title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings Corporation was an American holding company headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. It was the parent company of the chain stores Kmart and Sears and was founded after the former purchased the latter in 2005. It was the 20th-largest retailing company in the United States in 2015. It filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on October 15, 2018, and sold its assets to ESL Investments in 2019. The new owner moved Sears assets to its newly formed subsidiary Transform Holdco LLC and after that, Sears Holdings Corporation was closed.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On November 17, 2004, the management of Kmart Holding Corporation announced its intention to purchase Sears, Roebuck and Co. under a new corporation. Kmart previously emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on May 6, 2003. The new corporation became known as Sears Holdings Corporation, simply known as Sears Holdings. The new corporation announced that it would continue to operate stores under both the Sears and Kmart brands. The merger of Kmart and Sears closed on March 24, 2005, following affirmative shareholder votes of both companies. With the acquisition, the former HQ of Kmart in Detroit moved to the Sears Headquarters. The result of the merger was Kmart and parent Kmart Holding Corporation and Sears became subsidiaries of the new Sears Holdings Corporation. Sears Holdings now operates Sears and Kmart stores. The company continues to market products under brands held by both companies.


title: Sears Holdings

text: The company is directed by a board of directors composed of members from the two companies: seven members from Kmart's board, and three from Sears. Shareholders in the Kmart Holding Corporation received one share in the new company. Shares of Sears, Roebuck, and Co. stock were converted into a combination of 55 percent stock and 45 percent cash (at $50 a share). Stockholders had a choice of receiving either stock or cash, subject to the predefined ratio.


title: Sears Holdings

text: The merger was completed on March 24, 2005, after receiving regulatory approval from the government and approval by shareholders of both companies.


title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings continued to operate stores under the Sears and Kmart mastheads. In 2005, Sears introduced a new store format called Sears Essentials. As part of this new store format, some Kmart stores were converted to Sears Essentials, as well as a few locations that were acquired from Walmart and several bankrupt discount retailers. The new store format combined the Sears store concept with the Kmart format, which was intended to help the company better compete with Walmart and Target. The project has since been resigned and merged with the Sears Grand concept.


title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings has begun cross-selling merchandise between its two brands. For example, Craftsman tools are now available in Kmart stores; they were previously exclusive to the Sears brand. However, Martha Stewart brand paint colors were discontinued at Sears.


title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings owned 51 percent of Sears Canada, a large department store chain in Canada similar to the U.S. stores. At one point it owned as much as 92% of the Canadian company, but it failed in 2006 to buy the remainder of Sears Canada that it did not own because Bill Ackman took a 17.3 percent stake in it and prevented any takeover. He accepted to sell his stake at $30 a share on April 23, 2010. .


title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings also owns 20 percent of Sears Mexico; Carlos Slim owns the other 80 percent. Like Target stores, Kmart-branded stores in Australia belong to Wesfarmers (which acquired former owners Coles Group in 2007); Wesfarmers also holds the rights to the Kmart brand in New Zealand.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In 2005, Sears Holdings sold a stake in hardware chain Orchard Supply Hardware to private equity firm Ares Management. On December 14, 2011, Sears Holdings announced that it would spin off its remaining holdings in Orchard Supply to shareholders effective December 30, 2011.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In November 2006, speculation rolled around as "The Chicago Sun Times" reported that Sears may buy Safeway, Home Depot, Gap, BJ's Wholesale Club, Radio Shack, Pep Boys, and Anheuser-Busch. "The Washington Post", in a March 11, 2007, article, described the current Sears as a hedge fund with money being diverted from the maintenance and improvement of stores to non-retail financial investments. A former executive was quoted as saying the company faced an "uncertain future". Surprisingly, a third of pre-tax income in the third quarter of 2006, according to "The Washington Post", was due to financial trades and not the retail business. However, these investments performed poorly in the fourth quarter.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In 2007, the company placed its three major brands in "KCD IP", a "separate, wholly-owned, bankruptcy-remote subsidiary". KCD stands for the three brands: Kenmore, Craftsman, and DieHard. KCD IP then issued $1.8 billion in bonds that were sold to Sears' insurance subsidiary based in Bermuda. Sears would thus pay KCD for use of the three brands' trademarks.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On December 14, 2007, the company submitted a draft merger agreement to buy Restoration Hardware for $6.75 a share. Sears already owned 13.7 percent of the company. That offer was withdrawn after Restoration's shares tumbled and a competing bid from private equity firm Catterton Partners was lowered to $4.50 per share. On February 28, Sears Holdings made an offer of $4.55 a share.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In June 2008, Sears launched Servicelive.com, which was intended to connect Sears customers with local contractors for home improvement projects. The site charges 10 percent of the contract price for each completed service and offers more than 40,000 contractors. Servicelive.com was redesigned in March 2010. In 2010, Dennis Stemmle was appointed president of the division.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On February 22, 2010, the Sears Automotive business launched a new Independent Sears Auto Center franchise program that offers automobile dealers the opportunity to operate licensed Sears Auto Centers, with the first dealership in New Jersey. The company has faced consistent quarters of decline since the merger of Sears, Roebuck and Co. and Kmart Corp in 2005, the first year of results for the merged company. Income plunged 84 percent from $858 million, or $6.17 per diluted share from 2005 to 2011. Eddie Lampert has held the title of chairman of Sears Holdings over the period of decline. The first quarter of 2011 did not appear any better, with the company posting a net loss of $170 million, or $1.58 a share. Some industry analysts feel the heart of the problem is Eddie Lampert's "penny-pinching" cost-savings by stifling investment into stores. Instead, the company has been buying back stock and increasing its presence online.


title: Sears Holdings

text: The company closed a number of stores between 2011 and 2013. On December 27, 2011, after poor holiday sales, the company announced 100 to 120 Sears and Kmart stores would close. On February 23, 2012, Sears Holdings Corp. announced it is closing all nine "The Great Indoors" stores. On December 6, 2013, Sears Holding Corp. announced that it will spin off Lands' End catalog business as a separate company by distributing stock to the retailer's stockholders. Lands' End stock began trading on the NASDAQ on April 7, 2014.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In 2015, Sears Holdings planned to spinoff 235 of its properties into a new REIT to be called Seritage Growth Properties, with the package of properties backed by a $925 million loan from JP Morgan Chase Bank. The 235 properties, mainly Sears and Kmart locations, spread across the country and Puerto Rico, amounted to a total of 37.1 million square feet of space. The strategy of department stores converting their real estate holdings into REITs has been well-used in the current commercial real estate environment.


title: Sears Holdings

text: Not everyone was happy with the Seritage move. Some people felt that the property sold were undervalued. The fact that Eddie Lampert was involved in both ends of the deal, made the move very suspect. Investors filed a lawsuit against the move. Lampert settled this deal agreeing to $40million.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In May 2016, Sears Holdings announced that it was seeking strategic alternatives for its house brands to increase their revenue, including expanding their presence outside of Sears and Kmart. The filing stated that "by evaluating potential partnerships or other transactions that could expand distribution of our brands and service offerings, we can position both businesses to achieve greater success." Sears opened standalone appliance stores.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In late 2016 and early 2017, some significant steps were taken by Edward Lampert, president, chief executive officer and top shareholder of Sears Holding Corp. Lampert, with personal assets estimated at $2 billion, is also the founder and manager of the hedge fund ESL Investments Inc. He provided an additional loan of $500 million to the company and said he would provide letters of credit to Sears for additional amounts, reportedly totaling $200 million and possibly increasing to a half-billion dollars in the future. During this period, the company announced that it would close 150 stores (109 Kmart and 41 Sears outlets), in an attempt to cut its losses after a decline in sales of 12 to 13 percent during the holiday shopping season and the largest quarterly loss since 2013. On January 9, 2017, Sears announced that it had reached an agreement to sell the Craftsman brand to Stanley Black & Decker for $900 million, plus royalties on new Craftsman sales for a 15-year period. During this period, Sears will continue selling Craftsman products royalty-free under a licensing agreement.


title: Sears Holdings

text: As part of an effort to extend the brand, Sears launched a pilot location in San Antonio for a DieHard-branded auto service franchise, "DieHard Auto Center driven by Sears Auto". The brand is intended to operate as a standalone version of the Sears Auto Center locations attached to Sears department stores; the location was chosen because it was in proximity to a Sears location that had closed. In December 2017, the "Wall Street Journal" reported that Sears Holdings Corp. had not paid for any national television commercials since late November 2017, for both Kmart and Sears, instead relying on online marketing.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On January 4, 2018, Sears Holdings announced it would shutter 103 unprofitable Kmart and Sears stores, after 24 quarters of sales declines. These stores would be closing by April 2018, leaving Sears Holdings with 555 stores. According to an op-ed in MSN money, at this rate, Sears, along with sister company Kmart, has an extremely high chance of disappearing and going defunct in 2018, and that 2017 will have marked its final holiday season as an independent brand.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On March 15, 2018, Sears Holdings announced a small profit was made in quarter 4 of 2017. However, investors are claiming that this is due to tax refunds and that sales are still falling for both Kmart and Sears.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On September 11, 2018, the company stated it would announce its quarter 2 earnings when the market opened on September 13. After missing the deadline, the company announced at the end of the business day that it had lost $508 million, though same-store sales showed some improvements. The following day, Lampert blamed the losses on the company's difficulties in paying pensions and the resulting regulatory penalties.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On September 28, 2018, Sears Holdings began selling at less than a dollar per share, risking delisting by NASDAQ.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On October 10, 2018, it was reported that Sears Holdings had engaged advisors regarding an imminent bankruptcy filing.


