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375_16 | brick mausoleum domes were built without the use of centering, a technique developed in Persia. |
375_17 | The Seljuq Empire introduced the domed enclosure in front of the mosque's mihrab, which would become popular in Persian congregational mosques, although domed rooms may have also been used earlier in small neighborhood mosques. The domed enclosure of the Jameh Mosque of Isfahan, built in 1086-7 by Nizam al-Mulk, was the largest masonry dome in the Islamic world at that time, had eight ribs, and introduced a new form of corner squinch with two quarter domes supporting a short barrel vault. In 1088 Tāj-al-Molk, a rival of Nizam al-Mulk, built another dome at the opposite end of the same mosque with interlacing ribs forming five-pointed stars and pentagons. This is considered the landmark Seljuk dome, and may have inspired subsequent patterning and the domes of the Il-Khanate period. The use of tile and of plain or painted plaster to decorate dome interiors, rather than brick, increased under the Seljuks. One of the largest Seljuq domes, built over the site of a Sassanian Fire Temple, |
375_18 | was that of the Jameh Mosque of Qazvin with a span of 15.2 meters. The largest Seljuq domed chamber was the Tomb of Ahmed Sanjar, which had a large double shell, intersecting ribs over plain squinches, and an exterior elaborately decorated at the zone of transition with arches and stucco work. The tomb of Sultan Sanjar, who reigned from 1117 to 1157, was damaged in the sack of Merv in 1221 by Tolui Khan. |
375_19 | The Ilkhanate
After the disruptive effects of several Mongol invasions, Persian architecture again flourished in the Ilkhanate and Timurid periods. Characteristic of these domes are the use of high drums and several types of discontinuous double-shells, and the development of triple-shells and internal stiffeners occurred at this time. Beginning in the Ilkanate, Persian domes achieved their final configuration of structural supports, zone of transition, drum, and shells, and subsequent evolution was restricted to variations in form and shell geometry. The construction of tomb towers decreased. |
375_20 | The two major domes of the IlKhanate period are the no-longer-existing mausoleum of Ghazan in Tabriz and the Mausoleum of Öljaitü in Soltaniyeh, the latter having been built to rival the former. Öljaitü was the first sovereign of Persia to declare himself of the Shia sect of Islam and built the mausoleum, with the largest Persian dome, to house the bodies of Ali and Hussein as a pilgrimage site. This did not occur and it became his own mausoleum instead. The dome measures 50 meters high and almost 25 meters in diameter and has the best surviving tile and stucco work from this period. The thin, double-shelled dome was reinforced by arches between the layers. The dome has been proposed as an influence on the design of that of Florence Cathedral, built a century later. The mausoleum is the only remaining important building to survive from Öljaitü's capital city. |
375_21 | Tower tombs of this period, such as the tomb of Abdas-Samad Esfahani in Natanz, sometimes have muqarnas domes, although they are usually plaster shells that hide the underlying structures. The tall proportions of the Jameh Mosque of Varamin resulted primarily from the increased height of the zone of transition, with the addition of a sixteen-sided section above the main zone of muqarnas squinches. The 7.5 meter wide double dome of Soltan Bakht Agha Mausoleum (1351–1352) is the earliest known example in which the two shells of the dome have significantly different profiles, which spread rapidly throughout the region. The inner and outer shells had radial stiffeners and struts between them. An early example of a dome chamber almost completely covered with decorative tilework is that of the Jame Mosque of Yazd (1364), as well as several of the mausoleums of Shah-i-Zinda in Samarkand. The development of taller drums also continued into the Timurid period. |
375_22 | Timurid dynasty
At the Timurid capital of Samarkand, nobles and rulers in the 14th and 15th centuries began building tombs with double-shelled domes containing cylindrical masonry drums between the shells. In the Gur-e Amir, built by Timur around 1404, a timber framework on the inner dome supports the outer, bulbous dome. Radial tie-bars at the base of the bulbous dome provide additional structural support. Timber reinforcement rings and rings of stone linked by iron cramps were also used to compensate for the structural problems introduced by using such drums. Radial sections of brick walls with wooden struts were used between the shells of discontinuous double domes to provide structural stability as late at the 14th century.
The large dome of Bibi-Khanym Mosque in Samarkand was damaged by an earthquake during Timur's lifetime. |
375_23 | An account by ambassador Ruy González de Clavijo describes a huge square Timurid pavilion tent with a dome at the top that resembled a castle from a distance due to its size. It measured one hundred paces on a side and was assembled from tall wooden masts stayed by ropes, with silk curtains between them. The tent had four archways and was surrounded by a lower attached portico or gallery on all four sides. |
375_24 | A miniature painted at Samarkand shows that bulbous cupolas were used to cover small wooden pavilions in Persia by the beginning of the fifteenth century. They gradually gained in popularity. The large, bulbous, fluted domes on tall drums that are characteristic of 15th century Timurid architecture were the culmination of the Central Asian and Iranian tradition of tall domes with glazed tile coverings in blue and other colors. The Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi, situated in southern Kazakhstan was never finished, but has the largest existing brick dome in Central Asia, measuring 18.2 m in diameter. The dome exterior is covered with hexagonal green glazed tiles with gold patterns. |
375_25 | Mausoleums were rarely built as free-standing structures after the 14th century, being instead often attached to madrasas in pairs. Domes of these madrasas, such as those of the madrasa of Gawhar Shad (1417–1433) and the madrasa at Ḵargerd (1436–1443), had dramatically innovative interiors. They used intersecting arches to support an inner dome narrower than the floor below, a change that may have originated with the 14th century use of small lantern domes over transverse vaulting. The madrasa of Gawhar Shad is also the first triple-shell dome. The middle dome may have been added as reinforcement. Triple-shelled domes are rare outside of the Timurid era. The dome of the Amir Chakhmaq mosque (1437) has a semi-circular inner shell and an advanced system of stiffeners and wooden struts supporting a shallow pointed outer shell. Notably, the dome has a circular drum with two tiers. Another double shell dome from the early Seljuq period at the shrine complex of Bayazid Bastami was changed |
375_26 | in the Timurid period by the addition of a third conical shell over the existing two domed shells. |
375_27 | The Uzbek architecture of the region around Transoxiana maintained the Timurid style of dome-building. Where dome chambers were surrounded by axial iwans and corner rooms on an octagonal plan, as at the Khwaja Abu Nasr Parsa shrine (ca. 1598), they provided the model for Indian mausoleums such as Humayun's Tomb in Delhi or the Taj Mahal. Some of the earliest surviving domed markets, called tīmcās, can be found in Shaybanid-era Bukhara.
