title: Horse meat

text: In Belgium, horse meat ( in Dutch and in French) is popular in a number of preparations. Lean, smoked, and sliced horse meat fillet ( or ; in French) is served as a cold cut with sandwiches or as part of a cold salad. Horse steaks can be found in most butchers and are used in a variety of preparations. The city of Vilvoorde has a few restaurants specialising in dishes prepared with horse meat. Horse sausage is a well-known local specialty in Lokeren (Lokerse paardenworst) and Dendermonde with European recognition. Smoked or dried horse/pork meat sausage, similar to salami, is sold in a square shape to be distinguished from pork and/or beef sausages. A Flemish region around the Rupel River is also famous for a horse stew named , made out of shoulder chuck (or similar cuts), brown ale, onions, and mustard. is typically served with fries, mayonnaise, and a salad of raw Belgian endive. Horse fat is highly rated for making french fries, though rarely used nowadays.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is served in some restaurants in Bulgaria, as the preferred way of consuming it is in the form of steaks and burgers. Still being far from a meat for mass consumption, horse meat is regaining its popularity, which it had in the '60s and '70s of the past century, when it was also consumed in sausages and "tartare".


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is available in butcher shops and shops specializing in meats but it can sometimes be found in supermarkets, especially in ground form. The most common way to eat horse meat is in sausage form, especially ("Mettwurst"), a cured and smoked sausage which often contains pork, beef and horse meat. Finns consume around 400g of horse meat per person per year and the country produces around 300–400 thousand tons of meat per year, while importing around 1.5 million kilograms per year from countries like Canada, Mexico or Argentina. No horses are bred for meat production and there are stringent laws against using meat from a horse that has been medicated or injected with antibiotics. Using meat from a horse that has been treated with non-equine medicine or has not been inspected by a veterinarian is banned outright.


title: Horse meat

text: In France, specialized butcher shops () sell horse meat, as ordinary butcher shops were for a long time forbidden to deal in it. However, since the 1990s, it can be found in supermarket butcher shops and others.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat was eaten in large amounts during the 1870 Siege of Paris, when it was included in "haute cuisine" menus.


title: Horse meat

text: Although no taboo comparable to that in the English-speaking world exists, German law used to proscribe that horse meat be sold only by specialized butchers (). This proscription was abolished in 1993, but only a small minority of ordinary butchers have since begun to sell horse meat. , most horse meat was still sold by the specialists, some of whom also delivered by mail order.


title: Horse meat

text: Many regions of Germany have traditional recipes that include horse meat. In the Rhineland around Cologne and Düsseldorf, restaurants often offer the traditional "Sauerbraten" in horse meat, typically with a beef variant to choose from. Other traditional horse meat dishes include the Swabian (a joint of roast meat prepared similarly to roast beef), Bavarian sausage varieties such as and as well as , a meatloaf dish.


title: Horse meat

text: The 2013 meat adulteration scandal started when German authorities detected horse meat in prepared food products including frozen lasagna, where it was declared fraudulently as beef. The mislabeling prompted EU authorities to speed up publication of European Commission recommendations for labeling the origin of all processed meat.


title: Horse meat

text: In Hungary, horse meat is primarily used in salami and sausages, usually mixed with pork, but also in goulashes and other stews. These products are sold in most supermarkets and many butcher shops.


title: Horse meat

text: In Iceland, horse meat is both eaten minced and as steak, also used in stews and fondue, prized for its strong flavor. It has a particular role in the culture and history of the island. The people of Iceland supposedly were reluctant to embrace Christianity for some time largely over the issue of giving up horse meat after Pope Gregory III banned horse meat consumption in 732 AD, as it was a major part of many pagan rites and sacrifice in Northern Europe. Horse meat consumption was banned when the pagan Norse Icelanders eventually adopted Christianity in 1000 AD/Common Era. The ban became so ingrained that most people would not handle horse meat, let alone consume it. Even during harsh famines in the 18th century, most people would not eat horse meat, and those who did were castigated. In 1757, the ban was decriminalised, but general distaste for horse meat lasted well into the 19th century, possibly longer, and its consumption often regarded as an indication of poverty. Even today horse meat is not popular (3.2% of Iceland’s meat production in 2015), although this has more to do with culinary tradition and the popularity of equestrianism than any religious vestiges.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is especially popular in Lombardy, Apulia, the Veneto, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, Parma, and the islands of Sardinia and Sicily.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is used in a variety of recipes: as a stew called (typical of Verona), served as steaks, as "carpaccio", or made into "bresaola". Thin strips of horse meat called are popular. Horse fat is used in recipes such as "". Horse meat sausages and salamis are traditional in various places. In Sardinia, or and for horse meat) is one of the most renowned meats and sometimes is sold from kiosks with bread - also in the town of Sassari is a long tradition of eating horse steaks ( in the local dialect). Chefs and consumers tend to prize its uniqueness by serving it as rare as possible. Donkey is also cooked, for example as a stew called and as meat for sausages e.g. . The cuisine of Parma features a horse meat "tartare" called , as well as various cooked dishes.


title: Horse meat

text: In Veneto, the consumption of horse meat dates back to at least 1000 BC/BCE to the Adriatic Veneti, renowned for their horse-breeding skills. They were used to sacrifice horses to their goddess Reitia or to the mythical hero Diomedes. Throughout the classical period, Veneto established itself as a centre for horse breeding in Italy; Venetian horses were provided for the cavalry and carriage of the Roman legions, with the white Venetic horses becoming famous among Greeks and Romans as one of the best breeds for circus racing. As well as breeding horses for military and farming applications, the Venetics also used them for consumption throughout the Roman period, a practice that established the consumption of horse meat as a tradition in Venetian cuisine. In the modern age, horse meat is considered a luxury item and is widely available through supermarkets and butcheries, with some specialised butcheries offering only selected cuts of equine meat. Prices are usually higher than beef, pork, or any other kind of meat, except game.


title: Horse meat

text: In the Province of Padua, horse meat is a key element of the local cuisine, particularly in the area that extends southeast from the city, historically called Saccisica. Specialties based on horse meat constitute the main courses and best attractions of several typical restaurants in the zone. They are also served among other regional delicacies at the food stands of many local festivals, related to civil and religious anniversaries. Most notable is the , held annually in the small town of Legnaro and totally dedicated to horses, included their consumption for food.


title: Horse meat

text: In southern Italy, horse meat is commonly eaten everywhere - especially in the region of Apulia, where it is considered a delicacy. It is a vital part of the () in Bari and of the Pezzetti di cavallo, a stew with tomato sauce, vegetables and chili, popular in Salento.


title: Horse meat

text: According to British food writer Matthew Fort, "The taste for donkey and horse goes back to the days when these animals were part of everyday agricultural life. In the frugal, unsentimental manner of agricultural communities, all the animals were looked on as a source of protein. Waste was not an option."


title: Horse meat

text: In Malta, horse meat () is seared and slowly cooked for hours in either tomato or red wine sauce. A few horse meat shops still exist and it is still served in some restaurants.


title: Horse meat

text: In the Netherlands, smoked horse meat () is sold as sliced meat and eaten on bread. , a southern Dutch stew, is made with horse meat as main ingredient. There are also beef-based variants. Horse meat is also used in sausages ( and "frikandel"), fried fast food snacks and ready-to-eat soups.


title: Horse meat

text: In pre-Christian Norway, horse was seen as an expensive animal. To eat a horse was to show one had great wealth, and to sacrifice a horse to the gods was seen as the greatest gift one could give. When Norwegians adopted Christianity, horse-eating became taboo as it was a religious act for pagans, thus it was considered a sign of heresy.


title: Horse meat

text: Older horses are often exported on the hoof to Italy to be slaughtered. This practice is considered controversial. Horses in Poland are treated mostly as companions, and the majority of Poles are against live export for slaughter. Poland has a tradition of eating horse meat (e.g., sausage or steak "tartare".) The consumption of horse meat was highest at times when other meat was scarce, such as during the Second World War and the communist period that followed it.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is generally available in Serbia, though mostly shunned in traditional cuisine. It is, however, often recommended by general practitioners to persons who suffer from anemia. It is available to buy at three green markets in Belgrade, a market in Niš, and in several cities in ethnically mixed Vojvodina, where Hungarian and previously German traditions brought the usage.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is generally available in Slovenia, and is highly popular in the traditional cuisine, especially in the central region of Carniola and in the Karst region. Colt steak () is also highly popular, especially in Slovenia's capital Ljubljana, where it is part of the city's traditional regional cuisine. In Ljubljana, many restaurants sell burgers and meat that contain large amounts of horse meat, including a fast-food chain called Hot' Horse.


title: Horse meat

text: "Cecina" is a cured meat made from beef or horse, and is considered a delicacy. Foal meat () is preferred over horse meat for this purpose. Horse meat is easily found in supermarkets, and usually prepared as a stew or as steak. A common practice is to serve horse meat to anemic children. Although no generalized taboo exists in Spain, consumption of horse meat is minor, compared to that of pork, beef, or lamb.


title: Horse meat

text: Smoked, cured horse meat is widely available as a cold cut under the name (literally hamburger meat). It tends to be very thinly sliced and fairly salty, slightly reminiscent of deli-style ham, and as a packaged meat, may list horse meat (as ) as its primary ingredient. Several varieties of smoked sausage made from horse meat, including , are also quite popular, especially in the province of Dalarna, where they are produced. , similar to salami or "metworst", may substitute for those meats in sandwiches.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is widely available and consumed in Switzerland, where no taboo exists regarding it. The laws on foodstuffs of animal origin in Switzerland explicitly list equines as an animal type allowed for the production of food.


title: Horse meat

text: In the United Kingdom, the slaughter, preparation, and consumption of horses for food is not against the law, although it has been rare since the 1930s, and horse meat is not generally available. A cultural taboo against consuming horse meat exists in the UK, although it was eaten when other meats were scarce, such as during times of war, as was whale meat, which similarly failed to achieve popularity. The sale of meat labelled as horse meat in UK supermarkets and butchers is minimal, and most actual horse meat consumed in the UK is imported from continental Europe, predominantly from the south of France, where it is more widely eaten.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat may be eaten without the knowledge of the consumer, due to accidental or fraudulent introduction of horse meat into human food. A 2003 Food Standards Agency investigation revealed that certain sausages, salami, and similar products such as chorizo and pastrami sometimes contained horse meat without it being listed, although listing is legally required. The 2013 horse meat scandal involved multiple products being recalled from shelves due to unlabelled horse meat in amounts up to 100% of the meat content.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat was featured in a segment of a 2007 episode of the Gordon Ramsay series "The F Word". In the segment, Janet Street-Porter convinced locals to try horse meat, though not before facing controversy and being forced to move her stand to a privately owned location. The meat was presented as having a similar taste to beef, but with less fat, a high concentration of omega-3 fatty acids, and as a safer alternative in times of worry regarding bird flu and mad cow disease. The segment was met with skepticism from many viewers after broadcast for various reasons, either because some felt the practice was cruel and against social norms, or simply a belief that if the taste was really on par with other meats, then people would already be eating it. A company called Cowley's Fine Foods has also launched a horse jerky range called My Brittle Pony. Their Twitter account @MY Brittle Pony, states that they are "Determined to make horse a stable part of the British diet.


title: Horse meat

text: A thriving horse meat business exists in Quebec; the meat is available in most supermarket chains there. Horse meat is also for sale at the other end of the country, in Granville Island Market in downtown Vancouver, where according to a "Time" reviewer who smuggled it into the United States, it turned out to be a "sweet, rich, superlean, oddly soft meat, closer to beef than venison". Horse meat is also available in high-end Toronto butchers and supermarkets. Aside from the heritage of French cuisine at one end of the country, most of Canada shares the horse meat taboo with the rest of the English-speaking world. This mentality is especially evident in Alberta, where strong horse racing and breeding industries and cultures have existed since the province's founding, although large numbers of horses are slaughtered for meat in Fort MacLeod, and certain butchers in Calgary do sell it.


title: Horse meat

text: In 2013, the consumer protection show "Kassensturz" of Swiss television SRF reported the poor animal conditions at Bouvry Exports, a Canadian horse meat farm in Fort MacLeod, Alberta. Migros, the primary importer of horse meat into Switzerland, started working with Bouvry to improve their animal welfare, but in 2015 Migros cut ties with Bouvry because though improvements had been made, they had not improved sufficiently. Migros had "set itself the ambitious goal of bringing all suppliers abroad up to the strict Swiss standards by 2020."


title: Horse meat

text: CBC News reported on March 10, 2013, that horse meat was also popular among some segments of Toronto's population.


title: Horse meat

text: Horse meat is generally not eaten in the United States, and is banned in many states across the country. It holds a taboo in American culture very similar to the one found in the United Kingdom. All horse meat produced in the United States since the 1960s (until the last quarter of 2007) was intended solely for export abroad, primarily to the European Union. However, a thriving horse exportation business is going on in several states, including Texas, primarily exporting horses to slaughterhouses in either Canada or Mexico.


title: Horse meat

text: Restriction of human consumption of horse meat in the U.S. has generally involved legislation at local, state, and federal levels. Several states have enacted legislation either prohibiting the sale of horse meat or banning altogether the slaughter of horses.


title: Horse meat

text: California Proposition 6 (1998) was passed by state voters, outlawing the possession, transfer, reception, or holding any horse, pony, burro, or mule by a person who is aware that it will be used for human consumption, and making the slaughter of horses or the sale of horse meat for human consumption a misdemeanor offense.


title: Horse meat

text: In 2007, the Illinois General Assembly enacted Public Act 95-02, amending Chapter 225, Section 635 of the state's compiled statutes to prohibit both the act of slaughtering equines for human consumption and the trade of any horse meat similarly to Texas Agriculture Code's Chapter 149.


title: Horse meat

text: Other states banning horse slaughter or the sale of horse meat include New Jersey, Oklahoma, and Mississippi. In addition, several other states introduced legislation to outlaw the practice over the years, such as Florida, Massachusetts, New Mexico, and New York.


title: Horse meat

text: At the federal level, since 2001, several bills have been regularly introduced in both the House and Senate to ban horse slaughter throughout the country without success. However, a budgetary provision banning the use of federal funds to carry out mandatory inspections at horse slaughter plants (necessary to allow interstate sale and exports of horse meat) has also been in place since 2007. This restriction was temporarily removed in 2011 as part of the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2012 but was again included in the FY2014 Agriculture Appropriations Act and subsequent federal budgets, hence preventing the operation of any domestic horse slaughter operation.


title: Horse meat

text: Until 2007, only three horse meat slaughterhouses still existed in the United States for export to foreign markets, but they were closed by court orders resulting from the upholding of aforementioned Illinois and Texas statutes banning horse slaughter and the sale of horse meat.


title: Horse meat

text: The taboo surrounding horse meat in the United States received national attention again in May 2017 when a restaurant in the Lawrenceville section of Pittsburgh served a dish containing horse tartare as part of a special event the restaurant was hosting with French Canadian chefs as guests. The restaurant, which otherwise does not serve horse meat (which is legal to serve and consume in Pennsylvania), received an inspection and a warning from the USDA not to serve horse meat again. A Change.org petition subsequently went up to advocate making serving horse meat illegal in Pennsylvania.


title: Horse meat

text: From the 1920s and through the 1950s or 1960s, and with a brief rationing hiccup during WWII, horse meat was canned and sold as dog food by many different companies under many different brands, most notably by Ken-L Ration. The popularity of horse meat as dog food became so popular that by the 1930s, over 50,000 horses were bred and slaughtered each year to keep up with this specific demand.


title: Horse meat

text: As of 2005, Mexico was the second-largest producer of horse meat in the world. By 2009, it became the largest producer of horse meat in the world. It is only exported as it is not used or consumed in Mexico.


title: Horse meat

text: Argentina is a producer and exporter of horse meat, but it is not used in local consumption and is considered taboo.


title: Horse meat

text: In Chile, it is used in "charqui". Also in Chile, horse meat became the main source of nutrition for the nomadic indigenous tribes, which promptly switched from a guanaco-based economy to a horse-based one after the horses brought by the Spaniards bred naturally and became feral.


title: Horse meat

text: Although not nearly as common as beef meat, horse meat can be readily available in some butcheries throughout the country. It is generally less expensive than beef and somewhat associated with lower social strata.


title: Horse meat

text: In Uruguay horses are appreciated for their companionship and horse meat shouldn't be consumed, as it constitutes a taboo that dates back from Spaniard ancestry at colony times. There's a saying that preaches: "a lomo de caballo criollo se hizo la patria" (on criollo horse back the nation was made). However the country produces horse meat to be exported to France and China. Also a common belief is that horse meat is locally used to make salami. Slaughtering horses are fierce untamed colts.


title: Familiar

text: In European folklore of the medieval and early modern periods, familiars (sometimes referred to as familiar spirits) were believed to be supernatural entities that would assist witches and cunning folk in their practice of magic. According to records of the time, those alleging to have had contact with familiar spirits reported that they could manifest as numerous forms, usually as an animal, but sometimes as a human or humanoid figure, and were described as "clearly defined, three-dimensional... forms, vivid with colour and animated with movement and sound", as opposed to descriptions of ghosts with their "smoky, undefined form[s]".


title: Familiar

text: When they served witches, they were often thought to be malevolent, but when working for cunning folk they were often considered benevolent (although there was some ambiguity in both cases). The former were often categorized as demons, while the latter were more commonly thought of and described as fairies. The main purpose of familiars was to serve the witch, providing protection for them as they came into their new powers.


title: Familiar

text: Since the 20th century some magical practitioners, including adherents of the Neopagan religion of Wicca, use the concept of familiars, due to their association with older forms of magic. These contemporary practitioners use pets or wildlife, or believe that invisible versions of familiars act as magical aides.


title: Familiar

text: Among those accused witches and cunning-folk who described their familiar spirits, there were commonly certain unifying features. The historian Emma Wilby noted how the accounts of such familiars were striking for their "ordinariness" and "naturalism", despite the fact that they were dealing with supernatural entities.


title: Familiar

text: Familiar spirits were most commonly small animals, such as cats, rats, dogs, ferrets, birds, frogs, toads and hares. There were also cases of wasps and butterflies, as well as pigs, sheep and horses. Familiar spirits were usually kept in pots or baskets lined with sheep's wool and fed a variety of things including, milk, bread, meat and blood.


title: Familiar

text: Familiar spirits usually had names and "were often given down-to-earth, and frequently affectionate, nicknames." One example of this was Tom Reid, who was the familiar of the cunning-woman and accused witch Bessie Dunlop, while other examples included Grizell and Gridigut, who were the familiars of 17th-century Huntingdonshire witch Jane Wallis.


title: Familiar

text: An agathion is a familiar spirit which appears in the shape of a human or an animal, or even within a talisman, bottle or magic ring. It is strongest at midday.


title: Familiar

text: Using her studies into the role of witchcraft and magic in Britain during the Early Modern period as a starting point, the historian Emma Wilby examined the relationship that familiar spirits allegedly had with the witches and cunning-folk in this period.


title: Familiar

text: In the British accounts from the early modern period at least, there were three main types of encounter narrative related to how a witch or cunning person first met their familiar. The first of these was that the spirit spontaneously appeared in front of the individual while they were going about their daily activities, either in their home or outdoors somewhere. Various examples for this are attested in the sources of the time, for instance, Joan Prentice from Essex, England, gave an account when she was interrogated for witchcraft in 1589 claiming that she was "alone in her chamber, and sitting upon a low stool preparing herself to bedward" when her familiar first appeared to her, while the Cornish cunning-woman Anne Jeffries related in 1645 that hers first appeared to her when she was "knitting in an arbour in our garden".


title: Familiar

text: The second manner in which the familiar spirit commonly appeared to magical practitioners in Britain was that they would be given to a person by a pre-existing individual, who was sometimes a family member and at other times a more powerful spirit. For instance, the alleged witch Margaret Ley from Liverpool claimed, in 1667, that she had been given her familiar spirit by her mother when she died, while the Leicestershire cunning-woman Joan Willimot related, in 1618, that a mysterious figure whom she only referred to as her "master", "willed her to open her mouth and he would blow into her a fairy which should do her good. And that she open her mouth, and that presently after blowing, there came out of her mouth a spirit which stood upon the ground in the shape and form of a woman."


title: Familiar

text: In a number of accounts, the cunning person or witch was experiencing difficulty prior to the appearance of the familiar, who offered to aid them. As historian Emma Wilby noted, "their problems... were primarily rooted in the struggle for physical survival—the lack of food or money, bereavement, sickness, loss of livelihood and so on", and the familiar offered them a way out of this by giving them magical powers.


title: Familiar

text: In some cases, the magical practitioner then made an agreement or entered a pact with their familiar spirit. The length of time that the witch or cunning person worked with their familiar spirit varied between a few weeks through to a number of decades. In most cases, the magical practitioner would conjure their familiar spirit when they needed their assistance, although there are many different ways that they did this: the Essex witch Joan Cunny claimed, in 1589, that she had to kneel down within a circle and pray to Satan for her familiar to appear while the Wiltshire cunning woman Anne Bodenham described, in 1653, that she conjured her familiars by methods learned from books. In some rarer cases there were accounts where the familiars would appear at times when they were unwanted and not called upon, for instance the Huntingdonshire witch Elizabeth Chandler noted, in 1646, that she could not control when her two familiars, named Beelzebub and Trullibub, appeared to her, and had prayed for a god to "deliver her therefrom". It was also believed that familiars “helped diagnose illnesses and the sources of bewitchment and were used for divining and finding lost objects and treasures. Magicians conjured them in rituals, then locked them in bottles, rings and stones. They sometimes sold them as charms, claiming the spirits would ensure success in gambling, love, business or whatever the customer wanted. This sort of familiar was technically not illegal; England’s Witchcraft Act of 1604 prohibited only evil and wicked spirits.”


title: Familiar

text: Familiars are most common in western European mythology, with some scholars arguing that familiars are only present in the traditions of Great Britain and France. In these areas, three categories of familiars are believed to exist:


title: Familiar

text: During the English Civil War, the Royalist general Prince Rupert was in the habit of taking his large poodle dog named Boy into battle with him. Throughout the war the dog was greatly feared among the Parliamentarian forces and credited with supernatural powers. As noted by Morgan, the dog was apparently considered a kind of familiar. At the end of the war the dog was shot, allegedly with a silver bullet.


title: Familiar

text: Most data regarding familiars comes from the transcripts of English and Scottish witch trials held during the 16th–17th centuries. The court system that labeled and tried witches was known as the Essex. The Essex trial of Agnes Sampson of Nether Keith, East Lothian in Scotland in 1590, presents prosecution testimony regarding a divinatory familiar. This case is fundamentally political, trying Sampson for high treason, and accusing Sampson for employing witchcraft against King James VI. The prosecution asserts Sampson called familiar spirits and resolved her doubtful matter. Another Essex trial is that of Hellen Clark, tried in 1645, in which Clark was compelled to state that the Devil appeared as a "familiar" in the form of a dog.


title: Familiar

text: The English court cases reflect a strong relationship between State's accusations of witchcraft against those who practiced ancient indigenous traditions, including the familiar animal or spirit.


title: Familiar

text: In some cases familiars replace children in the favour of their mothers. (See witchcraft and children.)


title: Familiar

text: In colonial America animal familiars can be seen in the witch hunts that took place in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Familiar spirits often appear in the visions of the afflicted girls. Although the 1648 law that defined a witch as one who "hath or consulteth with a familiar spirit" had been suspended ten years earlier, association with a familiar spirit was used in the Salem trials as evidence to convict suspected witches. Sarah Good was said to have a yellow bird who sucked between her fingers. Ann Putnam in particular was supposed to have frequently seen the yellow bird in her afflictions. Tituba was said to have seen strange animals that urged her to hurt children, which included a hog, a black dog, a red cat and a black cat. “During the Salem witch trials, there is little account of the practice of animal familiars, although one man was charged with encouraging a dog to attack by way of magical means. The dog, interestingly enough, was tried, convicted, and hanged.”


title: Familiar

text: The witch's mark added a sexual component to the familiar spirit and is often found in trial records as a way to convict a suspected witch. The mark was most commonly an extra teat found somewhere on the body and was suspected to be used to suckle the familiar spirits. An example of this can be seen in the Salem witch trials of 1692. For example, Ann Putnam told Martha Corey that, "There is a yellow burd a sucking between your fore finger and midel finger I see it."


title: Familiar

text: Recent scholarship on familiars exhibits the depth and respectability absent from earlier demonological approaches. The study of familiars has grown from an academic topic in folkloric journals to a general topic in popular books and journals incorporating anthropology, history and other disciplines. James Sharpe, in "The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft: the Western Tradition", states: "Folklorists began their investigations in the 19th Century [and] found that familiars figured prominently in ideas about witchcraft."


title: Familiar

text: In the first decades of the 20th century, familiars are identified as "niggets", which are "creepy-crawly things that witches kept all over them".


title: Clay Guida

text: Clayton Charles Guida (; born December 8, 1981) is an American professional mixed martial artist, currently signed to the UFC competing in the Lightweight division. A professional competitor since 2003, Guida also formerly competed for Strikeforce, the WEC, King of the Cage, and Shooto. Guida was the inaugural Strikeforce Lightweight Champion.


title: Clay Guida

text: Born and raised in Illinois into an Italian family, Guida began wrestling at the age of five and was a three-sport athlete at Johnsburg High School. He continued his wrestling career for Harper College, where he competed at 149 lbs. He is the younger brother of fellow mixed martial artist, Jason Guida.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida made his professional debut in the summer of 2003, losing via rear-naked choke in the first round. After compiling a record of 3-3, he then won his next 15 consecutive fights before losing via submission at a King of the Cage event in February 2006. Guida was then signed by Strikeforce and fought a month later against Josh Thomson for the Strikeforce Lightweight Championship. Guida won via unanimous decision, before losing to the then-undefeated Gilbert Melendez. After losing his next bout overseas in Japan via submission, Guida was signed by Zuffa and the WEC, making his promotional debut at WEC 23. He won via unanimous decision. With an overall record of 20-6, Guida was signed by the UFC.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida was successful in his UFC debut, submitting Justin James in the second round at UFC 64. The submission earned him the "Submission of the Night" award.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida garnered attention for his three-round split decision loss to Tyson Griffin at UFC 72. Both fighters were awarded the Fight of the Night bonus.


title: Clay Guida

text: At UFC 74 Guida rebounded from his two consecutive losses, taking a split decision over PRIDE veteran Marcus Aurélio.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida was defeated by Roger Huerta at The Ultimate Fighter 6 Finale via rear-naked choke in the 3rd round after clearly winning the first 2 rounds. Both fighters were awarded the Fight of the Night bonus.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida returned to his winning ways at UFC Fight Night 13, where he defeated UFC newcomer Samy Schiavo via TKO at 4:15 of the first round.


title: Clay Guida

text: In a bout at UFC Fight Night 15, he defeated Mac Danzig via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28).


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida defeated Ultimate Fighter winner Nate Diaz via split decision at UFC 94. Both fighters were awarded the Fight of the Night bonus.


title: Clay Guida

text: His next fight was against Diego Sanchez, at which he lost by split decision. The fight had a frantic pace in which Guida weathered a ferocious striking offensive from Sanchez, with a seemingly endless barrage of punches and a brutal headkick which dropped Guida in the first round. This bout went on to win "Fight of the Night" honors. The fight would later make #13 on the "100 Greatest UFC fights" list.


title: Clay Guida

text: Despite his status as an up-and-coming UFC fighter he was not included in the UFC 2009 Undisputed video game due to technical issues caused by his long hair. He was even offered $10,000 by Dana White to cut it, but he refused.


title: Clay Guida

text: On December 12, 2009 he fought Kenny Florian at UFC 107. In the second round of a bloody fight, Guida was dropped by a right hand and lost via rear-naked choke.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida was expected to face Sean Sherk on March 21, 2010 at , but Sherk was forced off the card with an injury. Shannon Gugerty stepped up to become Guida's new opponent on the preliminary section of the event. At Guida defeated Shannon Gugerty at 3:40 of round 2 by way of arm-triangle choke, ending Guida's two fight losing streak along with winning his first UFC "Submission of the Night" award.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida then faced Rafael dos Anjos on August 7, 2010 at UFC 117. Guida appeared to injure the jaw of dos Anjos in the first round with a hook and would go on to defeat dos Anjos by submission (jaw injury) after dos Anjos tapped from the pressure being applied to his jaw while Guida had head-and-arm control.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida defeated Takanori Gomi on January 1, 2011 at UFC 125 by submission due to a guillotine choke in round two, his third consecutive submission victory which also earned him "Submission of the Night" honors.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida next defeated former #1 Lightweight contender Anthony Pettis via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27) on June 4, 2011 at The Ultimate Fighter 13 Finale.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Benson Henderson on November 12, 2011 at UFC on Fox 1. Guida lost a hard fought decision after three rounds. Both fighters were awarded the Fight of the Night bonus.


title: Clay Guida

text: For his next fight, Guida moved down to the featherweight division and faced Hatsu Hioki on January 26, 2013 at . Despite being outstruck by Hioki for the majority of the fight, Guida was able to take Hioki down multiple times using a strong top game and avoid Hioki's submission attempts from the bottom. Guida defeated Hioki via split decision.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida was expected to face Chad Mendes on April 20, 2013 at UFC on Fox 7. However it was revealed on March 15 that Guida had pulled out of the bout citing an injury.


title: Clay Guida

text: A rescheduled bout with Mendes took place on August 31, 2013 at UFC 164. After a close first and second round, Guida was defeated by Mendes via TKO by punches, marking the first time ever in his career that he was finished by strikes.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Tatsuya Kawajiri at UFC Fight Night 39. He won the fight by unanimous decision, in a performance that earned both participants "Fight of the Night" honors.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Dennis Bermudez on July 26, 2014 at UFC on Fox 12. He lost the bout via submission in the second round.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Robbie Peralta on April 4, 2015 at UFC Fight Night 63. He won the fight by unanimous decision.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Thiago Tavares on November 7, 2015 at UFC Fight Night 77. He lost the fight due to a guillotine choke submission early in the first round.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida was expected to face Bobby Green on June 9, 2018 at UFC 225. However, Green pulled out of the bout, citing an injury and was replaced by Charles Oliveira Guida lost the fight via guillotine choke submission in the first round.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida next faced former two-division UFC champion B.J. Penn on May 11, 2019 at UFC 237. He won the fight via unanimous decision.


title: Clay Guida

text: On June 28, 2019 it was announced that the fight between Guida and Diego Sanchez at , where Sanchez defeat Guida by split decision, on June 20, 2009, will be honored to enter the UFC Hall of Fame during the international fight July 2019.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Jim Miller on August 3, 2019 at UFC on ESPN 5. He lost the fight via a technical submission due to a guillotine choke in the first minute of the first round.


title: Clay Guida

text: As the first fight of his new, four-fight contract Guida faced Michael Johnson on February 6, 2021 at UFC Fight Night 184. He won the fight via unanimous decision.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Leonardo Santos on December 4, 2021 at . Despite nearly being finished with knees and punches in round one, Guida came back and won the fight via rear-naked choke submission in round two. This win earned him the Performance of the Night award.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Claudio Puelles on April 23, 2022 at UFC Fight Night 205. He lost the fight via a kneebar in round one.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida faced Scott Holtzman on December 3, 2022 at UFC on ESPN 42. He won the fight via split decision.


title: Clay Guida

text: Clay Guida starred in a National commercial for SafeAuto Insurance. The commercial was filmed in Columbus, Ohio in April 2011. Guida is one of several fighters who represents the SafeAuto Fight Team.


title: Clay Guida

text: Guida is a fan of the Chicago Bears and Chicago Cubs. Guida is also a die hard Grateful Dead fan. He attended the GD50 Grateful Dead reunion shows.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Maria Sara Bartiromo (born September 11, 1967) is an American financial journalist, television personality, news anchor, and author. She is the host of "Mornings with Maria" and "Maria Bartiromo's Wall Street" on the Fox Business Network as well as "Sunday Morning Futures With Maria Bartiromo" on the Fox News Channel.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo worked at CNN as a producer for five years before joining CNBC in 1993, where she worked on-air for 20 years. With CNBC, she was the host of "Closing Bell" and "On the Money with Maria Bartiromo". She was the first television journalist to deliver live reports from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. She has won several awards for her work on these programs, including two Emmy Awards. Nicknamed the "Money Honey", she garnered considerable attention within the financial industry in addition to the media. Her work for CNBC was largely non-political in its subject matter and approach. She sits on the boards of a number of non-profit and civic organizations.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In 2013, she left CNBC to host shows for Fox Corporation channels. During the presidency of Donald Trump, she became an advocate for the Trump administration, giving him frequent unchallenging interviews and amplifying his conspiracy theories.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo was born to Italian-American parents Vincent and Josephine Bartiromo, and was raised in the Dyker Heights area of Brooklyn in New York City. Her father was the owner of the Rex Manor restaurant in Brooklyn and her mother served as the hostess seating guests. Her mother also worked as a clerk at an off-track betting parlor. Her mother's family was from Agrigento, Sicily, and immigrated to the U.S. in 1898. Her grandfather, Carmine Bartiromo, immigrated to the U.S. from Nocera in Campania in 1933, settling in New York and serving in the U.S. armed forces.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo attended Fontbonne Hall Academy, an all-girls private Catholic school in Bay Ridge. She worked at the same time as a coat check person in her father's restaurant and as a stock clerk at Kleinfeld's wedding dress shop. She was fired from the latter for trying on newly arrived dresses before putting them away; she recalled "I cried the whole way home, but I learned a valuable lesson and that is – do your job."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: During her college years she worked at the same betting parlor where her mother worked. She graduated from NYU's Washington Square Campus in 1989, with a Bachelor of Arts in journalism and economics.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: While at NYU she began with radio, and got an internship with talk host Barry Farber's show on WMCA 570 in New York after Farber visited a class she was in. Farber was impressed by her willingness and capability in doing behind-the-scenes tasks associated with the role. Following that, she interned at CNN.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: After her internship, which began in 1988/89, Bartiromo spent five years as an executive producer and assignment editor with CNN Business. Her supervisor at CNN was Lou Dobbs, who later became a colleague at Fox Business. She also worked as a production assistant for Stuart Varney there.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In 1993, Bartiromo was hired by executive Roger Ailes to replace analyst Roy Blumberg at CNBC, and began reporting live from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, as well as hosting and contributing to the "Market Watch" and "Squawk Box" segments. Bartiromo became the first journalist to deliver live television reports from the raucous floor of New York Stock Exchange. "The Guardian" newspaper described the scene as, "viewers could watch Bartiromo amid the tumult on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, straining her voice to be heard as she delivered reports to camera ..., her 5ft 5in frame [1.65m] often jostled by burly traders." She has said of that innovation: "I got bumped around a little, but it was very exciting — a new, instantaneous way of reporting market news. We immediately had a big following."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo was the anchor and managing editor of the CNBC business interview show "On the Money with Maria Bartiromo" (called "The Wall Street Journal Report" during much of this time). Beginning in 2007, she hosted "The Business of Innovation". She hosted several other programs, including "Closing Bell" (2002–2013), "Market Wrap" (1998–2000), and "Business Center" (1997–1999). She became known for ability to get CEOs of companies in the news to come on her show for an interview. She became influential, with the Financial Times calling her "the Sophia Loren of Wall Street."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo appeared on television shows such as NBC Universal's "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" and "Late Night with Conan O'Brien", CBS Television Distribution's "The Oprah Winfrey Show", HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher", Warner Bros. Television's short-lived "The Caroline Rhea Show", CNBC's even shorter-existing "McEnroe", and Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report", as well as guest-hosting on the syndicated "Live with Regis and Kelly".


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo was nicknamed the "Money Honey" in the mid-to-late 1990s, a moniker that she had conflicted feelings about lest it diminish her credibility as a financial journalist. In January 2007, Bartiromo filed trademark applications to use the term "Money Honey" as a brand name for a line of children's products, including toys, puzzles and coloring books, to teach kids about money. By some accounts she later let the trademarks expire.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo anchored the television coverage of New York City's Columbus Day Parade beginning in 1995 and was the Grand Marshal in 2010.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In 2006–07 there was controversy over Bartiromo possibly being too close socially to some of the executives she was covering, which included overseas trips with some such sources. In part, that was part and parcel of her role to add "pizazz and drama". As "The New York Times" wrote, "in her years as CNBC’s most recognizable face, [she] has lent to the reporting of once gray business news a veneer of gloss and celebrity." But the "Times" noted that: "Typically, Ms Bartiromo’s interviewing style can be probing, aggressive and, her special access notwithstanding, she can make even some of her best sources sweat a bit on camera." CNBC defended her on the matter, saying that trips in question were properly approved and that "her journalistic integrity was never compromised", and Bartiromo retained the confidence of NBC upper management.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Following the financial crisis of 2008, which featured the collapse of some Wall Street firms and the federal bailouts of others, Bartiromo commented in an interview: "I’m a free-market capitalist who would like to think that the market can correct itself. Unfortunately, the structures we have in place dropped the ball. The boards of directors were asleep at the wheel. So were the regulators. I believe that so-called independent boards of directors should be held accountable for their firms, too. Wall Street today faces the wrath of their shareholders and the scorn of the public. There’s got to be substantial change from within to regain public trust."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo signed a new five-year contract with CNBC in late 2008. Her salary there was around $4 million a year. Former colleague Dylan Ratigan has said that Bartiromo "is a generational icon for financial television. Full stop."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: On November 18, 2013, it was announced that Bartiromo was leaving CNBC to join Fox Business (FBN). According to the "Drudge Report", her deal with Fox Business called for her to anchor a daily market hours program and to have a role on Fox News as well. Her first show with Fox Business was "Opening Bell with Maria Bartiromo". But on her Fox shows she expanded the subject domains she was covering, to include not just the stock market but also larger questions of public policy and the overall economy.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Since her time with the Fox Business channel, the ratings for her show began to surge when she became an important news source for Trump supporters.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: The developments of the 2016 Republican presidential nomination race benefited her ratings, as she developed an on-air relationship with Trump.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In regard to the 2016 Republican Party presidential debates and forums, she was one of three moderators for Fox Business of the debate of November 10, 2015 at the Milwaukee Theatre and she and her colleagues were credited with keeping a focus on economics and for overseeing a largely civil discussion among the candidates. She even drew some boos from the audience for suggesting that likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton had much more relevant experience than the candidates on stage. She then co-hosted on Fox Business another Republican debate, this time on January 14, 2016 in the North Charleston Coliseum, one that was not previously planned but awarded on the basis of the first performance. One assessment of the North Charleston debate was that the moderators were initially mild but got tougher as the debate went on and delved more into matters economic.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: During the 2016 general election, she commented on the differing ways that Wall Street would react to either candidate winning. She received a good deal of attention during this period for her sartorial choices for the traditional Al Smith Dinner. But as the election ran on towards its conclusion, Bartiromo took an increasingly sharp pro-Trump stance, such as repeating trolling Internet posts attacking Clinton.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: After Trump became president in 2017, she became an advocate for the Trump administration, frequently repeating administration talking points. She also gave friendly, non-challenging softball interviews to Trump and amplified Trump administration conspiracy theories and falsehoods. In her Trump interviews, she expressed agreement with and did not question Trump's claims, many of which had been debunked as false or unsubstantiated. Making reference to allegations that Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, used the U.S. intelligence community to spy on the Trump campaign and transition, Bartiromo said that 2016 requests by Obama administration officials to unmask the identity of an American who was the subject of a counterintelligence operation (who turned out to be Trump associate Michael Flynn) was "the biggest political scandal we’ve ever seen." Attorney general Bill Barr named federal prosecutor John Bash to lead an investigation, which concluded months later with no findings of substantive wrongdoing and no public report.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In late November 2020, after Trump lost his bid for reelection, Bartiromo conducted the first post-election interview with Trump. Before the interview, Bartiromo texted Mark Meadows, then Trump’s chief of staff, with advice that included questions she planned to ask Trump. In the interview, she backed Trump's false claims of election fraud and his attempt to overturn the election results, claiming that Trump was being overthrown in a "coup". Bartiromo was criticized for her conduct in the 45-minute interview, in which she never asked Trump to substantiate his claims of fraud. Brian Stelter of CNN recalled the "Maria Bartiromo [who was] once a feared and acclaimed journalist, best known for working the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, forcing CEOs to tell the truth."<ref name="Benveniste_11/29/2020"></ref> Trump praised Bartiromo as being "brave" for her approach to discussing the disputes. Bartiromo then defended herself by claiming that much of the media, such as CNN and "The New York Times", were taking a side and engaging in "election interference". In his November 2021 book, "Betrayal", former ABC News chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl reported a November 2020 incident when Bartiromo called attorney general Bill Barr "to complain that the DOJ hadn't done anything to stop the Democrats from stealing the election." Barr told Karl, "She called me up and she was screaming. I yelled back at her. She's lost it."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo was an outspoken proponent on her program of baseless allegations that rigged voting machines stole the election from Donald Trump. Hosts Lou Dobbs and Jeanine Pirro also promoted the falsehoods on their programs. Attorneys for Smartmatic, a voting machine company that had been baselessly accused of conspiring with competitor Dominion Voting Systems to rig the election, sent Fox News a letter in December 2020 threatening legal action and demanding retractions that "must be published on multiple occasions" so as to "match the attention and audience targeted with the original defamatory publications." The three programs each ran the same three-minute video segment refuting the baseless allegations days later, consisting of an election security expert being interviewed by an unseen and unidentified man, though none of the three hosts personally issued retractions. In February 2021, Smartmatic filed a $2.7 billion defamation suit against Fox News, three of its hosts, including Bartiromo, and two network guests. A New York State Supreme Court judge ruled in March 2022 that the suit against Fox News could proceed, dismissing allegations against two individuals, though claims against Bartiromo were allowed to stand.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In January 2021, after the storming of the U.S. Capitol that was carried out by a mob of supporters of Trump, Bartiromo hosted Trump economic advisor Peter Navarro on her show, where he falsely claimed in the interview that Trump had won the election. Bartiromo concurred, falsely claiming, "We know that there were irregularities in this election." In a broadcast on January 19, she falsely claimed that Democrats wore MAGA clothing and were behind the storming of the Capitol. In July 2021, Bartiromo referenced Ashli Babbitt, who was shot while part of a pro-Trump mob trying to push through a barricaded door inside the U.S. Capitol building, a "wonderful woman" who "went to peaceful protest."


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Five years after joining the fledgling network, both her shows and the channel itself was surpassing CNBC in audience size some of the time. In September 2019, she signed a new multi-year deal with FBN. That year, TheStreet.com reported that Bartiromo had an annual salary of $10 million, seventh highest among American television news anchors of any kind.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: During the latter part of January 2021, at the outset of the Biden administration, Fox News gave Bartiromo a trial run to head one of Fox News' primetime slots, the new weekday 7 p.m. "Fox News Primetime" political opinions show. Her guest hosting stint began the week of January 25, 2021.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In February 2021, Smartmatic sued Fox Corporation, Fox News, Bartiromo, Dobbs, and Pirro, for defamation, seeking $2.7 billion in damages. In response her lawyers moved to have the case against her dismissed, saying that she was just reporting on presidential claims during an historically controversial election and that Smartmatic was really trying to make up for poor business performance: "This complaint is not just meritless; it is a legal shakedown designed to chill speech and punish reporting on issues that cut to the heart of our democracy". Dobbs (by then off the air at FBN) and Pirro filed separate but similar motions for dismissal.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo is the author of several books. Her first was "Use the News: How to Separate the Noise from the Investment Nuggets and Make Money in Any Economy" (HarperCollins, 2001). It appeared on "The New York Times" Best Seller List, and additively on similar lists in "The Wall Street Journal" and "USA Today".


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Her next two books were "The 10 Laws of Enduring Success" (Crown Business, 2010) and "The Weekend That Changed Wall Street" (Portfolio Hardcover, 2011).


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: A fourth book, of which she held the status of co-author along with James Freeman, was titled "The Cost: Trump, China, and American Renewal" (Simon & Schuster, 2020).


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo is the recipient of an Excellence in Broadcast Journalism Award (1997); a Lincoln Statue Award presented by the Union League of Philadelphia (2004); a Gracie Award, for Outstanding Documentary (2008); and two Emmy Awards, an Emmy Award for Outstanding Coverage of a Breaking News Story (2008) and an Emmy Award for Outstanding Business and Economic Reporting (2009).


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In 2009, the "Financial Times" listed Bartiromo as one of “50 Faces That Shaped the Decade". In 2011, she was the third journalist to be inducted into the Cable Hall of Fame. In 2016, she was inducted into the Library of American Broadcasting.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: The Maria Bartiromo Broadcast Journalism Studio at Fontbonne Hall Academy, the high school she attended, is named after her. She was the keynote speaker for Fontbonne's 80th anniversary gala in 2018.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo is on board of trustees of New York University, her alma mater. She gave the commencement speech at the NYU Stern School of Business in 2012. She has also taught there, acting as an adjunct professor at the Stern School from 2010 to 2013. The seminar that she co-taught in fall 2010, titled "Global Markets and Normative Frameworks", filled its registration in 10 minutes.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: She has been on the board of trustees for the New York City Ballet. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Economic Club of New York. She has been on the board of the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York, Public Education Needs Civic Involvement and Leadership (PENCIL) in New York, and the Young Global Leaders of the World Economic Forum. She is a member of the board of governors of the Columbus Citizens Foundation, and in 2010 was the grand marshal of the Columbus Day Parade.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: In 1999, Bartiromo married Jonathan Steinberg, chief executive officer of WisdomTree Investments and son of billionaire financier Saul Steinberg. They first met in 1990, soon after her college graduation. The ceremony was held at the home of the bridegroom and was officiated over by a rabbi.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: The couple own a beach house in the hamlet of Westhampton, New York. They have also lived in a five story townhouse on Manhattan's Upper East Side.


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Bartiromo appeared as herself in the films "Risk/Reward", the documentary about the lives of women on Wall Street (2003); the 2009 remake of "The Taking of Pelham 123", an action film about armed men who hijack a New York City subway train; the sequel drama film "" (2010); the documentary "Inside Job" (2010); and the finance thriller, "Arbitrage" (2012).


title: Maria Bartiromo

text: Joey Ramone, of the punk rock pioneers The Ramones, developed a friendship with Bartiromo after his band broke up in the late 1990s. He subsequently wrote a song titled "Maria Bartiromo" that appeared on his solo album "Don't Worry About Me," released posthumously in 2002.


title: Dallas Roberts

text: Dallas Mark Roberts (born May 10, 1970) is an American actor. He is best known for his role as Milton Mamet in the third season of AMC's "The Walking Dead" (2012-2013), Eliot Delson on "Unforgettable", and Owen Cavanaugh on "The Good Wife". He also starred in the Netflix comedy "Insatiable".


title: Dallas Roberts

text: Roberts was born and raised in Houston, Texas, where he attended Paul Revere Middle School and Robert E. Lee High School. He moved to Sarasota, Florida, where he graduated from Sarasota High School in 1988 and attended State College of Florida, Manatee-Sarasota. In 1990 Roberts was accepted to the Juilliard School in New York City, where he graduated in 1994 as a member of the Drama Division's "Group 23".


title: Dallas Roberts

text: Roberts is primarily based in New York City, where he regularly appears in theatrical productions. Off-Broadway he has appeared in a revival of Lanford Wilson's "Burn This", opposite Edward Norton and Catherine Keener; in Adam Rapp's "Nocturne", for which he was nominated for a Drama Desk Award; and in Caryl Churchill's "A Number", opposite Sam Shepard and later Arliss Howard, among others.


title: Dallas Roberts

text: Roberts' film work includes the screen adaptation of Michael Cunningham's "A Home at the End of the World", and supporting roles in "Walk the Line" and "The Notorious Bettie Page", among others. He had a regular role on the Showtime drama "The L Word". He starred in the AMC original series "Rubicon" as Miles Fiedler, a genius intelligence analyst at a national think tank. He appeared in twelve episodes of "The Good Wife" as Alicia Florrick's (Julianna Margulies) gay brother, Owen. He has also made many appearances on "Law & Order" and its spinoff, "". He also appeared in a crossover arc between "SVU", "Chicago P.D." and "Chicago Fire" as serial killer Gregory Yates.


title: Dallas Roberts

text: From August 2012 through March 2013, Roberts was in the cast of "The Walking Dead" as scientist Milton Mamet, who studies "walkers" (zombies). From 2013 to 2015, he played Eliot Delson on "Unforgettable".


title: Rusyn language

text: Rusyn (; ; ), is an East Slavic language spoken by Rusyns in parts of Central and Eastern Europe, and written in the Cyrillic script. Within the community, the language is also referred to by the older folk term, , or simply referred to as speaking "our way" (). The majority of speakers live in an area known as Carpathian Rus' that spans from Transcarpathia, westward into eastern Slovakia and south-east Poland. There is also a sizeable Pannonian Rusyn linguistic island in Vojvodina, Serbia, as well as a Rusyn diaspora throughout the world. Per the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, Rusyn is officially recognized as a protected minority language by Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Poland (as Lemko), Serbia, and Slovakia.


title: Rusyn language

text: In the English language, the term "Rusyn" is recognized officially by the ISO. Other names are sometimes also used to refer to the language, mainly deriving from exonyms such as "Ruthenian" or "Ruthene" (, ), that have more general meanings, and thus (by adding regional adjectives) some specific designations are formed, such as: Carpathian Ruthenian/Ruthene or Carpatho-Ruthenian/Ruthene.


title: Rusyn language

text: The categorization of Rusyn as a language or dialect is a source of controversy. Czech, Slovak, and Hungarian, as well as American and some Polish and Serbian linguists treat it as a distinct language (with its own ISO 639-3 code), whereas other scholars (in Ukraine, Poland, Serbia, and Romania) treat it as a Southwestern dialect of Ukrainian.


title: Rusyn language

text: In terms of geographic distribution, Rusyn language is represented by two specific clusters: the first is encompassing Carpathian Rusyn or Carpatho-Rusyn varieties, and the second is represented by Pannonian Rusyn.


title: Rusyn language

text: Pannonian Rusyn is spoken by the Pannonian Rusyns in the region of Vojvodina (in Serbia), and in a nearby region of Slavonia (in Croatia).


title: Rusyn language

text: The Niagovo Postilla (Njagovskie poučenija), dated to 1758, is one of the earliest texts possessing significant phonetic and morphological characteristics of modern Rusyn (specifically the Subcarpathian variant) and is potentially "linguistically traceable" to the 16th century.


title: Rusyn language

text: By the 18th century, the Rusyn language was "clearly in evidence" and "quite recognizable in a more systematic fashion".


title: Rusyn language

text: The first books produced exclusively for Rusyn readership were printed under the direction of bishop of Mukachevo, Joseph Decamillis (r. 1690 - 1706). Under his direction, the printshop at the University of Trnava published a catechism (Katekhisis dlia naouki Ouhorouskim liudem, 1698) and an elementary language primer (Boukvar’ iazyka slaven’ska, 1699). For decades, these would be the only textbooks available to Rusyn students.


title: Rusyn language

text: Later, in 1767 Maria Theresa's Urbarium was published throughout the Habsburg Empire in a variety of languages, including Rusyn.


title: Rusyn language

text: Finally, under Bishop Andriy Bachynskyi's tenure (r. 1773 - 1809) in the Greek Catholic Eparchy of Mukachevo, new texts for Rusyn student readership were published. These several editions of Ioann Kutka's primer and catechism were published in Rusyn vernacular, though with heavy influence from Church Slavonic.


title: Rusyn language

text: By the 19th century, "attempts to write in a form of Russo-Church Slavonic with a Rusyn flavor, or a type of 'Subcarpathian Russian' with Rusyn phonetic features," began to be made. Notably, Myxajlo Lučkaj's grammar of the Subcarpathian variety of Church Slavonic, "Grammatica Slavo-Ruthena", of 1830 had a "distinctly Rusyn flavor". And while Lučkaj did not support use of vernacular as a literary language (commenting on the proper usage of either in his "Praefatio"), he "did" include examples of "Rusyn paradigms" in his work to attempt demonstrate its similarity to Church Slavonic. Lučkaj in effect sought to prove the two languages were close sisters of a common ancestor.


title: Rusyn language

text: In 1847, Greek Catholic priest Alexander Dukhnovych published the first textbook written almost fully in common Rusyn vernacular, "Knyzhytsia chytalnaia dlia nachynaiushchykh" (A Reader for Beginners). Further editions of the primer followed in 1850 and 1852, as well as the establishment of "the first Carpatho-Rusyn cultural organization", the Prešov Literary Society, in 1850. Over the next four years of its existence, the Society would go on to publish a further 12 works, including Dukhnovych's "Virtue is More Important than Riches" (the very first play written in Carpatho-Rusyn), as well Carpatho-Rusyn's first literary anthologies in 1850, 1851, and 1852, titled "Greetings to the Rusyns".


title: Rusyn language

text: The classification of the Rusyn language has historically been both linguistically and politically controversial. During the 19th century, several questions were raised among linguists, regarding the classification of East Slavic dialects that were spoken in the northeastern (Carpathian) regions of the Kingdom of Hungary, and also in neighbouring regions of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria. From those questions, three main theories emerged:


title: Rusyn language

text: In spite of these linguistic disputes, official terminology used by the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy that ruled the Carpathian region remained unchanged. For Austro-Hungarian state authorities, the entire East Slavic linguistic body within the borders of the Monarchy was classified as "Ruthenian" language (, ), an archaic and exonymic term that remained in use until 1918.


title: Rusyn language

text: After the dissolution of Austria-Hungary (1918), the newly proclaimed Hungarian Republic recognized Rusyn regional autonomy in Subcarpathian regions and created, at the beginning of 1919, a department for Rusyn language and literature at the Budapest University.


title: Rusyn language

text: By the end of 1919, the region of Subcarpathian Ruthenia was appended to the newly formed Czechoslovak state, as its easternmost province. During the next twenty years, linguistic debates were continued between the same three options (pro-Russian, pro-Ukrainian, and local Rusyn), with Czechoslovak state authorities occasionally acting as arbiters.


title: Rusyn language

text: In March 1939, the region proclaimed independence under the name Carpatho-Ukraine, but it was immediately occupied and annexed by Hungary. The region was later occupied (1944) and annexed (1945) by the Soviet Union, and incorporated into the Ukrainian SSR, which proceeded with implementation of Ukrainian linguistic standards. In Soviet Ukraine, Rusyns were not recognized as a distinctive ethnicity, and their language was considered a dialect of Ukrainian language. Poland employed similar policies, using internal deportations to move many Eastern Slavs from southeastern to newly acquired western regions (Operation Vistula), and switch their language to Polish, and Ukrainian at school.


title: Rusyn language

text: During that period, the only country that was officially recognizing the Rusyn minority and its language was Yugoslavia.


title: Rusyn language

text: After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, modern standards of minority rights were gradually applied throughout the Eastern Europe, thus affecting the attitude of several states towards the Rusyn language. As successors of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Croatia continued to recognize the Rusyn language as an official minority language.


title: Rusyn language

text: Scholars with the former Institute of Slavic and Balkan Studies in Moscow (now the Institute of Slavonic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences) formally acknowledged Rusyn as a separate language in 1992, and trained specialists to study the language. These studies were financially supported by the Russian Academy of Sciences.


title: Rusyn language

text: Since 1995, Rusyn has been recognized as a minority language in Slovakia, enjoying the status of an official language in municipalities where more than 20 percent of the inhabitants speak Rusyn.


title: Rusyn language

text: Ukrainian state authorities do not recognize Rusyns as a separate ethnicity, regardless of Rusyn self-identification. Ukraine officially considered Rusyn a dialect of Ukrainian. In 2012, Ukraine adopted a new law, recognizing Rusyn as one of several minority and regional languages, but that law was revoked in 2014.


title: Rusyn language

text: Rusyn is recognized as an officially protected, minority language by the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages in Bosnia and Herzegovina (2011), Croatia (1997), Hungary (1998), Romania (2008), Poland (as Lemko, 2009), Serbia (2006), and Slovakia (2002).


title: Rusyn language

text: It is not possible to estimate accurately the number of fluent speakers of Rusyn; however, their number is estimated to be in the tens of thousands.


title: Rusyn language

text: The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has assigned the ISO 639-3 code 'rue' for Carpathian Rusyn.


title: Rusyn language

text: The main continuum of Rusyn varieties stretches from Transcarpathia and follows the Carpathian Mountains westward into South-Eastern Poland and Eastern Slovakia, forming an area referred to as Carpathian Rus'. As with any language, all three major varieties of Rusyn vary with respect to phonology, morphology, and syntax, and have various features unique to themselves, while of course also containing their own, more local sub-varieties. The continuum of Rusyn is agreed to include the varieties known historically as Lemko and Bojko, and is also generally accepted to end at or with the Hucul variety, which is "not included in the Rusyn continuum per se, but represent[s] a linguistic variant .. better seen as a dialect of Ukrainian". As the westernmost member of the family of East Slavic languages, it has also acquired a number of West Slavic features—unique to East Slavic languages—due to prolonged contact with the coterritorial languages of Polish and Slovak.


title: Rusyn language

text: Today, there are three formally codified Rusyn literary varieties and one de facto (Subcarpathian Rusyn). These varieties reflect the culmination of nearly two centuries of activist and academic labor, during which a literary Rusyn language was desired, discussed, and addressed (time and again) by a dedicated intelligentsia. Linguist Stefan M. Pugh notes, "...at every stage someone was thinking of writing in Rusyn; approximately every generation a grammar of some sort would be written but not find wide acceptance, primarily for reasons of a political nature (and of course logistical practicalities)."


title: Rusyn language

text: Some of these earlier grammars include those by Dmytrij Vyslockij ("Karpatorusskij bukvar""'), Vanja Hunjanky" (1931), Metodyj Trochanovskij "(Bukvar: Perša knyžečka dlja narodnıx škol"; 1935), and Ivan Harajda (1941). Harajda's grammar is particularly notable for having arrived in the midst of a five-year linguistic furvor for Carpatho-Rusyn. From 1939 through 1944 an estimated 1,500 to 3,000 Rusyn-language publications (mostly centered around Uzhhorod, Ukraine) entered print and from 1941 onward, Harajda's grammar was the accepted standard.


title: Rusyn language

text: In Slovakia, the Prešov literary variety has been under continuous codification since 1995 when first published by Vasyl Jabur, Anna Plíšková and Kvetoslava Koporová. Its namesakes are both the city and region of Prešov, Slovakia—historically, each have been respective centers for Rusyn academia and the Rusyn population of Slovakia.


title: Rusyn language

text: Prešov Rusyn was based on varieties of Rusyn found in a relatively compact area within the Prešov Region. Specifically, the variety is based on the language spoken in the area between the West Zemplin and East Zemplin Rusyn dialects (even more specifically: a line along the towns and villages of Osadne, Hostovice, Parihuzovce, Čukalovce, Pcoline, Pichne, Nechvalova Polianka, Zubne, Nizna Jablonka, Vysna Jablonka, Svetlice, and Zbojne). And though the many Rusyn dialects of Slovakia entirely surpass the limited set of features prescribed in the standard, this comparatively small sample size was consciously chosen by codifiers in order to provide a structured ecosystem within which a variety of written and spoken language would inevitably (and already did) thrive.


title: Rusyn language

text: Its orthography is largely based on Zhelekhivka, a late 19th century variety of the Ukrainian alphabet.


