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In 1863, Elijah Benamozegh purported to establish that the main source of Spinoza's ontology is Kabbalah. The most recent research in the field seems to vindicate that claim.
The 19th-century German Sanskritist Theodor Goldstücker was one of the early figures to notice the similarities between Spinoza's religious conceptions and the Vedanta tradition of India, writing that Spinoza's thought was "... so exact a representation of the ideas of the Vedanta, that we might have suspected its founder to have borrowed the fundamental principles of his system from the Hindus, did his biography not satisfy us that he was wholly unacquainted with their doctrines..." Max Müller also noted the striking similarities between Vedanta and the system of Spinoza, equating the Brahman in Vedanta to Spinoza's 'Substantia.'
Legacy.
Spinoza's ideas have had a major impact on intellectual debates from the seventeenth century to the current era. How Spinoza is viewed has gone from the atheistic author of treatises that undermine Judaism and organized religion, to a cultural hero, the first secular Jew. One writer contends that what draws readers to Spinoza today and "makes him perhaps the most beloved philosopher since Socrates, is his confident equanimity". He is not a despairing nihilist, but rather Spinoza says that "blessedness is nothing else but the contentment of spirit, which arises from the intuitive knowledge of God." One of his biographers, Jonathan I. Israel, argues that "No leading figure of the post-1750 later Enlightenment, for example, or the nineteenth century, was engaged with the philosophy of Descartes, Hobbes, Bayle, Locke, or Leibniz, to the degree leading figures such as Lessing, Goethe, Kant, Hegel, Fichte, Schelling, Heine, George Eliot, and Nietzsche, remained preoccupied throughout their creative lives with Spinoza." Hegel (1770-1831) asserts that "The fact is that Spinoza is made a testing-point in modern philosophy, so that it may really be said: You are either a Spinozist or not a philosopher at all."
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His expulsion from the Portuguese synagogue in 1656 has stirred debate over the years on whether he is the "first modern Jew". Spinoza influenced discussions of the so-called Jewish question, the examination of the idea of Judaism and the modern, secular Jew. Moses Mendelsohn, Lessing, Heine, and Kant, as well as subsequent thinkers, including Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud were influenced by Spinoza. The changing conception of Spinoza as "the First Modern Jew" has been explicitly explored by various authors. His expulsion has been revisited in the 21st century, with Jewish writers such Berthold Auerbach; Salomon Rubin, who translated Spinoza's "Ethics" into Hebrew and saw Spinoza as a new Maimonides, penning "a new guide to the perplexed"; Zionist Yosef Klausner, and fiction-writer Isaac Bashevis Singer shaping his image.
In 1886, the young George Santayana published "The Ethical Doctrine of Spinoza", in "The Harvard Monthly". Much later, he wrote an introduction to "Spinoza's Ethics" and "De Intellectus Emendatione". In 1932, Santayana was invited to present an essay (published as "Ultimate Religion") at a meeting at The Hague celebrating the tricentennial of Spinoza's birth. In Santayana's autobiography, he characterized Spinoza as his "master and model" in understanding the naturalistic basis of morality.
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Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein evoked Spinoza with the title (suggested to him by G. E. Moore) of the English translation of his first definitive philosophical work, "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus", an allusion to Spinoza's "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus". Elsewhere, Wittgenstein deliberately borrowed the expression "sub specie aeternitatis" from Spinoza ("Notebooks, 1914–16", p. 83). The structure of his "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" does have some structural affinities with Spinoza's "Ethics" (though, admittedly, not with the Spinoza's "Tractatus") in erecting complex philosophical arguments upon basic logical propositions and principles. In propositions 6.4311 and 6.45 he alludes to a Spinozian understanding of eternity and interpretation of the religious concept of eternal life, contending, "If by eternity is understood not eternal temporal duration, but timelessness, then he lives eternally who lives in the present." (6.4311) "The contemplation of the world "sub specie aeterni" is its contemplation as a limited whole." (6.45)
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Spinoza's philosophy played an important role in the development of post-war French philosophy. Many of these philosophers "used Spinoza to erect a bulwark against the nominally irrationalist tendencies of phenomenology", which was associated with the dominance of Hegel, Martin Heidegger, and Edmund Husserl in France at that time. Louis Althusser, as well as his colleagues such as Étienne Balibar, saw in Spinoza a philosophy which could lead Marxism out of what they considered to be flaws in its original formulation, particularly its reliance upon Hegel's conception of the dialectic, as well as Spinoza's concept of immanent causality. Antonio Negri, in exile in France for much of this period, also wrote a number of books on Spinoza, most notably "The Savage Anomaly" (1981) in his own reconfiguration of Italian Autonomia Operaia. Other notable French scholars of Spinoza in this period included Alexandre Matheron, Martial Gueroult, André Tosel, and Pierre Macherey, the last of whom published a widely read and influential five-volume commentary on Spinoza's "Ethics", which has been described as "a monument of Spinoza commentary". His philosophical accomplishments and moral character prompted Gilles Deleuze in his doctoral thesis (1968) to name him "the prince of philosophers". Deleuze's interpretation of Spinoza's philosophy was highly influential among French philosophers, especially in restoring to prominence the political dimension of Spinoza's thought. Deleuze published two books on Spinoza and gave numerous lectures on Spinoza in his capacity as a professor at the University of Paris VIII. His own work was deeply influenced by Spinoza's philosophy, particularly the concepts of immanence and univocity. Marilena de Souza Chaui described Deleuze's "Expressionism in Philosophy" (1968) as a "revolutionary work for its discovery of expression as a central concept in Spinoza's philosophy."
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Albert Einstein named Spinoza as the philosopher who exerted the most influence on his world view ("Weltanschauung"). Spinoza equated God (infinite substance) with Nature, consistent with Einstein's belief in an impersonal deity. In 1929, Einstein was asked in a telegram by Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein whether he believed in God. Einstein responded by telegram: "I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings." Einstein wrote the preface to a biography of Spinoza, published in 1946.
Leo Strauss dedicated his first book, "Spinoza's Critique of Religion", to an examination of his ideas. Strauss identified Spinoza as part of the tradition of Enlightenment rationalism that eventually produced Modernity. Moreover, he identifies Spinoza and his works as the beginning of Jewish Modernity. More recently Jonathan Israel argued that, from 1650 to 1750, Spinoza was "the chief challenger of the fundamentals of revealed religion, received ideas, tradition, morality, and what was everywhere regarded, in absolutist and non-absolutist states alike, as divinely constituted political authority."
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Spinoza is an important historical figure in the Netherlands, where his portrait was featured prominently on the Dutch 1000-guilder banknote, legal tender until the euro was introduced in 2002. The highest and most prestigious scientific award of the Netherlands is named the "Spinozaprijs" (Spinoza prize). Spinoza was included in a 50 theme canon that attempts to summarise the history of the Netherlands. In 2014 a copy of Spinoza's "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus" was presented to the Chair of the Dutch Parliament, and shares a shelf with the Bible and the Quran.
Modern era.
Spinoza and Zionism.
In the Tractatus Spinoza said, in passing, about the Jews that "were it not that the fundamental principles of their religion discourage manliness, I would not hesitate to believe that they will one day, given the opportunity, [...] establish once more their independent state, and that God will again choose them". This comment, and Spinoza's general emphasis on the political-national aspects of Judaism, had inspired some of the secular forerunners of Zionism. Some Zionist leaders even described Spinoza as the first secular proto-Zionist. Some scholars agree (to various degrees) with the characterization of Spinoza as proto-Zionist, while other scholars are critical of it.
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Reconsideration of Spinoza's expulsion.
There has been a renewed debate in modern times about Spinoza's excommunication among Israeli politicians, rabbis and Jewish press, with many calling for the "cherem" to be reversed. A conference was organized at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York entitled "From Heretic to Hero: A Symposium on the Impact of Baruch Spinoza on the 350th Anniversary of His Excommunication, 1656–2006". Presenters included Steven Nadler, Jonathan I. Israel, Steven B. Smith, and Daniel B. Schwartz. There have been calls for Spinoza's "cherem" to be rescinded, but it can only be done by the congregation that issued it, and the chief rabbi of that community, Haham Pinchas Toledano, declined to do so, citing Spinoza's "preposterous ideas, where he was tearing apart the very fundamentals of our religion", the Amsterdam Jewish community organised a symposium in December 2015 to discuss lifting the "cherem", inviting scholars from around the world to form an advisory committee at the meeting. However, the rabbi of the congregation ruled that it should hold, on the basis that he had no greater wisdom than his predecessors, and that Spinoza's views had not become less problematic over time.
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Depictions and influence in literature.
Spinoza's life and work have been the subject of interest for several writers. For example, this influence was considerably early in German literature, where Goethe makes a glowing mention of the philosopher in his memoirs, highlighting the positive influence of the "Ethics" in his personal life. The same thing happened in the case of his compatriot, the poet Heine, who is also lavish in praise for Spinoza on his "On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany" (1834).
In the following century, the Argentinian Jorge Luis Borges famously wrote two sonnets in his honor ("Spinoza" in "El otro, el mismo", 1964; and "Baruch Spinoza" in "La moneda de hierro", 1976), and several direct references to Spinoza's philosophy can be found in this writer's work. Also in Argentina and previously to Borges, the Ukrainian-born Jewish intellectual Alberto Gerchunoff wrote a novella about philosopher's early sentimental life, "Los amores de Baruj [sic] Spinoza" (lit. "The loves of Baruj Spinoza", 1932), recreating a supposed affair or romantic interest with Clara Maria van den Enden, daughter of his Latin teacher and philosophical preceptor, Franciscus.
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That is not the only work of fiction where the philosopher appears as the main character. In 1837 the German writer Berthold Auerbach dedicated to him the first novel in his series on Jewish history, translated into English in 1882 ("Spinoza: a Novel"). Some other novels of biographical nature have appeared more recently, such as "The Spinoza Problem" (2012; a parallel story between the philosopher's formative years, and the fascination that his work had on the Nazi leader Alfred Rosenberg) by psychiatrist Irvin D. Yalom, or "O Segredo de Espinosa" (lit. "The Secret of Spinoza", 2023) by Portuguese journalist José Rodrigues dos Santos. Spinoza also appears in the first novel of the Argentinian activist Andres Spokoiny, "El impío" (lit. "The Impious", 2021), about the "marrano" physician and philosopher Juan de Prado, a key influence in Spinoza's biography.
Spinoza's "Ethics" play a central role in Isaac Bashevis Singer's short story, "The Spinoza of Market Street". The main character, Dr. Nahum Fischelson, studies the book religiously, and holds Spinoza in divine esteem.
External links.
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Bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the common ostrich. There are over 11,000 living species and they are split into 44 orders. More than half are passerine or "perching" birds. Birds have wings whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have further evolved for swimming. The study of birds is called ornithology.
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Birds are feathered theropod dinosaurs and constitute the only known living dinosaurs. Likewise, birds are considered reptiles in the modern cladistic sense of the term, and their closest living relatives are the crocodilians. Birds are descendants of the primitive avialans (whose members include "Archaeopteryx") which first appeared during the Late Jurassic. According to some estimates, modern birds (Neornithes) evolved in the Late Cretaceous or between the Early and Late Cretaceous (100 Ma) and diversified dramatically around the time of the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event 66 million years ago, which killed off the pterosaurs and all non-ornithuran dinosaurs.
Many social species preserve knowledge across generations (culture). Birds are social, communicating with visual signals, calls, and songs, and participating in such behaviour as cooperative breeding and hunting, flocking, and mobbing of predators. The vast majority of bird species are socially (but not necessarily sexually) monogamous, usually for one breeding season at a time, sometimes for years, and rarely for life. Other species have breeding systems that are polygynous (one male with many females) or, rarely, polyandrous (one female with many males). Birds produce offspring by laying eggs which are fertilised through sexual reproduction. They are usually laid in a nest and incubated by the parents. Most birds have an extended period of parental care after hatching.
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Many species of birds are economically important as food for human consumption and raw material in manufacturing, with domesticated and undomesticated birds being important sources of eggs, meat, and feathers. Songbirds, parrots, and other species are popular as pets. Guano (bird excrement) is harvested for use as a fertiliser. Birds figure throughout human culture. About 120 to 130 species have become extinct due to human activity since the 17th century, and hundreds more before then. Human activity threatens about 1,200 bird species with extinction, though efforts are underway to protect them. Recreational birdwatching is an important part of the ecotourism industry.
Evolution and classification.
The first classification of birds was developed by Francis Willughby and John Ray in their 1676 volume "Ornithologiae".
Carl Linnaeus modified that work in 1758 to devise the taxonomic classification system currently in use. Birds are categorised as the biological class Aves in Linnaean taxonomy. Phylogenetic taxonomy places Aves in the clade Theropoda as an infraclass or more recently a subclass or class.
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Definition.
Aves and a sister group, the order Crocodilia, contain the only living representatives of the reptile clade Archosauria. During the late 1990s, Aves was most commonly defined phylogenetically as all descendants of the most recent common ancestor of modern birds and "Archaeopteryx lithographica". However, an earlier definition proposed by Jacques Gauthier gained wide currency in the 21st century, and is used by many scientists including adherents to the "PhyloCode". Gauthier defined Aves to include only the crown group of the set of modern birds. This was done by excluding most groups known only from fossils, and assigning them, instead, to the broader group Avialae, on the principle that a clade based on extant species should be limited to those extant species and their closest extinct relatives.
Gauthier and de Queiroz identified four different definitions for the same biological name "Aves", which is a problem. The authors proposed to reserve the term Aves only for the crown group consisting of the last common ancestor of all living birds and all of its descendants, which corresponds to meaning number 4 below. They assigned other names to the other groups.
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Under the fourth definition "Archaeopteryx", traditionally considered one of the earliest members of Aves, is removed from this group, becoming a non-avian dinosaur instead. These proposals have been adopted by many researchers in the field of palaeontology and bird evolution, though the exact definitions applied have been inconsistent. Avialae, initially proposed to replace the traditional fossil content of Aves, is often used synonymously with the vernacular term "bird" by these researchers.
Most researchers define Avialae as branch-based clade, though definitions vary. Many authors have used a definition similar to "all theropods closer to birds than to "Deinonychus"", with "Troodon" being sometimes added as a second external specifier in case it is closer to birds than to "Deinonychus". Avialae is also occasionally defined as an apomorphy-based clade (that is, one based on physical characteristics). Jacques Gauthier, who named Avialae in 1986, re-defined it in 2001 as all dinosaurs that possessed feathered wings used in flapping flight, and the birds that descended from them.
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Despite being currently one of the most widely used, the crown-group definition of Aves has been criticised by some researchers. Lee and Spencer (1997) argued that, contrary to what Gauthier defended, this definition would not increase the stability of the clade and the exact content of Aves will always be uncertain because any defined clade (either crown or not) will have few synapomorphies distinguishing it from its closest relatives. Their alternative definition is synonymous to Avifilopluma.
Dinosaurs and the origin of birds.
Based on fossil and biological evidence, most scientists accept that birds are a specialised subgroup of theropod dinosaurs and, more specifically, members of Maniraptora, a group of theropods which includes dromaeosaurids and oviraptorosaurs, among others. As scientists have discovered more theropods closely related to birds, the previously clear distinction between non-birds and birds has become blurred. By the 2000s, discoveries in the Liaoning Province of northeast China, which demonstrated many small theropod feathered dinosaurs, contributed to this ambiguity.
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The consensus view in contemporary palaeontology is that the flying theropods, or avialans, are the closest relatives of the deinonychosaurs, which include dromaeosaurids and troodontids. Together, these form a group called Paraves. Some basal members of Deinonychosauria, such as "Microraptor", have features which may have enabled them to glide or fly. The most basal deinonychosaurs were very small. This evidence raises the possibility that the ancestor of all paravians may have been arboreal, have been able to glide, or both. Unlike "Archaeopteryx" and the non-avialan feathered dinosaurs, who primarily ate meat, studies suggest that the first avialans were omnivores.
The Late Jurassic "Archaeopteryx" is well known as one of the first transitional fossils to be found, and it provided support for the theory of evolution in the late 19th century. "Archaeopteryx" was the first fossil to display both clearly traditional reptilian characteristics—teeth, clawed fingers, and a long, lizard-like tail—as well as wings with flight feathers similar to those of modern birds. It is not considered a direct ancestor of birds, though it is possibly closely related to the true ancestor.
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Early evolution.
Over 40% of key traits found in modern birds evolved during the 60 million year transition from the earliest bird-line archosaurs to the first maniraptoromorphs, i.e. the first dinosaurs closer to living birds than to "Tyrannosaurus rex". The loss of osteoderms otherwise common in archosaurs and acquisition of primitive feathers might have occurred early during this phase. After the appearance of Maniraptoromorpha, the next 40 million years marked a continuous reduction of body size and the accumulation of neotenic (juvenile-like) characteristics. Hypercarnivory became increasingly less common while braincases enlarged and forelimbs became longer. The integument evolved into complex, pennaceous feathers.
The oldest known paravian (and probably the earliest avialan) fossils come from the Tiaojishan Formation of China, which has been dated to the late Jurassic period (Oxfordian stage), about 160 million years ago. The avialan species from this time period include "Anchiornis huxleyi", "Xiaotingia zhengi", and "Aurornis xui".
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The well-known probable early avialan, "Archaeopteryx", dates from slightly later Jurassic rocks (about 155 million years old) from Germany. Many of these early avialans shared unusual anatomical features that may be ancestral to modern birds but were later lost during bird evolution. These features include enlarged claws on the second toe which may have been held clear of the ground in life, and long feathers or "hind wings" covering the hind limbs and feet, which may have been used in aerial maneuvering.
Avialans diversified into a wide variety of forms during the Cretaceous period. Many groups retained primitive characteristics, such as clawed wings and teeth, though the latter were lost independently in a number of avialan groups, including modern birds (Aves). Increasingly stiff tails (especially the outermost half) can be seen in the evolution of maniraptoromorphs, and this process culminated in the appearance of the pygostyle, an ossification of fused tail vertebrae. In the late Cretaceous, about 100 million years ago, the ancestors of all modern birds evolved a more open pelvis, allowing them to lay larger eggs compared to body size. Around 95 million years ago, they evolved a better sense of smell.
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A third stage of bird evolution starting with Ornithothoraces (the "bird-chested" avialans) can be associated with the refining of aerodynamics and flight capabilities, and the loss or co-ossification of several skeletal features. Particularly significant are the development of an enlarged, keeled sternum and the alula, and the loss of grasping hands.
Early diversity of bird ancestors.
The first large, diverse lineage of short-tailed avialans to evolve were the Enantiornithes, or "opposite birds", so named because the construction of their shoulder bones was in reverse to that of modern birds. Enantiornithes occupied a wide array of ecological niches, from sand-probing shorebirds and fish-eaters to tree-dwelling forms and seed-eaters. While they were the dominant group of avialans during the Cretaceous period, Enantiornithes became extinct along with many other dinosaur groups at the end of the Mesozoic era.
Many species of the second major avialan lineage to diversify, the Euornithes (meaning "true birds", because they include the ancestors of modern birds), were semi-aquatic and specialised in eating fish and other small aquatic organisms. Unlike the Enantiornithes, which dominated land-based and arboreal habitats, most early euornithians lacked perching adaptations and likely included shorebird-like species, waders, and swimming and diving species.
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The latter included the superficially gull-like "Ichthyornis" and the Hesperornithiformes, which became so well adapted to hunting fish in marine environments that they lost the ability to fly and became primarily aquatic. The early euornithians also saw the development of many traits associated with modern birds, like strongly keeled breastbones, toothless, beaked portions of their jaws (though most non-avian euornithians retained teeth in other parts of the jaws). Euornithes also included the first avialans to develop true pygostyle and a fully mobile fan of tail feathers, which may have replaced the "hind wing" as the primary mode of aerial maneuverability and braking in flight.
A study on mosaic evolution in the avian skull found that the last common ancestor of all Neornithes might have had a beak similar to that of the modern hook-billed vanga and a skull similar to that of the Eurasian golden oriole. As both species are small aerial and canopy foraging omnivores, a similar ecological niche was inferred for this hypothetical ancestor.
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Diversification of modern birds.
Most studies agree on a Cretaceous age for the most recent common ancestor of modern birds but estimates range from the Early Cretaceous to the latest Cretaceous. Similarly, there is no agreement on whether most of the early diversification of modern birds occurred in the Cretaceous and associated with breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana or occurred later and potentially as a consequence of the Cretaceous–Palaeogene extinction event. This disagreement is in part caused by a divergence in the evidence; most molecular dating studies suggests a Cretaceous evolutionary radiation, while fossil evidence points to a Cenozoic radiation (the so-called 'rocks' versus 'clocks' controversy).
The discovery in 2005 of "Vegavis" from the Maastrichtian, the last stage of the Late Cretaceous, proved that the diversification of modern birds started before the Cenozoic era. The affinities of an earlier fossil, the possible galliform "Austinornis lentus", dated to about 85 million years ago, are still too controversial to provide a fossil evidence of modern bird diversification. In 2020, "Asteriornis" from the Maastrichtian was described, it appears to be a close relative of Galloanserae, the earliest diverging lineage within Neognathae.
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Attempts to reconcile molecular and fossil evidence using genomic-scale DNA data and comprehensive fossil information have not resolved the controversy. However, a 2015 estimate that used a new method for calibrating molecular clocks confirmed that while modern birds originated early in the Late Cretaceous, likely in Western Gondwana, a pulse of diversification in all major groups occurred around the Cretaceous–Palaeogene extinction event. Modern birds would have expanded from West Gondwana through two routes. One route was an Antarctic interchange in the Paleogene. The other route was probably via Paleocene land bridges between South America and North America, which allowed for the rapid expansion and diversification of Neornithes into the Holarctic and Paleotropics. On the other hand, the occurrence of "Asteriornis" in the Northern Hemisphere suggest that Neornithes dispersed out of East Gondwana before the Paleocene.
Classification of bird orders.
All modern birds lie within the crown group Aves (alternately Neornithes), which has two subdivisions: the Palaeognathae, which includes the flightless ratites (such as the ostriches) and the weak-flying tinamous, and the extremely diverse Neognathae, containing all other birds. These two subdivisions have variously been given the rank of superorder, cohort, or infraclass. The number of known living bird species is around 11,000 although sources may differ in their precise numbers.
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Cladogram of modern bird relationships based on Stiller "et al" (2024)., showing the 44 orders recognised by the IOC.
The classification of birds is a contentious issue. Sibley and Ahlquist's "Phylogeny and Classification of Birds" (1990) is a landmark work on the subject. Most evidence seems to suggest the assignment of orders is accurate, but scientists disagree about the relationships among the orders themselves; evidence from modern bird anatomy, fossils and DNA have all been brought to bear on the problem, but no strong consensus has emerged. Fossil and molecular evidence from the 2010s is providing an increasingly clear picture of the evolution of modern bird orders.
Genomics.
In 2010, the genome had been sequenced for only two birds, the chicken and the zebra finch. , the genomes of 542 species of birds had been completed. At least one genome has been sequenced from every order. These include at least one species in about 90% of extant avian families (218 out of 236 families recognised by the "Howard and Moore Checklist").
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Being able to sequence and compare whole genomes gives researchers many types of information, about genes, the DNA that regulates the genes, and their evolutionary history. This has led to reconsideration of some of the classifications that were based solely on the identification of protein-coding genes. Waterbirds such as pelicans and flamingos, for example, may have in common specific adaptations suited to their environment that were developed independently.
Distribution.
Birds live and breed in most terrestrial habitats and on all seven continents, reaching their southern extreme in the snow petrel's breeding colonies up to inland in Antarctica. The highest bird diversity occurs in tropical regions. It was earlier thought that this high diversity was the result of higher speciation rates in the tropics; however studies from the 2000s found higher speciation rates in the high latitudes that were offset by greater extinction rates than in the tropics. Many species migrate annually over great distances and across oceans; several families of birds have adapted to life both on the world's oceans and in them, and some seabird species come ashore only to breed, while some penguins have been recorded diving up to deep.
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Many bird species have established breeding populations in areas to which they have been introduced by humans. Some of these introductions have been deliberate; the ring-necked pheasant, for example, has been introduced around the world as a game bird. Others have been accidental, such as the establishment of wild monk parakeets in several North American cities after their escape from captivity. Some species, including cattle egret, yellow-headed caracara and galah, have spread naturally far beyond their original ranges as agricultural expansion created alternative habitats although modern practices of intensive agriculture have negatively impacted farmland bird populations.
Anatomy and physiology.
Compared with other vertebrates, birds have a body plan that shows many unusual adaptations, mostly to facilitate flight.
Skeletal system.
The skeleton consists of very lightweight bones. They have large air-filled cavities (called pneumatic cavities) which connect with the respiratory system. The skull bones in adults are fused and do not show cranial sutures. The orbital cavities that house the eyeballs are large and separated from each other by a bony septum (partition). The spine has cervical, thoracic, lumbar and caudal regions with the number of cervical (neck) vertebrae highly variable and especially flexible, but movement is reduced in the anterior thoracic vertebrae and absent in the later vertebrae. The last few are fused with the pelvis to form the synsacrum. The ribs are flattened and the sternum is keeled for the attachment of flight muscles except in the flightless bird orders. The forelimbs are modified into wings. The wings are more or less developed depending on the species; the only known groups that lost their wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds.
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Excretory system.
Like the reptiles, birds are primarily uricotelic, that is, their kidneys extract nitrogenous waste from their bloodstream and excrete it as uric acid, instead of urea or ammonia, through the ureters into the intestine. Birds do not have a urinary bladder or external urethral opening and (with exception of the ostrich) uric acid is excreted along with faeces as a semisolid waste. However, birds such as hummingbirds can be facultatively ammonotelic, excreting most of the nitrogenous wastes as ammonia. They also excrete creatine, rather than creatinine like mammals. This material, as well as the output of the intestines, emerges from the bird's cloaca. The cloaca is a multi-purpose opening: waste is expelled through it, most birds mate by joining cloaca, and females lay eggs from it. In addition, many species of birds regurgitate pellets.
It is a common but not universal feature of altricial passerine nestlings (born helpless, under constant parental care) that instead of excreting directly into the nest, they produce a fecal sac. This is a mucus-covered pouch that allows parents to either dispose of the waste outside the nest or to recycle the waste through their own digestive system.
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Reproductive system.
Most male birds do not have intromittent penises. Males within Palaeognathae (with the exception of the kiwis), the Anseriformes (with the exception of screamers), and in rudimentary forms in Galliformes (but fully developed in Cracidae) possess a penis, which is never present in Neoaves. Its length is thought to be related to sperm competition and it fills with lymphatic fluid instead of blood when erect. When not copulating, it is hidden within the proctodeum compartment within the cloaca, just inside the vent. Female birds have sperm storage tubules that allow sperm to remain viable long after copulation, a hundred days in some species. Sperm from multiple males may compete through this mechanism. Most female birds have a single ovary and a single oviduct, both on the left side, but there are exceptions: species in at least 16 different orders of birds have two ovaries. Even these species, however, tend to have a single oviduct. It has been speculated that this might be an adaptation to flight, but males have two testes, and it is also observed that the gonads in both sexes decrease dramatically in size outside the breeding season. Also terrestrial birds generally have a single ovary, as does the platypus, an egg-laying mammal. A more likely explanation is that the egg develops a shell while passing through the oviduct over a period of about a day, so that if two eggs were to develop at the same time, there would be a risk to survival. While rare, mostly abortive, parthenogenesis is not unknown in birds and eggs can be diploid, automictic and results in male offspring.