title: Sears Holdings

text: The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on October 15, 2018, in New York; the same day that a $134 million debt payment was due, and will close 142 stores, including 63 Kmart stores and 79 Sears stores.


title: Sears Holdings

text: All other Kmart and Sears stores are staying open to turn the company around. Their online stores sears.com, kmart.com, and shopyourway.com are also staying open to serve members affected by the store closures. On the same day, Lampert announced that he was stepping down as CEO, remaining chairman of the board. He also announced that CFO Robert A. Riecker, CDO Leena Munjal, and apparel and footwear segment president Greg Ladley would collectively share the responsibilities of CEO in his place.


title: Sears Holdings

text: After hitting below $1 per share due to bankruptcy filing, Sears Holdings was delisted from NASDAQ on October 24, 2018 and became listed on OTC Pink.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On November 8, 2018, Sears Holdings announced it would close an additional 40 Kmart and Sears stores.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On November 23, 2018, Sears Holdings released a list of 505 stores, including 239 Kmart stores and 266 Sears stores, that are for sale in the bankruptcy process while all others are currently holding liquidation sales.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On December 28, 2018. Sears Holdings announced that it would close an additional 80 Kmart and Sears stores, as it faces possible liquidation. Their deadline for a bid was December 28, 2018 at 4:00pm; if no offers are made for the company, it could face liquidation of the entire operation. During the last few minutes of the auction, Lampert sent a $4.6 billion bid to try to keep the dying company alive. He plans to keep 425 locations open, including 202 Kmart stores and 223 Sears stores, with 50,000 employees.


title: Sears Holdings

text: Sears Holdings announced on January 16, 2019, that Lampert (through his hedge fund, ESL Investments) had won the bankruptcy auction, allowing the company to remain open.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On January 24, 2019, a group of unsecured creditors, that included Simon Property Group, filed a motion with the bankruptcy court to overturn the deal Sears Holdings had just made with Lampert claiming that Lampert had been "engaged in serial asset stripping" of the company at the expense of suppliers and landlords. The creditors want the bankruptcy court to force the company to liquidate instead.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On January 28, 2019, the federal government operated Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation announced that they were not in favor with the current Sears Holding agreement with Lampert since that agreement would create a $1.7 billion funding gap in the employee pension fund that would require the American taxpayers to cover the shortfall. The same federal agency also accused "Lampert of structuring the deal to inappropriately obtain ownership of the chain's Kenmore appliance brand and the Diehard tools brand."


title: Sears Holdings

text: On February 7, 2019, a bankruptcy judge approved a $5.2 billion plan by Sears’ chairman and biggest shareholder to keep the iconic business going. The approval means roughly 425 stores and 45,000 jobs will be preserved. As a result, the retail business has emerged into Transform Holdco LLC.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On May 24, 2019, Sears announced it was opening small stores under the name Sears Home&Life. These stores would mainly sell appliances, mattresses, connected home products. This was done at three locations: Overland Park, Kansas, Anchorage, Alaska, and in Lafayette, Louisiana.


title: Sears Holdings

text: On June 28, 2019, it was reported that Sears Holdings had plans to fully dissolve after selling its retail assets to ESL Investments a few months prior.


title: Sears Holdings

text: In March 2019, Sears Holdings sued Transform Holdco LLC for $57.5 million it says it is owed from the sale. The company also says Transform owes it $41.3 million for credit card and cash transactions that occurred before the sale closed, as well as $16.2 million for a portion of February rent, according to the documents. Sears Holdings could not be reached for additional comment.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Belmore, a suburb in the Canterbury-Bankstown region of Sydney. They compete in the NRL Telstra Premiership, as well as competitions facilitated by the New South Wales Rugby League, including the Canterbury Cup NSW, the Jersey Flegg Cup, Harvey Norman Women's Premiership, Tarsha Gale Cup, S. G. Ball Cup and the Harold Matthews Cup.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The club was admitted to the New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership, predecessor of the current NRL competition, in 1935. They won their first premiership in their fourth year of competition with another soon after, and after spending the 1950s and most of the 1960s on the lower rungs went through a very strong period in the 1980s, winning four premierships in that decade.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Known briefly in the 1990s as the Sydney Bulldogs, as a result of the Super League war the club competed in that competition in 1997 before changing their name to the geographically indistinct Bulldogs and continuing to play every season of the re-unified NRL, winning their most recent premiership in 2004. In 2012, Canterbury won the minor premiership, but lost to the Melbourne Storm 14-4 in the grand final. In 2014, they came from 7th to make the grand final against South Sydney, but lost 30-6.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 1935—thirteen years after a meeting above "The Ideal Milk Bar" in Campsie led to the creation of the Canterbury-Bankstown Junior Rugby League—the Canterbury club was admitted into the elite New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership. It took the new club, nicknamed "Country Bumpkins" because of their rural recruiting and CB emblem, four years to win their first premiership in 1938. The grand final-winning effort was repeated in 1942 before a 38-year premiership drought.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 1967, having ended the 11-year premiership reign of St. George by defeating them in the final, "The Berries" (as they were known at the time) lost to South Sydney in the grand final. But the return to the top end of the table set the scene for off-field restructuring that laid the foundations for the club to become one of the most consistent achievers in the remaining decades of the 20th century.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 1978, Canterbury became known as "The Bulldogs". Nicknames such as "Cantabs" "CBs" and "Berries" were seen to be "soft" and the club wanted something to signify determination and grit. A grand final appearance in 1979, followed by a grand final win in 1980 with a young, enthusiastic and free-running side dubbed "The Entertainers", was the beginning of a golden era that was to produce three more grand final wins in the 1980s: 1984, 1985 and 1988.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: During the mid-1990s' Super League war, Canterbury aligned themselves with the Super League competition, playing in the 1997 premiership season. In 1998 the Bulldogs came close to adding another premiership trophy after qualifying for the grand final where they met the Brisbane Broncos and lost 38-12. On the way to the 1998 Grand Final, Canterbury had two come-from-behind wins. The first was against the Newcastle Knights in the third week of the finals—behind 16-0 in the second half, they fought back to 16 all at full time and went on to win in extra time. A week later they trailed arch rivals Parramatta in the preliminary final by 16 points with 9 minutes remaining. Three tries and a conversion from the sideline by Daryl Halligan in the final minutes got them back level at 18 all and send the game into extra-time. Canterbury eventually went on to win 32-20 in one of the greatest finals comebacks in the history of the game.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Following indifferent form in 1999, 2000 and 2001 where they had varying levels of success, the club was found to have systematically and deliberately breached the NRL salary cap in 2002 (for the 2001–02 seasons), and was penalized all 37 competition points which it had amassed up to that point for 2002. This resulted in the club falling from first to last place on the ladder, and at the end of the season the Bulldogs received their first "wooden spoon" (a reference to the club which finishes last in the competition) since 1964.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Bulldogs returned to finals contention in 2003; however, they fell one step short of yet another grand final after losing to the Roosters 28-18 in the preliminary final.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The club went through some off-field dramas in 2004, the most serious of which included rape allegations during a pre-season match in Coffs Harbour. The team managed to focus on football and triumphed when they held out the Sydney Roosters 16-13 with a try-saving tackle by Andrew Ryan in the dying seconds of the 2004 Grand Final. The game was to be the last for departing captain Steve Price, but he missed the match due to a leg injury. Price is now taking over at the club as the General Manager of Football, this position becoming effective in 2020 as he looks to turn the club's fortunes around to that of 2004.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: 2005 saw Canterbury-Bankstown unable to mount a serious defence of their premiership title as injuries and contract negotiations saw the year start and finish on a sour note for the club. Due to the extent of injuries suffered, the team was under-strength for most of the year. This took its toll in the final six weeks of the season, with the club suffering successive heavy losses and missing the finals series. In 2006, little was expected from the club after a poor 2005 season, but despite some doubt over the strength of their side, Canterbury's forward pack helped them to a better than expected result for the year, finishing a game short of the grand final, losing to eventual premiers the Brisbane Broncos. Inconsistency and a poor finish to the 2007 season meant Canterbury were knocked out of the finals in week two.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2008, having already lost Mark O'Meley to the Sydney Roosters, Willie Mason left the club. Further into the off-season Canterbury-Bankstown also lost halfback Brent Sherwin, and prospects for the 2008 NRL season began to look dim. Although they recorded at the start of the season a couple of victories, the injury toll and the departure Sonny Bill Williams mid-season demoralized the club and players, and the Canterbury-Bankstown club earned their second wooden spoon of the decade.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Another source of discontent in 2008 was the battle for election to the football club board. Many contenders believed that the board of the time was steering the club in the wrong direction, particularly then-CEO Malcolm Noad. New members were elected to the board early in 2008, and later in the season Noad resigned as CEO. His replacement as head of the football club was Todd Greenberg.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Greenberg's influence became apparent during the 2009 season. Premiership-winning coach Steve Folkes was replaced with his assistant Kevin Moore. The purchases of several key players, including former Melbourne and Cronulla playmaker Brett Kimmorley changed Canterbury from a poorly run and poorly performing club to one of the best clubs both on and off the field in 2009. Canterbury finished second in the regular season (losing the minor premiership to the St. George Illawarra Dragons due to a loss of two competition points for an interchange breach against Penrith in Round 2), and players and officials took out a number of Dally M awards. 2009 was also the final season for Hazem El Masri, who became the highest all-time pointscorer in Australian rugby league history with a penalty goal in the Bulldogs' Round 1 match against the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: From 2010, Canterbury-Bankstown returned to the name Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs. The Canterbury-Bankstown club celebrated its 75th anniversary in 2010.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the 2012 NRL season, Canterbury finished first on the competition ladder to take out their first minor premiership since 1994. They made it to the grand final, losing to Melbourne 14-4.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In May 2013, former Netball New Zealand chief executive Raelene Castle was appointed CEO, the first female in the NRL's history. They finished the regular season sixth on the ladder and bowed out in the semi final.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2014, Canterbury-Bankstown made history by winning three consecutive games by one point, from Round 5 to Round 7. They finished runners up to South Sydney in the 2014 NRL Grand Final. Canterbury reached the grand final after winning three sudden death finals matches against Melbourne, Manly-Warringah and Penrith.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 10 August 2017, Canterbury announced Rugby League World Cup CEO Andrew Hill as the replacement for outgoing boss Raelene Castle. On the appointment, chairman Ray Dib noted that "Andrew was appointed from a very strong list of candidates and has exceptional experience in the game of rugby league."


