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65-560: The Hotel Ambos Mundos ( Spanish pronunciation: [oˈtel ˈambos ˈmundos] , Both Worlds Hotel ) is a hotel in Havana, Cuba. Built with a square form with five floors, it has an eclectic set of characteristics of 20th-century style architecture. It was built in 1924 on a site that previously had been occupied by an old family house on the corner of Calle Obispo and Mercaderes (Bishop and Merchants Streets) in Old Havana . It

130-529: A continent in that southern part; full of animals and more populous than our Europe, or Asia, or Africa, and even more temperate and pleasant than any other region known to us. Vespucci's letter was a publishing sensation in Europe that was immediately and repeatedly reprinted in several other countries. Peter Martyr, who had been writing and circulating private letters commenting on Columbus's discoveries since 1493, often shares credit with Vespucci for designating

195-584: A large open ocean between China on the east side of the map, and the inchoate largely water-surrounded North American and South American discoveries on the western side of map. Out of uncertainty, they depicted a finger of the Asian land mass stretching across the top to the eastern edge of the map, suggesting it carried over into the western hemisphere. E.g. the Cantino Planisphere denotes Greenland as "Punta d'Asia"—"edge of Asia". Some maps, e.g.,

260-591: A note about Columbus's discovery of the land. Following Waldseemüller, the Swiss scholar Heinrich Glarean included the name America in a 1528 work of geography published in Basel . There, four years later, the German scholar Simon Grinaeus published a map, which Hans Holbein and Sebastian Münster (who had made sketches of Waldseemüller's 1507 map) contributed to; this labelled the continent America Terra Nova (America,

325-520: A quote from a late 15th-century manuscript (a calendar of Bristol events), the original of which had been lost in an 1860 Bristol fire, that indicated the name America was already known in Bristol in 1497. This year (1497), on St. John the Baptist's day (June 24th), the land of America was found by the merchants of Bristow, in a ship of Bristowe called the 'Mathew,' the which said ship departed from

390-691: A recent tradition that names Amerike as principal owner and main funder of the Matthew , Cabot's ship of 1497, academic enquiry does not connect Amerike with the ship. Her ownership at that date remains uncertain. Macdonald asserts that the caravel was specifically built for the Atlantic crossing. Hudd proposed his theory in a paper which was read at the 21 May 1908 meeting of the Clifton Antiquarian Club, and which appeared in Volume 7 of

455-505: Is a frequent tourist destination because it was home to the popular writer Ernest Hemingway for seven years in the 1930s. From colonial times the zone of Old Havana in which the building is now sited was populated by a diverse collection of family houses. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Spanish retailer Antolín Blanco Arias bought a family house on the site, from his office colleague Manuel Llerandi y Tomé. The new owner demolished

520-486: Is freed from the charge of violating the long-established and virtually inviolable ancient European tradition of using only the first name of royal individuals as opposed to the last name of commoners (such as Vespucci) in bestowing names to lands. Bristol antiquarian Alfred Hudd suggested in 1908 that the name was derived from the surname "Amerike" or "ap Meryk" and was used on early British maps that have since been lost. Richard ap Meryk, anglicised to Richard Amerike

585-586: Is no strong evidence to substantiate his theory that Cabot named America after Richard Ameryk. Moreover, because Amerike's coat of arms was similar to the flag later adopted by the independent United States, a legend grew that the North American continent had been named for him rather than for Amerigo Vespucci. It is not widely accepted - the origin is usually attributed to the flag of the British East India Company . In 1977,

650-477: Is now named South America, that same map famously labels simply " America ". Martin Waldseemüller 's map of 1516 retreats considerably from his earlier map and back to classical authority, with the Asian land mass merging into North America, which he now calls Terra de Cuba Asie partis , and quietly drops the "America" label from South America, calling it merely Terra incognita . The western coast of

715-543: Is used to describe the majority of lands of Earth 's Western Hemisphere , particularly the Americas . The term arose in the early 16th century during Europe 's Age of Discovery , after Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci published the Latin -language pamphlet Mundus Novus , presenting his conclusion that these lands (soon called America based on Amerigo's name ) constitute a new continent . This realization expanded

