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Droit Du Seigneur
('right of the lord'), also known as ('right of the first night'), sometimes referred to as ''prima nocta'', was a supposed legal right in medieval Europe, allowing feudal lords to have sexual relations with any female subject, particularly on her wedding night. There are many references to the alleged custom throughout the centuries. Terminology The French expression translates as "right of the lord", but modern French usage prefers (, from , 'leg') or, more commonly, (, from , 'thigh'). The term is often used synonymously with , Latin for "right of the first night". Ancient times The Greek historian Herodotus mentions a similar custom among the Adyrmachidae in ancient Libya: "They are also the only tribe with whom the custom obtains of bringing all women about to become brides before the king, that he may choose such as are agreeable to him." When the plebeians of the Etruscan city of Volsinii rebelled against the aristocrats in 280 BC, "They took their wives for ...
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Indulgence
In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (, from , 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for (forgiven) sins". The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' describes an indulgence as "a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain prescribed conditions…" The recipient of an indulgence must perform an action to receive it. This is most often the saying (once, or many times) of a specified prayer, but may also include a pilgrimage, the visiting of a particular place (such as a shrine, Church (building), church, or cemetery), or the performance of specific good works. Indulgences were introduced to allow for the remission of the severe penances of the early church and granted at the intercession of Christians awaiting martyrdom or at least imprisoned for the faith.Cross, F. L., ed. ''The Oxford Dictionary of the ...
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Baudouin De Sebourc
''Baudouin de Sebourc'' is a fourteenth-century French ''chanson de geste'' which probably formed part of a cycle related to the Crusades, and may well be related to ''Bâtard de Bouillon''. The poem was likely composed c. 1350 in Hainaut. The poem consists of 25,750 lines and is retained in two manuscript copies and was printed in 1841; a critical edition wasn't published until 1940. This edition, by Edmond-René Labande, advanced two ideas about the poem. The first was that it should be dated to the middle of the fourteenth century rather than earlier in that century, and the second that it was written by two poets—the first a very capable writer with a fine sense of humor, the second a much less original one. Plot According to Claassens, the plot "is impossible to summarize ... briefly". The main character's father, King Ernoul of Nijmegen, travels to the Orient to deliver his brother from Saracen captivity. In the meantime his seneschal, Gaufroi of Friesland, takes Ernoul's ...
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Vern Bullough
Vern Leroy Bullough (July 24, 1928 – June 21, 2006) was an American historian and sexologist. He was a distinguished professor emeritus at the State University of New York ( SUNY) at Buffalo, Faculty President at California State University, Northridge, a past president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, past Dean of natural and social sciences at the Buffalo State College in Buffalo, New York, one of the founders of the American Association for the History of Nursing, and a member of the editorial board of ''Paidika: The Journal of Paedophilia''. Early life and career Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, to a Mormon family, Bullough earned his A.B. at the University of Utah in 1951. He then attended the University of Chicago, earning an A.M. in 1951 and a Ph.D in 1954, and was a university fellow during 1953-1954. In 1981, he received a B.S.N. from California State University, Long Beach. According to the university, he is the author, co-author, or editor of ...
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Miracle
A miracle is an event that is inexplicable by natural or scientific lawsOne dictionary define"Miracle"as: "A surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore considered to be the work of a divine agency." and accordingly gets attributed to some supernatural or praeternatural cause. Various religions often attribute a phenomenon characterized as miraculous to the actions of a supernatural being, (especially) a deity, a miracle worker, a saint, or a religious leader. Informally, English-speakers often use the word ''miracle'' to characterise any beneficial event that is statistically unlikely but not contrary to the laws of nature, such as surviving a natural disaster, or simply a "wonderful" occurrence, regardless of likelihood (e.g. "the miracle of childbirth"). Some coincidences may be seen as miracles. A true miracle would, by definition, be a non-natural phenomenon, leading many writers to dismiss miracles as physically i ...
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Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault involving sexual intercourse, or other forms of sexual penetration, carried out against a person without consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person who is incapable of giving valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, has an intellectual disability, or is below the legal age of consent ( statutory rape). The term ''rape'' is sometimes casually used interchangeably with the term ''sexual assault''. The rate of reporting, prosecuting and convicting for rape varies between jurisdictions. Internationally, the incidence of rapes recorded by the police during 2008 ranged, per 100,000 people, from 0.2 in Azerbaijan to 92.9 in Botswana with 6.3 in Lithuania as the median.
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Odo Of Cluny
Odo of Cluny () ( – 18 November 942) was the second abbot of Cluny. Born to a noble family, he served as a page at the court of Aquitaine. He became a canon of the Church of St. Martin in Tours, and continued his education in Paris under Remigius of Auxerre. Upon returning to Tours, Odo became disillusioned with the life of a canon and subsequently entered the Benedictine abbey at Baume, where he became superior of the abbey school. Odo joined Abbot Berno at Cluny and when Berno died in 927, was elected his successor. While abbot, he also managed the priory at Romainmôtier. Next, he undertook the reform of Fleury Abbey. He encouraged the monks to adhere more closely to the original ''Rule of Saint Benedict''. In 931 the Pope authorized Odo to continue his work in the monasteries of Aquitaine. He enacted the various Cluniac Reforms of France and Italy. In 937, he went to Rome and was given Saint Paul Outside the Walls. He also sent his aides to Monte Cassino and Subiaco ...
