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Luigi Ferdinando Marsili

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Count (feminine: countess ) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Especially in earlier medieval periods the term often implied not only a certain status, but also that the count had specific responsibilities or offices. The etymologically related English term " county " denoted the territories associated with some countships, but not all.

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42-470: Count Luigi Ferdinando Marsili (or Marsigli , Lat. Marsilius ; 10 July 1658 – 1 November 1730) was an Italian scholar and natural scientist, who also served as an emissary and soldier. Born in Bologna , he was a member of an ancient patrician family and was educated in accordance with his noble social rank. He supplemented his reading by studying mathematics , anatomy , and natural history helped by

84-489: A Glossary on Heraldica.org by Alexander Krischnig. The male form is followed by the female, and when available, by the territorial circumscription. Apart from all these, a few unusual titles have been of comital rank, not necessarily permanently. Since Louis VII (1137–80), the highest precedence amongst the vassals ( Prince-bishops and secular nobility) of the French crown was enjoyed by those whose benefice or temporal fief

126-403: A description of the creation and form of the whole universe, not simply as a collection of maps. The volume that was published posthumously one year after his death is a wide-ranging text but, as the editions evolved, it became simply a collection of maps and it is in that sense that the word was used from the middle of the 17th century. The neologism coined by Mercator was a mark of his respect for

168-599: A military commander but was not a specific rank. In the Eastern Roman Empire , from about the seventh century, "count" was a specific rank indicating the commander of two centuriae (i.e., 200 men). The medieval title of comes was originally not hereditary. It was regarded as an administrative official dependent on the king, until the process of allodialisation during the 9th century in which such titles came to be private possessions of noble families. By virtue of their large estates, many counts could pass

210-717: A rule historically unrelated and thus hard to compare, but which are considered "equivalent" in rank. This is the case with: The title "Count" in fiction is commonly, though not always, given to evil characters, used as another word for prince or vampires: Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps ; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a continent or region of Earth . Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today, many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geographical features and political boundaries , many atlases often feature geopolitical , social, religious , and economic statistics . They also have information about

252-669: A title it indicated that someone was delegated to represent the ruler. In the late Roman Empire , the Latin title comes denoted the high rank of various courtiers and provincial officials, either military or administrative. Before Anthemius became emperor in the West in 467, he was a military comes charged with strengthening defenses on the Danube frontier. In the Western Roman Empire , "count" came to indicate generically

294-439: Is a distinction between counts (Swedish: greve ) created before and after 1809. All children in comital families elevated before 1809 were called count/countess. In families elevated after 1809, only the head of the family was called count, the rest have a status similar to barons and were called by the equivalent of "Mr/Ms/Mrs", before the recognition of titles of nobility was abolished. The following lists are originally based on

336-488: Is awarded to the collection of maps Theatrum Orbis Terrarum by the Brabantian cartographer Abraham Ortelius printed in 1570. Atlases published nowadays are quite different from those published in the 16th–19th centuries. Unlike today, most atlases were not bound and ready for the customer to buy, but their possible components were shelved separately. The client could select the contents to their liking, and have

378-535: Is no male to inherit the title and the count has a daughter, in some regions she could inherit the title. Many Italian counts left their mark on Italian history as individuals, yet only a few contadi (countships; the word contadini for inhabitants of a "county" remains the Italian word for "peasant") were politically significant principalities, notably: The principalities tended to start out as margraviate or (promoted to) duchy, and became nominal archduchies within

420-622: Is very prolific on the peninsula. In the eleventh century, Conti like the Count of Savoy or the Norman Count of Apulia, were virtually sovereign lords of broad territories. Even apparently "lower"-sounding titles, like Viscount , could describe powerful dynasts, such as the House of Visconti which ruled a major city such as Milan . The essential title of a feudatory, introduced by the Normans,