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780-639: The Terra Australis that had been posited as a hypothetical southern continent. All of the New World countries use the Latin script as its official script. The Florentine explorer Amerigo Vespucci is usually credited for coming up with the term "New World" ( Mundus Novus ) for the Americas in his 1503 letter, giving it its popular cachet, although similar terms had been used and applied before him. The Venetian explorer Alvise Cadamosto used

845-773: The Amerrisque Mountains in present-day Nicaragua . The next year, Jules Marcou suggested a derivation of the continent's name from this mountain range. Marcou corresponded with Augustus Le Plongeon , who wrote: "The name AMERICA or AMERRIQUE in the Mayan language means, a country of perpetually strong wind, or the Land of the Wind, and ... the [suffixes] can mean ... a spirit that breathes, life itself." In this view, native speakers shared this indigenous word with Columbus and members of his crew, and Columbus made landfall in

910-546: The Cosmographiae Introductio has commonly been read as argument, in which the author said that he was naming the newly discovered continent in honor of Vespucci and saw no reason for objections. But, as etymologist Joy Rea has suggested, it could also be read as an explanation, in which he indicates that he has heard the New World was called America, and the only explanation lay in Vespucci's name. Among

975-606: The Gulf of Paria implied that a previously unknown continent must lie behind it. Columbus proposes that the South American landmass is not a "fourth" continent, but rather the terrestrial paradise of Biblical tradition, a land allegedly known, but undiscovered, by Christendom . In another letter to the nurse of Prince John, written 1500, Columbus refers to having reached a "new heavens and world" ("nuevo cielo é mundo") and that he had placed "another world" ("otro mundo") under

1040-701: The New World , the continent also bears the inscription: America ab inuentore nuncupata (America, named after its discoverer). Mercator on his map called North America "America or New India" ( America sive India Nova ). Americus Vesputius was the Latinized version of the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci 's name, the forename being an old Italianization (compare modern Italian Enrico ) of Medieval Latin Emericus (see Saint Emeric of Hungary ), from

1105-576: The West Indies with what returning sailors told him of the East Indies . Vespucci wrote a preliminary letter to Lorenzo, while anchored at Bezeguiche, which he sent back with the Portuguese fleet, which expressed a certain puzzlement about his conversations. Vespucci ultimately was convinced while on his mapping expedition of eastern Brazil from 1501 to 1502. After returning from Brazil in

1170-913: The guava , papaya and pineapple . There are rare instances of overlap, e.g., the calabash (bottle-gourd), cotton , and yam are believed to have been domesticated separately in both the Old and New World, or their early forms possibly brought along by Paleo-Indians from Asia during the last glacial period . [REDACTED] Africa [REDACTED] Antarctica [REDACTED] Asia [REDACTED] Australia [REDACTED] Europe [REDACTED] North America [REDACTED] South America [REDACTED] Afro-Eurasia [REDACTED] Americas [REDACTED] Eurasia [REDACTED] Oceania [REDACTED] Africa [REDACTED] Eurasia [REDACTED] North America [REDACTED] Oceania [REDACTED] South America Naming of

1235-558: The postcolonial Romance-speaking countries of Africa), Germanic (but excluding English) speaking (including Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands) , and elsewhere , where America is still considered a continent encompassing the North America and South America subcontinents , as well as Central America . The earliest known use of

1300-520: The turkey were originally domesticated by pre-Columbian peoples in Mesoamerica . Agriculturalists in the Andean region of South America brought forth the cassava , peanut , potato , quinoa and domesticated animals like the alpaca , guinea pig and llama . Other New World crops include the sweetpotato , cashew , cocoa , rubber , sunflower , tobacco , and vanilla , and fruits like

1365-553: The "discoverer of the new globe" ("Colonus ille novi orbis repertor"). A year later, on 20 October 1494, Peter Martyr again refers to the marvels of the New Globe ("Novo Orbe") and the " Western Hemisphere " ("ab occidente hemisphero"). In Columbus's 1499 letter to the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, reporting the results of his third voyage, he relates how the massive waters of South America's Orinoco delta rushing into

