Page 11 - Citing Primary News Today

Juana Inés de la Cruz (1651--95) is considered among the greatest writers of Mexico, a central figure of 17th-century Latin American literature, and an early feminist who championed the right of women to acquire knowledge. She was born on the hacienda of Nepantla to parents who were not married and placed in the custody of her maternal grandfather. In 1667, she joined the Order of Discalced Carmelites in Mexico City, where she was free to pursue her intellectual and literary interests. She own...

This general map of the Middle East was published in London 1918. It shows Anatolia, Egypt, and the Arabian Desert. Despite the title, it is not focused on the region as a theater of battle. The political borders shown on the map are vague, except for the eastern border of Egypt and the Iranian and Russian frontiers. The map was issued at the end of World War I, before the division of Ottoman territories by the League of Nations. Armenia is shown to cover a large portion of Asia Minor. The Stra...

Xu Guangqi (1562--1633), a scholar and official, was a native of Shanghai. He came into contact with Christianity in 1596, later met the Jesuit missionaries Matteo Ricci and João da Rocha in Nanjing, and was baptized in 1603 under the name Paul. After receiving a jin shi degree in 1604, Xu became a bachelor in the Hanlin Academy. From 1604 to 1607 he worked continuously with Ricci, translating works on mathematics, hydraulics, astronomy, and geography, among them Euclid's Elements, entitle...

This scientific work is by Gao Yizhi (the Chinese name of the Italian Jesuit missionary Alfonso Vagnoni (1566--1640)). Vagnoni left Europe for China in 1603, arrived in Macao in 1605, and later was transferred to Nanjing, where he built a new church in 1611. The building of the church caused jealousy and displeasure among the Chinese officials and Buddhist and Taoist monks. In 1616 Shen Que, vice minister of the Nanjing Board of Rites, submitted two memorials to the imperial court, asking for th...

Herbert Gresford Jones (1870--1958) was an Anglican cleric and missionary to Uganda. He studied at Cambridge University and was ordained in 1895. After serving as a vicar at churches in England and as a chaplain with the British forces in World War I, he went to Uganda in 1920, where he was bishop suffragan of Kampala until 1923. Uganda in Transformation: 1876--1926 is Jones's account of the development of the Anglican Church in Uganda since the arrival of the first British missionaries in 1...

The Flemish scholar and geographer Abraham Ortelius (1527--98) published the first edition of his Theatrum orbis terrarum (Theater of the world) in 1570. Containing 53 maps, each with a detailed commentary, it is considered the first true atlas in the modern sense: a collection of uniform map sheets and accompanying text bound to form a book for which copper printing plates were specifically engraved. The 1570 edition was followed by editions in Latin, Dutch, French, German, and Spanish, with an...

In 1874-75, the Russian government sent a research and trading mission to China to seek out new overland routes to the Chinese market, report on prospects for increased commerce and locations for consulates and factories, and gather information about the Dungan Revolt then raging in parts of western China. Led by Lieutenant Colonel Iulian A. Sosnovskii of the army General Staff, the nine-man mission included a topographer, Captain Matusovskii; a scientific officer, Dr. Pavel Iakovlevich Piasetsk...

Sunzi bing fa (The art of war by Sunzi) is the most important and popular military classic of ancient China. Its influence also spread to neighboring countries and beyond. Sun Wu, also known as Sunzi or Sun Tzu, lived in the State of Qi during the late Spring and Autumn period (770-476 BC). He served the State of Wu, in the southeast coastal area, from around 512 BC and presented his military strategy in a work of 13 chapters to the king of Wu. Together with Wu Zixu (died 484 BC), a military str...

This photograph is from a collection of 65 projectable lantern slides relating to the Arab Revolt of 1916-18, an important theater of operations during World War I. By supporting the revolt against Ottoman Rule, the British sought to weaken the Ottoman Empire, which was aligned with Germany and Austria-Hungary. For their part, the Arabs hoped to secure independence and create a unified empire embracing the region from Aleppo, Syria to Aden, Yemen. The photographs depict many of the protagonists ...

The National Highways Association (NHA) was established in 1911 to promote the development of an improved national road network in the United States. Under the slogan "Good roads for everyone!" the NHA advocated the building and permanent maintenance by the federal government of a system of 50,000 miles (some 80,500 kilometers) of highways. This map, issued by the NHA in 1915, shows the Sunshine Highway, proposed by the Sunshine Highway Association and endorsed by the NHA. The projecte...