462-522: The Danube was published, after twenty years of delay, in 1726 in Amsterdam and The Hague. The maps of the work were published as an atlas in 1744. His treatise of oceans, published in 1725, renders Marsigli to be considered the founding father of modern oceanography . In 1727 he added to his other collections East India material which he collected in England and Holland . A formal procession of

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504-642: The First Bulgarian Empire , a komit was a hereditary provincial ruler under the tsar documented since the reign of Presian (836-852) The Cometopouli dynasty was named after its founder, the komit of Sredets . The title of Serdar was used in the Principality of Montenegro and the Principality of Serbia as a noble title below that of Voivode equivalent to that of Count. In Denmark and historically in Denmark-Norway

546-524: The Frankish kingdoms in the early Middle Ages , a count might also be a count palatine , whose authority derived directly over a royal household, a palace in its original sense of the seat of power and administration. This other kind of count had vague antecedents in Late Antiquity too: the father of Cassiodorus held positions of trust with Theodoric, as comes rerum privatarum , in charge of

588-557: The Habsburg Army he made journeys to Switzerland and then France, spending a considerable time at Marseilles undertaking studies about the nature of the sea. He drew plans, made astronomical observations, measured the speed and size of rivers, studied the products, the mines, the birds, fishes, and fossils of every land he visited, and also collected specimens of every kind, instruments, models, antiquities, etc. Finally he returned to Bologna and presented his entire collection to

630-550: The Senate of Bologna University in 1712. There he founded his " Institute of Sciences and Arts ", which was formally opened in 1715. Six professors were put in charge of the different divisions of the institute. Later he established a printing-house furnished with the best type sets for Latin, Greek , Hebrew , and Arabic . This was put in charge of the Dominicans under the patronage of St. Thomas Aquinas . His major work on

672-548: The 16th century all new peerages were always duchies and the medieval countship-peerages had died out, or were held by royal princes Other French countships of note included those of: See also above for parts of present France A Graf ruled over a territory known as a Grafschaft ('county'). See also various comital and related titles; especially those actually reigning over a principality: Gefürsteter Graf , Landgraf , Reichsgraf ; compare Markgraf , Burggraf , Pfalzgraf ( see Imperial quaternions ). The title of Conte

714-429: The 19th century, the title, having lost its high rank (equivalent to that of Duke ), proliferated. Portugal itself started as a countship in 868, but became a kingdom in 1139 (see: County of Portugal ). Throughout the history of Portugal , especially during the constitutional monarchy many other countships were created. In Spain, no countships of wider importance exist, except in the former Spanish march. In

756-623: The Habsburg border demarcation commission. Marsigli mapped the 850 km-long Habsburg -Ottoman border in the former Kingdom of Hungary (today including Croatia , Serbia , Romania ). During the twenty years he spent in Hungary he collected scientific information, specimens, antiques, took measurements and observations for his work on the Danube. He was assisted by Dr Johann Christoph Müller who prepared manuscripts for printing and commissioned

798-453: The Habsburg dynasty; noteworthy are: Apart from various small ones, significant were : Count/Countess was one of the noble titles granted by the Pope as a temporal sovereign, and the title's holder was sometimes informally known as a papal count/papal countess or less so as a Roman count/Roman countess, but mostly as count/countess. The comital title, which could be for life or hereditary,

840-999: The Institute he founded was established to take place every twenty-five years on the Feast of the Annunciation . In 1715 he was named a Foreign Associate of the Paris Academy of Sciences ; he was also a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, and of Montpellier . A list of his works, over twenty in number, is given in Niceron 's Mémoirs . His principal works are the following: Osservazioni interne al Bosforo Tracio (Rome, 1681); Histoire physique de la mer , translated by Leclerc ( Amsterdam , 1725); Danubius Pannonico-Mysicus , richly illustrated work in six volumes containing much valuable historic and scientific information on

882-518: The Middle Ages the title of jarl (earl) was the highest title of nobility. The title was eventually replaced by the title of duke, but that title was abolished in Denmark and Norway as early as the Middle Ages. Titles were only reintroduced with the introduction of absolute monarchy in 1660, with count as the highest title. In Sweden the rank of count is the highest rank conferred upon nobles in