Safavid dynasty
The domes of the Safavid dynasty (1501–1732) are characterized by a distinctive bulbous profile and are considered to be the last generation of Persian domes. They are generally thinner than earlier domes and are decorated with a variety of colored glazed tiles and complex vegetal patterns. The dome of the Blue Mosque in Tabriz (1465) had its interior covered with "dark-blue hexagonal tiles with stenciled gilding". The palace of Ālī Qāpū includes small domed rooms decorated with artificial vegetation. |
375_28 | The removal of thousands of Armenian Christians to the Isfahan suburb city of New Julfa by Shah Abbas resulted in the "unusual sight of Ṣafawid-style domes topped by a cross" in that city. |
375_29 | The dome of Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque in Isfahan (1603–1618), perhaps "the quintessential Persian dome chamber", blends the square room with the zone of transition and uses plain squinches like those of the earlier Seljuq period. On the exterior, multiple levels of glazed arabesque are blended with an unglazed brick background. The domes of the Shah Mosque (later renamed the Imam Mosque) and the Mādar-e Šāh madrasa have a similar exterior pattern against a background of light blue glazed tile. The bulbous dome of the Shah Mosque was built from 1611 to 1638 and is a discontinuous double-shell 33 meters wide and 52 meters high. The oldest example of the Safavid onion dome is over the octagonal mausoleum of Khwaja Rabi (1617–1622). Safavid domes were influential on those of other Islamic styles, such as the Mughal architecture of India. |
375_30 | Qajar dynasty
In the Qajar period (1779–1924), the movement to modern architecture meant less innovation in dome construction. Domes were built over madrasas, such as the 1848 Imam madrasa, or Sultani school, of Kashan, but they have relatively simple appearances and do not use tiled mosaics. The covered markets or bazaars (tīmcās) at Qom and Kashan feature a central dome with smaller domes on either side and elaborate muqarnas. An exaggerated style of onion dome on a short drum, as can be seen at the Shah Cheragh (1852–1853), first appeared in the Qajar period. Domes have remained important in modern mausoleums, such as the tombs of Ḥāfeẓ, Saʿdī, Reza Shah, and Ruhollah Khomeini in the twentieth century. Domed cisterns and icehouses remain common sights in the countryside.
References
Bibliography
Domes
Domes |
376_0 | Solid-state NMR (ssNMR) spectroscopy is a technique for characterizing atomic level structure in solid materials e.g. powders, single crystals and amorphous samples and tissues using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. The anisotropic part of many spin interactions are present in solid-state NMR, unlike in solution-state NMR where rapid tumbling motion averages out many of the spin interactions. As a result, solid-state NMR spectra are characterised by larger linewidths than in solution state NMR, which can be utilized to give quantitative information on the molecular structure, conformation and dynamics of the material. Solid-state NMR is often combined with magic angle spinning to remove anisotropic interactions and improve the resolution as well as the sensitivity of the technique. |
376_1 | Nuclear spin interactions
The resonance frequency of a nuclear spin depends on the strength of the magnetic field at the nucleus, which can be modified by isotropic (e.g. chemical shift, isotropic J-coupling) and anisotropic interactions (e.g. chemical shift anisotropy, dipolar interactions. In a classical liquid-state NMR experiment, molecular tumbling coming from Brownian motion averages anisotropic interactions to zero and they are therefore not reflected in the NMR spectrum. However, in media with no or little mobility (e.g. crystalline powders, glasses, large membrane vesicles, molecular aggregates), anisotropic local fields or interactions have substantial influence on the behaviour of nuclear spins, which results in the line broadening of the NMR spectra.
Chemical shielding |
376_2 | Chemical shielding is a local property of each nuclear site in a molecule or compound, and is proportional to the applied external magnetic field. The external magnetic field induces currents of the electrons in molecular orbitals. These induced currents create local magnetic fields that lead to characteristic changes in resonance frequency. These changes can be predicted from molecular structure using empirical rules or quantum-chemical calculations.
In general, the chemical shielding is anisotropic because of the anisotropic distribution of molecular orbitals around the nuclear sites. Under sufficiently fast magic angle spinning, or under the effect of molecular tumbling in solution-state NMR, the anisotropic dependence of the chemical shielding is time-averaged to zero, leaving only the isotropic chemical shift.
Dipolar coupling |
376_3 | Nuclear spins exhibit a magnetic dipole moment, which generates a magnetic field that interacts with the dipole moments of other nuclei (dipolar coupling). The magnitude of the interaction is dependent on the gyromagnetic ratio of the spin species, the internuclear distance r, and the orientation, with respect to the external magnetic field B, of the vector connecting the two nuclear spins (see figure). The maximum dipolar coupling is given by the dipolar coupling constant d,
,
where γ1 and γ2 are the gyromagnetic ratios of the nuclei, is the reduced Planck's constant, and is the vacuum permeability. In a strong magnetic field, the dipolar coupling depends on the angle θ between the internuclear vector and the external magnetic field B (figure) according to
. |
376_4 | D becomes zero for . Consequently, two nuclei with a dipolar coupling vector at an angle of θm = 54.7° to a strong external magnetic field have zero dipolar coupling. θm is called the magic angle. Magic angle spinning is typically used to remove dipolar couplings weaker than the spinning rate. |
376_5 | Quadrupolar interaction |
376_6 | Nuclei with a spin quantum number >1/2 have a non-spherical charge distribution and an associated electric quadrupole moment tensor. The nuclear electric quadrupole moment couples with surrounding electric field gradients. The nuclear quadrupole coupling is one of the largest interactions in NMR spectroscopy, often comparable in size to the Zeeman coupling. When the nuclear quadrupole coupling is not negligible relative to the Zeeman coupling, higher order corrections are needed to describe the NMR spectrum correctly. In such cases, the first-order correction to the NMR transition frequency leads to a strong anisotropic line broadening of the NMR spectrum. However, all symmetric transitions, between and levels are unaffected by the first-order frequency contribution. The second-order frequency contribution depends on the P4 Legendre polynomial, which has zero points at 30.6° and 70.1°. These anisotropic broadenings can be removed using DOR (DOuble angle Rotation) where you spin at |
376_7 | two angles at the same time, or DAS (Double Angle Spinning) where you switch quickly between the two angles. Both techniques were developed in the late 1980s, and require specialized hardware (probe). Multiple quantum magic angle spinning (MQMAS) NMR was developed in 1995 and has become a routine method for obtaining high resolution solid-state NMR spectra of quadrupolar nuclei. A similar method to MQMAS is satellite transition magic angle spinning (STMAS) NMR developed in 2000. |
376_8 | J-coupling
The J-coupling or indirect nuclear spin-spin coupling (sometimes also called "scalar" coupling despite the fact that J is a tensor quantity) describes the interaction of nuclear spins through chemical bonds. J-couplings are not always resolved in solids owing to the typically large linewdiths observed in solid state NMR.
Other interactions
Paramagnetic substances are subject to the Knight shift.
Solid-state NMR line shapes
Powder pattern
A powder pattern arise in powdered samples where crystallites are randomly orientated relative to the magnetic field so that all molecular orientations are present. In presence of a chemical shift anisotropy interaction, each orientation with respect to the magnetic field gives a different resonance frequency. If enough crystallites are present, all the different contributions overlap continuously and lead to a smooth spectrum. |
376_9 | Fitting of the pattern in a static ssNMR experiment gives information about the shielding tensor, which are often described by the isotropic chemical shift , the chemical shift anisotropy parameter , and the asymmetry parameter .
Dipolar pattern
The dipolar powder pattern (also Pake pattern) has a very characteristic shape that arises when two nuclear spins are coupled together within a crystallite. The splitting between the maxima (the "horns") of the pattern is equal to the dipolar coupling constant .:
where γ1 and γ2 are the gyromagnetic ratios of the dipolar-coupled nuclei, is the internuclear distance, is the reduced Planck's constant, and is the vacuum permeability.