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Birds are solely gonochoric, meaning they have two sexes: either female or male. The sex of birds is determined by the Z and W sex chromosomes, rather than by the X and Y chromosomes present in mammals. Male birds have two Z chromosomes (ZZ), and female birds have a W chromosome and a Z chromosome (WZ). A complex system of disassortative mating with two morphs is involved in the white-throated sparrow "Zonotrichia albicollis", where white- and tan-browed morphs of opposite sex pair, making it appear as if four sexes were involved since any individual is compatible with only a fourth of the population.
In nearly all species of birds, an individual's sex is determined at fertilisation. However, one 2007 study claimed to demonstrate temperature-dependent sex determination among the Australian brushturkey, for which higher temperatures during incubation resulted in a higher female-to-male sex ratio. This, however, was later proven to not be the case. These birds do not exhibit temperature-dependent sex determination, but temperature-dependent sex mortality.
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Respiratory and circulatory systems.
Birds have one of the most complex respiratory systems of all animal groups. Upon inhalation, 75% of the fresh air bypasses the lungs and flows directly into a posterior air sac which extends from the lungs and connects with air spaces in the bones and fills them with air. The other 25% of the air goes directly into the lungs. When the bird exhales, the used air flows out of the lungs and the stored fresh air from the posterior air sac is simultaneously forced into the lungs. Thus, a bird's lungs receive a constant supply of fresh air during both inhalation and exhalation. Sound production is achieved using the syrinx, a muscular chamber incorporating multiple tympanic membranes which diverges from the lower end of the trachea; the trachea being elongated in some species, increasing the volume of vocalisations and the perception of the bird's size.
In birds, the main arteries taking blood away from the heart originate from the right aortic arch (or pharyngeal arch), unlike in the mammals where the left aortic arch forms this part of the aorta. The postcava receives blood from the limbs via the renal portal system. Unlike in mammals, the circulating red blood cells in birds retain their nucleus.
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Heart type and features.
The avian circulatory system is driven by a four-chambered, myogenic heart contained in a fibrous pericardial sac. This pericardial sac is filled with a serous fluid for lubrication. The heart itself is divided into a right and left half, each with an atrium and ventricle. The atrium and ventricles of each side are separated by atrioventricular valves which prevent back flow from one chamber to the next during contraction. Being myogenic, the heart's pace is maintained by pacemaker cells found in the sinoatrial node, located on the right atrium.
The sinoatrial node uses calcium to cause a depolarising signal transduction pathway from the atrium through right and left atrioventricular bundle which communicates contraction to the ventricles. The avian heart also consists of muscular arches that are made up of thick bundles of muscular layers. Much like a mammalian heart, the avian heart is composed of endocardial, myocardial and epicardial layers. The atrium walls tend to be thinner than the ventricle walls, due to the intense ventricular contraction used to pump oxygenated blood throughout the body. Avian hearts are generally larger than mammalian hearts when compared to body mass. This adaptation allows more blood to be pumped to meet the high metabolic need associated with flight.
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Organisation.
Birds have a very efficient system for diffusing oxygen into the blood; birds have a ten times greater surface area to gas exchange volume than mammals. As a result, birds have more blood in their capillaries per unit of volume of lung than a mammal. The arteries are composed of thick elastic muscles to withstand the pressure of the ventricular contractions, and become more rigid as they move away from the heart. Blood moves through the arteries, which undergo vasoconstriction, and into arterioles which act as a transportation system to distribute primarily oxygen as well as nutrients to all tissues of the body. As the arterioles move away from the heart and into individual organs and tissues they are further divided to increase surface area and slow blood flow. Blood travels through the arterioles and moves into the capillaries where gas exchange can occur.
Capillaries are organised into capillary beds in tissues; it is here that blood exchanges oxygen for carbon dioxide waste. In the capillary beds, blood flow is slowed to allow maximum diffusion of oxygen into the tissues. Once the blood has become deoxygenated, it travels through venules then veins and back to the heart. Veins, unlike arteries, are thin and rigid as they do not need to withstand extreme pressure. As blood travels through the venules to the veins a funneling occurs called vasodilation bringing blood back to the heart. Once the blood reaches the heart, it moves first into the right atrium, then the right ventricle to be pumped through the lungs for further gas exchange of carbon dioxide waste for oxygen. Oxygenated blood then flows from the lungs through the left atrium to the left ventricle where it is pumped out to the body.
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Nervous system.
The nervous system is large relative to the bird's size. The most developed part of the brain of birds is the one that controls the flight-related functions, while the cerebellum coordinates movement and the cerebrum controls behaviour patterns, navigation, mating and nest building. Most birds have a poor sense of smell with notable exceptions including kiwis, New World vultures and tubenoses. The avian visual system is usually highly developed. Water birds have special flexible lenses, allowing accommodation for vision in air and water. Some species also have dual fovea. Birds are tetrachromatic, possessing ultraviolet (UV) sensitive cone cells in the eye as well as green, red and blue ones. They also have double cones, likely to mediate achromatic vision.
Many birds show plumage patterns in ultraviolet that are invisible to the human eye; some birds whose sexes appear similar to the naked eye are distinguished by the presence of ultraviolet reflective patches on their feathers. Male blue tits have an ultraviolet reflective crown patch which is displayed in courtship by posturing and raising of their nape feathers. Ultraviolet light is also used in foraging—kestrels have been shown to search for prey by detecting the UV reflective urine trail marks left on the ground by rodents. With the exception of pigeons and a few other species, the eyelids of birds are not used in blinking. Instead the eye is lubricated by the nictitating membrane, a third eyelid that moves horizontally. The nictitating membrane also covers the eye and acts as a contact lens in many aquatic birds. The bird retina has a fan shaped blood supply system called the pecten.
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Eyes of most birds are large, not very round and capable of only limited movement in the orbits, typically 10–20°. Birds with eyes on the sides of their heads have a wide visual field, while birds with eyes on the front of their heads, such as owls, have binocular vision and can estimate the depth of field. The avian ear lacks external pinnae but is covered by feathers, although in some birds, such as the "Asio", "Bubo" and "Otus" owls, these feathers form tufts which resemble ears. The inner ear has a cochlea, but it is not a spiral as in mammals. Several species have been demonstrated to hear infrasound (below 20 Hz) and a few cave-dwelling swifts and oilbirds emit ultrasound (above 20 KHz) and echolocate in darkness.
Defence and intraspecific combat.
A few species are able to use chemical defences against predators; some Procellariiformes can eject an unpleasant stomach oil against an aggressor, and some species of pitohuis from New Guinea have a powerful neurotoxin in their skin and feathers.
A lack of field observations limit our knowledge, but intraspecific conflicts are known to sometimes result in injury or death. The screamers (Anhimidae), some jacanas ("Jacana", "Hydrophasianus"), the spur-winged goose ("Plectropterus"), the torrent duck ("Merganetta") and nine species of lapwing ("Vanellus") use a sharp spur on the wing as a weapon. The steamer ducks ("Tachyeres"), geese and swans ("Anserinae"), the solitaire ("Pezophaps"), sheathbills ("Chionis"), some guans ("Crax") and stone curlews ("Burhinus") use a bony knob on the alular metacarpal to punch and hammer opponents. The jacanas "Actophilornis" and "Irediparra" have an expanded, blade-like radius. The extinct "Xenicibis" was unique in having an elongate forelimb and massive hand which likely functioned in combat or defence as a jointed club or flail. Swans, for instance, may strike with the bony spurs and bite when defending eggs or young.
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Feathers, plumage, and scales.
Feathers are a feature characteristic of birds (though also present in some dinosaurs not currently considered to be true birds). They facilitate flight, provide insulation that aids in thermoregulation, and are used in display, camouflage, and signalling. There are several types of feathers, each serving its own set of purposes. Feathers are epidermal growths attached to the skin and arise only in specific tracts of skin called pterylae. The distribution pattern of these feather tracts (pterylosis) is used in taxonomy and systematics. The arrangement and appearance of feathers on the body, called plumage, may vary within species by age, social status, and sex.
Plumage is regularly moulted; the standard plumage of a bird that has moulted after breeding is known as the "" plumage, or—in the Humphrey–Parkes terminology—"basic" plumage; breeding plumages or variations of the basic plumage are known under the Humphrey–Parkes system as "" plumages. Moulting is annual in most species, although some may have two moults a year, and large birds of prey may moult only once every few years. Moulting patterns vary across species. In passerines, flight feathers are replaced one at a time with the innermost being the first. When the fifth of sixth primary is replaced, the outermost begin to drop. After the innermost tertiaries are moulted, the starting from the innermost begin to drop and this proceeds to the outer feathers (centrifugal moult). The greater primary are moulted in synchrony with the primary that they overlap.
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A small number of species, such as ducks and geese, lose all of their flight feathers at once, temporarily becoming flightless. As a general rule, the tail feathers are moulted and replaced starting with the innermost pair. Centripetal moults of tail feathers are however seen in the Phasianidae. The centrifugal moult is modified in the tail feathers of woodpeckers and treecreepers, in that it begins with the second innermost pair of feathers and finishes with the central pair of feathers so that the bird maintains a functional climbing tail. The general pattern seen in passerines is that the primaries are replaced outward, secondaries inward, and the tail from centre outward. Before nesting, the females of most bird species gain a bare brood patch by losing feathers close to the belly. The skin there is well supplied with blood vessels and helps the bird in incubation.
Feathers require maintenance and birds preen or groom them daily, spending an average of around 9% of their daily time on this. The bill is used to brush away foreign particles and to apply waxy secretions from the uropygial gland; these secretions protect the feathers' flexibility and act as an antimicrobial agent, inhibiting the growth of feather-degrading bacteria. This may be supplemented with the secretions of formic acid from ants, which birds receive through a behaviour known as anting, to remove feather parasites.
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The scales of birds are composed of the same keratin as beaks, claws, and spurs. They are found mainly on the toes and metatarsus, but may be found further up on the ankle in some birds. Most bird scales do not overlap significantly, except in the cases of kingfishers and woodpeckers.
The scales of birds are thought to be homologous to those of reptiles and mammals.
Flight.
Most birds can fly, which distinguishes them from almost all other vertebrate classes. Flight is the primary means of locomotion for most bird species and is used for searching for food and for escaping from predators. Birds have various adaptations for flight, including a lightweight skeleton, two large flight muscles, the pectoralis (which accounts for 15% of the total mass of the bird) and the supracoracoideus, as well as a modified forelimb (wing) that serves as an aerofoil.
Wing shape and size generally determine a bird's flight style and performance; many birds combine powered, flapping flight with less energy-intensive soaring flight. About 60 extant bird species are flightless, as were many extinct birds. Flightlessness often arises in birds on isolated islands, most likely due to limited resources and the absence of mammalian land predators. Flightlessness is almost exclusively correlated with gigantism due to an island's inherent condition of isolation. Although flightless, penguins use similar musculature and movements to "fly" through the water, as do some flight-capable birds such as auks, shearwaters and dippers.
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Behaviour.
Most birds are diurnal, but some birds, such as many species of owls and nightjars, are nocturnal or crepuscular (active during twilight hours), and many coastal waders feed when the tides are appropriate, by day or night.
Diet and feeding.
are varied and often include nectar, fruit, plants, seeds, carrion, and various small animals, including other birds. The digestive system of birds is unique, with a crop for storage and a gizzard that contains swallowed stones for grinding food to compensate for the lack of teeth. Some species such as pigeons and some psittacine species do not have a gallbladder. Most birds are highly adapted for rapid digestion to aid with flight. Some migratory birds have adapted to use protein stored in many parts of their bodies, including protein from the intestines, as additional energy during migration.
Birds that employ many strategies to obtain food or feed on a variety of food items are called generalists, while others that concentrate time and effort on specific food items or have a single strategy to obtain food are considered specialists. Avian foraging strategies can vary widely by species. Many birds glean for insects, invertebrates, fruit, or seeds. Some hunt insects by suddenly attacking from a branch. Those species that seek pest insects are considered beneficial 'biological control agents' and their presence encouraged in biological pest control programmes. Combined, insectivorous birds eat 400–500 million metric tons of arthropods annually.
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Nectar feeders such as hummingbirds, sunbirds, lories, and lorikeets amongst others have specially adapted brushy tongues and in many cases bills designed to fit co-adapted flowers. Kiwis and shorebirds with long bills probe for invertebrates; shorebirds' varied bill lengths and feeding methods result in the separation of ecological niches. Divers, diving ducks, penguins and auks pursue their prey underwater, using their wings or feet for propulsion, while aerial predators such as sulids, kingfishers and terns plunge dive after their prey. Flamingos, three species of prion, and some ducks are filter feeders. Geese and dabbling ducks are primarily grazers.
Some species, including frigatebirds, gulls, and skuas, engage in kleptoparasitism, stealing food items from other birds. Kleptoparasitism is thought to be a supplement to food obtained by hunting, rather than a significant part of any species' diet; a study of great frigatebirds stealing from masked boobies estimated that the frigatebirds stole at most 40% of their food and on average stole only 5%. Other birds are scavengers; some of these, like vultures, are specialised carrion eaters, while others, like gulls, corvids, or other birds of prey, are opportunists.
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Water and drinking.