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924-580: The Rhine, which was surrendered in 1703. Count d'Arco was beheaded because he was found guilty of capitulating before necessary, while Marsigli was stripped of his titles and honours by the Holy Roman Emperor, and his chivalric sword was broken over him. His appeals to the Emperor were in vain, but public opinion, however, acquitted him later of the charge of neglect or ignorance. After he had left

966-695: The River Rába ; sold to a pasha who met him after the Battle of Vienna , his release was secured in 1684. He returned to the Imperial Army deploying his skills as a talented military engineer. Marsigli contributed to the successful siege of Buda in 1686 and in the following years in the military operations of the liberation war against the Turks. After the Treaty of Karlowitz he was commissioned to lead

1008-469: The Titan Atlas , the "King of Mauretania", whom he considered to be the first great geographer. The first work that contained systematically arranged maps of uniform size representing the first modern atlas was prepared by Italian cartographer Pietro Coppo in the early 16th century; however, it was not published at that time, so it is conventionally not considered the first atlas. Rather, that title

1050-611: The best Bolognese tutors and enhanced by his personal observations. After a course of scientific studies in his native city he travelled throughout Asia Minor collecting data on the Ottoman Empire 's military organisation, as well as on its natural history. On his return he entered the service of the Emperor Leopold (1682) and fought with distinction against the Turks , by whom he was wounded and captured in an action on

1092-511: The central area (for example, Geographers' A-Z Map Company 's A–Z atlas of London is 1:22,000 for Greater London and 1:11,000 for Central London ). A travel atlas may also be referred to as a road map . A desk atlas is made similar to a reference book . It may be in hardback or paperback form. There are atlases of the other planets (and their satellites) in the Solar System . Atlases of anatomy exist, mapping out organs of

1134-565: The emergence of the title came the most powerful symbol of entitlement, that is the ownership of and jurisdiction over land, hence the term county . The term is derived from the Old French conté or cunté denoting a jurisdiction under the control of a count ( earl ) or a viscount . The modern French is comté , and its equivalents in other languages are contea , contado , comtat , condado , Grafschaft , graafschap , etc. (cf. conte , comte , conde , Graf ). The title of Count

1176-756: The engravers in his home town of Nuremberg. The sample of the work, Prodromus , was published in 1700 and the large work was expected by 1704. His scholarship was well received in England, and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in November 1691. During the War of the Spanish Succession Marsigli was second-in-command under the Count d'Arco at the Imperial fortress of Breisach on

1218-685: The first free Constitution of Denmark of 1849 came a complete abolition of the privileges of the nobility. Since then the title of count has been granted only to members of the Danish royal family , either as a replacement for a princely title when marrying a commoner, or in recent times, instead of that title in connection with divorce. Thus the first wife of Prince Joachim of Denmark , the younger son of Margrethe II of Denmark , became Alexandra, Countess of Frederiksborg on their divorce—initially retaining her title of princess, but losing it on her remarriage. In

1260-495: The imperial lands, then as comes sacrarum largitionum ("count of the sacred doles"), concerned with the finances of the realm. In the United Kingdom, the title of earl is used instead of count . Although the exact reason is debated by historians and linguists, one of the more popular theories proposes that count fell into disuse because of its phonetic similarity to the vulgar slang word cunt . Originally, with

1302-467: The map and places in it. The use of the word "atlas" in a geographical context dates from 1595 when the German-Flemish geographer Gerardus Mercator published Atlas Sive Cosmographicae Meditationes de Fabrica Mundi et Fabricati Figura ("Atlas or cosmographical meditations upon the creation of the universe and the universe as created"). This title provides Mercator's definition of the word as