Essential solid-state techniques
Magic angle spinning |
376_10 | Magic angle spinning (MAS) is a technique routinely used in solid-state NMR to produce narrower NMR and more intense NMR lines. This is achieved by rotating the sample at the magic angle θm (ca. 54.74°, where cos2θm=1/3) with respect to the direction of the magnetic field, which has the effect to cancel, at least partially, anisotropic nuclear interactions such as dipolar, chemical shift anisotropy, and quadrupolar interactions. To achieve the completely averaging of these interactions, the sample needs to be spun at a rate that is at least higher than the greater that the largest anisotropy. |
376_11 | Spinning a powder sample at a slower rate than the largest component of the chemical shift anisotropy results in an incomplete averaging of the interaction, and produces a set of spinning sidebands in addition to the isotropic line, centred at the isotropic chemical shift. Spinning sidebands are sharp lines separated from the isotropic frequency by a multiple of the spinning rate. Although spinning sidebands can be used to measure anisotropic interactions, they are often undesirable and removed by spinning the sample faster or by recording the data points synchronously with the rotor period.
Cross-polarisation |
376_12 | Cross-polarization (CP) if a fundamental RF pulse sequence and a building-block in many solid-state NMR. It is typically used to enhance the signal of a dilute nuclei with a low gyromagnetic ratio (e.g. , ) by magnetization transfer from an abundant nuclei with a high gyromagnetic ratio (e.g. ), or as a spectral editing method to get through space information (e.g. directed → CP in protein spectroscopy).
To establish magnetization transfer, RF pulses ("contact pulses") are simultaneously applied on both frequency channels to produce fields whose strength fulfil the Hartmann–Hahn condition:
where are the gyromagnetic ratios, is the spinning rate, and is an integer. In practice, the pulse power, as well as the length of the contact pulse are experimentally optimised. The power of one contact pulse is typically ramped to achieve a more broadband and efficient magnetisation transfer. |
376_13 | Decoupling
Spin interactions can be removed (decoupled) to increase the resolution of NMR spectra during the detection, or to extend the lifetime of the nuclear magnetization.
Heteronuclear decoupling is achieved by radio-frequency irradiation on at the frequency of the nucleus to be decoupled, which is often 1H. The irradiation can be continuous (continuous wave decoupling), or a series of pulses that extend the performance and the bandwidth of the decoupling (TPPM, SPINAL-64, SWf-TPPM)
Homonuclear decoupling is achieved with multiple-pulse sequences (WAHUHA, MREV-8, BR-24, BLEW-12, FSLG), or continuous wave modulation (DUMBO, eDUMBO). Dipolar interactions can also be removed with magic angle spinning. Ultra fast MAS (from 60 kHz up to above 111 kHz) is an efficient way to average all dipolar interactions, including 1H-1H homonuclear dipolar interactions, which extends the resolution of 1H spectra and enables the usage of pulse sequences used in solution state NMR. |
376_14 | Advanced solid-state NMR spectroscopy
Rotational Echo DOuble Resonance (REDOR)
Rotational Echo DOuble Resonance (REDOR) experiment, are a type of heteronuclear dipolar recoupling experiment which enable one to re-introduce heteronuclear dipolar couplings averaged by MAS. The reintroduction of such dipolar coupling reduce the intensity of the NMR signal intensity compared to a reference spectrum where no dephasing pulse is used. REDOR can be used to measure heteronuclear distances, and are the basis of NMR crystallographic studies.
Ultra Fast MAS for 1H NMR |
376_15 | The strong 1H-1H homonuclear dipolar interactions associated with broad NMR lines and short T2 relaxation time effectively relegate proton for bimolecular NMR. Recent developments of faster MAS, and reduction of dipolar interactions by deuteration have made proton ssNMR as versatile as in solution. This includes spectral dispersion in multi-dimensional experiments as well as structurally valuable restraints and parameters important for studying material dynamics.
Ultra-fast NMR and the associated sharpening of the NMR lines enables NMR pulse sequences to capitalize on proton-detection to improve the sensitivity of the experiments compared to the direct detection of a spin-1/2 system (X). Such enhancement factor is given by:
where are the gyromagnetic ratios, represent the NMR line widths, and represent the quality factor of the probe resonances.
MAS-Dynamic Nuclear Polarisation (MAS-DNP) |
376_16 | Magic angle spinning Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (MAS-DNP) is a technique that increases the sensitivity of NMR experiments by several orders of magnitude. It involves the transfer of the very high electron polarisation from unpaired electrons to nearby nuclei. This is achieved at cryogenic temperatures by the means of a continuous microwave irradiation coming from a klystron or a Gyrotron, with a frequency close to the corresponding electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) frequency.
The development in the MAS-DNP instrumentation, as well as the improvement of polarising agents (TOTAPOL, AMUPOL, TEKPOL, etc.) to achieve a more efficient transfer of polarisation has dramatically reduced experiments times which enabled the observation of surfaces, insensitive isotopes, and multidimensional experiments on low natural abundance nuclei, and diluted species.
Applications |
376_17 | Biology
Solid-state NMR is used to study insoluble proteins and proteins very sensitive to their environment such as membrane proteins and amyloid fibrils, the latter two related to Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. Solid-state NMR spectroscopy complements solution-state NMR spectroscopy and beam diffraction methods (e.g. X-ray crystallography, electron microscopy). Despite often requiring isotopic enrichment, ssNMR has the advantage that little sample preparation is required and can be used on fully hydrated samples, or native, non-crystalline tissues. Solid-state NMR structure elucidation of proteins has traditionally been based on secondary chemical shifts and spatial contacts between heteronuclei.
Solid-state NMR has been successfully used to study biomaterials such as bone, hair, silk, wood, as well as viruses, plants, cells, biopsies, and even live animals. |
376_18 | Materials science
Solid-state NMR spectroscopy serves as an analysis tool in organic and inorganic chemistry, where it is used to characterize chemical composition, supramolecular structure, local motions, kinetics, and thermodynamics, with the special ability to assign the observed behavior to specific sites in a molecule.
Solid-state NMR has been successfully used to study metal organic frameworks (MOFS), batteries, surfaces of nanoporous materials, polymers.
Art conservation
NMR can also be applied to art conservation. Different salts and moisture levels can be detected through the use of solid state NMR. However, sampling sizes retrieved from works of art in order to run through these large conducting magnets typically exceed levels deemed acceptable. Unilateral NMR techniques use portable magnets that are applied to the object of interest, bypassing the need for sampling.
References
Suggested readings for beginners
General NMR |
376_19 | Solid-state NMR
Levitt, Malcolm H., Spin Dynamics: Basics of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, Wiley, Chichester, United Kingdom, 2001. (NMR basics, including solids)
Duer, Melinda J., Introduction to Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy, Blackwell, Oxford, 2004. (Some detailed examples of ssNMR spectroscopy)
Schmidt-Rohr, K. and Spiess, H.-W., Multidimensional Solid-State NMR and Polymers, Academic Press, San Diego, 1994.
