Every year since 2000, La Poste France has issued a Valentine series created by various fashion designers (the exception being in 2002). Besides Saint Laurent, designs by Christian Lacroix, Torrente, Chanel, Cacharel, Jean-Louis Scherrer, Givenchy, Franck Sorbier, Ungaro, Lanvin, Maurizio Galante and Hermes, to mention just a few, have been released.
His great encyclopaedic work Kitāb al-Shifā' (The Book of Healing) is an original compendium of these diverse disciplines. Avicenna distinguished himself in several areas, namely metaphysics, by elaborating the concepts of possible, necessary, essence and existence, influenced by Islamic theology, thereby creating a metaphysical system that would have a major impact on Western philosophy, particularly on St. Thomas Aquinas, and throughout the medieval and early modern philosophy, in its reflection on existence and that which exists. Avicenna also developed a detailed theory on the faculties of the soul, specifically the human soul, with a highly developed theory of subjectivity.Shown here La Poste France stamp and explanatory folder on Avicenna and his scholarly works and contributions to humanity.
The 'Mona Lisa' is believed to have been Lisa del Giocondo, a member of the Gherardini family of Florence and Tuscany, and wife of wealthy Florentine silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo. The painting is thought to have been commissioned for their new home, and to celebrate the birth of their second son, Andrea. The Italian name for the painting, La Gioconda, means 'jocund' ('happy' or 'jovial') or, literally, 'the jocund one', a pun on the feminine form of Lisa's married name, Giocondo
The Kathiri State of Seiyun in Hadhramaut was a part of Britain’s Aden Protectorate until 1967. The Kathiris once ruled much of Hadhramaut, but their power was truncated by the rival Qu’aitis in the 19th and 20th centuries, losing Al-Mukalla in the late 19th century process. The Kathiris were eventually restricted to a small inland portion of Hadhramaut with their capital at Seiyun (Say’un). The sultanate entered into treaty relations with the British in 1888 and became a part of the Aden Protectorate.
The Kathiri State declined to join the Federation of South Arabia, but remained under British protection as part of the Protectorate of South Arabia. Al-Husayn ibn Ali, Kathiri sultan since 1949, was overthrown in October 1967, and the following month the former sultanate became part of newly independent South Yemen. South Yemen united with North Yemen in 1990 to become the Republic of Yemen.
Tianwen-1 was a China National Space Administration (CNSA) mission to send a robotic spacecraft to Mars that consisted of 5 spacecraft: an orbiter, deployable camera, lander, drop camera, and the Zhurong rover.
The mission's scientific objectives included investigation of the Martian surface geology and internal structure, search for indications of current and past presence of water, and characterization of the space environment and the atmosphere of Mars.
The mission was launched from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site on 23 July 2020 on a Long March 5 heavy-lift launch vehicle. After seven months of transit through the inner Solar System, the spacecraft entered Martian orbit on 10 February 2021.
On 22 May 2021, the Zhurong rover drove onto the Martian surface via the descent ramps on the landing platform. With the successful deployment of the rover, China became the second nation to accomplish this feat, after the United States, as well as the first nation to orbit, land and release a rover during its first foray into Martian space.
Most people know Hedy Lemarr as a screen goddess from the golden era of cinema, but she was also a highly gifted inventor whose pioneering inventions are still being used. Together with the American composer George Antheil, in 1942, she devised the frequency hopping technique for the Allies that could be used to steer torpedoes. Switching between frequencies made radio signals difficult to locate and secure against interference. Whilst the complex process was not used by the U.S. during World War II, it became the basis for modern communications technologies like Bluetooth, WLAN and GSM.
In 1997, Lamarr and Antheil were awarded an Electronic Frontier Pioneer Award for their invention. In 2014, Hedy Lamarr was posthumously given a place in the National Inventors Hall of Fame in the U.S.
The 1895 radio depicted on this stamp is on exhibit at the A.S. Popov Central Museum of Communications named after him. The maxi card is one of only 10 printed and shows the Russian Physicochemical Society meeting when Popov first presented his invention.
One of the reasons why Marconi gets the credit and Popov doesn’t is that Marconi was much more savvy about intellectual property. One of the best ways to preserve your place in history is to secure patents and publish your research findings in a timely way. Popov did neither. He never pursued a patent for his lightning detector, and there is no official record of his 24 March 1896 demonstration. He eventually abandoned radio to turn his attention to the newly discovered Röntgen waves, also known as X-rays.
Marconi, on the other hand, filed for a British patent on 2 June 1896, which became the first application for a patent in radiotelegraphy. He quickly raised capital to commercialize his system, built up a vast industrial enterprise, and went on to be known—outside of Russia—as the inventor of radio.
His writings included: “The Deer and Shalashovka” (1954), “The Road” (1952), “In the First Circle” (1958), “The GULAG Archipelago” (1968), “One Day by Ivan Denisovich” (1959), “ Matryonin Yard ”and“ The Case at Krechetovka Station ”(1963),“ Cancer Building ”(1966),“ Red Wheel ”(1969–2000).
This is rather ironic considering that in 1945 Solzhenitsyn was arrested and sentenced to 8 years in various Soviet gulags for writing derogatory comments in private letters to a friend about the conduct of the war by Joseph Stalin. He also had talks with the same friend about the need for a new organisation to replace the Soviet regime.
The maxi card here features Solzhenitsyn with former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. A postage stamp depicts a portrait of Solzhenitsyn and a gulag observation tower in Matryonin Yard. Only 10 maxi cards with this stamp were printed.
On a side note, the progressive rock group, Renaissance, recorded a song about Solzhenitsyn called "Mother Russia".
The MiG-29 was a fourth-generation Soviet multi-role fighter developed at the MiG Design Bureau. According to NATO classification, the MiG-29 received the designation "Fulcrum-A".
MiG-29 export modifications were created with a more simplified avionics, excluding the possibility of delivering a nuclear charge -- the MiG-29A model (for the air forces of the Warsaw Treaty parties and the MiG-29B (for other countries).
