Ming Great Wall

The Ming Great Wall (明長城; Ming changcheng), built by the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), forms the most visible parts of the Great Wall of China today. A comprehensive archaeological survey, using advanced technologies, has concluded that the Ming walls measure 8,850 km (5,500 mi) from Jiayu Pass in the west to the sea in Shanhai Pass, then looping over to terminate in Manchuria at the Hushan Great Wall. This is made up of 6,259 km (3,889 mi) sections of actual wall, 359 km (223 mi) of trenches and 2,232 km (1,387 mi) of natural defensive barriers such as hills and rivers.

While the Ming walls are generally referred to as "Great Wall" (changcheng) in modern times, in Ming times they were called "border barriers" (邊牆; bianqiang) by the Chinese, since the term changcheng was said to evoke imagery of the tyranny of Qin Shi Huang (260–210 BC).

History

Early Ming walls and garrisons

In 1368, the Hongwu Emperor (Zhu Yuanzhang, r. 1368–98) ousted the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty from China to inaugurate the Ming dynasty. The Mongols fled back to Mongolia, but even after numerous campaigns, the Mongol problem remained.

Wall (play)

Wall is a 2009 play by David Hare, in the form of a monologue. It was first performed in March 2009 at the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at the Royal Court Theatre by the author himself, directed by Stephen Daldry. Its topic is the Israeli Security Barriers in the West Bank and Gaza and it is intended by Hare as a companion piece to his monologue Berlin and its passages on the Berlin Wall.

External links

List of Marvel Comics characters: W

Walking Stiletto

The Walking Stiletto is a robot supervillain created by Stan Lee, John Romita, Sr., and Sal Buscema, first appeared in Captain America #114 (June 1969). Within the context of the stories, the Walking Stiletto is a creation and agent of AIM. When Sharon Carter attacks a group of AIM leaders, they let loose the Stiletto to attack her, but she is saved by Captain America and Rick Jones, who destroy the robot. Many years later, the Walking Stiletto is among the robotic collection of the Reanimator, who unleashes it on Wolverine and Nova. Wolverine eviscerates the Walking Stiletto, rendering it inoperative.

Wall

Wall is a mutant whose first appearance was in Cable vol. 2 #79. Wall was a member of Randall Shire's small traveling carnival in Australia before Shire was possessed by the alien Undying known as Semijan and subsequently enslaved Wall and his brother Key with his mutant vocal power. Wall is a low-level mutant whose body is denser than adamantium, and is resistant to injury. Wall also possesses enhanced strength.

Wall (Chinese constellation)

The Wall mansion (Chinese: 壁宿; pinyin: Bì Xiù) is one of the Twenty-eight mansions of the Chinese constellations. It is one of the northern mansions of the Black Tortoise.

Asterisms

Ming (album)

Ming is the third album by David Murray to be released on the Italian Black Saint label and the first to feature his Octet. It was released in 1980 and features performances by Murray, Henry Threadgill, Olu Dara, Lawrence "Butch" Morris, George Lewis, Anthony Davis, Wilber Morris and Steve McCall.

Reception

The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide said "both Ming and Home display an excellent balance between written material and solos by a distinguished group of sidemen".

The Penguin Guide to Jazz selected this album as part of its suggested Core Collection.

The Allmusic review by Scott Yanow awarded the album 5 stars stating "His octet was always the perfect setting for tenor saxophonist David Murray, large enough to generate power but not as out of control as many of his big-band performances. Murray contributed all five originals (including "Ming" and "Dewey's Circle") and arrangements, and is in superior form on both tenor and bass clarinet. The "backup crew" is also quite notable: altoist Henry Threadgill, trumpeter Olu Dara, cornetist Butch Morris, trombonist George Lewis, pianist Anthony Davis, bassist Wilbur Morris, and drummer Steve McCall. These avant-garde performances (reissued on CD) are often rhythmic enough to reach a slightly larger audience than usual, and the individuality shown by each of these major players is quite impressive. Recommended.".

Ming library

Ming is a C library for creating Adobe Flash (.swf) files. It is often packaged as a PHP module that allows for the dynamic generation of Flash animations. In addition to PHP, the library can also be used in the programming languages C++, Perl, Python, and Ruby.

Ming's core library is distributed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License, and its makeswf command-line tool is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License, thus making Ming free software.

References

External links

Ming (clam)

Ming (c. 1499 – 2006) was a nickname given to a specimen of the ocean quahog clam (Arctica islandica, family Veneridae), that was dredged off the coast of Iceland in 2006 and whose age was calculated by counting annual growth lines in the shell. Ming was the oldest individual (non-colonial) animal ever discovered whose age could be accurately determined. Originally thought to be 405 years old, Ming was later determined to be 507 years old.

Original discovery

Ming was dredged off the northern coast of Iceland in 2006. In 2007, on the basis of counting the annual growth bands on the cross-sectional surface of the hinge region of the shell, researchers announced that the clam was 405 years old. The research was carried out by researchers from Bangor University, including Dr. Alan Wanamaker, Dr. Paul Butler, Professor James Scourse and Professor Chris Richardson. It is not known how much longer Ming might have lived had it been left in place on the ocean floor.

It was named after the Ming dynasty, during which it was born. Professor Richardson said that the existence of such long-lived species could help scientists discover how some animals reach such advanced ages.