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In September 2017, Canterbury announced that former premiership winning player Dean Pay would be the new coach at the club starting in 2018.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The 2018 NRL season started off badly for Canterbury with the club only winning 3 of its first 10 matches. In May 2018, the new Canterbury board admitted that they would not be able to make any major signings until the end of the 2021 season due to the salary cap drama engulfing the club. The issue with the salary cap problems involved the previous administration and former coach Des Hasler who signed numerous players on back ended deals. In the wake of the scandal, the club was forced to offload players to free up room in the cap. This resulted in Moses Mbye departing for the Wests Tigers and star recruit Aaron Woods being sold to Cronulla after only signing with Canterbury months prior. On 16 June 2018, Canterbury suffered a humiliating 32-10 loss to the Gold Coast Titans at Belmore, in the press conference coach Dean Pay said "Physically, we just weren't good enough. The way they turned up, the way they trained during the week wasn't good enough, I feel sorry for the fans".


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 20 July 2018, Canterbury played against arch rivals Parramatta in what the media had dubbed as the "Spoon Bowl" with both sides sitting at the bottom of the ladder. There were fears before the game that the match would attract the lowest NRL crowd in over 20 years. Parramatta went on to win the match 14-8.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: After the defeat by Parramatta, Canterbury were facing the prospect of finishing with the wooden spoon for the first time since 2008 but over the coming four weeks the club managed to pull off upset wins against the Wests Tigers, the Brisbane Broncos and St. George to finish the season in 12th place. The lower grades of Canterbury performed better in 2018 with the club winning the Intrust Super Premiership defeating Newtown 18-12 in the final and also winning the NRL State Championship defeating Redcliffe 42-18.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Canterbury started off the 2019 NRL season losing their two first games in convincing fashion against the New Zealand Warriors and rivals Parramatta. Due to the bad start to the season, there were rumours that coach Dean Pay would be relieved of his duties but he was then granted a 12-month contract extension to remain as Canterbury coach until the end of 2020.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: By the midway part of the 2019 season, Canterbury-Bankstown found themselves sitting last on the table and in real danger of finishing with the wooden spoon. However, for the third straight season, Canterbury achieved four upset victories in a row over Penrith, the Wests Tigers, South Sydney and Parramatta who were all competing for a place in the finals series and were higher on the table. Pay was credited with the late season revival as the side focused heavily on defence.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the 2020 NRL season, Canterbury-Bankstown were defeated in both of their opening fixtures. The season was then temporarily postponed. Following the season resumption, they were defeated by Manly-Warringah at Central Coast Stadium. They then defeated the St George Illawarra Dragons 22-2 at Bankwest Stadium. After round 9, they have not won a game. They were defeated in round 9 by the Brisbane Broncos at Suncrop Stadium 26-8. The speculation that then Head Coach Dean Pay would be sacked grew. By Tuesday 14 July 2020, Canterbury-Bankstown released a statement saying that Pay had resigned from his position. In this statement, the club announced that Pay's assistant coach Steve Georgallis would take over the role. Following this, it was reported that Dean's other assistant, Steve Antonelli, also resigned from his position. The clubs Canterbury Cup NSW head coach Brad Henderson would fill in as Georgallis's assistant coach.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On Wednesday 22 July 2020, the club announced that they had secured the services of former Manly Warringah Sea Eagles head coach and current (at 22 July 2020) Penrith Panthers assistant coach, Trent Barrett to coach the club from the start of season 2021 on a three-year deal.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Canterbury finished the 2020 NRL season in 15th place on the table after a horror year on and off the field. Canterbury finished on equal points with Brisbane but avoided the wooden spoon due to a slightly better for and against record.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Canterbury started the 2021 NRL season poorly losing their opening three matches including being kept scoreless in round 2 & round 3 against Penrith and Brisbane respectively. This was the first time in the club's history that this had occurred.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In round 4 of the 2021 NRL season, Canterbury were defeated 38-0 by South Sydney in the traditional Good Friday game. Canterbury became only the second team in the NRL era to lose three straight games without scoring a point after Cronulla who achieved this in the 2014 NRL season.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: It was also the worst start to a season by any team since Glebe in the 1928 NSWRFL season who managed to only score 12 points in their first four matches.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 30 June 2021, Canterbury were fined $50,000 by the NRL after failing to communicate the increased Covid restrictions to players. The incident was in relation to five Canterbury players visiting Sydney's Eastern Suburbs which was a Covid-19 hotspot.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In round 16 of the 2021 NRL season, Canterbury suffered their third heaviest defeat in club history losing 66-0 to Manly-Warringah at WEstern Sydney Stadium.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In round 22 of the 2021 NRL season, Canterbury were handed their sixth Wooden Spoon after losing 24-10 against the New Zealand Warriors. Canterbury needed to win the match and their remaining three fixtures to avoid finishing last.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Despite a number of off-season recruits, Canterbury started the 2022 NRL season poorly winning only two of their first ten matches. On 16 May 2022, Canterbury head coach Trent Barrett resigned from his position with the club sitting bottom of the table.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 18 May 2022, Michael Potter was named as interim coach of the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs after the resignation of Barrett. Under Potter, the club won five of their last 14 matches to avoid the wooden spoon by finishing 12th.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The name and emblem of the club has changed several times over its history. At the club's foundation in 1935, it was known only as 'Canterbury-Bankstown', without an animal mascot. The nicknames 'Berries' and 'C-Bs' (or, derisively, 'Country Bumpkins') were often used informally, 'C-Bs' being used from the outset and 'Berries' coming into use by the mid-1940s. The club had been referred to as the 'Bulldogs' as early as 1977. In 1978, the Bulldog mascot and name was adopted, with the club becoming known as the 'Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs'. This was the name used throughout the team's 1980s glory era. In 1995 the club name was changed to 'Sydney Bulldogs', reflecting a similar change by Eastern Suburbs (to 'Sydney City Roosters'). The name changed again in 1996, returning to 'Canterbury Bulldogs' with 'Bankstown' omitted, and yet again in 2000, to the geographically indistinct 'Bulldogs'. Bob Hagan, the club boss at the time of the 2000 change, explained that the dropping of the name 'Canterbury' was intended to broaden the appeal of the club outside of its traditional supporter base, so that the club could attract a geographically diverse following like Manchester United or the Chicago Bulls. Despite the name change, some supporters, as well as many television and radio commentators, continued to refer to the club as 'Canterbury'. In the most recent change, board officials voted in late 2009 for the club to return to 'Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs' from the 2010 season onwards.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The initial crest was a 'C-B' in a shield. The adoption of the 'Bulldogs' name and mascot took place in 1978. There have been three main versions of the mascot logo. The first, which featured a snarling bulldog inside a circle, was replaced in 1998 by a more 'cartoonish' logo of a bulldog's head. In 2009, the club announced that the logo would be changing again, and asked members to vote on which of two similar proposed logos would be used from 2010. The rationale for the logo change was to celebrate the club's 75th anniversary in 2010 and to better reflect the club's "true essence and history". Two months later, the new design was unveiled, with the official change of logo taking place in November 2009. The current logo returns to the standing bulldog of the 1978–1997 logo, although it is no longer snarling. It also references elements of the club's history by incorporating the 'C-B' emblem, the club's year of foundation (1935), and the blue and white 'V' design which has featured on many of the club's jerseys over the years. The change of name from 'Bulldogs' to 'Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs' took place after the new logo was unveiled.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Bulldogs have played in predominantly blue and white strip since the club entered the league in 1935. The only exception to this was during the Second World War, when rationing meant they had to wear a maroon jersey with a blue 'V'.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: There have been four basic strip designs since the club's inception in the top-flight league competition:


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In their inaugural season, very few home matches were allocated to the Canterbury-Bankstown club. However, when the opportunity arose the club took their matches to either Marrickville or Pratten Park. From the following season, the club began to base itself at Belmore Sports Ground. The club had a long-time affinity with the ground and stayed there continuously until 1994.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 1995 when the Super League War began to come about, the club changed its playing name to the "Sydney Bulldogs" in an attempt to broaden its fan base and played matches at Parramatta Stadium where spectator facilities were of a higher class. This move paid off with the club going on to become premiers that season. However, the club reverted its name to Canterbury for the 1996 season and once again played matches out of Belmore Sports Ground; something that lasted up until the inaugural National Rugby League season of 1998.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Once the new Stadium Australia had been finished and opened in preparation for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, the club began to play matches there between 1999 and 2000. From 2001 to 2005, the club then began to play matches out of the new Sydney Showground at Homebush Bay, with bigger matches played out of the then-Telstra Stadium from 2003. When fans began to complain about the poor quality of the Showground venue as a rugby league ground, the club eventually decided to move all future home matches to the Stadium, where the club remains. In 2008, Telstra Stadium became known as ANZ Stadium due to a naming rights change.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The club's training and administration offices remained at Belmore Sports Ground until the beginning of 2008, but were relocated to Sydney Olympic Park during the 2008 season. With the NSW Government committing to upgrading Belmore Sports Ground, the club administration and training has now been returned to the historical ground after a $9 million upgrade.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2015, the club played two home games at their traditional home ground Belmore Sports Ground as part of the club's 80th-anniversary celebrations. They have continued to play some games at Belmore every year since 2015. From 2019, the club started to schedule only one home fixture at Belmore Sports Ground. No game was held at Belmore in the 2020 season due to the COVID-19 season postponement and season rescheduling.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Bulldogs Army is the core supporter group for the Bulldogs, with the section they sit within known as 'The Kennel'. To be sitting in this section, supporters must become a member of the club itself and register any large flags and/or banners which are brought to the game. At all away games the Bulldogs Army locates themselves in the general admission section. The main aim of the Bulldogs Army is to show support and passion for the Bulldogs.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: As the region's traditional local representatives, the Bulldogs predominantly draw on a support base in and around the districts of Canterbury and Bankstown in south-western Sydney, although in recent years club administration and home matches have relocated to Sydney Olympic Park. The Bulldogs are the most supported NRL club in regional NSW—over 25% of Bulldog fans are located in regional NSW, over 25% are located outside of NSW and over 10% are located in Queensland. The club has one of the highest average attendances in the league: over the 2010 season, it was one of only two clubs to record an average home crowd of more than 20,000.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The multicultural demographics of the suburbs in the club's support base, such as Lakemba, means the club has a large number of supporters from a range of non-Anglo ethnicities. In recent years the club has become particularly identified in the media with the Lebanese and the Greek community, particularly with the club's former star goalkicker Hazem El Masri, who migrated from Lebanon as a young child. The Greek community has a huge history of Greeks playing for the club dating back to the 1970s with club legend Dr George Peponis, who migrated from Greece as a very young child who captained the Bulldogs and Australia. El Masri retired at the end of the 2009 season.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The rivalry between the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs and the Parramatta Eels is one of the fiercest in the NRL. The two clubs have been geographically close throughout their whole histories. In the 1980s, Canterbury and Parramatta both won four premierships each and met in two grand finals in 1984 and 1986.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the 1990s, at the height of the super league war, Parramatta signed four of Canterbury's star players Jarrod McCracken, Dean Pay, Jim Dymock and Jason Smith which helped Parramatta reach the finals for the first time in eleven years, in the 1998 preliminary final, Parramatta were winning against Canterbury 18-2 with less than ten minutes to play when Canterbury staged one of the biggest comebacks finals comebacks defeating Parramatta 32-20 in extra time.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the 2007 NRL season, the club's played each other in the elimination final at Telstra Stadium with Parramatta gaining revenge for the 1998 preliminary final as they defeated Canterbury 25-6.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the 2009 NRL season, Parramatta defeated Canterbury in the preliminary final to cap off a remarkable run to the grand final. The crowd which attended the match was a non grand final record of 74,000 fans.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Speaking to the Herald Sun in 2007, former Canterbury-Bankstown player Craig Polla-Mounter described the rivalry between the two club's saying "I think the Parramatta and Canterbury fans can be the most unforgiving, especially when we play each other. I have no doubt it is the biggest rivalry in rugby league and part of the reason he didn't play again". Polla-Mounter said this in reference to Parramatta player Paul Carige and his infamous performance in the 1998 preliminary final.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Speaking of the rivalry in 2015, former Canterbury player James Graham said "As soon as I came to this club, I was told that they were the closest club to us and that there was no love lost between players and fans". Andrew Ryan who played for both clubs said "Both clubs do speak about the rivalry, in the change room and leading into the clashes, they always want to get the wood on their rival, I went for Canterbury when I was a kid, but then got my first opportunity in first grade to play for Parramatta. They place a huge amount of emphasis on the game. I think I was one of the only players to go the other way, a lot of players who had played for the Bulldogs allayed first the Eels, not too many went the other way".


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs have a long-standing rivalry with fellow team the Sydney Roosters, Whilst both teams had crossed premiership paths in grand finals in four occasions. In 1938, Canterbury-Bankstown won their first premiership against the Eastern Suburbs as what they were known as back then winning 19-6 at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Two years later in 1940, the sides met again with the Easts winning the 1940 NSWRFL Grand Final 24-14. In 1980, the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs broke a 38-year premiership drought defeating the Eastern Suburbs Roosters 18-4 at the Sydney Cricket Ground.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2002, the Sydney Roosters won the NRL premiership on the back of a 9-game winning streak. This was the same year the premiership favourite Canterbury were stripped of 37 points due to systematic breaches of the salary cap in 2001 and 2002, in 2003, the Roosters proved themselves worthy of defending premiers title when they defeated Canterbury in the preliminary final 28-18 in front of a sold out Aussie Stadium. In 2004, the Roosters defeated Canterbury 35-0 and fighting broke out in the stands during and after the game had been completed. While the Roosters finished the regular season with the minor premiership, Canterbury defeated them in the grand final 16-13 after trailing 13-6 at half time.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: As of the 2021 NRL season, the last time the two clubs met in a finals game was the 2015 Elimination Final which the Roosters won 38-12 at the Sydney Football Stadium.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs have a fierce rivalry with their neighbour the St. George Illawarra Dragons. Canterbury-Bankstown were founded in 1935, fourteen years after St. George Dragons, St. George inflicted a premiership record 91-6 victory over Canterbury in 1935 but Canterbury enjoyed premiership success first in 1938 and St. George in 1942. In the 1942 NSWRFL season, the two clubs met in the Grand Final with Canterbury-Bankstown defeating St. George 11-9 in a low-scoring affair at the Sydney Cricket Ground. After that however, St. George recorded eleven straight premierships in the years following 1955-1966. It was also Canterbury who put an end to their Premiership run in 1967, when they beat them by a point in the preliminary final to face South Sydney in the grand final. Since then, both clubs inflicted Premiership defeats on the other, with the St. George Dragons defeating the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs in their last grand final success in 1979, the Bulldogs returned the favour in 1985.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The two teams subsequently met in the 1993 preliminary final which St. George defeated Canterbury 27-12. They would meet again in the 1995 and 1998 finals series with Canterbury running out winners on both occasions. The elimination final in 1998 was also St. George's last game as a stand-alone entity as the club elected to form a joint venture with Illawarra for the 1999 NRL season.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Souths and Canterbury-Bankstown have played each other every Good Friday since 2012. They met in the 1967 NSWRFL Grand Final with South Sydney winning 12-10. However, the competitive nature intensified when they met in the 2014 NRL Grand Final where Souths won 30-6 to claim their first premiership since 1971.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: During their Good Friday clash in 2015, this game was labelled for its controversy, as South Sydney won 18-17 thanks to a late penalty goal. Canterbury fans were angry about the match officials decision and attacked the match officials when they walked off the field, throwing bottles at them, even causing one of them to slip over. Some fans were given lifetime bans for throwing bottles at the match officials.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In round 4 of the 2021 NRL season, Canterbury were defeated 38-0 by South Sydney in the traditional Good Friday game. Canterbury became only the second team in the NRL era to lose three straight games without scoring a point after Cronulla who achieved this in the 2014 NRL season.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: It was also the worst start to a season by any team since Glebe in the 1928 NSWRFL season who managed to only score 12 points in their first four matches.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The Canterbury League Club is the licensed club of the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs. Canterbury League Club first opened its doors for trade in September 1956 to service the needs of the football club and local community. The Salvation Army Hall became the first venue of the Canterbury League Club. Sixty people would fill the venue on a busy night.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In the first two years of trade the club was outgrowing itself and in 1960 the Club moved its premises to Bridge St which allowed the League Club to grow as well as cater for patron parking.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: During the 1990s Canterbury managed one of the most successful league clubs in NSW and was quickly becoming known as one of the most progressive leisure facilities in Australia. With trade booming and patronage at an all-time high, the Club extended its trading to 24-hour trading.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2000, the Board had approved major renovations. The renovations started in 2000 and in 2002 the Banyan Brasserie, Dynasty Restaurant, new foyer, level 1 and health club were opened to the public.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Canterbury League Club has since become one of Sydney's premier hospitality destinations with 5-star amenities including three restaurants, two coffee shops, multiple bars and entertainment lounges and a 24-hour health club.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Hazem El Masri holds the NRL record for the most games played for the club, having made 317 appearances in total.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: Hazem El Masri also holds records for the most points scored, the most tries scored and the most points scored for the Bulldogs. Since his debut in 1996, he has scored a total of 2,418 points—which was also a competition record for Rugby League in Australia until 2019. Former player Daryl Halligan, who retired with the club in 2000, had previously held the competition record for most points scored with 2,034, which included points scored whilst at his former club the North Sydney Bears.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: The club's largest win occurred in 1995 when they played as the "Sydney Bulldogs." In a match against the newly formed North Queensland Cowboys, the Bulldogs won 66-4. In the club's first season in 1935 they were subject to the two heaviest defeats in competition history two weeks in succession. Firstly, they lost to St. George 91-6 and the following week to Eastern Suburbs 87-7. However, despite these big losses, the club was able to secure their first premiership 3 years later in 1938 in the Grand Final against Eastern Suburbs; at the same time setting the record for becoming the quickest non-foundation club to win a title. This record was not broken until 1999.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 2002, the club won 17 matches in a row after getting beaten by New Zealand Warriors; falling just two short of the record set by the Eastern Suburbs team of 1975.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In Round 7 of the 2014 season, after beating the South Sydney Rabbitohs 15-14, the Bulldogs became the first club to win three consecutive matches by 1 point. They went on to be runners up to South Sydney Rabbitohs in the grandfinal.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