Water is needed by many birds although their mode of excretion and lack of sweat glands reduces the physiological demands. Some desert birds can obtain their water needs entirely from moisture in their food. Some have other adaptations such as allowing their body temperature to rise, saving on moisture loss from evaporative cooling or panting. Seabirds can drink seawater and have salt glands inside the head that eliminate excess salt out of the nostrils.
Most birds scoop water in their beaks and raise their head to let water run down the throat. Some species, especially of arid zones, belonging to the pigeon, finch, mousebird, button-quail and bustard families are capable of sucking up water without the need to tilt back their heads. Some desert birds depend on water sources and sandgrouse are particularly well known for congregating daily at waterholes. Nesting sandgrouse and many plovers carry water to their young by wetting their belly feathers. Some birds carry water for chicks at the nest in their crop or regurgitate it along with food. The pigeon family, flamingos and penguins have adaptations to produce a nutritive fluid called crop milk that they provide to their chicks.
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Feather care.
Feathers, being critical to the survival of a bird, require maintenance. Apart from physical wear and tear, feathers face the onslaught of fungi, ectoparasitic feather mites and bird lice. The physical condition of feathers are maintained by often with the application of secretions from the . Birds also bathe in water or dust themselves. While some birds dip into shallow water, more aerial species may make aerial dips into water and arboreal species often make use of dew or rain that collect on leaves. Birds of arid regions make use of loose soil to dust-bathe. A behaviour termed as anting in which the bird encourages ants to run through their plumage is also thought to help them reduce the ectoparasite load in feathers. Many species will spread out their wings and expose them to direct sunlight and this too is thought to help in reducing fungal and ectoparasitic activity that may lead to feather damage.
Migration.
Many bird species migrate to take advantage of global differences of seasonal temperatures, therefore optimising availability of food sources and breeding habitat. These migrations vary among the different groups. Many landbirds, shorebirds, and waterbirds undertake annual long-distance migrations, usually triggered by the length of daylight as well as weather conditions. These birds are characterised by a breeding season spent in the temperate or polar regions and a non-breeding season in the tropical regions or opposite hemisphere. Before migration, birds substantially increase body fats and reserves and reduce the size of some of their organs.
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Migration is highly demanding energetically, particularly as birds need to cross deserts and oceans without refuelling. Landbirds have a flight range of around and shorebirds can fly up to , although the bar-tailed godwit is capable of non-stop flights of up to . Some seabirds undertake long migrations, with the longest annual migrations including those of Arctic terns, which were recorded travelling an average of between their Arctic breeding grounds in Greenland and Iceland and their wintering grounds in Antarctica, with one bird covering , and sooty shearwaters, which nest in New Zealand and Chile and make annual round trips of to their summer feeding grounds in the North Pacific off Japan, Alaska and California.
Other seabirds disperse after breeding, travelling widely but having no set migration route. Albatrosses nesting in the Southern Ocean often undertake circumpolar trips between breeding seasons.
Some bird species undertake shorter migrations, travelling only as far as is required to avoid bad weather or obtain food. Irruptive species such as the boreal finches are one such group and can commonly be found at a location in one year and absent the next. This type of migration is normally associated with food availability. Species may also travel shorter distances over part of their range, with individuals from higher latitudes travelling into the existing range of conspecifics; others undertake partial migrations, where only a fraction of the population, usually females and subdominant males, migrates. Partial migration can form a large percentage of the migration behaviour of birds in some regions; in Australia, surveys found that 44% of non-passerine birds and 32% of passerines were partially migratory.
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Altitudinal migration is a form of short-distance migration in which birds spend the breeding season at higher altitudes and move to lower ones during suboptimal conditions. It is most often triggered by temperature changes and usually occurs when the normal territories also become inhospitable due to lack of food. Some species may also be nomadic, holding no fixed territory and moving according to weather and food availability. Parrots as a family are overwhelmingly neither migratory nor sedentary but considered to either be dispersive, irruptive, nomadic or undertake small and irregular migrations.
The ability of birds to return to precise locations across vast distances has been known for some time; in an experiment conducted in the 1950s, a Manx shearwater released in Boston in the United States returned to its colony in Skomer, in Wales within 13 days, a distance of . Birds navigate during migration using a variety of methods. For diurnal migrants, the sun is used to navigate by day, and a stellar compass is used at night. Birds that use the sun compensate for the changing position of the sun during the day by the use of an internal clock. Orientation with the stellar compass depends on the position of the constellations surrounding Polaris. These are backed up in some species by their ability to sense the Earth's geomagnetism through specialised photoreceptors.
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Communication.
Birds communicate primarily using visual and auditory signals. Signals can be interspecific (between species) and intraspecific (within species).
Birds sometimes use plumage to assess and assert social dominance, to display breeding condition in sexually selected species, or to make threatening displays, as in the sunbittern's mimicry of a large predator to ward off hawks and protect young chicks.
Visual communication among birds may also involve ritualised displays, which have developed from non-signalling actions such as preening, the adjustments of feather position, pecking, or other behaviour. These displays may signal aggression or submission or may contribute to the formation of pair-bonds. The most elaborate displays occur during courtship, where "dances" are often formed from complex combinations of many possible component movements; males' breeding success may depend on the quality of such displays.
Bird calls and songs, which are produced in the syrinx, are the major means by which birds communicate with sound. This communication can be very complex; some species can operate the two sides of the syrinx independently, allowing the simultaneous production of two different songs. Calls are used for a variety of purposes, including mate attraction, evaluation of potential mates, bond formation, the claiming and maintenance of territories, the identification of other individuals (such as when parents look for chicks in colonies or when mates reunite at the start of breeding season), and the warning of other birds of potential predators, sometimes with specific information about the nature of the threat. Some birds also use mechanical sounds for auditory communication. The "Coenocorypha" snipes of New Zealand drive air through their feathers, woodpeckers drum for long-distance communication, and palm cockatoos use tools to drum.
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Flocking and other associations.
While some birds are essentially territorial or live in small family groups, other birds may form large flocks. The principal benefits of flocking are safety in numbers and increased foraging efficiency. Defence against predators is particularly important in closed habitats like forests, where ambush predation is common and multiple eyes can provide a valuable early warning system. This has led to the development of many mixed-species feeding flocks, which are usually composed of small numbers of many species; these flocks provide safety in numbers but increase potential competition for resources. Costs of flocking include bullying of socially subordinate birds by more dominant birds and the reduction of feeding efficiency in certain cases. Some species have a mixed system with breeding pairs maintaining territories, while unmated or young birds live in flocks where they secure mates prior to finding territories.
Birds sometimes also form associations with non-avian species. Plunge-diving seabirds associate with dolphins and tuna, which push shoaling fish towards the surface. Some species of hornbills have a mutualistic relationship with dwarf mongooses, in which they forage together and warn each other of nearby birds of prey and other predators.
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Resting and roosting.
The high metabolic rates of birds during the active part of the day is supplemented by rest at other times. Sleeping birds often use a type of sleep known as vigilant sleep, where periods of rest are interspersed with quick eye-opening "peeks", allowing them to be sensitive to disturbances and enable rapid escape from threats. Swifts are believed to be able to sleep in flight and radar observations suggest that they orient themselves to face the wind in their roosting flight. It has been suggested that there may be certain kinds of sleep which are possible even when in flight.
Some birds have also demonstrated the capacity to fall into slow-wave sleep one hemisphere of the brain at a time. The birds tend to exercise this ability depending upon its position relative to the outside of the flock. This may allow the eye opposite the sleeping hemisphere to remain vigilant for predators by viewing the outer margins of the flock. This adaptation is also known from marine mammals. Communal roosting is common because it lowers the loss of body heat and decreases the risks associated with predators. Roosting sites are often chosen with regard to thermoregulation and safety. Unusual mobile roost sites include large herbivores on the African savanna that are used by oxpeckers.
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Many sleeping birds bend their heads over their backs and tuck their bills in their back feathers, although others place their beaks among their breast feathers. Many birds rest on one leg, while some may pull up their legs into their feathers, especially in cold weather. Perching birds have a tendon-locking mechanism that helps them hold on to the perch when they are asleep. Many ground birds, such as quails and pheasants, roost in trees. A few parrots of the genus "Loriculus" roost hanging upside down. Some hummingbirds go into a nightly state of torpor accompanied with a reduction of their metabolic rates. This physiological adaptation shows in nearly a hundred other species, including owlet-nightjars, nightjars, and woodswallows. One species, the common poorwill, even enters a state of hibernation. Birds do not have sweat glands, but can lose water directly through the skin, and they may cool themselves by moving to shade, standing in water, panting, increasing their surface area, fluttering their throat or using special behaviours like urohidrosis to cool themselves.
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Breeding.
Social systems.
95 per cent of bird species are socially monogamous. These species pair for at least the length of the breeding season or—in some cases—for several years or until the death of one mate. Monogamy allows for both paternal care and biparental care, which is especially important for species in which care from both the female and the male parent is required in order to successfully rear a brood. Among many socially monogamous species, extra-pair copulation (infidelity) is common. Such behaviour typically occurs between dominant males and females paired with subordinate males, but may also be the result of forced copulation in ducks and other anatids.
For females, possible benefits of extra-pair copulation include getting better genes for her offspring and insuring against the possibility of infertility in her mate. Males of species that engage in extra-pair copulations will closely guard their mates to ensure the parentage of the offspring that they raise.
Other mating systems, including polygyny, polyandry, polygamy, polygynandry, and promiscuity, also occur. Polygamous breeding systems arise when females are able to raise broods without the help of males. Mating systems vary across bird families but variations within species are thought to be driven by environmental conditions. A unique system is the formation of trios where a third individual is allowed by a breeding pair temporarily into the territory to assist with brood raising thereby leading to higher fitness.
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Breeding usually involves some form of courtship display, typically performed by the male. Most displays are rather simple and involve some type of song. Some displays, however, are quite elaborate. Depending on the species, these may include wing or tail drumming, dancing, aerial flights, or communal lekking. Females are generally the ones that drive partner selection, although in the polyandrous phalaropes, this is reversed: plainer males choose brightly coloured females. Courtship feeding, billing and are commonly performed between partners, generally after the birds have paired and mated.
Homosexual behaviour has been observed in males or females in numerous species of birds, including copulation, pair-bonding, and joint parenting of chicks. Over 130 avian species around the world engage in sexual interactions between the same sex or homosexual behaviours. "Same-sex courtship activities may involve elaborate displays, synchronised dances, gift-giving ceremonies, or behaviours at specific display areas including bowers, arenas, or leks."
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Territories, nesting and incubation.
Many birds actively defend a territory from others of the same species during the breeding season; maintenance of territories protects the food source for their chicks. Species that are unable to defend feeding territories, such as seabirds and swifts, often breed in colonies instead; this is thought to offer protection from predators. Colonial breeders defend small nesting sites, and competition between and within species for nesting sites can be intense.
All birds lay amniotic eggs with hard shells made mostly of calcium carbonate. Hole and burrow nesting species tend to lay white or pale eggs, while open nesters lay camouflaged eggs. There are many exceptions to this pattern, however; the ground-nesting nightjars have pale eggs, and camouflage is instead provided by their plumage. Species that are victims of brood parasites have varying egg colours to improve the chances of spotting a parasite's egg, which forces female parasites to match their eggs to those of their hosts.
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Bird eggs are usually laid in a nest. Most species create somewhat elaborate nests, which can be cups, domes, plates, mounds, or burrows. Some bird nests can be a simple scrape, with minimal or no lining; most seabird and wader nests are no more than a scrape on the ground. Most birds build nests in sheltered, hidden areas to avoid predation, but large or colonial birds—which are more capable of defence—may build more open nests. During nest construction, some species seek out plant matter from plants with parasite-reducing toxins to improve chick survival, and feathers are often used for nest insulation. Some bird species have no nests; the cliff-nesting common guillemot lays its eggs on bare rock, and male emperor penguins keep eggs between their body and feet. The absence of nests is especially prevalent in open habitat ground-nesting species where any addition of nest material would make the nest more conspicuous. Many ground nesting birds lay a clutch of eggs that hatch synchronously, with precocial chicks led away from the nests (nidifugous) by their parents soon after hatching.
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Incubation, which regulates temperature for chick development, usually begins after the last egg has been laid. In monogamous species incubation duties are often shared, whereas in polygamous species one parent is wholly responsible for incubation. Warmth from parents passes to the eggs through brood patches, areas of bare skin on the abdomen or breast of the incubating birds. Incubation can be an energetically demanding process; adult albatrosses, for instance, lose as much as of body weight per day of incubation. The warmth for the incubation of the eggs of megapodes comes from the sun, decaying vegetation or volcanic sources. Incubation periods range from 10 days (in woodpeckers, cuckoos and passerine birds) to over 80 days (in albatrosses and kiwis).
The diversity of characteristics of birds is great, sometimes even in closely related species. Several avian characteristics are compared in the table below.
Parental care and fledging.
At the time of their hatching, chicks range in development from helpless to independent, depending on their species. Helpless chicks are termed "altricial", and tend to be born small, blind, immobile and naked; chicks that are mobile and feathered upon hatching are termed "precocial". Altricial chicks need help thermoregulating and must be brooded for longer than precocial chicks. The young of many bird species do not precisely fit into either the precocial or altricial category, having some aspects of each and thus fall somewhere on an "altricial-precocial spectrum". Chicks at neither extreme but favouring one or the other may be termed or .
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The length and nature of parental care varies widely amongst different orders and species. At one extreme, parental care in megapodes ends at hatching; the newly hatched chick digs itself out of the nest mound without parental assistance and can fend for itself immediately. At the other extreme, many seabirds have extended periods of parental care, the longest being that of the great frigatebird, whose chicks take up to six months to fledge and are fed by the parents for up to an additional 14 months. The "chick guard stage" describes the period of breeding during which one of the adult birds is permanently present at the nest after chicks have hatched. The main purpose of the guard stage is to aid offspring to thermoregulate and protect them from predation.