External links
SSNMRBLOG Solid-State NMR Literature Blog by Prof. Rob Schurko's Solid-State NMR group at the University of Windsor
Nuclear magnetic resonance
Scientific techniques |
377_0 | Françoise Bigot (; born Bordeaux, 30 January 1703; died Neuchâtel, Switzerland, 12 January 1778) was a French government official. He served as the Financial Commissary on Île Royale (nowadays Cape Breton Island). commissary general of the ill-fated Duc d'Anville expedition and finally as the Intendant of New France. He was the last official ever to hold the latter position, losing it on the occasion of the conquest of 1760. He was subsequently accused of corruption and put on trial in France, and upon conviction was thrown into the Bastille for eleven months. Upon his release, Bigot was further sentenced to lifelong banishment. However, shortly after the judgement was made, Bigot escaped to Switzerland where he would live until his dying day. |
377_1 | Early life
Bigot was born at Bordeaux into a family that had attained nobility. He was the son of Louis-Amable Bigot (1663-1743), Conseilleur du Roi, Counsellor to the Parliament at Bordeaux and Receiver General to the King; by his wife, Marguerite de Lombard (1682-1766), daughter of Joseph de Lombard, Baron du Cubzagués, Commissioner of the Marine at Guyenne and a representative of an old and powerful Guyenne family. His paternal grandfather had become rich from his commercial activities; his father had a successful legal career and held several important government positions. Bigot was to receive, as would befit a gentleman's son, "a good education which included legal studies." Nothing is known for certain of Bigot's education, but historians believed he took a few courses in law at the Faculté de Droit in Bordeaux. |
377_2 | In 1723, at the age of twenty, when legal studies were normally completed, he used his influence within the French Royal Court to join "the commissary of the marine" as a chief scrivener. He served as a scrivener until 1728, when he was made a commissary. He became chief scrivener in 1729, and resident commissary of the Navy at Rochefort in 1732, at the age of 29. Rochefort was a port that saw many fleets kitted out and made ready for their voyages to the New World. This would be the last post that Bigot would hold in France for some time. |
377_3 | As a young man in France, Bigot had an inordinate love for the gaming tables. The pressure he experienced from both his superiors and his creditors led him to accept a post as the financial commissary of the promising Acadian stronghold, Louisbourg. Another reason why he decided to accept this position, was because the Secretary of State of the Navy, the Count of Maurepas, had explained to him that "an intendancy in the ports of France cannot be expected if one has not served in the colonies." This appointment, about which he was not too happy, became effective on 1 May 1739. He arrived at Louisbourg on the 9 September having come out on the same ship as the newly appointed governor, Isaac-Louis de Forant. |
377_4 | Louisbourg
Bigot wanted to impress his superiors in France. Thus, he began to attend to every aspect of the commissary's duties. He reorganized the bookkeeping and personally supervised operations in detail. In addition, Bigot avoided the conflicts with the governor that had marked the administrations of his predecessors. |
377_5 | After Forant died in May 1740, Bigot befriended François Du Pont Duvivier and Louis Du Pont Duchambon, who were members of the pre-eminent military family in the colony. This friendship was marked by free use of patronage to the Du Pont family, who were beneficiaries of much of it. Payouts, sometimes amounting to thousands of livres, were made to this one family for things such as providing Bigot with boats to carry him about the island, even though the financial commissary had already been granted 1,200 livres annually to defray his transportation costs. This money came at the Crown's expense. Bigot was known for stealing money from the coffers of New France, as well as hiring out the King's workers and pocketing the money. |
377_6 | By 1744, we see Bigot was an active central figure in the paying business of outfitting and supplying privateers. Preying on the ships of New England was an occupation that involved any number of Frenchmen located at Louisbourg, from the highest in the administration to the lowest of deck hands. In this business, Bigot, as it happened, was a keen supporter of the Du Pont brothers. For example, when Bigot was in partnership with Duvivier and Duquesnel and with Duvivier's brother Michel Du Pont de Gourville, "he held a quarter interest in the Saint-Charles, the total cost of which was 8,850 livres, and Bigot obtained another quarter interest in a larger vessel, the Brador, acquired and fitted out for 34,590 livres." |
377_7 | Also in 1744, Bigot found himself dealing with a mutiny at the Louisbourg garrison. The mutiny was quelled, apparently peacefully, with an amnesty. Bigot was not in charge of dealing with the uprising, and indeed it is unclear how he was involved, but as the official who controlled the finances, it seems likely that his rôle in ending the crisis was a key one. |
377_8 | Maintaining supply links was a problem that Bigot, as financial commissary, had to deal with. However, supply had been a persistent problem for his predecessor, Le Normant. Moreover, between 1741 and 1743, Canada endured three consecutive crop failures. Sometimes supplies were also threatened by various events in Europe and North America. Bigot had no more success in solving the problems than Le Normant. Nevertheless, Intendant Gilles Hocquart asked Bigot for help. Although it was unorthodox, Bigot had no compunction about sending an agent, François du Pont Duvivier, to New England to secure fish, other foodstuffs and other goods from suppliers there when supplies from France or other French possessions seemed unreliable. Bigot was known for keeping the food supply at Louisbourg well stocked, even if he was dealing with France's foes. Indeed, the supply was threatened at one point with the outbreak of hostilities. New England was, of course, still ruled by the British in those days. |
377_9 | When the crisis in Québec finally died down, Bigot ended up having enough food and fish to last the colony right through the winter. |
377_10 | As a hedge against the threat of further crop failures, Bigot considered a variety of measures. In 1739, there was a proposal to build a warehouse that would store extra food in case of these crop failures. Bigot brought it up again a few years later. Furthermore, he also wanted to practise agriculture in the areas of Île Royale that were potentially suitable, or on Île Saint-Jean (Prince Edward Island), where the land appeared to him to be fertile. Nevertheless, Bigot never actually did find a permanent solution to this problem. Yet, the population never went hungry. |
377_11 | Before the Siege of Louisbourg, Bigot warned Maurepas that an attack by the British was forthcoming. His warning was quite justifiable, for in April 1745, warships under Commodore Peter Warren instituted a blockade against Louisbourg. On 11 May 1745, American provincial troops commanded by William Pepperrell landed unopposed at Pointe Platte (Simon Point), 1.6 km west of Louisbourg. Unfortunately, on 26 May 1745 a unanimous decision was made at the war council that capitulation was the only option. Bigot returned to France on the Launceston, arriving at Belle-Île on 15 July 1745. |
377_12 | Duc d'Anville expedition |
377_13 | After Louisbourg surrendered to the British, François Bigot returned to France only to find his hopes for a posting there dashed. It had been decided that Louisbourg along with the rest of Acadia was to be recaptured by a large expedition commanded by the duc d'Anville. Bigot was appointed commissary general for what became known as the Duc d'Anville expedition and sent to Rochefort to look after the garrison, and to outfit the invasion force destined, it was hoped, to win back some lost glory. This would be no easy task. He had to prepare about 1,100,000 rations of food for the mission. Bigot sailed with the expedition when it finally departed on 22 June 1746. The expedition was beset by storms and lost ships to British capture before it arrived at Chebucto, later to become Halifax, Nova Scotia. Illness devastated the soldiers and sailors of the fleet at Chebucto. Duc d'Anville died and there were rapid changes in command. Louisbourg could not be retaken and only a meager and |
377_14 | unsuccessful siege of Annapolis Royal was mounted. Bigot watched as the whole undertaking that he had prepared with such effort unravelled. He, unlike many others, escaped from it with his life, if not all his belongings, back to France, but not before the ship that he was sailing on was wrecked on a shoal off Port-Louis. |
377_15 | This latest débâcle had its attendant consequences in France, and although Bigot was never actually prosecuted for any perceived failing on his part, he did spend the better part of the next two years endlessly writing reports about the failures. He came through the ordeal with his reputation intact, however. |
377_16 | Intendant of New France
Bigot was eventually sent to New France on 26 August 1748 to become the Intendant, much as it displeased him, for he had no wish to take up such an office. As the Intendant of New France, Bigot's tasks were to direct trade, finance, industry, food supplies, prices, policing, and other matters. His fundamental duty was to assist the Governor in the tasks of imperial expansion. Bigot showed much greater ability at one of the Intendant's traditional tasks, that of maintaining food supplies. Although his record was stained by a greedy attention to personal profit, Bigot fed the forces and the populace better than might have been expected in the hungry winters of 1751–1752, 1756–1757, and 1757–1758. |
377_17 | The growing need to control the food supply was reflected in Bigot's many regulations for the distribution and pricing of grain, flour, and bread. History shows that "authorities managing food supplies, however vigorously and successfully, are usually seen as corrupt, arrogant, and ineffectual." Hence, the word "Tyranny" springs to mind when reading the list of Bigot's decrees such as "directing people's movements and behaviour in detail, prescribing severe punishments for offenders, and relying in criminal cases on the stocks, the gibbet, the execution block and the tortures of the boot." Nevertheless, tyranny of this type was standard French practice. |
377_18 | Furthermore, many of Bigot's laws reflected a paternal effort to save the people of an unsettled frontier society from their own foolishness and lack of civic sense. Even more than previous intendants, he tried to prevent people from firing guns in towns, fighting in church doorways, dumping rubbish in streets and harbours and letting their livestock wander about unattended in the streets. He paved and maintained the streets of Québec with the proceeds of a tax of 30 or 40 livres a year on tavern-keepers, and tried to regulate traffic. Indeed, his authoritarian zeal went so far that Rouillé and other ministers advised him "to leave more of the policing work to the courts." But it was not in Bigot's nature to leave things to courts for he was, after all, an 18th-century naval officer attempting to run the colony as he might have run the naval installations at Brest or Rochefort, where he would rather have been. |
377_19 | Amid accusations of fraud and favouritism, Bigot was recalled to France in 1754 to answer the charges. The next year, however, he was sent back to New France.
