration or other sexual activity during masturbation or with sex partners. Dildos are made from a number of materials. The shape and size are typically that of a human penis, but there is a wide variation to accommodate the needs of different users. Etymology The etymology of the word ''dildo'' was long considered unclear,. but the third edition of the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' concluded in 2018 that the word originates in nonsense syllables common in early-modern popular ballads (not dissimilar to the still-familiar nursery rhyme phrase " hey diddle diddle"), which came to be used as a coy euphemism for dildos.dildo, int. and n.1. , ''OED Online'', 3rd edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018). Accessed 29 May 2019. The phras ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Banknote
A banknote or bank notealso called a bill (North American English) or simply a noteis a type of paper money that is made and distributed ("issued") by a bank of issue, payable to the bearer on demand. Banknotes were originally issued by commercial banks, which were legally required to Redemption value, redeem the notes for legal tender (usually gold or silver coin) when presented to the chief cashier of the originating bank. These commercial banknotes only traded at face value in the market served by the issuing bank. Commercial banknotes have primarily been replaced by national banknotes issued by central banks or monetary authority, monetary authorities. By extension, the word "banknote" is sometimes used (including by collectors) to refer more generally to paper money, but in a strict sense notes that have not been issued by banks, e.g. government notes, are not banknotes. National banknotes are often, but not always, legal tender, meaning that courts of law are required to ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |