Знаменитые личности в истории человечества. Биография, достижения жизни, творчество. Читаем статьи на английском языке, обогощаем словарный запас и пополняем свои знания.
1 Biography of Christopher Columbus (1451–1506)
Christopher Columbus was born in the Republic of Genoa, in what is today Northwestern Italy. His father was a middle-class wool merchant, though it was relatively humble beginnings for what he later became. Columbus learnt to sail from an early age and later worked as a business agent, travelling around Europe to England, Ireland and later along the West coast of Africa. He was not a scholar but was an enthusiastic self-educated man, who read extensively on astronomy, science and navigation. He also became fluent in Latin, Portuguese and Spanish.
Christopher Columbus was a believer in the spherical nature of the world (some Christians still held the view that the world was flat). An ambitious man, Christopher Columbus hoped to find a Western trade route to the lucrative spice markets in Asia. Rather than sailing east, he hoped that sailing west would lead to countries like Japan and China.
To gain the necessary funding and support for his journeys, he approached the Catholic Monarchs of Spain. As part of his offer, he said that he hoped to be able to spread Christianity to ‘heathen lands’ in the east. The Spanish monarchs agreed to fund Columbus, partly on the Christian missionary efforts, but also hoping to gain an upper hand in the lucrative trade markets. One advantage of the westward exploration is that it avoided conflict with the growing power of the Ottomans in the east.
His voyages to the America
Columbus’ first voyage was completed in 1492. He had intended to sail to Japan but ended up in the Bahamas, which he named San Salvador.
Columbus made a total of four journeys, where he sailed extensively around the Caribbean islands of Cuba, Jamaica, the Bahamas and also to the mainland, to places such as Panama.
Columbus was not the first person to reach America. Previous successful voyages included a Norse expedition led by Leif Ericson. However, Columbus was the first to travel to America and establish permanent settlements. Columbus’ voyages and reports, over the next 400 years encouraged all the major European powers to seek to colonise parts of America.
Columbus was a skilled navigator with tremendous faith in the possibilities of exploration. He claimed in his diary entries, his steely will held the crew together when they feared they would never reach land.
Towards the end of his life, Columbus became increasingly religious. In particular, he became fascinated with Biblical prophecies and wrote his own ‘Book of Prophecies’ (1505). He was also frustrated with his lack of public recognition and seeming demotion in the eyes of the Spanish monarchs. In 1503, he wrote a letter to the monarchs laying out his sense of unappreciated sacrifice.
Columbus died in 1506, aged 54 from a heart attack related to reactive arthritis. Undoubtedly, the rigours of travelling across the seas weighed upon Columbus’ health. Towards the end of his life, he was frequently in physical pain from his journeys.
- Columbus is venerated by many European Americans as the man who helped put America on the map.
Columbus Day is observed on 12 October in Spain and across the Americas.
- Others take a more critical view of Columbus, arguing that his “discovery” was not really a discovery – because the land was already populated and that through his actions the ensuing European colonisations led to the mistreatment and genocide of the Native American people who already lived there.
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2 Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955)
Born in Germany in 1879, Albert Einstein is one of the most celebrated scientists of the Twentieth Century. His theories on relativity laid the framework for a new branch of physics, and Einstein’s E = mc2 on mass-energy equivalence is one of the most famous formulas in the world. In 1921, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for his contributions to theoretical physics and the evolution of Quantum Theory.
Born in Germany to Jewish parents, Einstein settled in Switzerland and then, after Hitler’s rise to power, the United States. Einstein was a truly global man and one of the undisputed genius’ of the Twentieth Century.
Early life Albert Einstein
Einstein was born 14 March 1879, in Ulm the German Empire. His parents were working-class (salesman/engineer) and non-observant Jews. Aged 15, the family moved to Milan, Italy, where his father hoped Albert would become a mechanical engineer. However, despite Einstein’s intellect and thirst for knowledge, his early academic reports suggested anything but a glittering career in academia. His teachers found him dim and slow to learn. Part of the problem was that Albert expressed no interest in learning languages and the learning by rote that was popular at the time.
School failed me, and I failed the school. It bored me. The teachers behaved like Feldwebel. I wanted to learn what I wanted to know, but they wanted me to learn for the exam.” Einstein and the Poet (1983)
At the age of 12, Einstein picked up a book on geometry and read it cover to cover. He became fascinated by maths and taught himself – becoming acquainted with the great scientific discoveries of the age.
Despite Albert’s independent learning, he languished at school. Eventually, he was asked to leave by the authorities because his indifference was setting a bad example to other students.
He applied for admission to the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. His first attempt was a failure because he failed exams in botany, zoology and languages. However, he passed the next year and in 1900 became a Swiss citizen.
At college, he met a fellow student Mileva Maric, and after a long friendship, they married in 1903; they had two sons before divorcing several years later.
After graduating from Zurich college, he attempted to gain a teaching post but none was forthcoming; instead, he gained a job in the Swiss Patent Office. While working at the Patent Office, Einstein continued his own scientific discoveries and began radical experiments to consider the nature of light and space.
He published his first scientific paper in 1900, and by 1905 had completed his PhD entitled “A New Determination of Molecular Dimensions. In addition to working on his PhD, Einstein also worked feverishly on other papers. In 1905, he published four pivotal scientific works, which would revolutionise modern physics.
In 1911, Einstein predicted the sun’s gravity would bend the light of another star. He based this on his new general theory of relativity. On 29 May 1919, during a solar eclipse, British astronomer and physicist Sir Arthur Eddington was able to confirm Einstein’s prediction. The news was published in newspapers around the world, and it made Einstein internationally known as a leading physicist. It was also symbolic of international co-operation between British and German scientists after the horrors of the First World War.
In 1952, he was offered the position as President of Israel, but he declined saying he had:
“neither the natural ability nor the experience to deal with human beings.” … “I am deeply moved by the offer from our State of Israel, and at once saddened and ashamed that I cannot accept it.”
Einstein died in 1955, at his request his brain and vital organs were removed for scientific study.
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text is taken from https://www.biographyonline.net/