title: Rusyn language

text: In Poland, a standard Lemko-Rusyn grammar and dictionary were published in 2000 by Mirosława Chomiak and Henryk Fontański, with a second edition issued in 2004.


title: Rusyn language

text: In Transcarpathia, Ukraine, M. Alamašij's and Igor Kerča's "Materyns'kyj jazyk - pysemnycja rusyns'koho jazyka", serves as the "de facto" literary standard for Subcarpathian, though "unofficial". Published in 1999, with a second edition in 2004, and a 58,000 word Rusyn-Russian dictionary in 2007, Kerča's work has been used by prominent Rusyn publishers in Uzhorod—albeit with variations between published works that are typical of the spoken language.


title: Rusyn language

text: Despite the above codified varieties, many Carpatho-Rusyn publications will use a combination of the three Carpathian standards (most notably in Hungary and in Transcarpathia). There have even attempts to revitalize the pre-war etymological orthography with archaic Cyrillic orthography (i.e. usage of the letter ѣ, or "yat"'); the latter can be observed throughout Rusyn Wikipedia, where even a single article may be written in several different codified varieties. And while somewhat archaic, used of Harajda's grammar is even promoted by some in Rusyn Wikipedia (although parts of the articles are written using other standards).


title: Rusyn language

text: Pannonian Rusyn, has variously been referred to as an incredible distinct dialect of Carpathian Rusyn or a separate language altogether. In the ISO 639-9 identifier application for Pannonian Rusyn (or "Ruthenian" as it is referred to in that document), the authors note that "Ruthenian is closest to [a] linguistic entity sometimes called [ , ], ... (the speeches of Trebišov and Prešov [districts])."


title: Rusyn language

text: The literary variety of Serbian and Croatian Rusyns is, again, significantly different from the above three Carpathian varieties in both vocabulary and grammar. It was first standardized in 1923 by G. Kostelnik. The modern standard has been continuously developed since the 1980s by Julian Ramač, Helena Međeši and Mihajlo Fejsa of Serbia, and Mihály Káprály of Hungary.


title: Rusyn language

text: A soft consonant combination sound [] exists more among the northern and western dialects. In the eastern dialects the sound is recognized as [], including the area on which the standard dialect is based. It is noted that a combination sound like this one, could have evolved into a soft fricative sound [].


title: Rusyn language

text: Declension in Rusyn is based on grammatical number, gender, and case. Like English, only two types of grammatical number are expressed: singular and plural. And like other Slavic languages, Rusyn has three grammatical genders: feminine, masculine, and neuter. Furthermore, like those languages, Rusyn uses a seven-case system of nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, locative, instrumental, and vocative cases.


title: Rusyn language

text: One final point of note is that the masculine gender (and only the masculine gender) is further subdivided into animate and inanimate types. While there are no suffixes "specific" to animacy, declension between the two differs in that for "animates", the form of the accusative case copies that of the genitive case.


title: Rusyn language

text: As mentioned in the preceding section, Rusyn cases are similar to those of other Slavic languages. A "very general" summary of usage is given in the table below, though proper usage depends on a particular situation, prepositions, and verbs used, as well as other extenuating circumstances.


title: Rusyn language

text: Nouns will generally decline differently to indicate each case (e.g. English "they/them/their/theirs"). Based on "how" they decline, nouns can be grouped into one of four "types".


title: Rusyn language

text: This type consists of grammatically feminine nouns ending in -а (hard) or -я (soft) in the nominative case. The table below includes four examples of such nouns. The first two represent the "archetypal" feminine paradigm, while the second two represent a "common" or "two-fold gender" paradigm.


title: Rusyn language

text: It is important to note that this second paradigm has atypical dative, locative, and instrumental singular suffixes which are actually representative of the male/neuter declension paradigm (visible later in this article). According to Pugh, this peculiarity developed as a result of the societal roles of "judge" and "elder" being traditionally patriarchal. This phenomenon is in contrast to grammatically feminine nouns of ambiguous gender where a particular role was not historically male-oriented, such as . In these cases, the typical feminine paradigm is "maintained".


title: Rusyn language

text: This declension type encompasses a very large set of vocabulary as it contains nouns of both masculine and neuter genders, hard and soft stems, as well as animate and inanimate beings (for the masculine gender).


title: Rusyn language

text: This declension contains a large amount of identical forms (syncretism) between cases. Depending on the noun, the number of distinct forms may number from as few as 3 to as many as 6. For singular animate nouns, there is a single form for the accusative and genitive cases, as well as a single form for the dative and locative cases. Similarly, singular inanimate nouns share a form for nominative and locative cases.


title: Rusyn language

text: The following table demonstrates the declension paradigm for nouns with hard stems which end in -o in the nominative case. Though there are some masculine nouns in this category, these nouns are predominantly neuter.


title: Rusyn language

text: All nouns in this type are feminine. The paradigm can be identified by the following suffixes in the nominative singular case: a "paired consonant" (-cons.+ь), an "unpaired palato-alveolar consonant" (-ш, -ч, щ, -ж, or -дж), or the suffix -ов. Additionally, the noun is also part of this type.


title: Rusyn language

text: This declension paradigm is used very rarely. It entirely consists of grammatically neuter nouns. This paradigm can be identified by the -a suffix in the nominative and accusative cases, as well as the appearance of the affix -t- between the stem and suffix in other cases. There is "no variation" in this paradigm: all nouns decline in an identical manner.


title: Rusyn language

text: Type IV is predominantly made up of words referring to the young of animals and humans. However, this should not be taken as a hard rule as some nouns which "historically" declined differently (e.g. and ), now decline according to this paradigm instead.


title: Rusyn language

text: Verbs may be divided into two major conjugation types, which may be identified based on the "stem-marker" that appears during conjugation. Unfortunately, the infinitive verb forms are often ambiguous and as such, there is no "general" system that allows an infinitive to be identified as either Type I or Type II. Some infinitive suffixes, however, are unique to at least Type I, i.e. -ути, -овати, -нути, etc. In the following sections, the stem-markers are given in Latin as Cyrillic often obscures the markers in the conjugated forms.


title: Rusyn language

text: Type I may be divided into several sub-types, the most notable of which are the "vowel+j" stem-markers: -uj-, -ij-, -yj-, etc. It is important to remember that in the infinitive and some conjugations that the consonant, -j-, is truncated when followed by another consonant, e.g. "-aj-ty → -a-ty".


title: Rusyn language

text: The -uj- set of verbs can be divided into two groups based the presence of the suffixal markers -ova- or -uj- in the infinitive. The former group representing the overwhelming majority of verbs in this type.


title: Rusyn language

text: Each of the Rusyn standard varieties has its own Cyrillic alphabet. The table below shows the Rusyn alphabet of the Prešov Standard, with notes on other varieties. The alphabets of the other Carpathian Rusyn varieties, Lemko Rusyn and Subcarpathian Rusyn, differ from the Prešov Standard in lacking ё and ї. For the Pannonian Rusyn alphabet, see .


title: Rusyn language

text: Romanization (transliteration) is given according to ALA-LC, BGN/PCGN, generic European, ISO/R9 1968 (IDS), and ISO 9.


title: Rusyn language

text: The Prešov Rusyn alphabet of Slovakia has 36 letters. It includes all the letters of the Ukrainian alphabet plus ё, ы, and ъ.


title: Rusyn language

text: The Lemko Rusyn alphabet of Poland has 34 letters. It includes all the Ukrainian letters with the exception of ї, plus ы and ъ.


title: Rusyn language

text: The Rusyn alphabets all place ь after я, as the Ukrainian alphabet did until 1990. The vast majority of Cyrillic alphabets place ь before э (if present), ю, and я.


title: Rusyn language

text: The Lemko and Prešov Rusyn alphabets place ъ at the very end, while the vast majority of Cyrillic alphabets place it after щ. They also place ы before й, while the vast majority of Cyrillic alphabets place it after ш, щ (if present), and ъ (if present).


title: Rusyn language

text: In the Prešov Rusyn alphabet, і and ї come before и, and likewise, і comes before и in the Lemko Rusyn alphabet (which doesn't have ї). In the Ukrainian alphabet, however, и precedes і and ї, and the Pannonian Rusyn alphabet (which doesn't have і) follows this precedent by placing и before ї.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: Choi Min-sik (born April 27, 1962) is a South Korean actor. He received critical acclaim for his roles in "Oldboy" (2003), "I Saw the Devil" (2010) and "" (2014).