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1430-480: The 1506 Contarini–Rosselli map and the 1508 Johannes Ruysch map, bowing to Ptolemaic authority and Columbus's assertions, have the northern Asian landmass stretching well into the western hemisphere and merging with known North America, Labrador, Newfoundland, etc. These maps place the island of Japan near Cuba and leave the South American continent—Vespucci's "New World" proper—detached and floating below by itself. The Waldseemüller map of 1507, which accompanied

1495-591: The Americas In contemporary English, North and South America are generally considered separate continents, and taken together are called the Americas in the plural. When conceived as a unitary continent, the form is generally the continent of America in the singular. However, without a clarifying context, singular America in English commonly refers to the United States of America . Historically, in

1560-419: The Americas as a new world. Peter Martyr used the term Orbe Novo , meaning "New Globe", in the title of his history of the discovery of the Americas, which began appearing in 1511. The Vespucci passage above applied the "New World" label to merely the continental landmass of South America . At the time, most of the continent of North America was not yet discovered, and Vespucci's comments did not eliminate

1625-591: The Americas remained unclear. That there must be a large ocean between Asia and the Americas was implied by the known existence of vast continuous sea along the coasts of East Asia . Given the size of the Earth as calculated by Eratosthenes this left a large space between Asia and the newly discovered lands. Even prior to Vespucci, several maps, e.g. the Cantino planisphere of 1502 and the Canerio map of 1504, placed

1690-445: The Americas until they were introduced by post-Columbian contact in the 1490s. Many common crops were originally domesticated in the Americas before they spread worldwide after Columbian contact, and are still often referred to as " New World crops ". Common beans ( phaseolus ), maize , and squash —the " three sisters "—as well as the avocado , tomato , and wide varieties of capsicum ( bell pepper , chili pepper , etc.), and

1755-770: The Americas, to distinguish them from their counterparts in the "Old World" (Europe, Africa and Asia)—e.g., New World monkeys , New World vultures , New World warblers . The label is also often used in agriculture. Asia, Africa, and Europe share a common agricultural history stemming from the Neolithic Revolution , and the same domesticated plants and animals spread through these three continents thousands of years ago, making them largely indistinct and useful to classify together as "Old World". Common Old World crops, e.g., barley , lentils , oats , peas , rye , wheat , and domesticated animals, e.g., cattle , chickens , goats , horses , pigs , sheep , did not exist in

1820-410: The Atlantic coast of North America in what is present-day Canada and the United States . The term "New World" is still commonly employed when discussing historic spaces, particularly the voyages of Christopher Columbus and the subsequent European colonization of the Americas . It has been framed as being problematic for applying a colonial perspective of discovery and not doing justice to either

1885-649: The Bell Tolls , a novel of the Spanish Civil War which he had witnessed over the previous several years, in the room in the Ambos Mundos, on 1 March 1939. Today, his hotel room, No. 511, is presented as if the author might have left it, and is a small museum in the middle of the establishment, with tours given regularly in the daytime. The corner of the ground floor hotel lobby also has two walls of framed photographs dedicated to Hemingway. In 1987,

1950-672: The English-speaking world, the term America could refer to a single continent until the 1950s (as in Van Loon 's Geography of 1937): According to historians Kären Wigen and Martin W. Lewis, While it might seem surprising to find North and South America still joined into a single continent in a book published in the United States in 1937, such a notion remained fairly common until World War II. It cannot be coincidental that this idea served American geopolitical designs at

2015-486: The Harbor from the top of the building and adding a kitchen and services. Presently the building contains its original still-functioning Otis screen-cage elevators, and a lobby with a low open freshwater fountain/pool in which turtles are maintained. 23°08′22″N 82°21′02″W  /  23.13944°N 82.35056°W  / 23.13944; -82.35056 New World#Usage and definition The term " New World "

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2080-487: The Indies "), and consequently came up with alternative names to refer to them. Only a few weeks after Columbus's return from his first voyage, Martyr wrote letters referring to Columbus's discovered lands as the "western antipodes" ("antipodibus occiduis", letter of 14 May 1493), the "new hemisphere of the earth" ("novo terrarum hemisphaerio", 13 September 1493). In a letter dated 1 November 1493, he refers to Columbus as

