Wander Lord

Interesting on art, nature, people, history

Category Archive: History

Great Golden Gate Bridge

Great Golden Gate Bridge

Great Golden Gate Bridge


People dreamed of the construction of the bridge across the Golden Gate Strait, which would connect San Francisco and Marin County, back in the XIX century. But only at the beginning of the XX century there were real technical possibilities for its construction. Engineer Joseph Strauss, developer of about 400 bridge structures, proposed to extend the suspension bridge with two supports over 2.5 km in length. People didn’t believe that it was possible to build such a bridge, but they became interested in the project.
Motorization in many ways accelerated the process of creating a bridge across the Golden Gate Strait. San Francisco grew rapidly, and the number of cars on the streets of the city increased.
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Suez Canal – Joining Two Seas for a Shortcut

Suez Canal - Joining Two Seas for a Shortcut

Suez Canal – Joining Two Seas for a Shortcut


The Suez Canal is one of the most important waterways that people have ever made. The idea to connect the Red and Mediterranean seas appeared in the Ancient World. Egyptian pharaoh Necho II (609-595 BC) tried to do it … and 120 thousand slaves died. Persian king Darius dug the canal from the Red Sea only to the Nile, as witnessed on the stone tablets. Later the canal was filled with sand.
The construction of this artificial 161-kilometer-long sea route also excited the French Emperor Louis XIV, and later Napoleon. The project, as the court advisers proved, promised considerable benefits. Merchant ships from the Indian Ocean could enter the Mediterranean, to the shores of France and further to the Atlantic Ocean. They would not have to go around Africa and the way would be 8-15 thousand km shorter. If the trade route connects the three continents – Asia, Africa and Europe, the one who owns the canal, becomes the richest man, will become the ruler of the world.
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Awesome Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius

Awesome Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius

Awesome Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius


Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius is 70 km to the north-east of Moscow on the southern slope of the Smolensk-Moscow Upland in the city of Sergiev Posad. It is famous not only in the religious world. It was founded in 1345 by Sergius of Radonezh, who was a spiritual leader and monastic reformer. A century later the monastery became widely known spiritual and cultural center of the Moscow principality.
He was called Bartholomew, his parents were the Rostov boyars Cyril and Maria. From his childhood he was reading holy books. As a boy he wanted to devote his life to the Orthodox Church. But eventually his parents became impoverished and in 1328 the family moved to the Pokrovsky Monastery in Khotkovo – one of the first monasteries that was built on the lands of the Moscow principality. There lived men and women at that time, but later it became a nunnery. His parents and elder brother diligently served God and were buried there.
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Samurai – icon of Japanese history

Samurai - icon of Japanese history

Samurai – icon of Japanese history

For hundreds of years warriors called samurai controlled Japan. The Japanese emperor took away the power of the samurai in 1871.
The first samurai protected vast lands owned by members of Japan’s upper class. Gradually the samurai spread out across the country and got their own pieces of land. They became more and more powerful. In 1185 one of the samurai gained military control of all Japan and in 1192 he took the title of shogun. The emperors had less power than the shoguns.
The originally Chinese term samurai means “a person who serves in close attendance to nobility.” They served with a loyalty, bravery, and honor that have made the samurai one of the best-known icons of Japanese history. The samurai are symbols of Japan’s feudal past before the rapid modernization.
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Why must Carthage be destroyed?

Why must Carthage be destroyed

Why must Carthage be destroyed


Everyone knows the famous Latin phrase “Carthage must be destroyed”. But few people know that it is attributed to the Roman commander and statesman Cato the Elder. Carthage was the city that once existed on the northern coast of Africa. In general, the mysteries of ancient city have long been a source of interest not only for scientists and travelers, but also for history lovers. Romance of antiquity, Punic wars, wealth and luxury of antiquity … All this makes us again and again return to the history of Carthage, one of the greatest cities of the Ancient world with almost a million people that nearly crushed the Roman Empire.
The ruins of ancient Carthage lie in Tunis, the capital of Tunisia. In the second millennium BC the ancestors of the Carthaginians, the Phoenicians, occupied only a narrow strip of the coast of the eastern Mediterranean. It was 60 years before the appearance of its main rival – Rome.
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Moscow Kremlin – amazing building with rich history

Moscow Kremlin – amazing building with rich history

Moscow Kremlin – amazing building with rich history

The central part of the ancient city was enclosed with the fortress walls and towers. The name “kremlin” is considered to be Russian, derived from the “kromka”, meaning “fortress wall, enclosing the city” in ancient times. Until the XIV century Moscow Kremlin was called Detinets, it was built on the left high bank of the Moskva River and became the center of the future city. Archaeological excavations on the territory found the settlement dated back the XI century. The first annalistic mention of Moscow was in 1147. The first Kremlin wall made of white stone was built in 1367 and of the red brick in 1495.
The history of the Kremlin is inseparably linked with the history of Moscow. In the middle of the XII century, Suzdal Prince Yury Dolgoruky built several forts to protect the western borders of Suzdal principality and a wooden fortress on Borovitsky Hill at the confluence of the Neglinnaya River to the Moscow River was among them. Timbered wall rose to 3 meters high and stretched for 1,200 meters around the perimeter. The protective earth mound was erected in front of it. In 1237-1238 Batu Khan’s hordes looted and burned the Kremlin and Moscow.
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Pompeii and Herculaneum

Deadly eruption

Deadly eruption

Pompeii and Herculaneum were two ancient Roman towns destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. Mount Vesuvius, which had formed at least 17,000 years earlier, was one mile away.
People lived in the Pompeii region in prehistoric times. The Romans took control of Pompeii in about 290 BC. The entire region along the coast of the Bay of Naples became a popular vacation destination for wealthy Roman citizens.
Around one o’clock in the afternoon on August 24, AD 79 Mount Vesuvius erupted and spewed 18-20 feet of ash and cinders that buried the town and asphyxiated and mummified most of the 20,000 people in Pompeii. The intense ash clouded the Sun for several days and created a tsunami in the Bay of Naples. The town, which had been a vacation resort for Rome’s nobility, was completely covered by ash and remained buried for the next 16 centuries.
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