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Gerald Of Aurillac
Gerald of Aurillac (or Saint Gerald) ( 855 – c. 909) is a French saint of the Roman Catholic Church, also recognized by other religious denominations of Christianity. Life Gerald was born into the Gallo-Roman nobility, counting Cesarius of Arles among his forebears, though the title "Count of Aurillac" was not held by his father, to whose estates he succeeded, and was assumed by him in later life. He was related to Robert de Turlande. The details of his life known today come primarily from ''The Life of St. Gerald of Aurillac'' (c. 930–931) written by Odo of Cluny. Writing twenty years after the event, Abbot Odo of Cluny described how William, duke of Aquitaine, had entreated Gerald to abandon the ''militia regia'', the feudal service performed directly to the king and pay homage to himself, "for the sake of love". Gerald resisted, having recently assumed the title of ''comes'' and doubtless preferring to owe his fealty to the more distant liege, the king at Paris. Accord ...
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Thomas Kinsella
Thomas Kinsella (4 May 1928 – 22 December 2021) was an Irish poet, translator, editor, and publisher. Born outside Dublin, Kinsella attended University College Dublin before entering the civil service. He began publishing poetry in the early 1950s and, around the same time, translated early Irish poetry into English. In the 1960s, he moved to the United States to teach English at universities including Temple University. Kinsella continued to publish steadily until the 2010s. Early life and work Thomas Kinsella was born on 4 May 1928 in Inchicore to working-class but "cultured" parents John Paul Kinsella and Agnes, née Casserly. His father and grandfather both worked in Guinness's brewery, his father, a union organiser, in the cooperage, later working as "a helper, a labourer, on a Guinness delivery lorry"; his grandfather ran a barge from the brewery to sea-going vessels in Dublin harbour. Kinsella spent most of his childhood in the Kilmainham/ Inchicore area of Dublin, an ...
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Cathbad
Cathbad () or Cathbhadh (modern spelling) is the chief druid in the court of King Conchobar mac Nessa in the Ulster Cycle of Irish Mythology. He features in both accounts of Conchobar's birth, in one of which he is the king's father. In the first, Nessa, daughter of Eochaid Sálbuide, the then king of Ulster, asks the druid what it is an auspicious time for (as he had the ability to foretell the future). Cathbad replies, "for begetting a king on a queen". There were no other men around, so Ness takes Cathbad to bed and conceives a son. In the second version, Cathbad, who is a leader of a band of ''fianna'' (landless warriors) as well as a druid, attacks Ness's foster-fathers' house, killing all 12 of them. Because the culprit cannot be identified, Eochaid is powerless to do anything about it, so Ness forms her own band of 27 ''fianna'' to track him down. However, one day, when she goes off on her own to bathe, Cathbad comes upon her alone and unarmed, and demands her as his wife ...
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Druid
A druid was a member of the high-ranking priestly class in ancient Celtic cultures. The druids were religious leaders as well as legal authorities, adjudicators, lorekeepers, medical professionals and political advisors. Druids left no written accounts. While they were reported to have been literate, they are believed to have been prevented by doctrine from recording their knowledge in written form. Their beliefs and practices are attested in some detail by their contemporaries from other cultures, such as the Romans and the Greeks. The earliest known references to the druids date to the 4th century BC. The oldest detailed description comes from Julius Caesar's ''Commentarii de Bello Gallico'' (50s BC). They were described by other Roman writers such as Cicero, Cicero (44) I.XVI.90. Tacitus, and Pliny the Elder. Following the Roman invasion of Gaul, the druid orders were suppressed by the Roman government under the 1st-century AD emperors Tiberius and Claudius, a ...
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Cú Chulainn
Cú Chulainn ( ), is an Irish warrior hero and demigod in the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology, as well as in Scottish and Manx folklore. He is believed to be an incarnation of the Irish god Lugh, who is also his father. His mother is the mortal Deichtine, sister of King Conchobar mac Nessa. Born Sétanta, he gained his better-known name as a child, after killing Culann's fierce guard dog in self-defence and offering to take its place until a replacement could be reared, hence he became the "Hound (''cú'') of Culann". He was trained in martial arts by Scáthach, who gave him the spear Gáe Bulg. It was prophesied that his great deeds would give him everlasting fame, but that his life would be short. At the age of seventeen he defended Ulster single-handedly against the armies of Queen Medb of Connacht in the famous '' Táin Bó Cúailnge'' ("Cattle Raid of Cooley"). He is known for his terrifying battle frenzy (''ríastrad''), in which he becomes an unrecognisable mo ...
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