2145-458: The New Land). In 1534, Joachim von Watt labelled it simply America. Gerardus Mercator applied the names North and South America on his influential 1538 world map; by this point, the naming was irrevocable. Acceptance may have been aided by the "natural poetic counterpart" that the name America made with Asia, Africa, and Europa . In 1874, Thomas Belt published the indigenous name of

2210-534: The New World, including the Pacific Ocean , was discovered in 1513 by Vasco Núñez de Balboa , twenty years after Columbus' initial voyage. It was a few more years before the voyage of Ferdinand Magellan 's between 1519 and 1522 determined that the Pacific Ocean definitely formed a single large body of water that separates Asia from the Americas. Several years later, the Pacific Coast of North America

2275-519: The Old High German name Emmerich , which may have been a merger of several Germanic names – Amalric , Ermanaric and Old High German Haimirich , from Proto-Germanic *amala- ('vigor, bravery'), *ermuna- ('great; whole') or *haima- ('home') + *rīk- ('ruler') (compare *Haimarīks ). Amerigo Vespucci (March 9, 1454 – February 22, 1512) was an Italian explorer, financier, navigator and cartographer who may have been

2340-484: The South American mainland], after Americus who discovered it and who is a man of intelligence, Amerigen, that is, the Land of Americus, or America: since both Europa and Asia got their names from women". America is also inscribed on the Paris Green Globe (or Globe vert ) which has been attributed to Waldseemüller and dated to 1506–07: as well as the single name inscribed on the northern and southern parts of

2405-554: The chief of the navigation of Spain. Although the proceedings of the Toro-Burgos conferences are missing, it is almost certain that Vespucci articulated his recent 'New World' thesis to his fellow navigators there. During these conferences, Spanish officials seem to have accepted that the Antilles and the known stretch of Central America were not the Indies as they had hoped. Though Columbus still insisted they were. They set out

2470-458: The club's Proceedings . In "Richard Ameryk and the name America," Hudd discussed the 1497 discovery of North America by John Cabot , an Italian who had sailed on behalf of England. Upon his return to England after his first (1497) and second (1498–1499) voyages, Cabot received two pension payments from Henry VII . Of the two customs officials at the Port of Bristol who were responsible for delivering

2535-534: The dominion of the Kings of Spain. The term "New World" ( Mundus Novus ) was coined in Spring 1503 by Amerigo Vespucci in a letter written to his friend and former patron Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de' Medici , which was published in Latin ) in 1503–04 under the title Mundus Novus . Vespucci's letter contains the first explicit articulation in print of the hypothesis that the lands discovered by European navigators to

2600-422: The famous Cosmographiae Introductio volume, which includes reprints of Vespucci's letters, comes closest to modernity by placing a completely open sea, with no stretching land fingers, between Asia on the eastern side and the New World. It is represented two times in the same map in a different way: with and without a sea passage in the middle of what is now named Central America on the western side—which, on what

2665-535: The first to assert that the West Indies and corresponding mainland were not part of Asia's eastern outskirts as initially conjectured from Columbus's voyages , but instead constituted an entirely separate landmass hitherto unknown to the Europeans. Vespucci was apparently unaware of the use of his name to refer to the new landmass, as Waldseemüller's maps did not reach Spain until a few years after his death. Ringmann may have been misled into crediting Vespucci by

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2730-569: The geographical horizon of earlier European geographers, who had thought that the world only included Afro-Eurasian lands. Africa , Asia , and Europe became collectively called the " Old World " of the Eastern Hemisphere , while the Americas were then referred to as "the fourth part of the world", or the "New World". Antarctica and Oceania are considered neither Old World nor New World lands, since they were only discovered by Europeans much later. They were associated instead with

2795-420: The historic or geographic complexity of the world. It is argued that both 'worlds' and the age of Western colonialism rather entered a new stage, as in the ' modern world '. In wine terminology , "New World" uses a particular definition. " New World wines " include not only North American and South American wines, but also those from South Africa , Australia , New Zealand , and all other locations outside