For François Bigot, a posting to Québec was a kind of exile like a posting to any other remote bastion of the empire and he had to endure it for 12 years. Thus, it is surprising how well he performed his job as the Intendant of New France. |
377_20 | L'Affaire du Canada |
377_21 | The fraud of which Bigot was accused was not based upon mere forgery or underhanded ways of misusing funds; it was a system of private enterprise on a grand scale with the collaboration of most of the other colonial officials and many army officers and merchants working under the terms of personal understandings or even formal companies. This sort of corruption was a part of the political culture in Bourbon France, a way of life inevitably promoted by authoritarian governments and not changed until after the French Revolution, when new standards of honesty and new methods of control to enforce them were gradually imposed. Furthermore, Bigot's system of corruption was merely part of a viceregal court which he set up at Québec and which was essentially modelled on the royal court at Versailles: the magnificent social life with parties and lovely dinners in the midst of a wretchedly poor populace, as well as the preferment, employments, contracts, and business opportunities shared out |
377_22 | among these tightly knit circles. |
377_23 | The main difference between Bigot and the previous Canadian intendants was that his opportunities for enrichment were much greater at a time when more money was being spent in Canada than ever before. Bigot tried to get involved in every business and always asked for a percentage out of it. As such, while Bigot and dozens of officials and officers in Canada were making private fortunes, "the Canadian populace was suffering from inflated prices, food shortages, and occasional severe famines." As a result, a serious economic crisis developed in which prices rose by 1759 to perhaps "eight times their pre-war level, and in the same year goods in Canada were estimated to cost about seven times more than in France." Various reports of Bigot's commerce and corruption began to reach Versailles soon afterwards. |
377_24 | Unfortunately, the inflation dramatically increased government expenses in Canada, and this expansion in turn increased the financial strain. In 1750 the colony cost the Crown a little more than "two million livres, in 1754 the cost more than doubled, and in a letter of 15 April 1759 the intendant reckoned that the bills of exchange for that year would amount to over 30 millions." Considering that Bigot was spending less than the aforementioned before the war, one might imagine why the enormous demands of the later war years forced the ministry to investigate and then to prosecute the intendant whom they held responsible. Thus, it was big bills rather than tales of corruption, which brought the official wrath down on Bigot's head.
During the Seven Years' War, government expenditures for Canada rose fivefold in four years, from 1755 to 1759. François Bigot and some of his associates, notably David Gradis, were accused of having stolen a great deal of it. |
377_25 | Fall of New France and consequences for Bigot
François Bigot is often seen as a man of marked mercenary tendencies. It was noted in his youth that he was rather fonder of gambling than most men, and superiors in the Navy even upbraided him for it. He was even later blamed for New France's loss to the British Empire during the Seven Years' War; In the battle for Quebec City, once the British had finally committed to their assault from the Plains of Abraham, just west of the city, Commander Montcalm requested all twenty-five guns [horse drawn artillery] available for deployment, that were positioned in Beaufort Works, east of the Quebec City. Governor Vaudreuil only released three; against the single (one) field piece that Wolf’s artillerymen had managed to disassemble and drag up the escarpment. |
377_26 | Francois Bigot the Intendant of New France had made a habit of renting the artillery unit's horses out to harvesting farmers and the like, for his personal profit, and thus they were not available to be harnessed in front of the guns and moved with all speed west of Quebec City, to engage the British. Arguably, the battle could have been a French victory, had the guns been available to Montcalm.
History records that France freely agreed at the peace negotiations to allow the British to keep New France in exchange for Guadeloupe. Nevertheless, France, seeking a scapegoat for its defeat in North America, obliged Bigot and his friends in a trial that became known as the "Canada Affair" to make good the sum of money that they had supposedly stolen. |
377_27 | When the Seven Years' War began to go badly for France in 1757, the ruling faction of the Duc de Choiseul began to make changes and to look for scapegoats. It was fatally easy for the government to link Bigot's evident corruption with the inflation in Canada. By showing how the corruption and inflation were cause and effect, the Crown came up with an excuse for suspending payments on the Canadian bills of exchange. In view of the defeat at the Plains of Abraham it indeed seemed necessary to suspend payments, which might otherwise end up in the enemy's pockets. The crown was thus able to hide its own expected bankruptcy with a politically and morally necessary suspension of payments. By association, Bigot and the other officials from Canada were soon made to serve as scapegoats for the military and naval disasters as well as the financial ones. On 17 November 1761, Bigot and those associated, including his former business associates Cadet and Péan were arrested. Their trial ensued, |
377_28 | which ended with the judgement of 10 December 1763. Bigot's sentence was exile and the confiscation of all his property; heavy fines were imposed on all the convicted men. |
377_29 | Shortly after judgement was delivered on 10 December 1763, Bigot left for Switzerland. He changed his name to François Bar (de Barr), which was his brother-in-law's name, the Sieur de Barre (Bar). He stayed for some time at Fribourg and then went to Neuchâtel. On 18 March 1765 he secured permission to take up residence there, where he would live until his dying day.
François Bigot died on 12 January 1778 at Neuchâtel; he was buried in the little Catholic church of Saint-Martin-L'Évêque in Cressier, a village nearby, as he had requested in his will: "I desire that my body be buried in the cemetery at Cressier without any pomp, just as the poorest person in the parish would be." |
377_30 | No portrait of François Bigot is known to exist. He is sometimes represented by a wood-engraving made in 1855 by the French printmaker Charles Tamisier. The ruins of his residence and storehouse at Louisbourg was excavated and reconstructed in the 1960s by the Canadian Park Service and now forms a prominent museum component of the reconstructed Fortress Louisbourg national historic site which explores Bigot's role in the colony.
See also
Angélique des Méloizes referred to as the madame de Pompadour of François Bigot .
References
External links
Annotated biography of François Bigot
From the Warpath to the Plains of Abraham (Virtual Exhibition)
Intendants of New France
French people of the French and Indian War
1703 births
1778 deaths
People of New France |
378_0 | HMS Duke of York was a battleship of the Royal Navy. Laid down in May 1937, the ship was constructed by John Brown and Company at Clydebank, Scotland, and commissioned into the Royal Navy on 4 November 1941, subsequently seeing combat service during the Second World War.
In mid-December 1941, Duke of York transported Prime Minister Winston Churchill to the United States to meet President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The journey through the seas were rough even for the North Atlantic, Churchill wrote to his wife "Being in a ship in such weather as this is like being in a prison, with the extra chance of being drowned." Between March and September 1942 Duke of York was involved with convoy escort duties, including as flagship of the Heavy Covering Force of Convoy PQ-17, but in October she was dispatched to Gibraltar where she became the flagship of Force H. |
378_1 | In October 1942, Duke of York was involved in the Allied invasion of North Africa, but saw little action as her role only required her to protect the accompanying aircraft carriers. Duke of York stopped the Portuguese vessel Gil Eannes on 1 November 1942 and a commando arrested Gastão de Freitas Ferraz. The British had picked up radio traffic indicating naval espionage, possibly compromising the secrecy of the upcoming Operation Torch.
After Operation Torch, Duke of York was involved in Operations Camera and Governor, which were diversionary operations designed to draw the Germans' attention away from Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. On 4 October, Duke of York operated with her sister ship in covering a force of Allied cruisers and destroyers and the American carrier , during Operation Leader, which raided German shipping off Norway. The attack sank four merchant ships and badly damaged a further seven. |
378_2 | On 26 December 1943 Duke of York was part of a task force which encountered the off the North Cape of Norway. During the engagement that followed, Scharnhorst hit Duke of York twice with little effect, but was herself hit by several of Duke of Yorks 14-inch shells, silencing one of her turrets and hitting a boiler room. After temporarily escaping from Duke of Yorks heavy fire, Scharnhorst was struck several times by torpedoes, allowing Duke of York to again open fire, contributing to the eventual sinking of Scharnhorst after a running action lasting ten-and-a-half hours.
In 1945, Duke of York was assigned to the British Pacific Fleet as its flagship, but suffered mechanical problems in Malta which prevented her arriving in time to see any action before Japan surrendered.
After the war, Duke of York remained active until she was laid up in November 1951. She was eventually scrapped in 1957. |
378_3 | Construction |
378_4 | In the aftermath of the First World War, the Washington Naval Treaty was drawn up in 1922 in an effort to stop an arms race developing between Britain, Japan, France, Italy and the United States. This treaty limited the number of ships each nation was allowed to build and capped the displacement of capital ships at . These restrictions were extended in 1930 through the Treaty of London, but by the mid-1930s Japan and Italy had withdrawn from both of these treaties and the British became concerned about the lack of modern battleships in the Royal Navy. The Admiralty therefore ordered the construction of a new battleship class: the . Due to the provisions of both the Washington Naval Treaty and the Treaty of London, both of which were still in effect when the King George Vs were being designed, the main armament of the class was limited to the guns. They were the only battleships built at that time to adhere to the treaty and even though it soon became apparent to the British that the |
378_5 | other signatories to the treaty were ignoring its requirements, it was too late to change the design of the class before they were laid down in 1937. |
378_6 | Duke of York was the third ship in the King George V class, and was laid down at John Brown & Company's shipyard in Clydebank, Scotland, on 5 May 1937. The title of Duke of York was in abeyance at that time, having been that held by King George VI prior to his succession to the throne in December 1936. The battleship was launched on 28 February 1940 and completed on 4 November 1941, and joined the Home Fleet at Scapa Flow.
Description
Duke of York displaced as built and fully loaded. The ship had an overall length of , a beam of and a draught of . Her designed metacentric height was at normal load and at deep load. |
378_7 | She was powered by Parsons geared steam turbines, driving four propeller shafts. Steam was provided by eight Admiralty 3-drum water-tube boilers which normally delivered , but could deliver at emergency overload.
This gave Duke of York a top speed of . The ship carried of fuel oil, which was later increased to . She also carried of diesel oil, of reserve feed water and of freshwater. At full speed Duke of York had a range of at . |
378_8 | Armament
Duke of York mounted 10 BL Mk VII guns, which were mounted in one Mark II twin turret forward and two Mark III quadruple turrets, one forward and one aft. The guns could be elevated 40 degrees and depressed 3 degrees, while their training arcs varied. Turret "A" was able to traverse 286 degrees, while turrets "B" and "Y" could both move through 270 degrees. Hydraulic drives were used in the training and elevating process, achieving rates of two and eight degrees per second, respectively. A full gun broadside weighed , and a salvo could be fired every 40 seconds. The secondary armament consisted of 16 QF Mk I dual purpose guns which were mounted in eight twin turrets. The maximum range of the Mk I guns was at a 45-degree elevation, the anti-aircraft ceiling was . The guns could be elevated to 70 degrees and depressed to 5 degrees. The normal rate of fire was ten to twelve rounds per minute, but in practice the guns could only fire seven to eight rounds per minute. |
378_9 | Along with her main and secondary batteries, Duke of York carried 48 QF 2 pdr () Mk.VIII "pom-pom" anti-aircraft guns in six octuple, power-driven, mountings. These were supplemented by six Oerlikon light AA guns in single, hand-worked, mounts.
Operational history
Second World War
In mid-December 1941, Duke of York embarked Prime Minister Winston Churchill for a trip to the United States to confer with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. She arrived at Annapolis, Maryland, on 22 December 1941, made a shakedown cruise to Bermuda in January 1942, and departed for Scapa Flow on 17 January with Churchill returning home by air. |
378_10 | On 1 March 1942, she provided close escort for Convoy PQ 12 in company with the battlecruiser , the cruiser , and six destroyers. On 6 March, that force was reinforced with one of Duke of Yorks sister-ships, , and the aircraft carrier , the heavy cruiser , and six destroyers as a result of Admiral John Tovey's concerns that the battleship might attempt to intercept the convoy. On 6 March, the German battleship put to sea and was sighted by a British submarine around 19:40; no contact was made, however, except for an unsuccessful aerial torpedo attack by aircraft from Victorious. |
378_11 | Later that month, Convoy PQ 13 was constituted and Duke of York again formed part of the escort force. In early April, Duke of York, King George V, and the carrier Victorious formed the core of a support force that patrolled between Iceland and Norway to cover several convoys to the Soviet Union. In late April, when King George V accidentally rammed and sank the destroyer in dense fog, sustaining significant bow damage, Duke of York was sent to relieve her. She continued in these operations through May, when she was joined by the American battleship . In mid-September, Duke of York escorted Convoy QP 14. |
378_12 | In October 1942, Duke of York was sent to Gibraltar as the new flagship of Force H, and supported the Allied landings in North Africa the following month. During this time Duke of York came under air attack by Italian aircraft on several occasions, but the raids were relatively small scale and were swiftly dealt with by the "umbrella" provided by the aircraft from the accompanying carriers Victorious, and . After this action, Duke of York returned to Britain for a refit. |
378_13 | With her refit completed, Duke of York resumed her status as flagship from 14 May 1943 pending the departure of King George V and Howe for Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily. Operation Gearbox in June 1943 involved a sweep by Duke of York and , in company with the US battleships and , to provide distant cover for minor operations in Spitsbergen and the Kola Inlet, while the following month diversionary operations, code-named "Camera" and "Governor of Norway," were carried out in order to draw the Germans' attention away from Operation Husky. On 4 October, Duke of York and Anson covered a force of Allied cruisers and destroyers and the American carrier under Operation Leader, which raided German shipping off Norway. The attack resulted in the sinking of four German merchant ships and damage to seven others, which forced many of them to be grounded.