In some species, both parents care for nestlings and fledglings; in others, such care is the responsibility of only one sex. In some species, other members of the same species—usually close relatives of the breeding pair, such as offspring from previous broods—will help with the raising of the young. Such alloparenting is particularly common among the Corvida, which includes such birds as the true crows, Australian magpie and fairy-wrens, but has been observed in species as different as the rifleman and red kite. Among most groups of animals, male parental care is rare. In birds, however, it is quite common—more so than in any other vertebrate class. Although territory and nest site defence, incubation, and chick feeding are often shared tasks, there is sometimes a division of labour in which one mate undertakes all or most of a particular duty.
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The point at which chicks fledge varies dramatically. The chicks of the "Synthliboramphus" murrelets, like the ancient murrelet, leave the nest the night after they hatch, following their parents out to sea, where they are raised away from terrestrial predators. Some other species, such as ducks, move their chicks away from the nest at an early age. In most species, chicks leave the nest just before, or soon after, they are able to fly. The amount of parental care after fledging varies; albatross chicks leave the nest on their own and receive no further help, while other species continue some supplementary feeding after fledging. Chicks may also follow their parents during their first migration.
Brood parasites.
Brood parasitism, in which an egg-layer leaves her eggs with another individual's brood, is more common among birds than any other type of organism. After a parasitic bird lays her eggs in another bird's nest, they are often accepted and raised by the host at the expense of the host's own brood. Brood parasites may be either "obligate brood parasites", which must lay their eggs in the nests of other species because they are incapable of raising their own young, or "non-obligate brood parasites", which sometimes lay eggs in the nests of conspecifics to increase their reproductive output even though they could have raised their own young. One hundred bird species, including honeyguides, icterids, and ducks, are obligate parasites, though the most famous are the cuckoos. Some brood parasites are adapted to hatch before their host's young, which allows them to destroy the host's eggs by pushing them out of the nest or to kill the host's chicks; this ensures that all food brought to the nest will be fed to the parasitic chicks.
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Sexual selection.
Birds have evolved a variety of mating behaviours, with the peacock tail being perhaps the most famous example of sexual selection and the Fisherian runaway. Commonly occurring sexual dimorphisms such as size and colour differences are energetically costly attributes that signal competitive breeding situations. Many types of avian sexual selection have been identified; intersexual selection, also known as female choice; and intrasexual competition, where individuals of the more abundant sex compete with each other for the privilege to mate. Sexually selected traits often evolve to become more pronounced in competitive breeding situations until the trait begins to limit the individual's fitness. Conflicts between an individual fitness and signalling adaptations ensure that sexually selected ornaments such as plumage colouration and courtship behaviour are "honest" traits. Signals must be costly to ensure that only good-quality individuals can present these exaggerated sexual ornaments and behaviours.
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Inbreeding depression.
Inbreeding causes early death (inbreeding depression) in the zebra finch "Taeniopygia guttata". Embryo survival (that is, hatching success of fertile eggs) was significantly lower for sib-sib mating pairs than for unrelated pairs.
Darwin's finch "Geospiza scandens" experiences inbreeding depression (reduced survival of offspring) and the magnitude of this effect is influenced by environmental conditions such as low food availability.
Inbreeding avoidance.
Incestuous matings by the purple-crowned fairy wren "Malurus coronatus" result in severe fitness costs due to inbreeding depression (greater than 30% reduction in hatchability of eggs). Females paired with related males may undertake extra pair matings (see Promiscuity#Other animals for 90% frequency in avian species) that can reduce the negative effects of inbreeding. However, there are ecological and demographic constraints on extra pair matings. Nevertheless, 43% of broods produced by incestuously paired females contained extra pair young.
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Inbreeding depression occurs in the great tit ("Parus major") when the offspring produced as a result of a mating between close relatives show reduced fitness. In natural populations of "Parus major", inbreeding is avoided by dispersal of individuals from their birthplace, which reduces the chance of mating with a close relative.
Southern pied babblers "Turdoides bicolor" appear to avoid inbreeding in two ways. The first is through dispersal, and the second is by avoiding familiar group members as mates.
Cooperative breeding in birds typically occurs when offspring, usually males, delay dispersal from their natal group in order to remain with the family to help rear younger kin. Female offspring rarely stay at home, dispersing over distances that allow them to breed independently, or to join unrelated groups. In general, inbreeding is avoided because it leads to a reduction in progeny fitness (inbreeding depression) due largely to the homozygous expression of deleterious recessive alleles. Cross-fertilisation between unrelated individuals ordinarily leads to the masking of deleterious recessive alleles in progeny.
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Ecology.
Birds occupy a wide range of ecological positions. While some birds are generalists, others are highly specialised in their habitat or food requirements. Even within a single habitat, such as a forest, the niches occupied by different species of birds vary, with some species feeding in the forest canopy, others beneath the canopy, and still others on the forest floor. Forest birds may be insectivores, frugivores, or nectarivores. Aquatic birds generally feed by fishing, plant eating, and piracy or kleptoparasitism. Many grassland birds are granivores. Birds of prey specialise in hunting mammals or other birds, while vultures are specialised scavengers. Birds are also preyed upon by a range of mammals including a few avivorous bats. A wide range of endo- and ectoparasites depend on birds and some parasites that are transmitted from parent to young have co-evolved and show host-specificity.
Some nectar-feeding birds are important pollinators, and many frugivores play a key role in seed dispersal. Plants and pollinating birds often coevolve, and in some cases a flower's primary pollinator is the only species capable of reaching its nectar.
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Birds are often important to island ecology. Birds have frequently reached islands that mammals have not; on those islands, birds may fulfil ecological roles typically played by larger animals. For example, in New Zealand nine species of moa were important browsers, as are the kererū and kōkako today. Today the plants of New Zealand retain the defensive adaptations evolved to protect them from the extinct moa.
Many birds act as ecosystem engineers through the construction of nests, which provide important microhabitats and food for hundreds of species of invertebrates. Nesting seabirds may affect the ecology of islands and surrounding seas, principally through the concentration of large quantities of guano, which may enrich the local soil and the surrounding seas.
A wide variety of avian ecology field methods, including counts, nest monitoring, and capturing and marking, are used for researching avian ecology.
Relationship with humans.
Since birds are highly visible and common animals, humans have had a relationship with them since the dawn of man. Sometimes, these relationships are mutualistic, like the cooperative honey-gathering among honeyguides and African peoples such as the Borana. Other times, they may be commensal, as when species such as the house sparrow have benefited from human activities. Several species have reconciled to habits of farmers who practice traditional farming. Examples include the Sarus Crane that begins nesting in India when farmers flood the fields in anticipation of rains, and the woolly-necked storks that have taken to nesting on a short tree grown for agroforestry beside fields and canals. Several bird species have become commercially significant agricultural pests, and some pose an aviation hazard. Human activities can also be detrimental, and have threatened numerous bird species with extinction (hunting, avian lead poisoning, pesticides, roadkill, wind turbine kills and predation by pet cats and dogs are common causes of death for birds).
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Birds can act as vectors for spreading diseases such as psittacosis, salmonellosis, campylobacteriosis, mycobacteriosis (avian tuberculosis), avian influenza (bird flu), giardiasis, and cryptosporidiosis over long distances. Some of these are zoonotic diseases that can also be transmitted to humans.
Economic importance.
Domesticated birds raised for meat and eggs, called poultry, are the largest source of animal protein eaten by humans; in 2003, tons of poultry and tons of eggs were produced worldwide. Chickens account for much of human poultry consumption, though domesticated turkeys, ducks, and geese are also relatively common. Many species of birds are also hunted for meat. Bird hunting is primarily a recreational activity except in extremely undeveloped areas. The most important birds hunted in North and South America are waterfowl; other widely hunted birds include pheasants, wild turkeys, quail, doves, partridge, grouse, snipe, and woodcock. Muttonbirding is also popular in Australia and New Zealand. Although some hunting, such as that of muttonbirds, may be sustainable, hunting has led to the extinction or endangerment of dozens of species.
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Other commercially valuable products from birds include feathers (especially the down of geese and ducks), which are used as insulation in clothing and bedding, and seabird faeces (guano), which is a valuable source of phosphorus and nitrogen. The War of the Pacific, sometimes called the Guano War, was fought in part over the control of guano deposits.
Birds have been domesticated by humans both as pets and for practical purposes. Colourful birds, such as parrots and mynas, are bred in captivity or kept as pets, a practice that has led to the illegal trafficking of some endangered species. Falcons and cormorants have long been used for hunting and fishing, respectively. Messenger pigeons, used since at least 1 AD, remained important as recently as World War II. Today, such activities are more common either as hobbies, for entertainment and tourism.
Amateur bird enthusiasts (called birdwatchers, twitchers or, more commonly, birders) number in the millions. Many homeowners erect bird feeders near their homes to attract various species. Bird feeding has grown into a multimillion-dollar industry; for example, an estimated 75% of households in Britain provide food for birds at some point during the winter.
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In religion and mythology.
Birds play prominent and diverse roles in religion and mythology.
In religion, birds may serve as either messengers or priests and leaders for a deity, such as in the Cult of Makemake, in which the Tangata manu of Easter Island served as chiefs or as attendants, as in the case of Hugin and Munin, the two common ravens who whispered news into the ears of the Norse god Odin. In several civilisations of ancient Italy, particularly Etruscan and Roman religion, priests were involved in augury, or interpreting the words of birds while the "auspex" (from which the word "auspicious" is derived) watched their activities to foretell events.
They may also serve as religious symbols, as when Jonah (, dove) embodied the fright, passivity, mourning, and beauty traditionally associated with doves. Birds have themselves been deified, as in the case of the common peacock, which is perceived as Mother Earth by the people of southern India. In the ancient world, doves were used as symbols of the Mesopotamian goddess Inanna (later known as Ishtar), the Canaanite mother goddess Asherah, and the Greek goddess Aphrodite. In ancient Greece, Athena, the goddess of wisdom and patron deity of the city of Athens, had a little owl as her symbol. In religious images preserved from the Inca and Tiwanaku empires, birds are depicted in the process of transgressing boundaries between earthly and underground spiritual realms. Indigenous peoples of the central Andes maintain legends of birds passing to and from metaphysical worlds.
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In culture and folklore.
Birds have featured in culture and art since prehistoric times, when they were represented in early cave painting and carvings. Some birds have been perceived as monsters, including the mythological Roc and the Māori's legendary , a giant bird capable of snatching humans. Birds were later used as symbols of power, as in the magnificent Peacock Throne of the Mughal and Persian emperors. With the advent of scientific interest in birds, many paintings of birds were commissioned for books.
Among the most famous of these bird artists was John James Audubon, whose paintings of North American birds were a great commercial success in Europe and who later lent his name to the National Audubon Society. Birds are also important figures in poetry; for example, Homer incorporated nightingales into his "Odyssey", and Catullus used a sparrow as an erotic symbol in his Catullus 2. The relationship between an albatross and a sailor is the central theme of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", which led to the use of the term as a metaphor for a 'burden'. Other English metaphors derive from birds; vulture funds and vulture investors, for instance, take their name from the scavenging vulture. Aircraft, particularly military aircraft, are frequently named after birds. The predatory nature of raptors make them popular choices for fighter aircraft such as the F-16 Fighting Falcon and the Harrier Jump Jet, while the names of seabirds may be chosen for aircraft primarily used by naval forces such as the HU-16 Albatross and the V-22 Osprey.
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Perceptions of bird species vary across cultures. Owls are associated with bad luck, witchcraft, and death in parts of Africa, but are regarded as wise across much of Europe. Hoopoes were considered sacred in Ancient Egypt and symbols of virtue in Persia, but were thought of as thieves across much of Europe and harbingers of war in Scandinavia. In heraldry, birds, especially eagles, often appear in coats of arms In vexillology, birds are a popular choice on flags. Birds feature in the flag designs of 17 countries and numerous subnational entities and territories. Birds are used by nations to symbolise a country's identity and heritage, with 91 countries officially recognising a national bird. Birds of prey are highly represented, though some nations have chosen other species of birds with parrots being popular among smaller, tropical nations.
In music.
In music, birdsong has influenced composers and musicians in several ways: they can be inspired by birdsong; they can intentionally imitate bird song in a composition, as Vivaldi, Messiaen, and Beethoven did, along with many later composers; they can incorporate recordings of birds into their works, as Ottorino Respighi first did; or like Beatrice Harrison and David Rothenberg, they can duet with birds.
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A 2023 archaeological excavation of a 10,000-year-old site in Israel yielded hollow wing bones of coots and ducks with perforations made on the side that are thought to have allowed them to be used as flutes or whistles possibly used by Natufian people to lure birds of prey.
Threats and conservation.
Human activities have caused population decreases or extinction in many bird species. Over a hundred bird species have gone extinct in historical times, although the most dramatic human-caused avian extinctions, eradicating an estimated 750–1800 species, occurred during the human colonisation of Melanesian, Polynesian, and Micronesian islands. Many bird populations are declining worldwide, with 1,227 species listed as threatened by BirdLife International and the IUCN in 2009. There have been long-term declines in North American bird populations, with an estimated loss of 2.9 billion breeding adults, about 30% of the total, since 1970.
The most commonly cited human threat to birds is habitat loss. Other threats include overhunting, accidental mortality due to collisions with buildings or vehicles, long-line fishing bycatch, pollution (including oil spills and pesticide use), competition and predation from nonnative invasive species, and climate change.