2860-454: The hotel underwent some small restoration, with more complete work finalized in 1997 to turn it once again into a luxurious hotel reminiscent of its time. Between 2004 and 2005, further maintenance was carried out, cleaning and painting the Hotel's facades. As originally conceived, the three-story building plan had the following distribution: the ground floor served as a commercial center, and in

2925-521: The money to Cabot, the more senior was Richard Ameryk ( High Sheriff of Bristol in 1503). Hudd postulated that Cabot named the land that he had discovered after Ameryk, from whom he received the pension conferred by the king. He stated that Cabot had a reputation for being free with gifts to his friends, such that his expression of gratitude to the official would not be unexpected. Hudd also thought it unlikely that America would have been named after Vespucci's given name rather than his family name. Hudd used

2990-752: The name America dates to April 25, 1507, when it was applied to what is now known as South America. It appears on a small globe map with twelve time zones, together with the largest wall map made to date, both created by the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller in Saint-Dié-des-Vosges in France. These were the first maps to show the Americas as a land mass separate from Asia. An accompanying book, Cosmographiae Introductio , anonymous but apparently written by Waldseemüller's collaborator Matthias Ringmann , states, "I do not see what right any one would have to object to calling this part [that is,

3055-441: The new goal for Spanish explorers: find a sea passage or strait through the Americas, a path to Asia proper. The term New World was not universally accepted, entering English only relatively late, and has more recently been subject to criticism . While it became generally accepted after Amerigo Vespucci that Christopher Columbus ' discoveries were not Asia but a "New World", the geographic relationship between Europe and

3120-400: The opinion of the ancients was, that the greater part of the world beyond the equinoctial line to the south was not land, but only sea, which they have called the Atlantic; and even if they have affirmed that any continent is there, they have given many reasons for denying it is inhabited. But this opinion is false, and entirely opposed to the truth. My last voyage has proved it, for I have found

3185-443: The port of Bristowe the 2nd of May and came home again the 6th August following. Hudd reasoned that the scholars of the 1507 Cosmographiae Introductio , unfamiliar with Richard Ameryk, assumed that the name America, which he claimed had been in use for ten years, was based on Amerigo Vespucci and, therefore, mistakenly transferred the honour from Ameryk to Vespucci. While Hudd's speculation has found support from some authors, there

3250-462: The possibility that the islands of the Antilles discovered earlier by Christopher Columbus might still be the eastern edges of Asia, as Columbus continued to insist until his death in 1506. A 1504 globe , possibly created by Leonardo da Vinci , depicts the New World as only South America , excluding North America and Central America . A conference of navigators known as Junta de Navegantes

3315-488: The reasons which proponents give in adopting this theory include the recognition of, in Cohen's words, "the simple fact that place names usually originate informally in the spoken word and first circulate that way, not in the printed word". In addition, Waldseemüller not only is exonerated from the charge of having arrogated to himself the privilege of naming lands, which privilege was reserved to monarchs and explorers, but also

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3380-675: The spring of 1503, Vespucci authored the Mundus Novus letter in Lisbon and sent it to Lorenzo in Florence , with the famous opening paragraph: In passed days I wrote very fully to you of my return from new countries, which have been found and explored with the ships, at the cost and by the command of this Most Serene King of Portugal; and it is lawful to call it a new world, because none of these countries were known to our ancestors and to all who hear about them they will be entirely new. For

3445-518: The term "un altro mondo" ("another world") to refer to sub-Saharan Africa , which he explored in 1455 and 1456 on behalf of the Portuguese. This was merely a literary flourish, not a suggestion of a new "fourth" part of the world. Cadamosto was aware that sub-Saharan Africa was part of the African continent. Peter Martyr d'Anghiera , an Italian chronicler at the service of Spain , doubted Christopher Columbus 's claims to have reached East Asia ("

3510-578: The time, which sought both Western Hemispheric domination and disengagement from the "Old World" continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa. By the 1950s, however, virtually all American geographers had come to insist that the visually distinct landmasses of North and South America deserved separate designations. This shift did not seem to happen in most other cultural hemispheres on Earth, such as Romance-speaking (including France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, Switzerland, Latin America , and