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1344-513: The maps coloured/gilded or not. The atlas was then bound. Thus, early printed atlases with the same title page can be different in contents. States began producing national atlases in the 19th century. A travel atlas is made for easy use during travel, and often has spiral bindings, so it may be folded flat. National atlases in Europe are typically printed at a scale of 1:250,000 to 1:500,000; city atlases are 1:20,000 to 1:25,000, doubling for

1386-515: The modern era and are, like their Danish and Norwegian counterparts, broadly comparable to that of dukes in other European countries. Unlike the rest of Scandinavia, the title of duke is still used in Sweden, but only by members of the royal family and are not considered part of the nobility. Like other major Western noble titles , Count is sometimes used to render certain titles in non-western languages with their own traditions, even though they are as

1428-516: The process of indygenat , naturalisation. Somewhat similar to the native privileged class of nobles found in Poland, Hungary also had a class of Conditional nobles . As opposed to the plethora of hollow "gentry" counts, only a few countships ever were important in medieval Iberia ; most territory was firmly within the Reconquista kingdoms before counts could become important. However, during

1470-665: The purchaser of land designated "feudal" was ennobled by the noble seat that he held and became a conte . This practice ceased with the formal abolition of feudalism in the various principalities of early-19th century Italy, last of all in the Papal States . Poland was notable throughout its history for not granting titles of nobility. This was on the premise that one could only be born into nobility, outside rare exceptions. Instead, it conferred non-hereditary courtly or civic roles . The noble titles that were in use on its territory were mostly of foreign provenance and usually subject to

1512-578: The river Danubius , (6 vols., The Hague , 1726); and L'Etat militaire de l'empire ottoman (Amsterdam, 1732). Count (nobility) The title of count is typically not used in England or English-speaking countries, and the term earl is used instead. A female holder of the title is still referred to as a countess , however. The word count came into English from the French comte , itself from Latin comes —in its accusative form comitem . It meant "companion" or "attendant", and as

1554-466: The title of count ( greve ) is the highest rank of nobility used in the modern period. Some Danish/Dano-Norwegian countships were associated with fiefs , and these counts were known as "feudal counts" ( lensgreve ). They rank above ordinary (titular) counts, and their position in the Danish aristocracy as the highest-ranking noblemen is broadly comparable to that of dukes in other European countries. With

1596-670: The title to their heirs—but not always. For instance, in Piast Poland , the position of komes was not hereditary, resembling the early Merovingian institution. The title had disappeared by the era of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth , and the office had been replaced by others. Only after the Partitions of Poland did the title of "count" resurface in the title hrabia , derived from the German Graf . In

1638-402: Was signore , modeled on the French seigneur , used with the name of the fief . By the fourteenth century, conte and the Imperial title barone were virtually synonymous . Some titles of a count, according to the particulars of the patent, might be inherited by the eldest son of a Count. Younger brothers might be distinguished as "X dei conti di Y" ("X of the counts of Y"). However, if there

1680-412: Was a pairie , i.e. carried the exclusive rank of pair ; within the first (i.e. clerical) and second (noble) estates, the first three of the original twelve anciennes pairies were ducal, the next three comital comté-pairies : Later other countships (and duchies, even baronies) have been raised to this French peerage, but mostly as apanages (for members of the royal house) or for foreigners; after

1722-588: Was also often conferred by the monarch as an honorific title for special services rendered, without a feudal estate (countship, county) being attached, so it was merely a title, with or without a domain name attached to it. In the United Kingdom , the equivalent "Earl" can also be used as a courtesy title for the eldest son of a duke or marquess. In the Italian states , by contrast, all the sons of certain counts were little counts ( contini ). In Sweden there

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1764-552: Was awarded in various forms by popes and Holy Roman Emperors since the Middle Ages, infrequently before the 14th century, and the pope continued to grant the comital and other noble titles even after 1870, it was largely discontinued in the mid 20th-century, on the accession of John XXIII . The Papacy and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies might appoint counts palatine with no particular territorial fief. Until 1812 in some regions,

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