Action against Scharnhorst |
378_14 | In 1943, the German battleship Scharnhorst moved to Norway, a position whence she could threaten the Arctic convoys to Russia. With Tirpitz and two armoured ships also in Norwegian fjords, it was necessary for the Royal Navy to provide heavy escorts for convoys between Britain and Russia. One of these was sighted by the Germans in early December 1943, and Allied intelligence concluded that the following convoy, Convoy JW 55B, would be attacked by the German surface ships. Two surface forces (Forces 1 and 2) were assigned to provide distant cover to JW 55B, which had left Loch Ewe on 22 December. On 25 December 1943, Scharnhorst was reported at sea, escorted by five Narvik-class destroyers (Z-29, Z-30, Z-33, Z-34, and Z-38). Force 1, comprising the heavy cruiser , and the light cruisers and Sheffield, made contact shortly after 0900 on 26 December. A brief gunnery engagement followed, without damage to Force 1, but two hits from a cruiser's guns upon Scharnhorst resulted in the |
378_15 | destruction of her radar controls. In worsening weather, unable to effectively control her fire, Scharnhorst was unable to convert a tactical advantage of greater range and weight of shot. Fearing she was in a gunnery duel with a battleship, Scharnhorst turned away, outdistancing her pursuers. She again outran Force 1 after a second brief skirmish around noon that did not further damage Scharnhorst, but did result in hits on Norfolk which disabled a main battery turret and her radar. Kriegsmarine Konteradmiral (Rear Admiral) Erich Bey, aboard Scharnhorst, having already detached his destroyers to independently seek out Convoy JW 55B, ordered Scharnhorst to return to port at Altafjord, Norway. |
378_16 | Meanwhile, Force 2, comprising Duke of York, the light cruiser , and four destroyers (the S-class , , and , and the Norwegian destroyer ), was closing, and it was estimated that a night action with Scharnhorst would commence around 17:15. But Scharnhorst altered course, and Belfast regained radar contact, passing it to Force 2. Duke of York made her initial radar contact at 16:17, at a distance of , and Force 2 began to manoeuvre for broadside fire and torpedo runs by the destroyers. Belfast fired star shells at 1648 to illuminate Scharnhorst, followed by another star shell from one of Duke of Yorks guns, taking Scharnhorst by surprise with her main battery trained fore and aft. By 16:50, Duke of York had closed to less than and opened fire with a full 10-gun broadside, scoring one hit. Although under heavy fire, Scharnhorsts return fire straddled Duke of York a number of times and hit her twice. A shell passed through the mainmast and its port leg without detonating, but |
378_17 | fragments from the hit destroyed the cable for the main search radar. A shell also pierced the port strut of the foremast without exploding. At 1655, a shell from Duke of York silenced Scharnhorsts forward main battery turrets Anton and Bruno, but she maintained speed so that by 1824 the range had opened to , when Duke of York ceased fire after expending 52 broadsides. However, one shell from the final salvoes pierced Scharnhorsts armour belt and destroyed her No. 1 boiler room, slowing the ship and allowing the pursuing British destroyers to overtake her. |
378_18 | Force 2's destroyers attacked at 18:50 with torpedoes, launching 28 and scoring hits with four. This further slowed Scharnhorst, and at 19:01 Duke of York and Jamaica again opened fire, at a range of . At 19:15, Belfast also began shelling Scharnhorst, and both Belfast and Jamaica fired their remaining torpedoes. At least ten 14-inch shells had already hit the German battleship, causing fires and explosions, and silencing most of the secondary battery. By 1916, all three main turrets aboard Scharnhorst had ceased firing, and her speed had been cut to . Duke of York ceased fire at 19:30 to allow her escorting cruisers and destroyers to close on Scharnhorst. In the final stages of the battle, the destroyers , , , and fired a total of 19 torpedoes at Scharnhorst, causing her to list badly to port, and at 19:45 Scharnhorst capsized and quickly sank after a running action lasting ten-and-a-half hours, taking with her 1,932 men (there were only 36 survivors). Following her sinking, and |
378_19 | the retreat of most of the remaining German heavy surface units from Norway, the need to maintain powerful surface forces in British home waters diminished. |
378_20 | Subsequent operations
On 29 March 1944, Duke of York and the bulk of the Home Fleet left Scapa Flow to provide a support force for Convoy JW 58. The ship operated in the Arctic and as cover for carriers conducting the Goodwood series of air strikes on Tirpitz in mid to late August. In September, when she was overhauled and partially modernized at Liverpool, radar equipment and additional anti-aircraft guns were added. She was then ordered to join the British Pacific Fleet and sailed in company with her sister-ship Anson on 25 April 1945. A problem with the ship's electrical circuitry delayed her while she was at Malta and, as a result, she did not reach Sydney until 29 July, by which time it too late for her to take any meaningful part in hostilities against the Japanese. |
378_21 | Nevertheless, in early August, Duke of York was assigned to Task Force 37, along with four aircraft carriers and her sister-ship King George V. From 9 August, TF 37 and three American carrier task forces conducted a series of air raids on Japan, which continued until 15 August when a surrender came into effect. After the conclusion of hostilities, Duke of York, alongside her sister-ship, King George V, participated in the surrender ceremonies that took place in Tokyo Bay. The following month Duke of York sailed for Hong Kong, to join the fleet that assembled there to accept the surrender of the Japanese garrison. She was the flagship of the British Pacific Fleet when the Japanese surrendered, and remained so until June 1946, when she returned to Plymouth for an overhaul.
Post war |
378_22 | Duke of York was flagship of the Home Fleet following the end of the war and remained in active service until April 1949. She was laid up in November 1951, and on 18 May 1957, she was ordered scrapped. She was broken up by Shipbreaking Industries, Ltd., in Faslane. The ship's bell was salvaged and given to the Duke of York School (since renamed the Lenana School) in Nairobi, Kenya.
Refits
During her career, Duke of York was refitted on several occasions to bring her equipment up-to-date. The following are the dates and details of the refits undertaken.
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
External links
Maritimequest HMS Duke of York pages
Alan Sutherland RN Collection on MaritimeQuest
High resolution picture
Newsreel footage of HMS Duke of York (last quarter of the clip).