3575-561: The traditional wine-growing regions of Europe, North Africa and the Near East . The usefulness of these terms for wines though have been questioned as arbitrary and too generalized. In a biological context, species can be divided into those in the Old World ( Palearctic , Afrotropic ) and those in the New World ( Nearctic , Neotropic ). Biological taxonomists often attach the "New World" label to groups of species found exclusively in

3640-408: The upper two floors were the rooms for the guests. The fused concrete and steel structure of the building gave an eclectic and modern character for its time of manufacture. In 1924, the original plan was extended, gaining height to a final five stories. Finally, the structure was officially declared habitable on 6 January 1925. Five years after construction a hall was placed in the roof giving views of

3705-463: The very old house to construct the hotel, the work being in charge of the architect Luis Wise Hernandez . In the 1930s this hotel was the property of the Asper family. Hotel Ambos Mundos was a family hotel, that attracted writers, actors and actresses, and many Americans. This hotel since has gained international note from its most famous long-time tenant: in 1932 a room on the upper (5th) floor became

3770-409: The vicinity of these mountains on his fourth voyage. The name America then spread via oral means throughout Europe relatively quickly even reaching Waldseemüller, who was preparing a map of newly reported lands for publication in 1507. Waldseemüller's work in the area of denomination takes on a different aspect in this view. Jonathan Cohen of Stony Brook University writes: The baptismal passage in

3835-475: The watering stop at Bezeguiche in present-day Dakar , Senegal , as Vespucci was on his expedition to chart the coast of newly discovered Brazil and the ships of the Second Portuguese India armada , commanded by Pedro Álvares Cabral , were returning from India . Having already visited the Americas in prior years, Vespucci likely found it difficult to reconcile what he had already seen in

3900-489: The west were not the edges of Asia, as asserted by Christopher Columbus , but rather an entirely different continent that represented a "New World". According to Mundus Novus , Vespucci realized that he was in a "New World" on 17 August 1501 as he arrived in Brazil and compared the nature and people of the place with what Portuguese sailors told him about Asia . A chance meeting between two different expeditions occurred at

3965-514: The widely published Soderini Letter, a sensationalized version of one of Vespucci's actual letters reporting on the mapping of the South American coast, which glamorized his discoveries and implied that he had recognized that South America was a continent separate from Asia. Spain officially refused to accept the name America for two centuries, saying that Columbus should get credit, and Waldseemüller's later maps, after Ringmann's death, did not include it; in 1513 he labelled it " Terra Incognita " with

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4030-551: The “first home” in Cuba of writer Ernest Hemingway, who enjoyed the views of Old Havana, and the harbor in which he fished frequently in his yacht Pilar . Hemingway rented the room for $ 1.50 per night ($ 1.75 for double occupancy) until mid-1939, when he transferred his winter residence from Key West (a U.S. island 90 miles from Cuba) to a house in the hills near Havana, Finca Vigia , which he shared with Martha Gellhorn (they were married in 1940). Hemingway began his novel For Whom

4095-486: Was a wealthy Anglo-Welsh merchant, royal customs officer and sheriff of Bristol. According to some writers, he was the principal owner of the Matthew , the ship sailed by John Cabot during his voyage of exploration to North America in 1497. The idea that Richard Amerike was a 'principal supporter' of Cabot has gained popular currency in the 21st century. There is no evidence to support this. Similarly, and contrary to

4160-406: Was assembled by the Spanish monarchs at Toro in 1505 and continued at Burgos in 1508 to digest all existing information about the Indies, come to an agreement on what had been discovered, and set out the future goals of Spanish exploration. Amerigo Vespucci attended both conferences, and seems to have had an outsized influence on them—at Burgos, he ended up being appointed the first piloto mayor ,

4225-487: Was mapped. The discovery of the Bering Straits in the early 18th century, established that Asia and North America were not connected by land. But some European maps of the 16th century, including the 1533 Johannes Schöner globe , still continued to depict North America as connected by a land bridge to Asia. In 1524, the term "New World" was used by Giovanni da Verrazzano in a record of his voyage that year along

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