The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenian
people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. At the
orders of Talaat Pasha, an estimated 800,000 to 1,200,000 Armenian
women, children, and elderly or infirm people were sent on death marches
to the Syrian Desert in 1915 and 1916. Driven forward by paramilitary
escorts, the deportees were deprived of food and water and subjected to
robberies, rapes, and massacres. In the desert, the survivors were
dispersed into concentration camps. In 1916 another wave of massacres
was ordered, leaving about 200,000 deportees alive by the end of 1916.
Around 100,000 to 200,000 Armenian women and children were forcibly
converted to Islam and integrated into Muslim households. The Turkish
nationalist movement carried out massacres and ethnic cleansing of
survivors during the Turkish War of Independence after World War I.
The Armenian genocide destroyed more than two millennia of Armenian
civilization in eastern Anatolia.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_genocide>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1866:
German composer Max Bruch conducted the premiere of his first
violin concerto, which later became his most famous work.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violin_Concerto_No._1_%28Bruch%29>
1922:
The first portion of the Imperial Wireless Chain, a strategic
international wireless telegraphy communications network created to link
the countries of the British Empire, opened.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Wireless_Chain>
1932:
An estimated 400 ramblers committed a wilful mass trespass of
Kinder Scout in the Peak District to highlight the denial of access to
areas of open country in England.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_trespass_of_Kinder_Scout>
1965:
Cold War: The Dominican Civil War broke out due to tensions
following a military coup against the democratically elected government
of President Juan Bosch two years earlier.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominican_Civil_War>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
loath:
1. Averse, disinclined; reluctant, unwilling.
2. (obsolete) Angry, hostile.
3. (obsolete) Loathsome, unpleasant.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/loath>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as
little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same
is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoso shall receive one such
little child in my name receiveth me. But whoso shall offend one of
these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a
millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the
depth of the sea. Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must
needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence
cometh!
--Gospel of Matthew
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Matthew>