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Governments and conservation groups work to protect birds, either by passing laws that preserve and restore bird habitat or by establishing captive populations for reintroductions. Such projects have produced some successes; one study estimated that conservation efforts saved 16 species of bird that would otherwise have gone extinct between 1994 and 2004, including the California condor and Norfolk parakeet.
Human activities have allowed the expansion of a few temperate area species, such as the barn swallow and European starling. In the tropics and sub-tropics, relatively more species are expanding due to human activities, particularly due to the spread of crops such as rice whose expansion in south Asia has benefitted at least 64 bird species, though may have harmed many more species. |
...Baby One More Time (album)
...Baby One More Time is the debut studio album by American singer Britney Spears. It was released on January 12, 1999, by Jive Records. Spears had been a child performer on "" from 1993 to 1994, and was looking to expand her career as a teen singer. After being turned away by several record companies, Spears signed with Jive for a multi-album deal in 1997. She travelled to Sweden to collaborate with producers Max Martin and Rami Yacoub, who had been writing songs with producer Denniz Pop and others, for "...Baby One More Time". Their collaboration created a pop, bubblegum pop, dance-pop, and teen pop record, with Spears later saying that she felt excited when she heard it and knew it was going to be a hit record. The album was completed in June 1998.
Upon its release, "...Baby One More Time" garnered mixed reviews from music critics, with many praising its commercial appeal but deeming it silly and premature. Despite its initial mixed reception, it helped Spears receive a nomination for Best New Artist at the 42nd Annual Grammy Awards (2000). Retrospectively, it has been hailed for its major impact on pop culture, and has been deemed one of the most influential pop records of all time. A massive global commercial success, it made Spears the fifth artist under the age of 18 to top the US "Billboard" 200. It has been certified 14× platinum (diamond) by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Spears's best-selling album, it has sold over 25 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling albums of all time, as well as the best-selling debut album by a teenage female artist.
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"...Baby One More Time" produced five singles. The lead single, "...Baby One More Time", brought Spears tremendous global success, reaching number one in most countries it charted in and becoming one of the best-selling physical singles of all time. In 2020, it was named the greatest debut single of all time by "Rolling Stone". Subsequent singles "Sometimes" and "Born to Make You Happy" peaked within the top ten in most international countries while "(You Drive Me) Crazy" became Spears's second US "Billboard" Hot 100 top-ten hit. Spears heavily promoted the album through interviews and televised performances. Furthermore, she embarked on her first headlining concert tour, entitled ...Baby One More Time Tour (1999) and later continued with (You Drive Me) Crazy Tour (2000).
Recording and production.
In June 1997, Spears was in talks with then-manager Lou Pearlman to join the female pop group Innosense. Her mother, Lynne Spears, asked family friend and entertainment lawyer Larry Rudolph for his opinion and submitted a tape of Spears singing over a Whitney Houston karaoke song along with some pictures. Rudolph decided to pitch her to record labels, which required a professional demo. He sent Spears an unused song from Toni Braxton; she rehearsed for a week and recorded in a studio with an audio engineer. Spears traveled from her hometown Kentwood, Louisiana, to New York City with the demo and met executives from four labels, returning to Kentwood the same day. Three rejected her, arguing audiences wanted pop bands such as the Backstreet Boys and the Spice Girls, and "there wasn't going to be another Madonna, another Debbie Gibson or another Tiffany." Two weeks later, executives from Jive Records returned calls to Rudolph. Jive's senior vice president of A&R Jeff Fenster stated: "It's very rare to hear someone that age who can deliver emotional content and commercial appeal. [...] For any artist, the motivation—the 'eye of the tiger'—is extremely important. And Britney had that."
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Jive soon appointed Spears to work with producer Eric Foster White for a month, who reportedly shaped her voice from "lower and less poppy" delivery to "distinctively, unmistakably Britney." One of the first songs Spears recorded with Foster White was "From the Bottom of My Broken Heart", which was released as the album's 4th single. Foster White also produced "Autumn Goodbye", which was the B-side to Spears' debut single "...Baby One More Time". During the same session for "Autumn Goodbye", Spears and Foster White also worked on a song called "Love Is On", which ultimately did not make the album and was later given to Sharon Cuneta. Spears recorded a lot of material with Eric Foster White, such as "Autumn Goodbye", "E-Mail My Heart", "From the Bottom of My Broken Heart", "I'm So Curious", "I Will Still Love You", "Way It Is Loving You", "I'll Be There For You", "Soda Pop", "Thinkin' About You", "Nothing Less Than Real", "Wishing on a Falling Star" and a cover of "You Got It All" by the Jets. She also recorded a cover of Sonny & Cher's 1967 single "The Beat Goes On". White was responsible for the vocal recording and song production, while additional production was handled by English electronic music group All Seeing I. After hearing the material, Jive Records president Clive Calder ordered a full studio album.
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Spears flew to Cheiron Studios in Stockholm, where half of "...Baby One More Time" was recorded from May 1998, with producers Max Martin and Rami Yacoub, and contributions from others, including songwriting from Denniz Pop, who was too ill to attend any recording sessions. Martin showed Spears and her management a track titled "Hit Me Baby One More Time", originally written for American group TLC, who had rejected it. Spears later said that she felt excited when she heard it and knew it was going to be a hit. "We at Jive said, 'This is a fuckin' smash, revealed the label's A&R executive, Steven Lunt; however, other executives were concerned that the line "Hit Me" would condone domestic violence, and later revised it to "...Baby One More Time". Spears revealed that she "didn't do well at all the first day in the studio [recording the song], I was just too nervous. So I went out that night and had some fun. The next day I was completely relaxed and nailed it. You gotta be relaxed singing '... Baby One More Time'." By June 1998, the album had been completed.
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Music and lyrics.
Spears originally envisioned "Sheryl Crow music, but younger – more adult contemporary" for "...Baby One More Time", but acquiesced to the wishes of her label, since "It made more sense to go pop, because I can dance to it—it's more me." The album opens with its lead single, "...Baby One More Time", a teen pop and dance-pop song beginning with a three-note motif in the bass range of the piano. Its opening was compared to many other songs, such as "We Will Rock You" (1977), "Start Me Up" (1981), "These Words" (2004) and the theme song of the film "Jaws" due to the fact the track "makes its presence known in exactly one second". According to "Blender", "...Baby One More Time" is composed of "wah-wah guitar lines and EKG-machine bass-slaps". Claudia Mitchell and Jacqueline Reid-Walsh, authors of "Girl Culture: Studying Girl Culture: A Readers' Guide" (2008), observed that the lyrics of the song "gesture toward [Spears] longing for the return of an ex-boyfriend." "(You Drive Me) Crazy" runs through a moderately slow dance beat, and has an R&B melody mixed with edgy synthesized instrumentals. "Sometimes" is a ballad, which Spears begins with the lines "You tell me you're in love with me / That you can't take your pretty eyes away from me / It's not that I don't wanna stay / But every time you come too close I move away". Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic noted the song has "a catchy hook and endearing melody, with a reminiscent euro-dance rhythm."
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"Soda Pop" draws influences from bubblegum pop and ragga, and features background vocals from co-writer Mikey Bassie. Spears' vocals on the fifth track, "Born to Make You Happy" span more than an octave. Its lyrics allude to a relationship that a woman desires to repair, not quite understanding what went wrong, as she comes to realize that "I don't know how to live without your love / I was born to make you happy". "From the Bottom of My Broken Heart" is a sentimental slow-tempo teen pop ballad. "I Will Be There" is a pop rock song featuring a guitar riff similar to Natalie Imbruglia's "Torn" (1997), with a "rousing chorus about standing by your man (or a best friend or a house pet)", as noted by Kyle Anderson of MTV. "E-Mail My Heart" is a sensitive piano ballad on which Spears sings: "E-mail me back / And say our love will stay alive". The cover of Sonny & Cher's 1967 single "The Beat Goes On" is influenced by bossa nova and trip hop, and features a sound similar to spy film themes. Among the bonus tracks included on select editions of the album is a cover of J'Son's 1996 song "I'll Never Stop Loving You".
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Release and promotion.
Promotion for "...Baby One More Time" began in May 1998, when Spears performed "...Baby One More Time", "Sometimes" and "You Got It All" at the Singapore Jazz Festival. Subsequently, she embarked on the L'Oréal-sponsored promotional tour titled L'Oreal Hair Zone Mall Tour, visiting malls and food courts across North America from August 1998 to January 1999. In December, "...Baby One More Time" first showed up on MTV's and The Box's most-requested video charts. In the United States, "...Baby One More Time" was originally set for an October 1998 release, but was pushed back to January 12, 1999, due to marketing issues, with its international release occurring within the following three months. Spears had appeared on "Ricki Lake", "The Howie Mandel Show", and was a presenter at the 1999 American Music Awards prior to the release. However, after hurting her knee in February, she rescheduled appearances on several shows, such as "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" and "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee". Additionally, she appeared on "MTV Spring Break" and on the hundredth episode of Nickelodeon's "All That". After recovering, Spears embarked on another promotional schedule, appearing at the 1999 Kids' Choice Awards on May 1, "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee" on May 3, MTV's "FANatic" on May 12, and "The Rosie O'Donnell Show" on May 25.
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Outside the US, Spears visited the German shows "Wetten, dass..?" and "Top of the Pops" on June 25. She also went to the United Kingdom, making appearances on programmes such as "This Morning", "" and "National Lottery". Spears visited the music variety show "Hey! Hey! Hey! Music Champ" in Japan, and performed at the Festival Bar in Italy. Spears was also featured on an episode of the ABC sitcom "Sabrina, the Teenage Witch", in which she played herself. According to "People", Spears was returning a favor to actress Melissa Joan Hart, who played a cameo role in Spears' music video for "(You Drive Me) Crazy". The episode aired on September 24. The same month, Spears performed on "The Rosie O'Donnell Show" on September 27, and visited Carson Daly on MTV's "Total Request Live" the following day. Spears also performed live with Joey McIntyre in the Disney Channel taped concert event titled Britney Spears & Joey McIntyre in Concert. In November, Spears performed "...Baby One More Time" and "(You Drive Me) Crazy" at the 1999 MTV Europe Music Awards. Promotion for the album continued in early 2000, when Spears performed at the 2000 American Music Awards, and also performed "From the Bottom of My Broken Heart" in a medley with "...Baby One More Time" at the 42nd Annual Grammy Awards.
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On March 5, 1999, it was reported that Spears was planning her first headlining tour. She announced that the tour would start in July. On May 12, Tommy Hilfiger was announced as the main tour sponsor, as Spears was being featured in the company's "AllStars" campaign at the time. On December 17, during the premiere of the music video of "From the Bottom of My Broken Heart" on "Total Request Live", Spears called the show to announce the March 2000 US tour dates. The extension, entitled (You Drive Me) Crazy Tour, was considered a prelude to her future world tour, Oops!... I Did It Again Tour. The leg's main sponsor was Got Milk?, whose media director Peter Gardiner explained: "Britney is magic with teen-age girls, and that's an absolutely crucial target for milk". Spears shot an advertising campaign to be shown before her performances began. The secondary sponsor was Polaroid, who released I-Zone as the tour's official camera. Spears used the I-Zone onstage to take pictures of the audience and further promote the product. The show was divided into segments, separated by interludes, and ended with an encore. The set list consisted of songs from "...Baby One More Time" and several covers. Some changes were made during the 2000 leg, with the covers replaced by songs from her second studio album "Oops!... I Did It Again" (2000). The tour received positive critical reception. During the tour, Spears was accused of lip synching, although she denied those claims. On April 20, the concert at Hilton Hawaiian Village in Honolulu, Hawaii, was taped. It was slightly altered from its tour incarnation and featured different costumes. On June 5, it was broadcast on Fox, airing several times during the year. On November 21, Jive Records released the video album "", which included the Fox special. It was certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for shipping 300,000 units.
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On August 14, 2017, 18 years after the release of "...Baby One More Time", it was announced that 2,500 pink-and-white-swirl copies of the album would be released on vinyl exclusively through Urban Outfitters on November 3. During the celebration of the 20th anniversary of Spears' debut single "...Baby One More Time", on October 19, 2018, Legacy Recordings announced the global release of the album on vinyl for November 23.
Singles.
The title track was released as the lead single from "...Baby One More Time" and Spears' debut single on September 29, 1998. It received generally favorable critical reviews, which mostly praised its composition. After its accompanying music video premiered in late November, the single attained worldwide success in early 1999, peaking atop the US "Billboard" Hot 100 and in most countries it charted in. It received numerous certifications around the world, and is one of the best-selling singles of all time, selling over ten million copies. The music video, directed by Nigel Dick, portrays Spears as a high school student who starts to sing and dance around the school, while watching her love interest from afar. In 2010, the video was voted the third most influential video in the history of pop music on Jam!.
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"Sometimes" was released as the second single from "...Baby One More Time" on April 6, 1999. It achieved commercial success internationally, reaching number one in Belgium, the Netherlands and New Zealand. In the United States, however, it missed the top 20, peaking at number 21 on the "Billboard" Hot 100. The song's accompanying music video was directed by Nigel Dick. During rehearsals, on February 11, 1999, Spears injured her left knee and needed surgery. After recuperating in Kentwood, Louisiana, the video was filmed on April 9–10 at Paradise Cove in Malibu, California. It premiered on MTV's "Total Request Live" on May 6.
In May 1999, Max Martin and Spears went to the Battery Studios in New York City to re-record the vocals of "(You Drive Me) Crazy", for a reproduced version subtitled "The Stop! Remix", which was going to be included on the original motion picture soundtrack for the film "Drive Me Crazy" (1999). The remix was subsequently released as the third single from "...Baby One More Time" on August 24. It features the addition of a stanza in which Spears yells "Stop!", then all sound cutting out, followed by a transition, while omitting the lines "Lovin' you means so much more, more than anything I ever felt before". The video was directed by Nigel Dick, and featured actors Melissa Joan Hart and Adrian Grenier.