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title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 1 August 2015, the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs announced the first five inductees into the Hall of Fame to celebrate their 80th anniversary.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: On 1 August 2015, the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs announced a "Team of the Decade" to celebrate their 80th anniversary.


title: Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

text: In 1908 and 1909 the only districts with Junior Leagues were South Sydney and Balmain. The first clubs from the Canterbury district to participate in rugby league were Belmore in the NSWRL 2nd grade competition, and Campsie Triers in the Western Suburbs A Grade. When the St George JRL was established in 1911, Canterbury clubs were allocated to this competition. In 1922 the Canterbury JRL was established and Campsie Iona with 17 points edged out Wattle Hill 16 for the A Grade title, Lakemba won B Grade and Wattle Hill the C Grade. Campsie Iona repeated their A grade success in 1923, 1924 and 1925 before Belmore stopped their run in 1926.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The SIG Sauer P250 is a semi-automatic pistol made by Sigarms (now known as Sig Sauer Inc. of Exeter, New Hampshire). Introduced in 2007, the hammer-fired P250 can be chambered in .22 Long Rifle, .380 ACP, 9×19mm Parabellum (9mm), .357 SIG, .40 S&W, and .45 ACP. The P250 chambered in 9mm was introduced to the North American market on November 7, 2007, followed by the .45 ACP compact model in February 2008 at the SHOT Show. The last of the models was introduced in late 2009.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: In early 2014, the SIG P320 was introduced. This striker-fired descendant of the P250 continued the modular format and shares several of the same components including magazines and grip frames.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: As of January 2017, the P250 was no longer listed online by SIG Sauer, except for a .22 Long Rifle version; no P250 was listed as of January 2018.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The P250 has no manual external safeties. Instead, A firing pin block aids to prevent the weapon from accidental discharge.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The trigger is a self-decocking DAO trigger system with spurless and recessed hammer. The trigger system has a pull weight of about 45 N (4.6 kgf, 5.5 lbf)


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The handguns are available with a dark colored Nitron slide surface finish, two tone finish, where the stainless steel slide has an untreated surface, and a diamond-plated finish.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The grip module on the P250 Compact was changed in 2009. This change makes that the original and new style grip modules use different magazines. These old magazines are not compatible with new grip modules; the accessory rail was changed as well from a curved rail to a Picatinny rail.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: The factory holsters of the original grip modules do not fit newer grip modules featuring Picatinny rails though the modular nature of the firearm allows the original grip modules to be easily swapped out with the new version inexpensively.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: In 2012, SIG Sauer introduced a medium width version of the subcompact grip module with the Picatinny rail. The small width versions of the subcompact does not have this. Also introduced were exchange kits for a .380ACP and a .45ACP caliber subcompact version.


title: SIG Sauer P250

text: In the 2017 Sig Sauer catalog, the P250 was found under the rimfire category showing the .22 LR caliber as being available but mentioning that caliber exchange kits could be applied to convert the handgun to 9 x 19mm, .40 S&W, or .45 ACP calibers. As of January 2018, the P250 was no longer found on the Sig Sauer website.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: Counter-Strike: Source is a tactical first-person shooter video game developed by Valve and Turtle Rock Studios. Released in October 2004 for Windows, it is a remake of "Counter-Strike" (2000) using the Source game engine. As in the original, "Counter-Strike: Source" pits a team of counter-terrorists against a team of terrorists in a series of rounds. Each round is won either by completing an objective (such as detonating a bomb or rescuing hostages) or by eliminating all members of the enemy team. The game was initially bundled with all retail and digital copies of "Half-Life 2", before being released standalone.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: "Counter-Strike: Source" retains its team-based objective-orientated first-person shooter style gameplay. The aim of playing a map is to accomplish a map's objective: defusing the bomb, rescuing all hostages, or killing the entire opposing team. The ultimate goal of the game is to win more rounds than the opposing team. Once players are killed, they do not respawn until the next round, though this depends on which server people play on. This gameplay feature distinguishes Counter-Strike from other first-person shooter games, where players respawn instantly or after a short delay.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: Shooting while moving dramatically decreases accuracy, and holding the trigger down to continuously shoot produces severe recoil. The severity of damage induced by weaponry is dependent upon the specific locations of hits, with hits to the head being most lethal and shots which make contact elsewhere causing lesser loss of health. Damage is also affected by the distance, and if the target wears protection.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: "Counter-Strike: Source" was initially released as a beta to members of the Valve Cyber Café Program on August 11, 2004. On August 18, 2004, the beta was released to owners of "" as well as those who had received a "Half-Life 2" voucher bundled with some ATI Radeon video cards. The game was included with Half-Life 2 bundles, which were released on November 16, 2004.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: On October 11, 2006, Valve released an experimental update entitled Dynamic Weapons Pricing. Under this system, item prices are determined based on their demand the previous week.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: On March 5, 2010, Valve announced the release of games from its first-party library, including games from the "Counter-Strike" series, for Mac OS X. The ports were slated for release in April 2010. Valve employed Hidden Path Entertainment to provide support on updating "Counter-Strike: Source". On May 7, 2010, Valve released an update that includes new features and functionality developed in collaboration with Hidden Path Entertainment. These include 144 (now 146) new achievements, a new domination and revenge system, similar to that of "Team Fortress 2", player stats, an upgrade to the "Source" engine and more. On June 23, 2010, Valve released the beta to the public alongside the promised OS X version. On February 5, 2013, Valve released a port of "Counter-Strike: Source" for Linux.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: "Counter-Strike: Malvinas" is a multiplayer first-person shooter modification of "Counter-Strike: Source", developed and distributed by Argentine web hosting company Dattatec. The mod was released worldwide on 4 March 2013 and utilizes the Source game engine. The game is set in Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands, and revolves around a group of Argentine special forces capturing the archipelago from British "terrorists". The objective of the game is similar to that of the "Counter-Strike" series; each round is won by either detonating a bomb or by eliminating all members of the enemy team. "Counter-Strike: Malvinas" pays homage to the 1982 Falklands War, in which an estimated 650 Argentine and 255 British servicemen died. The mod prompted strong controversy in the United Kingdom; Dattatec's website was targeted by British hackers on 27 March 2013.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: "Counter-Strike: Source" was met with positive reviews from professional critics. Metacritic, a review aggregator website, awarded "Source" a rating of 88 out of a possible 100 based on 9 critic's reviews. Jeff Haynes of "IGN" said the game was "much more detailed, featuring many more polygons per model, bump mapping and other graphical enhancements" compared to the original.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: On August 12, 2011, Valve announced the production of a successor to "Counter-Strike: Source", entitled "". "Global Offensive"s development began in March 2010 when Hidden Path Entertainment attempted to port "Counter-Strike: Source" onto video game consoles prior to the end of its lifespan. During its development, Valve saw the opportunity to turn the port into a full game and expand on the predecessor's gameplay.


title: Counter-Strike: Source

text: "Counter-Strike: Source" has been played in tournaments since shortly after its release. The game received some criticism by the competitive community, who believed the game's skill ceiling was significantly lower than that of CS 1.6. This caused a divide in the competitive community as to which game to play competitively.


The Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin, also known as the Hungarian conquest or the Hungarian land-taking (), was a series of historical events ending with the settlement of the Hungarians in Central Europe in the late 9th and early 10th century. Before the arrival of the Hungarians, three early medieval powers, the First Bulgarian Empire, East Francia, and Moravia, had fought each other for control of the Carpathian Basin. They occasionally hired Hungarian horsemen as soldiers. Therefore, the Hungarians who dwelt on the Pontic steppes east of the Carpathian Mountains were familiar with their future homeland when their conquest started. Archaeogenetic studies confirmed the Asian origin of the conquerors.


title: Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin

text: The Hungarian conquest started in the context of a "late or 'small' migration of peoples". Contemporary sources attest that the Hungarians crossed the Carpathian Mountains following a joint attack by the Pechenegs and Bulgarians in 894 or 895. They first took control over the lowlands east of the river Danube and attacked and occupied Pannonia (the region to the west of the river) in 900. They exploited internal conflicts in Moravia and annihilated this state sometime between 902 and 906.


text: The Hungarians strengthened their control over the Carpathian Basin by defeating the Bavarian army in a battle fought at "Brezalauspurc" on 4 July 907. They launched a series of plundering raids between 899 and 955 and also targeted the Byzantine Empire between 943 and 971. However, they gradually settled in the basin and established a Christian monarchy, the Kingdom of Hungary, around 1000.


text: Byzantine authors were the first to record these events. The earliest work is Emperor Leo the Wise's "Tactics", finished around 904, which recounts the Bulgarian-Byzantine war of 894–896, a military conflict directly preceding the Hungarians' departure from the Pontic steppes. Nearly contemporary narration can be read in the "Continuation of the Chronicle by George the Monk". However, "De Administrando Imperio" ("On Governing the Empire") provides the most detailed account. It was compiled under the auspices of Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in 951 or 952.


text: Works written by clergymen in the successor states of the Carolingian Empire narrate events closely connected to the conquest. The "Annals of Fulda" which ends in 901 is the earliest among them. A letter from Archbishop Theotmar of Salzburg to Pope John IX in 900 also refers to the conquering Hungarians, but it is often regarded as a fake document. Abbot Regino of Prüm who compiled his "World Chronicle" around 908, sums up his knowledge on the Hungarians in a sole entry under "the year 889". Another valuable source is Bishop Liutprand of Cremona's "Antapodosis" ("Retribution") from around 960. Aventinus, a 16th-century historian, provides information that is not known by the other works which suggests that he used now-lost sources. However, his work is not considered as a reliable source.


text: An Old Church Slavonic compilation of "Lives" of saints preserved an eyewitness account on the Bulgarian-Byzantine war of 894–896. The first "Life" of Saint Naum, written around 924, contains nearly contemporary information on the fall of the Great Moravia caused by Hungarian invasions, although its earliest extant copy is from the 15th century. Similarly late manuscripts (the oldest of which was written in the 14th century) offer the text of the "Russian Primary Chronicle", a historical work completed in 1113. It provides information based on earlier Byzantine and Moravian sources.


text: The Hungarians initially preserved the memory of the major events in "the form of folk songs and ballads" as C.A. Macartney. The earliest local chronicle was compiled in the late 11th century. It exists now in more than one variant, its original version several times extended and rewritten during the Middle Ages. For instance, the 14th-century "Illuminated Chronicle" contains texts from the 11th-century chronicle.


text: An anonymous author's "Gesta Hungarorum" ("Deeds of the Hungarians"), written before 1200, is the earliest extant local chronicle. However, according to Macartney, this "most misleading" example "of all the early Hungarian texts" contains much information that cannot be confirmed based on the contemporaneous sources. Around 1283 Simon of Kéza, a priest at the Hungarian royal court, wrote the next surviving chronicle. He claims that the Hungarians were closely related to the Huns, earlier conquerors of the Carpathian Basin that emigrated from the Asian steppes. Accordingly, in his narration, the Hungarian invasion is in fact a second conquest of the same territory by the same people.


text: Graves of the first generations of the conquering Hungarians were identified in the Carpathian Basin, but fewer than ten definitely Hungarian cemeteries have been unearthed in the Pontic steppes. Most Hungarian cemeteries include 25 or 30 inhumation graves, but isolated burials were common. Adult males (and sometimes women and children) were buried together with either parts of their horses or with harness and other objects symbolizing a horse. The graves also yielded decorated silver belts, sabretaches furnished with metal plates, pear-shaped stirrups and other metal works. Many of these objects had close analogues in the contemporaneous archaeological cultures (e.g. Kushnarenkovo culture) from Cis-Ural and Trans-Ural region, and multiethnic "Saltovo-Mayaki culture" of the Pontic steppes. Most cemeteries from the 9th and 10th centuries are concentrated in the Upper Tisza region and in the plains along the rivers Rába and Vág, but early small cemeteries were also unearthed at Kolozsvár (Cluj-Napoca), Marosgombás (Aiud) and other Transylvanian sites.


text: A genetic study published in the "Annals of Human Genetics" in March 2008 analyzed 4 samples from the 10th century, and two carried North Eurasian Y-DNA haplogroup N1a1-Tat ("previously called Tat or N1c", M46). A 2009 study also examined mtDNA variation in 31 ancient horses from the Pannonian Basin, 17 from Avar and 14 from Hungarian conquest period, and "Avar sequences were genetically heterogeneous, closely related to Eastern breeds including the north Russian Tuva and Vyatskaya groups ... by contrast, the early Hungarian horses showed a relatively close relationship with the Akhal-Teke and Norwegian Ffjord breeds [and] at least at the level of high quality horses, our results show that the ethnic changes induced by the Hungarian Conquest in the late 9th century were accompanied by a similar change in the stables of the Carpathian Basin". A 2011 study on lactase persistence polymorphism of 23 elite and commoner samples from the 10-11th century found that their low prevalence of lactase persistence "corresponds well with those of present-day populations of the Uralic linguistic family, such as the Khantys, Mansis and Maris, and certain Central-Asian and Turkish populations" and "additional mtDNA testing identified six major mtDNA haplogroups (H, U, T, N1a, JT, X) among Hungarian conquerors, six among commoners from the time of the conquest (H, HV, M, R, T, U)", including those of Asian origin (like N, M and U4).


text: A comprehensive archaeogenetic study published in "Scientific Reports" in September 2016 examined mtDNA of 76 Hungarian-conquest period samples, and "West-Eurasian haplogroups (H, HV, I, J, K, N1a, R, T, U, V, X, W) were present at a frequency of 77%, and Central and East-Eurasian haplogroups (A, B, C, D, F, G, M) at 23%", in conclusion, "both the linguistically recorded Finno-Ugric roots and historically documented Turkic and Central Asian influxes had possible genetic imprints in the conquerors' genetic composition". In the same year was published by "Molecular Genetics and Genomics" a study of 17 samples of first generation Hungarian conqueror cemetery, revealing that "the most frequent [mtDNA] Hg was B, which together with Hg A indicate that about 30% of the Karos population is genetically connected to Central and East Asia. The majority of Hg-s (H, U, T, J, X) are of Eurasian origin; however, it is remarkable that two individuals belong to subhaplogroup


text: H6, which may also indicate Asian connection ... The single X2f maternal haplotype of the chief (sample 11) is of particular interest, as this haplotype is most probably of south Caucasian origin...", while only four had a Y-DNA Hg (typical European 2x I2a and R1b). A genetic study published in "PLOS One" in October 2018 examined the mtDNA of individuals from 10th-century graves associated with the Hungarian conquerors of the Basin. The majority of their maternal lineages were traced back to the Potapovka, Srubnaya and Poltavka cultures of the Pontic–Caspian steppe, while one-third of their maternal lineages could be traced back to Inner Asia, probably being derived from Asian Scythians and the Xiongnu (Asian Huns). The mtDNA of the conquerors was found to be most closely related to the Onoğur-Bulgar ancestors of the Volga Tatars. The conquerors did not display significant genetic relations to speakers of other Finno-Ugric languages. The evidence implied that the conquerors did not contribute significantly to the gene pool of modern Hungarians. A 2021 study analyzed maternal lineages from 202 10-11th century commoners from Carpathian Basin and compared them to conqueror elite, finding that "the haplogroup composition of the commoner population markedly differs from that of the elite, and, in contrast to the elite, commoners cluster with European populations. Alongside this, detectable sub-haplogroup sharing indicates admixture between the elite and the commoners. The majority of the 10–11th century commoners most likely represent local populations of the Carpathian Basin, which admixed with the eastern immigrant groups (which included conquering Hungarians)".


