Trivia _ Pau

Humanities

1. Ancient Greece continues to fascinate the hearts and minds of intelligent people the world over. For example, which English genius deciphered the pre-alphabetic Greek writing system known as Linear B? Michael Ventris.

==> Linear B was the writing system the ancient Greeks used before the alphabet was invented. It dates to ca. 1400-1200 BC, about half a millennium before Homer. Linear B only came to light in 1900, when Sir Arthur Evans began archaeological excavations at the Palace of Knossos on Crete. Michael Ventris first became fascinated with Linear B when he visited Sir Arthur Evans' "Minoan World" exhibition as a young boy. Witnesses report that Evans was showing the schoolboys some of the Linear B tablets, when a small voice piped up, "You say they haven't been deciphered, sir?" From that moment onwards, Ventris was obsessed with deciphering Linear B. He attended the Architectural Association school to become an architect, and served in the Royal Air Force during WWII, but always kept his interest in Linear B alive. In 1951, Ventris quit his job as an architect to work on Linear B exclusively. He deciphered Linear B the next year, in 1952, at the age of 30. Ventris' decipherment was especially remarkable for two reasons. First, there is no "Rosetta Stone," no bilingual inscription containing a text in Linear B with a translation in a known language. Ventris could only work from observations of the internal structure of Linear B. Second, Ventris had no professional training in the Classics, even though he was a brilliant polyglot. He was simply a gifted amateur who succeeded when two generations of Classical scholars had failed. Sadly, Ventris' life took on a "tragic hero" quality after the decipherment. Once the fame and glory wore off, what could he do next? He was never interested in reading the texts, just in the challenge of decipherment, and didn't have the Classical training to pursue Linear B research further. He took a prestigious architectural job, only to turn it down a short time later because he felt inadequate for the task. It was clear to friends that Ventris was feeling increasingly depressed and dissatisfied with his life. What should he have done? We'll never know. Ventris died in a car accident under mysterious circumstances in 1956. He was only 34.

2. Parsees are modern practitioners in India of what 'ism'? Zoroastrianism

==> Zoroastrianism is an ancient religion of Persia. The founding of this religion is assigned to Zoroaster (Zarathustra) but the tenets of the religion are probably even more ancient. The holy book of the Zoroastrians is called the Zend Avesta, and like the Christians, the Zoroastrians believe that there is a supernatural conflict between good and evil forces, personified by Ahura Mazda and Angra Mainyu (similar to God and the Devil).

3. Esperanto
==> the most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. [2] The name derives from Doktoro Esperanto, the pseudonym under which L. L. Zamenhof published the first book of Esperanto, the Unua Libro, in 1887. The word "esperanto" means 'one who hopes'. Zamenhof's goal was to create an easy and flexible language as a universal second language to foster peace and international understanding.
Although no country has adopted the language officially, it has enjoyed continuous usage by a community estimated at between 100,000 and 2 million speakers for over a century. By most estimates, there are approximately a thousand native speakers.[3]
Today, Esperanto is employed in world travel, correspondence, cultural exchange, conventions, literature, language instruction, television (Internacia Televido), and radio broadcasting.[4] Some state education systems offer elective courses in Esperanto, and in one university, the Akademio Internacia de la Sciencoj in San Marino, Esperanto is the language of instruction. There is evidence that learning Esperanto may provide a good foundation for learning languages in general.
Esperanto was developed in the late 1870s and early 1880s by ophthalmologist Dr. Ludovic Lazarus Zamenhof, an Ashkenazi Jew from Bialystok, now in Poland and previously in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, but at the time part of the Russian Empire. After some ten years of development, which Zamenhof spent translating literature into the language as well as writing original prose and verse, the first Esperanto grammar was published in Warsaw in July 1887. The number of speakers grew rapidly over the next few decades, at first primarily in the Russian empire and Eastern Europe, then in Western Europe and the Americas, China, and Japan. In the early years speakers of Esperanto kept in contact primarily through correspondence and periodicals, but in 1905 the first world congress of Esperanto speakers was held in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France. Since then world congresses have been held in different countries every year, save for during the two World Wars. Since the Second World War, they have been attended by an average of over 2000 people, and by up to 6000.

4. What is the better known name of Horace's "Epistulae ad Pisonem"? Ars Poetica

==>this work instructs one on how to write poetry; Ars Poetica is a term meaning "The Art of Poetry" or "On the Nature of Poetry". Early examples of Ars Poetica by Aristotle and Horace have survived and have since spawned many other poems that bear the same name. Three of the most notable examples, including the work by Horace, are as follows.
==>Ars Poetica (also known as "The Art of Poetry", Epistula Ad Pisones, or Letters to Piso) was a treatise on poetics. It was first translated into English by Ben Jonson, Three quotes in particular are associated with the work:
"in medias res", or "into the middle of things"; this describes a popular narrative technique that appears frequently in ancient epics and remains popular to this day
"bonus dormitat Homerus" or "even Homer nods"; an indication that even the most skilled poet can make continuity errors
"ut pictura poesis", or "As is painting so is poetry", by which Horace meant that poetry (in its widest sense, "imaginative texts") merited the same careful interpretation that was, in Horace's day, reserved for painting.

5. What artist was struck in the face with a mallet by an envious rival, disfiguring him for life? Michelangelo

==> While studying at the Academy of Ancient Art in the Medici Palace, Michelangelo not only developed his genius as a sculptor, but also excited the wrath of his rival, Torregiano, who struck him with a mallet, crushing the nose on his face and disfiguring him for life.

6. What is the longest movie ever made? Cure for Insomnia

==> The Cure for Insomnia, directed by John Henry Timmis IV, is officially the world's longest movie, according to Guinness World Records, as of its release in 1987. Running 5220 minutes (87 hours) in length, the movie has no plot, instead consisting of artist L. D. Groban reading his lengthy poem "A Cure for Insomnia" over the course of three and a half days, spliced with occasional clips from heavy metal and pornographic videos.[1]
The movie is shot entirely on video, and its intended purpose actually was to be so unbelievably boring that it would put people to sleep thus curing insomnia. It is therefore disputed as to whether or not The Cure for Insomnia should even be considered as a candidate for the world's longest film in the strictest sense.
It was first played in its entirety at The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, Illinois from January 31 to February 3, 1987 in one continuous showing. It is not clear whether or not the movie has been shown since then. Considering that a DVD can only hold up to five hours of video at poor quality, The Cure for Insomnia would fill around 18 discs.