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"Born to Make You Happy" was released as the fourth and final European single from "...Baby One More Time" on December 6, 1999, to a mixed critical reception. A commercial success, it peaked within the top five in 11 countries and atop the UK Singles Chart. Its accompanying music video was directed by Bille Woodruff, and choreographed by Wade Robson. Despite its success in Europe, the song was never released as a single in the US.
"From the Bottom of My Broken Heart" was released as the fourth and final North American and Oceanian single from "...Baby One More Time" on December 14, 1999. The song received mixed critical reviews, which branded it a classic hit and competent single, despite considering it an unremarkable song referring only to kissing. It achieved moderate commercial success, peaking at number 14 on the US "Billboard" Hot 100. In Oceania, it peaked at number 37 in Australia and number 23 in New Zealand. It was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on March 28, 2000. The song's accompanying music video, directed by Gregory Dark, was released on December 17, 1999. It elicited controversy due to the fact that Dark had previously directed pornographic films.
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Critical reception.
"...Baby One More Time" received mixed reviews from music critics upon its release. The editors of AllMusic gave the album four out of five stars. Paul Verna from "Billboard" considered the album "a top 40-ready workout filled with hook-laden songs from the same bag as the title cut". "The Village Voice" critic Robert Christgau highlighted the title track and "Soda Pop" while summing the album up as a "girl next door" version of Madonna. Kyle Anderson of MTV said he "was surprised in more ways than one" with his first listening of "...Baby One More Time", commenting he "expected there to be a lot of filler (there sort of is), though I didn't expect it to be as odd (at least sonically) as it ended up being. There has never been any mystery to why Spears became such a superstar, but these songs probably would have been huge even if Britney wore burlap sacks in all of her videos."
Barry Walters of "Rolling Stone" gave the album two stars out of five, and compared the album's sound to early hits of Debbie Gibson, Mariah Carey and Samantha Fox. Walters also said that "while several Cherion-crafted kiddie-funk jams serve up beefy hooks, shameless schlock slowies, like 'E-Mail My Heart', is pure spam." An "NME" reviewer rated "...Baby One More Time" one out of ten, saying that "we seem to have reached crisis point: pubescent pop is now so rife that 17-year-old Britney 'lizard-lounge' Spears is already halfway through her lucrative showbiz career". He also found the album premature, commenting: "hopefully, if she starts to live the wretched life that we all eventually do, her voice will show the scars, she'll stop looking so fucking smug, she'll find solace in drugs and we'll be all the happier for it. Now grow up, girl. Quick!" Amanda Murray of Sputnikmusic felt that "with the exception of the terrific title track, "...Baby One More Time" is a collection of either competent pop songs underwhelmingly executed or underwhelmingly written pop songs competently executed."
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In 2024, "Paste" listed the album among its picks for "The 300 Greatest Albums of All Time", with critic Olivia Abercrombie praising the album's iconic status and influence in pop music.
Accolades.
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Commercial performance.
In the United States, "...Baby One More Time" debuted atop the "Billboard" 200 with sales of 121,000 copies in its first week, beating DMX's "Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood". Spears broke several records by doing so. The singer became the first new female artist to have a number-one single on the "Billboard" Hot 100 and number one album on the "Billboard" 200 at the same time; the first new artist (male or female) to have a single go to the number one spot the same week that the album debuted at number one; and the first new female artist to have the first single and first album at number one the same week. |
The singer became the first new female artist to have a number-one single on the "Billboard" Hot 100 and number one album on the "Billboard" 200 at the same time; the first new artist (male or female) to have a single go to the number one spot the same week that the album debuted at number one; and the first new female artist to have the first single and first album at number one the same week. It sold over 500,000 copies within its first month, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Its fifth week became the album's highest-selling week with 229,000 copies sold, bringing the total to 804,000 copies. "...Baby One More Time" spent a total of six non-consecutive weeks at number one, and sold over 1.8 million copies in the US within its first two months. In its 47th week on the "Billboard" 200, the album held strong at number three, reaching the ten-million sales mark in the country. The album was certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on December 9, 1999, making then-18-year-old Spears the youngest artist to receive that certification, breaking the record held by Alanis Morissette, who was 21 when her album "Jagged Little Pill" (1995) was certified diamond. |
The album was certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on December 9, 1999, making then-18-year-old Spears the youngest artist to receive that certification, breaking the record held by Alanis Morissette, who was 21 when her album "Jagged Little Pill" (1995) was certified diamond. It became the 14th album since 1991 to sell over ten million copies in the US, and Spears became the best-selling female artist of 1999. "...Baby One More Time" spent a total of 51 weeks within the top ten on the "Billboard" 200. It was the second best-selling album of 1999 in the US, only behind "Millennium" by the Backstreet Boys. The album has spent a total of 103 weeks on the "Billboard" 200. "...Baby One More Time" landed at number three on BMG Music Club's all-time best-sellers list, selling 1.6 million units through the club. As of May 2020, it has sold 10.7 million copies in the US according to Nielsen SoundScan, with the BMG Music Club sales bringing its total to 12.3 million units.
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"...Baby One More Time" debuted atop the Canadian Albums Chart, spending nine non-consecutive weeks at the summit. On December 12, 1999, the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) certified it diamond, for sales of over one million units. The album spent two weeks at number two on the European Top 100 Albums, and sold over four million copies across Europe, being certified quadruple platinum by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). It peaked at number two on the UK Albums Chart, and has been certified quadruple platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). It peaked at number four in France, being certified double platinum by the Syndicat National de l'Édition Phonographique (SNEP). In addition, it has been certified triple gold in Germany, and platinum by the Polish Society of the Phonographic Industry (ZPAV). In Australia, it debuted at number nine on the ARIA Albums Chart, reaching number two nine weeks later. The album became the seventh highest-selling album of 1999 in the country, and was certified quadruple platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) the following year after shipping 280,000 copies to retailers. The album debuted at number three in New Zealand, later being certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of New Zealand (RIANZ).
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Legacy.
Spears was at the forefront of the female teen pop explosion starting in 1999 and extending through the 2000s, leading the pack of Christina Aguilera, Jessica Simpson, and Mandy Moore. All of these performers had been developing material in 1998, but the market changed dramatically in December 1998 when Spears' debut single and video were charting highly. RCA Records signed Aguilera and rushed her debut single to capitalize on Spears' success, producing the hit single "Genie in a Bottle" in May 1999 and Aguilera's eponymous debut studio album in August. Aguilera's album sold millions but not as many as "...Baby One More Time". Simpson consciously modeled her persona as more mature than Spears; her single "I Wanna Love You Forever" charted in September 1999, and her album "Sweet Kisses" followed shortly after. Moore's first single, "Candy", hit the airwaves a month before Simpson's single, but it did not perform as well on the charts; Moore was often seen as less accomplished than Spears and the others, coming in fourth of the "pop princesses". Fueling media stories about their competition for first place, Spears and Aguilera traded barbs but also compliments through the 2000s.
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"The Daily Yomiuri" reported that "critics have hailed her as the most gifted teenage pop idol for many years, but Spears has set her sights a little higher-she is aiming for the level of superstardom that has been achieved by Madonna and Janet Jackson." "Rolling Stone" wrote: "Britney Spears carries on the classic archetype of the rock & roll teen queen, the dungaree doll, the angel baby who just has to make a scene." Rami Yacoub who co-produced Spears's debut album with lyricist Max Martin commented: "I know from Denniz Pop and Max's previous productions, when we do songs, there's kind of a nasal thing. With N' Sync and the Backstreet Boys, we had to push for that mid-nasal voice. When Britney did that, she got this kind of raspy, sexy voice." Chuck Taylor of "Billboard" observed, "Spears has become a consummate performer, with snappy dance moves, a clearly real-albeit young-and funkdified voice ... "(You Drive Me) Crazy", her third single ... demonstrates Spears' own development, proving that the 17-year-old is finding her own vocal personality after so many months of steadfast practice." Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic referred to her music as a "blend of infectious, rap-inflected dance-pop and smooth balladry." Sputnikmusic writer Amanda Murray noted the album "offers a marker for Spears' progression as an artist, as a celebrity, and as a woman." In 2010, the album was included in the book "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die".
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Spears became an international pop culture icon immediately after launching her recording career. "Rolling Stone" wrote: "One of the most controversial and successful female vocalists of the 21st century," she "spearheaded the rise of post-millennial teen pop ... Spears early on cultivated a mixture of innocence and experience that generated lots of cash". She is listed by the "Guinness World Records" as having the "Best-selling album by a teenage solo artist". Melissa Ruggieri of the "Richmond Times-Dispatch" reported, "She's also marked for being the best-selling teenage artist. Before she turned 20 in 2001, Spears sold more than 25 million albums worldwide". Barbara Ellen of "The Observer" reported: "Spears is famously one of the 'oldest' teenagers pop has ever produced, almost middle aged in terms of focus and determination. Many 19-year-olds haven't even started working by that age, whereas Britney, a former Mouseketeer, was that most unusual and volatile of American phenomena — a child with a full-time career. While other little girls were putting posters on their walls, Britney was wanting to be the poster on the wall. Whereas other children develop at their own pace, Britney was developing at a pace set by the ferociously competitive American entertainment industry". "...Baby One More Time" is Spears' most commercially successful album to date, with worldwide sales of 25 million copies. It was ranked at number 41 on the all-time US "Billboard" 200 chart, and at number 16 on the "Billboard" 200 albums by women.
Track listing.
Notes
Personnel.
Credits are adapted from the liner notes of "...Baby One More Time", except where noted.
Certifications and sales.
! scope="row"|Philippines (PARI) |
Burn card
In card games, a burn card is a playing card dealt from the top of a deck, and discarded ("burned"), unused by the players. Burn cards are usually not shown to the players.
Burning is most often performed in casinos to deter a form of cheating known as card marking.
Usage.
In poker the top card of the deck stub is burned at the beginning of each betting round, so that players who might have been able to read markings on that card during the previous round are less able to take advantage of that information. Knowledge of a burn card might be marginally useful, such as knowing there is one fewer Ace in the deck, but far less so than knowing it is about to be in play.
Two other uses for burning are: to prevent second dealing and to provide extra cards for use when an irregularity of play occurs. Sometimes a misdealt card (such as one of the down cards in poker that has flashed during the deal) will be used as the burn card – in those cases, the card should be immediately placed face up on the deck after the deal is complete.
When Texas hold 'em (as well as in Omaha hold 'em) is played in casinos (or other formal games where cheating is a concern), a card is burned before dealing the flop, turn, and river, for a maximum of 3 total burn cards. |
Bulgaria
Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey to the south, Serbia and North Macedonia to the west, and Romania to the north. It covers a territory of and is the sixteenth-largest country in Europe by area. Sofia is the nation's capital and largest city; other major cities include Burgas, Plovdiv, and Varna.
One of the earliest societies in the lands of modern-day Bulgaria was the Karanovo culture (6,500 BC). In the 6th to 3rd century BC, the region was a battleground for ancient Thracians, Persians, Celts and Macedonians; stability came when the Roman Empire conquered the region in AD 45. After the Roman state splintered, tribal invasions in the region resumed. Around the 6th century, these territories were settled by the early Slavs. The Bulgars, led by Asparuh, attacked from the lands of Old Great Bulgaria and permanently invaded the Balkans in the late 7th century. They established the First Bulgarian Empire, victoriously recognised by treaty in 681 AD by the Byzantine Empire. It dominated most of the Balkans and significantly influenced Slavic cultures by developing the Cyrillic script. The First Bulgarian Empire lasted until the early 11th century, when Byzantine emperor Basil II conquered and dismantled it. A successful Bulgarian revolt in 1185 established a Second Bulgarian Empire, which reached its apex under Ivan Asen II (1218–1241). After numerous exhausting wars and feudal strife, the empire disintegrated and in 1396 fell under Ottoman rule for nearly five centuries.
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The Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78 resulted in the formation of the third and current Bulgarian state, which declared independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1908. Many ethnic Bulgarians were left outside the new nation's borders, which stoked irredentist sentiments that led to several conflicts with its neighbours and alliances with Germany in both world wars. In 1946, Bulgaria came under the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc and became a socialist state. The ruling Communist Party gave up its monopoly on power after the revolutions of 1989 and allowed multiparty elections. Bulgaria then transitioned into a democracy.
Since adopting a democratic constitution in 1991, Bulgaria has been a parliamentary republic composed of 28 provinces, with a high degree of political, administrative, and economic centralisation. Its high-income economy is part of the European Single Market and is largely based on services, followed by manufacturing and mining—and agriculture. Bulgaria has been influenced by its role as a transit country for natural gas and oil pipelines, as well as its strategic location on the Black Sea. Its foreign relations have been shaped by its geographical location and its modern membership in the European Union and NATO.
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Etymology.
The name "Bulgaria" is derived from the "Bulgars", a tribe of Turkic origin that founded the First Bulgarian Empire. Their name is not completely understood and is difficult to trace it back earlier than the 4th century AD, but it is possibly derived from the Proto-Turkic word "bulģha" ("to mix", "shake", "stir") and its derivative "bulgak" ("revolt", "disorder"). The meaning may be further extended to "rebel", "incite" or "produce a state of disorder", and so, in the derivative, the "disturbers". Tribal groups in Inner Asia with phonologically close names were frequently described in similar terms, as the Buluoji, a component of the "Five Barbarian" groups, which during the 4th century were portrayed as both: a "mixed race" and "troublemakers".
History.