text: A genetic study published in "Scientific Reports" in November 2019 examined the remains of 29 Hungarian conquerors of the Carpathian Basin. The majority of them carried Y-DNA of West Eurasian origin, but at least 30% of East Eurasian & broadly Eurasian (N1a-M2004, N1a-Z1936, Q1a and R1a-Z2124). They carried a higher amount of West Eurasian paternal ancestry than West Eurasian maternal ancestry. Among modern populations, their paternal ancestry was the most similar to Bashkirs. Haplogroup I2a1a2b was observed among several conquerors of particularly high rank. This haplogroup is of European origin and is today particularly common among South Slavs. A wide variety of phenotypes were observed, with several individuals having blond hair and blue eyes, and some had East Asian admixture. The study also analyzed three Hunnic samples from the Carpathian Basin in the 5th century, and these displayed genetic similarities to the conquerors. The Hungarian conquerors appeared to be a recently assembled heterogenous group incorporating both European, Asian and Eurasian elements. In the same year the journal published an analysis of N3a4-Z1936 which is still found in very rare frequencies in modern Hungarians, and showed that Hungarian "sub-clade [N-B539/Y13850] splits from its sister-branch N3a4-B535, frequent today among Northeast European Uralic speakers, 4000-5000 ya, which is in the time-frame of the proposed divergence of Ugric languages", while on N-B539/Y13850+ sub-clade level confirmed shared paternal lineages with modern Ugric (Mansis and Khantys via N-B540/L1034) and Turkic speakers (Bashkirs and Volga Tatars via N-B540/L1034 and N-B545/Y24365).


text: A genetic study published in the "Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences" in January 2020 examined the remains of 19 male Hungarian conquerors. These conquerors were found to be carriers of a diverse set of haplogroups, and displayed genetic links to Turkic peoples, Finnic peoples and Slavs. More than 37% of them carried types of haplogroup N3a-L708 (mainly N3a4-Z1936, N3a4-Z1936 > Y13850, N3a4-Z1936 > Y13850 > L1034; less N3a2-M2118, present in Yakuts). This evidence suggested that the conquerors were of Ob-Ugric descent and spoke a Ugric language. A 2020 archaeogenetic and archaeological study published in "Scientific Reports" of 36 samples from Cis-Ural region and 9 Hungarian conquerors confirmed connection of paternal Hg N-Z1936 (> N-B545/Y24365) and maternal Hg N1a1 via common ancient population in addition to archaeological, historical and linguistic sources, implying the Hungarian homeland was "probably in the southern Trans-Ural region, where the Kushnarenkovo culture was disseminated [where] Lomovatovo and Nevolino cultures are archaeologically related to ancient Hungarians".


text: A genetic study published in the "European Journal of Human Genetics" in July 2020 examined the skeletal remains of Árpád dynasty descendant and King Béla III of Hungary and unknown Árpád member named as "II/52" / "HU52" from the Royal Basilica of Székesfehérvár. It was established that the male lineage of the Árpáds belonged to the Y-haplogroup R1a subclade R-Z2125 > R-Z2123 > R-Y2632 > R-Y2633 > R-SUR51. The subclade was also found in nearest contemporary matches of 48 Bashkirs from the Burzyansky and Abzelilovsky districts of the Republic of Bashkortostan in the Volga-Ural region, and 1 individual from the region of Vojvodina, Serbia. The Árpád members and one individual from Serbia share additional private SNPs making a novel subclade R-SUR51 > R-ARP, and as the mentioned individual has additional private SNPs it branches from the medieval Árpáds forming R-ARP > R-UVD. Based on the data of the distribution, appearance and coalescence estimation of R-Y2633 the dynasty traces ancient origin near northern Afghanistan about 4,500 years ago, with a separation date of R-ARP from the closest kin Bashkirs from the Volga-Ural region to 2,000 years ago, while the individual from Serbia (R-UVD) descends from the Árpáds about 900 years ago. As also the separation of haplogroup N-B539 between the Hungarians and Bashkirs is estimated to have occurred 2,000 years ago, it implies that the ancestors of Hungarians having Ugric and Turkic ancestry left the Volga Ural region about 2,000 years ago and started a migration that eventually culminated in the settlement in the Carpathian Basin.


text: An archaeogenetic study published in scientific journal "Current Biology" in May 2022 examined "48 from 10th century Conquering Hungarian elite cemeteries, 65 from commoner cemeteries of the Hungarian conquer-early Árpádian Period (10-11th centuries)". According to autosomal analysis, the Hungarian elite core can be modeled as ~50% Mansi-like, ~35% Sarmatian-like, and ~15% Hun/Xiongnu-like, and the Mansi-Sarmatian admixture event is suggested to have taken place in the Southern Ural region at 643–431 BCE, while Mansi-Hun around 217-315 CE. However, most individuals can be modeled as two-way admixtures of "Conq_Asia_Core" and "Eur_Core". The elite males carried, among others, East Eurasian Y-DNA haplogroups N1a, D1a, C2a, with Q1a and R1a-Z94 being sign of Hun-related ancestry, "generally accompanied by Asian maternal lineages". Notably, almost exclusively in the elite were present I2-Y3120 subclades, "very often accompanied by Asian maternal lineages, indicating that I2a1a2b1a1a could be more typical for the immigrants than to the local population". The study also showed "that a common 'proto-Ugric' gene pool appeared in the Bronze Age from the admixture of Mezhovskaya and Nganasan people, supporting genetic and linguistic data".


text: The "Continuation of the Chronicle by George the Monk" contains the earliest certain reference to the Hungarians. It states that Hungarian warriors intervened in a conflict between the Byzantine Empire and the Bulgarians on the latter's behalf in the Lower Danube region in 836 or 837. The first known Hungarian raid in Central Europe was recorded in the "Annals of St. Bertin," which writes of "enemies, called Hungarians, hitherto unknown" who ravaged King Louis the German's realm in 862. Victor Spinei and other historians argue that Rastislav of Moravia, at war with Louis the German, hired Hungarians to invade East Francia. Archbishop Theotmar of Salzburg clearly states in his letter of around 900 that the Moravians often allied with the Hungarians against the Germans.


text: Porphyrogenitus mentions that the Hungarians dwelled in a territory that they called ""Atelkouzou"" until their invasion across the Carpathians. He adds that it was located in the territory where the rivers "Barouch", "Koubou", "Troullos", "Broutos" and "Seretos" run. Although the identification of the first two rivers with the Dnieper and the Southern Bug is not unanimously accepted, the last three names without doubt refer to the rivers Dniester, Prut and Siret. In the wider region, at Subotsi on the river Adiamka, three graves (one of them belonging to a male buried with the skull and legs of his horse) are attributed to pre-conquest Hungarians. However, these tombs may date to the 10th century.


text: The Hungarians were organized into seven tribes that formed a confederation. Constantine Porphyrogenitus mentions this number. Anonymous seems to have preserved the Hungarian ""Hetumoger"" ("Seven Hungarians") denomination of the tribal confederation, although he writes of "seven leading persons" jointly bearing this name instead of a political organization.


text: The "Hetumoger" confederation was strengthened by the arrival of the Kabars, who (according to Constantine) joined the Hungarians following their unsuccessful riot against the Khazar Khaganate. The Hungarians and the Kabars are mentioned in the longer version of the "Annals of Salzburg", which relates that the Hungarians fought around Vienna, while the Kabars fought nearby at "Culmite" in 881. Madgearu proposes that Kavar groups were already settled in the Tisza plain within the Carpathian Basin around 881, which may have given rise to the anachronistic reference to Cumans in the "Gesta Hungarorum" at the time of the Hungarian conquest.


text: The "Hetumoger" confederation was under a dual leadership, according to Ibn Rusta and Gardizi (two Muslim scholars from the 10th and 11th centuries, respectively, whose geographical books preserved texts from an earlier work written by Abu Abdallah al-Jayhani from Bukhara). The Hungarians' nominal or sacred leader was styled "kende", while their military commander bore the title "gyula". The same authors add that the "gyula" commanded an army of 20,000 horsemen, but the reliability of this number is uncertain.