title: Choi Min-sik

text: For his role in "Oldboy", he won the Best Actor prize at the 40th Baeksang Art Awards, the 24th Blue Dragon Awards, and the 41st Grand Bell Awards. In 2014, he was listed as Gallup Korea's Film Actor of the Year.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: Choi was born in Seoul, South Korea. When he was in third grade, Choi was diagnosed with tuberculosis and told that he could not be cured. He claims to have regained his health by a month-long stay in the mountains.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: Graduating with a degree in theatre from Dongguk University, Choi began his career as a theatre actor by joining a theater company named ‘Ppuri’(극단 뿌리) in 1982. His debut was a play named ‘Our Town’.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: He then started filming, playing roles in Park Jong-won's early movies, like "Kuro Arirang" and "Our Twisted Hero". He continued to act on stage, as well as in television dramas like "The Moon of Seoul" with Han Suk-kyu.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: In 1997, Choi played a police prosecuter in Song Neung-han's "No. 3", and then accepted a role in Kim Jee-woon's debut film "The Quiet Family". The first real success came with his role of a North Korean agent in "Shiri" in 1999. The film was not only critically acclaimed but also achieved box office success. Choi received the Best Actor award at Grand Bell Awards for his portrayal. In the same year he also took part in a stage production of "Hamlet", and then starred in "Happy End", where he portrayed a man who is cheated on by his wife. In 2001 he took the role of a gangster opposite Cecilia Cheung in "Failan". A year later, Choi portrayed Jang Seung-eop, a Joseon painter in Im Kwon-taek's "Chihwaseon", which was awarded the Best Director prize in Cannes.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: In 2003, Choi starred in Park Chan-wook's "Oldboy", which made him popular not only in South Korea but also won him international recognition. In the next two years, he played a trumpet player in "Springtime", a struggling former boxer in Ryoo Seung-wan's "Crying Fist", and a child murderer in "Sympathy for Lady Vengeance", the last film in Park Chan-wook's vengeance trilogy. In 2005, Choi and Song Kang-ho were accused by director and Cinema Service head Kang Woo-suk of demanding a share of profits for so-called "contributions" when no contributions were made. Kang later rescinded the statement and apologized.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: At various points during 2006, Choi and other South Korean film industry professionals, together and separate from Choi, demonstrated in Seoul and at the Cannes Film Festival against the South Korean administration's decision to reduce the Screen Quotas from 146 to 73 days as part of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States. As a sign of protest, Choi returned the prestigious Okgwan Order of Cultural Merit which had been awarded to him, saying, "To halve the screen quota is tantamount to a death sentence for Korean film. This medal, once a symbol of pride, is now nothing more than a sign of disgrace, and it is with a heavy heart that I must return it." Over the next four years, Choi went on a self-imposed exile from making films, begun in protest over the screen quota but also partly due to the studios' reluctance to hire the outspoken and politically active actor. Instead he returned to his theater roots in the 2007 staging of "The Pillowman", his first play in seven years.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: During the retrospective on Choi held at the 14th Lyon Asian Film Festival in November 2008, the actor was asked his reaction to the upcoming remake of "Oldboy", and he admitted to the French reporters present that he was upset at Hollywood for using what he described as pressure tactics on Asian and European filmmakers so they could remake foreign movies in the United States.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: Choi made his comeback in Jeon Soo-il's 2009 art film "Himalaya, Where the Wind Dwells", in which he was the only South Korean actor working with locally cast Tibetan actors. Though Kim Jee-woon's 2010 action thriller "I Saw the Devil" drew criticism from some quarters for its ultra-violent content, reviewers agreed that Choi's performance as a serial killer was memorable and the film emerged as a box office success. Choi did voice acting for "Leafie, A Hen into the Wild", which in 2011 became the highest grossing South Korean animated film in history. In his 2012 follow-up "", Choi played another complex, layered antihero, and the Yoon Jong-bin film was both a critical and box office hit. and earned him the Best Performance by an Actor award at the 2012 Asia Pacific Screen Awards. Choi's next film was Park Hoon-jung's "New World", a 2013 noir about an undercover cop in the world of gangsters, which also became successful critically and commercially.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: For his English-language debut, Choi appeared in Luc Besson's "Lucy" (2014), in the role of a gangster who kidnaps a girl and forces her to become a drug mule (Scarlett Johansson), but she inadvertently acquires superhuman powers. He then played Yi Sun-sin in the blockbuster period epic "" about the Battle of Myeongnyang, regarded as one of the admiral's most remarkable naval victories. "Roaring Currents" became the all-time most watched film in South Korean film history, the first ever to reach 15 million admissions and the first local film to gross more than . Choi next starred in the period film "", where he played a hunter. Choi had three films in 2017; he played an unscrupulous mayor in the political film "The Mayor", and headlined the remake crime thriller "Heart Blackened".


title: Choi Min-sik

text: Choi is set to star in the period film "Astronomy" next, playing Jang Yeong-sil. On December 10, 2021, his contract with C-JeS Entertainment ended.


title: Choi Min-sik

text: In 2022, Choi stars in the Disney+ series "Casino" which marks his first drama appearance in 26 years since "Love and Separation" in 1997.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Religion in Nigeria (the most populous African country with a population of over 225 million in 2022) is diverse. The country is home to some of the world's largest Christian and Muslim populations, simultaneously. Nigeria is divided roughly in half between Muslims, who live mostly in the north, and Christians, who live mostly in the south east; indigenous religions, such as those native to the Igbo and Yoruba ethnicities, are in the minority. The Christian share of Nigeria's population is on decline due to lower fertility rate compared to Muslims in the north.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Most Nigerian Christians are Protestant (broadly defined), though about a quarter are Catholic. The majority of Nigerian Muslims are either Sunni or non-denominational Muslims. Many Sunni Muslims are members of Sufi brotherhoods or Tariqa. Most Sufis follow the Qadiriyya, Tijaniyyah or Mouride movement. A significant Shia minority also exists ("see Shia in Nigeria"). There are also Ahmadiyya and Mahdiyya minorities. In terms of Nigeria's major ethnic groups' religious affiliations, the Hausa ethnic group in the north is mostly Muslim the Yoruba tribe in the west is divided among mainly Muslims and Christians with many followers of traditional religions, while the Igbos of the east and the Ijaw in the south are predominantly Christians with some practitioners of traditional religions. The middle belt of Nigeria contains the most of the minority ethnic groups in Nigeria and they are mostly Christians and Christian converts, as well as members of traditional religions with few Muslim converts.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Nigeria is officially a secular state with no official state religion. Article 10 of the Constitution states that “The Government of the Federation or of a State shall not adopt any religion as State Religion.” However, twelve Muslim-majority northern states have incorporated Sharia courts into their legal systems with the power and jurisdiction of these courts waxing and waning over the past two decades. In some of these states, sharia courts are optional arbitration courts for personal status issues where as in others, sharia has effectively replaced the formerly secular state level legal system in both civil and criminal contexts. This has brought controversy due its discriminatory practices towards religious and sexual minorities. Northern Nigeria has also been the site of ongoing Islamist insurgency which has led to the death and displacement of tens of thousands of people.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Figures in the most recent edition of The World Christian Encyclopedia (Johnson and Zurlo 2020) draw on figures assembled and updated as part of the World Christian Database (WCD); these put those who identify as Christians on 46.3%, and Muslims on 46.2 and ‘ethnic religions’ on 7.2%.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: WCD figures predict that both Muslism and Christians will continue to grow as a proportion of the population through to 2050. Their projections predict Christians at that point will make up on 48% of the population and Muslims on 48.7%, both growing at the expense of ethnic religions, down to 2.9% of the population. Hsu et al. (2008) found that the WCD appears to overestimate Christian identification and cautioned against what seems to be uncritical acceptance of figures given by religious groups of their membership. The criticisms offered by Hsu et Al (2008) have been supported by evidence found by Nigeria Mckinnon (2020), which demonstrated that the WCD had substantially overestimated the Anglican proportion of the population.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: According to a 2018 estimate in "The World Factbook" by the CIA, the population is estimated to be 53.5% Muslim, 45.9% Christian (10.6% Roman Catholic and 35.3% other Christian), and 0.6% as other. In a 2019 report released by Pew Research Center in 2015, the Muslim population was estimated to be 50% while the Christian population was estimated to be 48.1%.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The Pew Forum in a 2010 report compared reports from several sources. The 1963 Nigerian census found that 47% of the population was Muslim, 34% Christian, and 18% other. The 2008 MEASURE Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) found 53% Muslim, 45% Christian, and 2% other; the 2008 Afrobarometer poll found 49% Christian, 50% Muslim, and 1% other; Pew's own survey found 52% Muslim, 46% Christian, and 1% other.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Nigeria has one of the largest Muslim populations in West Africa. In Nigeria, about 52 percent of the population is Muslim. Most of Nigeria's Muslim population live in the Northern, South western and Central states. Islam was introduced to northern and central Nigeria in the Middle Ages as early as the 11th century and was well established in the major capitals of the region by the 16th century, spreading into the countryside and toward the Middle Belt uplands. Shehu Usman dan Fodio established a government in Northern Nigeria based on Islam before the advent of European colonialism. The British colonial government therefore established indirect rule in Northern Nigeria based on the structure of this government. Islam also came to South Western Yoruba-speaking areas during the time of Mansa Musa's Mali Empire.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The vast majority of Muslims in Nigeria are Sunni belonging to Maliki school of jurisprudence; however, a sizeable minority also belongs to Shafi madhhab. Many Sunni Muslims are members of Sufi brotherhoods. Most Sufis follow the Kadiriyya, Tijaniyya or Mouride movements. Nigerian Islam has become heterogenous with the springing up of many Islamic sects. Notable examples are the Izala movement, the Shia movement, and many local Islamic sects that have limited expansion.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The Shia Muslims of Nigeria are primarily located in the Sokoto State. Shia Muslims make up between two and four million of Nigeria's population. Ibrahim Zakzaky introduced many Nigerians to Shia Islam. The headquarter of Shia is Zaria where the leader lives with his family.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Some Nigerian Muslims emphasize asceticism and mysticism and usually form groups called "tariqas", "Sufi orders" or "Sufi brotherhoods". They always preach peaceful co-existence and had no empathy for radical Islam. Most Sufis follow the Qadiriyya, Tijaniyyah or Mouride movement.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The Ahmadiyya movement established itself in Nigeria in 1916, and make up approximately 3% of the Muslim population. There are numerous Ahmadiyya centres in Nigeria including the Baitur-Raheem Mosque in Ibadan inaugurated in 2008, the Mubarak Mosque in Abuja, which is the last Ahmadiyya mosque, built in the first century of the Ahmadiyya Caliphate. Ahmadiyyas have also established a weekly newspaper called "The Truth" which is the first Muslim newspaper in the country.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The Kala Kato are a Nigerian group of Quranists. Their name means "a mere man said it" referring to the narrators of the sayings of Muhammad. The Kalo Kato rely entirely on the Quran and they are found among mostly lower-class communities across northern Nigeria.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: Islam in Nigeria has witnessed a rise in the numbers of Islamic extremism notably among them, the Boko Haram, Maitatsine, Darul Islam among others.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: These sects have sometimes resorted to the use of violence in a bid to realizing their ambitions on the wider Islamic and Nigerian populations as a whole.


title: Religion in Nigeria

text: The rise of this radical movements has been attributed partly to the poor socio economic infrastructures and poor governance in Nigeria. Poverty has been seen as the major catalyst leading to the rapid increase in the membership of these religious extremist groups. The rise of these sects has also been linked to the increase and aiding of religious extremist by politicians for their selfish ambitions. In recent times, there has been break out of religious crises in the ancient city of kano with scores of Christians dead and their properties destroyed.