Prehistory and Antiquity.
Neanderthal remains dating to around 150,000 years ago, or the Middle Paleolithic, are some of the earliest traces of human activity in the lands of modern Bulgaria. Remains from "Homo sapiens" found there are dated . This result represents the earliest arrival of modern humans in Europe. The Karanovo culture arose and was one of several Neolithic societies in the region that thrived on agriculture. The Copper Age Varna culture (fifth millennium BC) is credited with inventing gold metallurgy. The associated Varna Necropolis treasure contains the oldest golden jewellery in the world with an approximate age of over 6,000 years. The treasure has been valuable for understanding social hierarchy and stratification in the earliest European societies.
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The Thracians, one of the three primary ancestral groups of modern Bulgarians, appeared on the Balkan Peninsula some time before the 12th century BC. The Thracians excelled in metallurgy and gave the Greeks the Orphean and Dionysian cults, but remained tribal and stateless. The Persian Achaemenid Empire conquered parts of present-day Bulgaria (in particular eastern Bulgaria) in the 6th century BC and retained control over the region until 479 BC. The invasion became a catalyst for Thracian unity, and the bulk of their tribes united under king Teres to form the Odrysian kingdom in the 470s BC. It was weakened and vassalised by Philip II of Macedon in 341 BC, attacked by Celts in the 3rd century, and finally became a province of the Roman Empire in AD 45.
By the end of the 1st century AD, Roman governance was established over the entire Balkan Peninsula and Christianity began spreading in the region around the 4th century. The Gothic Bible—the first Germanic language book—was created by Gothic bishop Ulfilas in what is today northern Bulgaria around 381. The region came under Byzantine control after the fall of Rome in 476. The Byzantines were engaged in prolonged warfare against Persia and could not defend their Balkan territories from barbarian incursions. This enabled the Slavs to enter the Balkan Peninsula as marauders, primarily through an area between the Danube River and the Balkan Mountains known as Moesia. Gradually, the interior of the peninsula became a country of the South Slavs, who lived under a democracy. The Slavs assimilated the partially Hellenised, Romanised, and Gothicised Thracians in the rural areas.
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First Bulgarian Empire.
Not long after the Slavic incursion, Moesia was once again invaded, this time by the Bulgars under Khan Asparukh. Their horde was a remnant of Old Great Bulgaria, an extinct tribal confederacy situated north of the Black Sea in what is now Ukraine and southern Russia. Asparukh attacked Byzantine territories in Moesia and conquered the Slavic tribes there in 680. A peace treaty with the Byzantine Empire was signed in 681, marking the foundation of the First Bulgarian Empire. The minority Bulgars formed a close-knit ruling caste.
Succeeding rulers strengthened the Bulgarian state throughout the 8th and 9th centuries. Krum introduced a written code of law and checked a major Byzantine incursion at the Battle of Pliska, in which Byzantine emperor Nicephorus I was killed. Boris I abolished paganism in favour of Eastern Orthodox Christianity in 864. The conversion was followed by a Byzantine recognition of the Bulgarian church and the adoption of the Cyrillic alphabet, developed in the capital, Preslav. |
Boris I abolished paganism in favour of Eastern Orthodox Christianity in 864. The conversion was followed by a Byzantine recognition of the Bulgarian church and the adoption of the Cyrillic alphabet, developed in the capital, Preslav. The common language, religion and script strengthened central authority and gradually fused the Slavs and Bulgars into a unified people speaking a single Slavic language. A golden age began during the 34-year rule of Simeon the Great, who oversaw the largest territorial expansion of the state. The literature produced in Old Bulgarian soon spread north from Bulgaria and became the lingua franca of the Balkans and Eastern Europe. The political, cultural, and spiritual power of the Bulgarian Empire during the Krum dynasty turned Bulgaria into one of the three superpowers in Europe at that time, alongside the Byzantine Empire and the Carolingian Empire of the Franks, which would later become the Holy Roman Empire.After Simeon's death, Bulgaria was weakened by wars with Magyars and Pechenegs and the spread of Bogomilism. |
The political, cultural, and spiritual power of the Bulgarian Empire during the Krum dynasty turned Bulgaria into one of the three superpowers in Europe at that time, alongside the Byzantine Empire and the Carolingian Empire of the Franks, which would later become the Holy Roman Empire.After Simeon's death, Bulgaria was weakened by wars with Magyars and Pechenegs and the spread of Bogomilism. Simeon's successor Peter I (r.927–969) negotiated a favourable peace treaty. The Byzantines agreed to recognize him as Emperor of Bulgaria and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church as an independent Patriarchate, as well as to pay an annual tribute. The peace was reinforced with a marriage between Peter and Romanos's granddaughter Irene Lekapene. This agreement ushered in a period of 40 years of peaceful relations between the two powers. During the first years of his reign, Peter I faced revolts by two of his three brothers, John in 928 and Michael in 930, but both were quelled. During most of the reign of Emperor Peter I, the empire enjoyed a period of political consolidation, economic expansion, and cultural activity.
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Preslav was seized by the Byzantine army in 971 after consecutive Rus' and Byzantine invasions. The empire briefly recovered from the attacks under Samuil, but this ended when Byzantine emperor Basil II defeated the Bulgarian army at Klyuch in 1014. Samuil died shortly after the battle, and by 1018 the Byzantines had conquered the First Bulgarian Empire. After the conquest, Basil II prevented revolts by retaining the rule of local nobility, integrating them in Byzantine bureaucracy and aristocracy, and relieving their lands of the obligation to pay taxes in gold, allowing tax in kind instead. The Bulgarian Patriarchate was reduced to an archbishopric, but retained its autocephalous status and its dioceses.
Second Bulgarian Empire.
Byzantine domestic policies changed after Basil's death and a series of unsuccessful rebellions broke out, the largest being led by Peter Delyan. The empire's authority declined after a catastrophic military defeat at Manzikert against Seljuk invaders, and was further disturbed by the Crusades. This prevented Byzantine attempts at Hellenisation and created fertile ground for further revolt. In 1185, Asen dynasty nobles Ivan Asen I and Peter IV organised a major uprising and succeeded in re-establishing the Bulgarian state. Ivan Asen and Peter laid the foundations of the Second Bulgarian Empire with its capital at Tarnovo.
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Kaloyan, the third of the Asen monarchs, extended his dominion to Belgrade and Ohrid. He acknowledged the spiritual supremacy of the pope and received a royal crown from a papal legate. The empire reached its zenith under Ivan Asen II (1218–1241), when its borders expanded as far as the coast of Albania, Serbia and Epirus, while commerce and culture flourished. Ivan Asen's rule was also marked by a shift away from Rome in religious matters.
The Asen dynasty became extinct in 1257. Internal conflicts and incessant Byzantine and Hungarian attacks followed, enabling the Mongols to establish suzerainty over the weakened Bulgarian state. In 1277, swineherd Ivaylo led a great peasant revolt that expelled the Mongols from Bulgaria and briefly made him emperor. He was overthrown in 1280 by the feudal landlords, whose factional conflicts caused the Second Bulgarian Empire to disintegrate into small feudal dominions by the 14th century. These fragmented rump states—two tsardoms at Vidin and Tarnovo and the Despotate of Dobrudzha—became easy prey for a new threat arriving from the Southeast: the Ottoman Turks. During the reign of Emperor Ivan Alexander (1331–1371), the Bulgarian Empire entered a period of cultural revival, sometimes called the "Second Golden Age" of the empire. Bulgarian architecture, arts, and literature spread beyond the borders of Bulgaria into Serbia, Wallachia, Moldavia, and the Rus' Principalities and affected Slavic culture.
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Ottoman rule.
The Ottomans were employed as mercenaries by the Byzantines in the 1340s, but later became invaders in their own right. Sultan Murad I took Adrianople from the Byzantines in 1362; Sofia fell in 1382, followed by Shumen in 1388. The Ottomans completed their conquest of Bulgarian lands in 1393 when Tarnovo was sacked after a three-month siege and the Battle of Nicopolis which brought about the fall of the Vidin Tsardom in 1396. Sozopol was the last Bulgarian settlement to fall, in 1453. The Bulgarian nobility was subsequently eliminated and the peasantry was enserfed to Ottoman masters, while much of the educated clergy fled to other countries.
Bulgarians were subjected to heavy taxes (including Devshirme, or "blood tax"), their culture was suppressed, and they experienced partial Islamisation. Ottoman authorities established a religious administrative community called the Rum Millet, which governed all Orthodox Christians regardless of their ethnicity. Most of the local population then gradually lost its distinct national consciousness, identifying only by its faith. The clergy remaining in some isolated monasteries kept their ethnic identity alive, enabling its survival in remote rural areas, and in the militant Catholic community in the northwest of the country.
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As Ottoman power began to wane, Habsburg Austria and Russia saw Bulgarian Christians as potential allies. The Austrians first backed an uprising in Tarnovo in 1598, then a second one in 1686, the Chiprovtsi Uprising in 1688 and finally Karposh's rebellion in 1689. The Russian Empire also asserted itself as a protector of Christians in Ottoman lands with the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca in 1774.
The Western European Enlightenment in the 18th century influenced the initiation of a national awakening of Bulgaria. It restored national consciousness and provided an ideological basis for the liberation struggle, resulting in the April Uprising of 1876. Up to 30,000 Bulgarians were killed as Ottoman authorities put down the rebellion. The massacres prompted the Great Powers to take action. They convened the Constantinople Conference in 1876, but their decisions were rejected by the Ottomans. This allowed the Russian Empire to seek a military solution without risking confrontation with other Great Powers, as had happened in the Crimean War. In 1877, Russia declared war on the Ottomans and defeated them with the help of Bulgarian rebels, particularly during the crucial Battle of Shipka Pass which secured Russian control over the main road to Constantinople.
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Third Bulgarian state.
The Treaty of San Stefano was signed on 3 March 1878 by Russia and the Ottoman Empire. It was to set up an autonomous Bulgarian principality spanning Moesia, Macedonia and Thrace, roughly on the territories of the Second Bulgarian Empire, and this day is now a public holiday called National Liberation Day. The other Great Powers immediately rejected the treaty out of fear that such a large country in the Balkans might threaten their interests. It was superseded by the Treaty of Berlin, signed on 13 July. It provided for a much smaller state, the Principality of Bulgaria, only comprising Moesia and the region of Sofia, and leaving large populations of ethnic Bulgarians outside the new country. This significantly contributed to Bulgaria's militaristic foreign affairs approach during the first half of the 20th century.
The Bulgarian principality won a war against Serbia and incorporated the semi-autonomous Ottoman territory of Eastern Rumelia in 1885, proclaiming itself an independent state on 5 October 1908. In the years following independence, Bulgaria increasingly militarised and was often referred to as "the Balkan Prussia". It became involved in three consecutive conflicts between 1912 and 1918—two Balkan Wars and World War I. After a disastrous defeat in the Second Balkan War, Bulgaria again found itself fighting on the losing side as a result of its alliance with the Central Powers in World War I. Despite fielding more than a quarter of its population in a 1,200,000-strong army and achieving several decisive victories at Doiran and Monastir, the country capitulated in 1918. The war resulted in significant territorial losses and a total of 87,500 soldiers killed. More than 253,000 refugees from the lost territories immigrated to Bulgaria from 1912 to 1929, placing additional strain on the already ruined national economy.
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Between 19 October 1925 and 29 October 1925, the Incident at Petrich, nicknamed "the War of the Stray Dog" occurred, which was a minor armed conflict. Greece invaded Bulgaria, after the killing of a Greek captain and sentry by Bulgarian soldiers. The conflict was settled by the League of Nations, and resulted in a Bulgarian diplomatic victory. The League ordered a ceasefire, Greek troops to withdraw from Bulgaria and Greece to pay £45,000 to Bulgaria.
The resulting political unrest led to the establishment of a royal authoritarian dictatorship by Tsar Boris III (1918–1943). Bulgaria entered World War II in 1941 as a member of the Axis but declined to participate in Operation Barbarossa and saved its Jewish population from deportation to concentration camps. The sudden death of Boris III in mid-1943 pushed the country into political turmoil as the war turned against Germany, and the communist guerrilla movement gained momentum. The government of Bogdan Filov subsequently failed to achieve peace with the Allies. Bulgaria did not comply with Soviet demands to expel German forces from its territory, resulting in a declaration of war and an invasion by the USSR in September 1944. The communist-dominated Fatherland Front took power, ended participation in the Axis and joined the Allied side until the war ended. Bulgaria suffered little war damage and the Soviet Union demanded no reparations. But all wartime territorial gains, with the notable exception of Southern Dobrudzha, were lost.
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The left-wing coup d'état of 9 September 1944 led to the abolition of the monarchy and the executions of some 1,000–3,000 dissidents, war criminals, and members of the former royal elite. But it was not until 1946 that a one-party people's republic was instituted following a referendum. It fell into the Soviet sphere of influence under the leadership of Georgi Dimitrov (1946–1949), who established a repressive, rapidly industrialising Stalinist state. By the mid-1950s, standards of living rose significantly and political repression eased. The Soviet-style planned economy saw some experimental market-oriented policies emerging under Todor Zhivkov (1954–1989). Compared to wartime levels, national GDP increased five-fold and per capita GDP quadrupled by the 1980s, although severe debt spikes took place in 1960, 1977 and 1980. Zhivkov's daughter Lyudmila bolstered national pride by promoting Bulgarian heritage, culture and arts worldwide. Facing declining birth rates among the ethnic Bulgarian majority, Zhivkov's government in 1984 forced the minority ethnic Turks to adopt Slavic names in an attempt to erase their identity and assimilate them. These policies resulted in the emigration of some 300,000 ethnic Turks to Turkey.
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