HMS Duke of York in heavy seas while on Arctic convoy duty
King George V-class battleships (1939)
Ships built on the River Clyde
1940 ships
World War II battleships of the United Kingdom |
379_0 | Medingen Abbey or Medingen Convent () is a former Cistercian nunnery. Today it is a residence for women of the Protestant Lutheran faith () near the Lower Saxon town of Bad Bevensen and is supervised by the Monastic Chamber of Hanover (Klosterkammer Hannover). The current director of the abbey (Äbtissin) is the art historian Dr Kristin Püttmann.
History |
379_1 | A founding legend ascribes the convent's origins to a lay brother called Johannes; the convent's history from its founding to the election of abbess Margaretha Puffen was formerly depicted in a cycle of 15 painted wooden boards, that were destroyed in the fire of 1781; the only surviving copy is the affix in Johann Ludolf Lyßman's Historische Nachrichten (1772). The legend has it that Johannes claimed divine guidance in his quest to build the new convent. The community was founded 1228 in Restorf am Höhbeck by Johannes and four nuns who joined him in Magdeburg, but the group did not stay there. For unknown reasons, they moved on to Plate near Lüchow and later Bohndorf, before they eventually settled in Altenmedingen, where the first buildings were consecrated on 24 August 1241. |
379_2 | The military road passing through the convent yard presented an ever-present danger of attacks or arson, so the convent decided to move one last time, to the village of Zellensen, today's Medingen. The new church was consecrated on 24 August 1336. |
379_3 | 1479 saw the advent of the convent reforms under the influence of the devotio moderna. Many convents at that time did not follow the Cistercian rule very strictly; nuns were allowed to keep their belongings and keep in touch with their relatives once they joined the convent. The Cistercian order was re-established and the prioress Margarete Puffen was made an abbess in 1494.
After the reforms, a scriptorium became one of the focal points of the convent and to this day a large number of manuscripts found worldwide can be attributed to the sixteenth-century nuns of Medingen. Hymns (Leisen) noted down in these texts are still part of both Catholic and Protestant hymnbooks today, e.g. in the current German Protestant hymnal EG 23 "Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ", EG 100 "Wir wollen alle fröhlich sein" and EG 214 "Gott sei gelobet und gebenedeiet", even though they were wrongly dated to the 14th century by the music historian Walther Lipphardt. |
379_4 | The Reformation attempted to be introduced in Medingen in 1524, was met with resistance from the nuns. They hid their confessor in the attic, publicly burned the Lutheran bible and almost faced the dissolution of the convent. In 1541, the Uelzen Landtag decided to ensure the economic security of Medingen and the five other convents nearby. This was in the nobility's interests, because their unmarried daughters could benefit from the livelihood and education befitting their status. In 1542, all of the convent's goods and earnings were confiscated and contact between the nuns and their family was prohibited. The abbess, Margareta von Stöterogge, did not give in to the demands of bringing all remaining property to Celle, but rather went to Hildesheim for two years, taking the convent's archive and valuables with her. It took her brother, Nikolaus von Stöterogge, to convince her finally to accept the communion under both forms. Eventually, in 1554, the convent became Protestant and from |
379_5 | then on, the Klosterordnung (convent order) was defined by the Landesherr or territorial lord. |
379_6 | After the Reformation had been introduced, life changed drastically: The incumbents were now allowed to marry, but had to leave the convent when they did so. In 1605, they replaced the traditional Cistercian habit with an attire in accordance with the convent order introduced by Duke William in 1574. The Thirty Years' War left its mark on the convent and its surrounding area. A new convent order was introduced by Kurfürst (elector) George Louis in 1706.
Most of the convent buildings were destroyed in a fire in January 1781, although valuable possessions like the archives and the abbesses' crosier from 1494 were able to be salvaged. The ruins were demolished in 1782 and the convent re-built in the early neoclassic style. Completed in 1788, the new buildings were consecrated on 24 August.
List of heads of convent |
379_7 | Cultural heritage
A large number of medieval manuscripts were produced in Medingen, 44 of which have survived and are conserved all over the world. The nuns enhanced the liturgy written in Latin with Low German prayers and songs, producing unique compilations of illuminated texts that were important to them as well as the noblewomen in the surrounding areas.
Furthermore, the brewery (), built in 1397, survived the fire of 1781 and can still be seen today. It attests to the fact that the convent was originally built in the Brick Gothic style.
References |
379_8 | Further reading
Achten, Gerard: De Gebedenboeken van de Cistercienserinnenkloosters Medingen en Wienhausen, in: Miscellanea Neerlandica 3 (= FS Jan Deschamps), 1987, pp. 173–188.
Brohmann, Friedrich: Geschichte von Bevensen und Kloster Medingen, 1928.
Hascher-Burger, Ulrike / Lähnemann, Henrike: Liturgie und Reform in Kloster Medingen. Edition und Untersuchung des Propst-Handbuchs Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Lat. liturg. e. 18 (Spätmittelalter und Reformation. Neue Reihe), Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013 (in press).
Heutger, Nicolaus Carl: Kloster Medingen in der Lüneburger Heide, in: 'Cistercienser Chronik.' Forum für Geschichte, Kunst, Literatur und Spiritualität des Mönchtums, Vol. 101 (1994), pp. 15–18
Homeyer, Joachim: 750 Jahre Kloster Medingen. Kleine Beiträge zur frühen Klostergeschichte. (Schriften zur Uelzener Heimatkunde, hg. v. Hans E. Seidat, H. 3), Uelzen, 1978. |
379_9 | Homeyer, Joachim: Kloster Medingen, die Gründungslegende und ihre historischen Elemente, in: Jahrbuch der Gesellschaft für niedersächsische Kirchengeschichte 79 (1981), pp. 9–60.
Homeyer, Joachim (Hg.): Kloster Medingen 1788 – 1988, 200 Jahre Neubau. Kleine Beiträge zum Jubiläum. Uelzen, 1988
Homeyer, Joachim: Urkundenbuch des Klosters Medingen. Hahn, Hannover 2006, .
Homeyer, Joachim: 500 Jahre Äbtissinnen in Medingen (Schriften zur Uelzener Heimatkunde, hg.v. von Horst Hoffmann, H. 11), Uelzen, 1994.
Krüger, Nilüfer: Niederdeutsches Osterorationale aus Medingen, in: FS für Horst Gronemeyer zum 60. Geburtstag, hg.v. Herald Weigel, Herzberg, 1993, pp. 179–201.
Lähnemann, Henrike: An dessen bom wil ik stighen. Die Ikonographie des Wichmannsburger Antependiums im Kontext der Medinger Handschriften, in: Oxford German Studies 34 (2005), pp. 19–46. |
379_10 | Lähnemann, Henrike/ Linden, Sandra: Per organa. Musikalische Unterweisung in Handschriften der Lüneburger Klöster, in: Dichtung und Didaxe. Lehrhaftes Sprechen in der deutschen Literatur des Mittelalters, Berlin/New York, 2009, p. 397-412.
Lähnemann, Henrike: Die Erscheinungen Christi nach Ostern in Medinger Handschriften, in: Medialität des Heils im späten Mittelalter, ed. by Carla Dauven-van Knippenberg, Cornelia Herberichs, and Christian Kiening, Chronos, 2009 (Medienwandel – Medienwechsel – Medienwissen 10), pp. 189–202.
Lähnemann, Henrike: Schnipsel, Schleier, Textkombinatorik. Die Materialität der Medinger Orationalien, in: Materialität in der Editionswissenschaft, ed. by Martin Schubert, Tübingen, 2010 (Beihefte zu editio), pp. 135–146. |
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