text: Regino of Prüm and other contemporary authors portray the 9th-century Hungarians as nomadic warriors. Emperor Leo the Wise underlines the importance of horses to their military tactics. Analysis of horse skulls found in Hungarian warriors graves has not revealed any significant difference between these horses and Western breeds. Regino of Prüm states that the Hungarians knew "nothing about fighting hand-to-hand in formation or taking besieged cities", but he underlines their archery skills. Remains indicate that composite bows were the Hungarians' most important weapons. In addition, slightly curved sabres were unearthed in many warrior tombs from the period. Regino of Prüm noted the Hungarians' preference for deceptions such as apparent retreat in battle. Contemporaneous writers also recounted their viciousness, represented by the slaughter of adult males in settlement raids.


text: Based on the extant Hungarian chronicles, it is clear that more than one (occasionally extended) list existed of the peoples inhabiting the Carpathian Basin at the time of the Hungarian landtaking. Anonymous, for instance, first writes of the "Slavs, Bulgarians, Vlachs and the shepherds of the Romans" as inhabiting the territory, but later he refers to "a people called Kozar" and to the Székelys. Similarly, Simon of Kéza first lists the "Slavs, Greeks, Germans, Moravians and Vlachs", but later he adds that the Székelys also lived in the territory. According to Macartney, those lists were based on multiple sources and do not document the real ethnic conditions of the Carpathian Basin around 900. According to Ioan-Aurel Pop, Simon of Kéza listed the peoples who inhabited the lands that the Hungarian conquered and the nearby territories.


text: The Hungarians adopted the ancient (Celtic, Dacian or Germanic) names of the longest rivers in the Carpathian Basin from a Slavic-speaking population. For instance, the Hungarian names of the rivers Danube "(Duna)", Dráva, Garam, Maros, Olt, Száva, Tisza and Vág were borrowed from Slavs. The Hungarians also adopted a great number of hydronyms of Slavic origin, including Balaton ("swamp"), Beszterce ("swift river"), Túr ("aurochs' stream") and Zagyva ("sooty river"). Place names of Slavic origin abound across the Carpathian Basin. For instance, Csongrád ("black fortress"), Nógrád ("new fortress"), Visegrád ("citadel") and other early medieval fortresses bore a Slavic name, while the name of Keszthely preserved the Latin word for fortress "(castellum)" with Slavic mediation.


text: Besides the Slavs, the presence of a German-speaking population can be demonstrated based on toponyms. For instance, the Hungarians adopted the Germanized form of the name of the river Vulka (whose name is of Slavic origin) and the document known as the "Conversion of the Bavarians and the Carantanians" from around 870 lists Germanic place names in Pannonia, including "Salapiugin" ("bend of the Zala") and "Mosaburc" ("fortress in the marshes"). The name of the Barca, Barót and other rivers could be either Turkic or Slavic.


text: According to Béla Miklós Szőke's theory, the detailed description of the Magyars by western contemporary sources and the immediate Hungarian intervention in local wars suggest that the Hungarians had already lived on the eastern territories of the Carpathian Basin since the middle of the 9th century. Regarding the right location of early Hungarian settlements, the Arabic geographer al-Jayhani (only snippets of his work survived in other Muslim authors' papers) in the 870s placed the Hungarians between the Don and Danube rivers. Szőke identifies al-Jayhani's Danube with the middle Danube region, as opposed to the previously assumed lower Danube region, because following al-Jayhani's description the Christian Moravians were the western neighbors of the Magyars.


text: The Carpathian Basin was controlled from the 560s by the Avars, a Turkic-speaking people. Upon their arrival in the region, they imposed their authority over the Gepids who had dominated the territories east of the river Tisza. However, the Gepids survived up until the second half of the 9th century, according to a reference in the "Conversion of the Bavarians and the Carantanians" to their groups dwelling in Lower Pannonia around 870.


text: The Avars initially were nomadic horsemen, but both large cemeteries used by three or four generations and a growing number of settlements attest to their adoption of a sedentary (non-nomadic) way of life from the 8th century. The Avars' power was destroyed between 791 and 795 by Charlemagne, who occupied Transdanubia and attached it to his empire. Archaeological investigation of early medieval rural settlements at Balatonmagyaród, Nemeskér and other places in Transdanubia demonstrate that their main features did not change with the fall of the Avar Khaganate. New settlements appeared in the former borderlands with cemeteries characterized by objects with clear analogues in contemporary Bavaria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Moravia and other faraway territories. A manor defended by timber walls (similar to noble courts of other parts of the Carolingian Empire) was unearthed at Zalaszabar.


text: Avar groups who remained under the rule of their "khagan" were frequently attacked by Slav warriors. Therefore, the "khagan" asked Charlemagne to let his people settle in the region between Szombathely and Petronell in Pannonia. His petition was accepted in 805. The "Conversion of the Bavarians and the Carantanians" lists the Avars among the peoples under the ecclesiastic jurisdiction of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Salzburg around 870. According to Pohl, it "simply proved impossible to keep up an Avar identity after Avar institutions and the high claims of their tradition had failed." The growing number of archaeological evidence in Transdanubia also presumes Avar population in the Carpathian Basin at the eve of the 10th century. Archaeological findings suggesting that there is a substantial late Avar presence on the Great Hungarian Plain, however it is difficult to determine their proper chronology.


text: A charter issued in 860 by King Louis the German for the Mattsee Abbey may well attest that the Onogurs (another people of Turkic origin) were also present in the territory. The charter refers to the "Marches of the Wangars" "(marcha uuangariourum)" situated in the westernmost regions of the Carpathian Basin. The "Wangar" denomination seems to reflect the Slavic form of the Onogurs' ethnonym.


text: The territories attached to the Frankish Empire were initially governed by royal officers and local chieftains. A Slavic prince named Pribina received large estates along the river Zala around 840. He promoted the colonization of his lands and also erected Mosaburg, a fortress in the marshes. Initially defended by timber walls, this "castle complex" (András Róna-Tas) became an administrative center. It was strengthened by drystone walls at the end of the century. Four churches surrounded by cemeteries were unearthed in and around the settlement. At least one of them continued to be used up to the 11th century.


text: Pribina died fighting the Moravians in 861, and his son Kocel inherited his estates. Kocel was succeeded around 876 by Arnulf, a natural son of Carloman, king of East Francia. Under his rule, Moravian troops interved into the conflict known as the "Wilhelminer War" and "laid waste from the Raab eastward", between 882 and 884, according to the "Annals of Fulda".


text: Moravia emerged in the 820s under its first known ruler, Mojmir I. His successor, Rastislav, developed Moravia's military strength. He promoted the proselytizing activities of the Byzantine brothers, Constantine and Methodius in an attempt to seek independence from East Francia. Moravia reached its "peak of importance" under Svatopluk I who expanded its frontiers in all directions.


text: Moravia's core territory is located in the regions on the northern Morava river, in the territory of present-day Czech Republic and Slovakia. However, Constantine Porphyrogenitus places "great Moravia, the unbaptized" somewhere in the regions beyond Belgrade and Sirmium (Sremska Mitrovica, Serbia). His report supported further theories on Moravia's location. For instance, Kristó and Senga propose the existence of two Moravias (one in the north and other one in the south), while Boba, Bowlus and Eggers argue that Moravia's core territory is in the region of the southern Morava river, in present-day Serbia. The existence of a southern Moravian realm is not supported by artifacts, while strongholds unearthed at Mikulcice, Pohansko and other areas to the north of the middle Danube point at the existence of a power center in those regions.


text: In addition to East Francia and Moravia, the First Bulgarian Empire was also deeply involved in the Carpathian Basin in the 9th century. A late 10th-century Byzantine lexicon known as "Suda" adds that Krum of Bulgaria attacked the Avars from the southeast around 803. The "Royal Frankish Annals" narrates that the Abodrites inhabiting "Dacia on the Danube" (most probably along the lower courses of the river Tisza) sought the assistance of the Franks against the Bulgars in 824. Bulgarian troops also invaded Pannonia, "expelled the Slavic chieftains and appointed Bulgar governors instead" in 827. An inscription at Provadia refers to a Bulgarian military leader named Onegavonais drowning in the Tisza around the same time. The emerging power of Moravia brought about a rapprochement between Bulgaria and East Francia in the 860s. For instance, King Arnulf of East Francia sent an embassy to the Bulgarians in 892 in order "to renew the former peace and to ask that they should not sell salt to the Moravians". The latter request suggests that the route from the salt mines of the eastern Carpathians to Moravia was controlled around that time by the Bulgarians.


text: The anonymous author of the "Gesta Hungarorum", instead of Svatopluk I of Moravia and other rulers known from contemporary sources, writes of personalities and polities that are not mentioned by chroniclers working at the end of the 9th century. For instance, he refers to Menumorut residing in the castle of Bihar (Biharia, Romania), to Zobor "duke of Nitra by the grace of the Duke of the Czechs", and to Gelou "a certain Vlach" ruling over Transylvania. According to historian Ryszard Grzesik, the reference to Gelou and his Vlachs evidences that the Vlachs had already settled in Transylvania by the time the "Gesta" was completed, while the stories about Zobor and Menumorut preserved the memory of the Hungarians' fight against the Moravians. Translating Menumorut's name as "Great Moravian", Grzesik associates him with Svatopluk I and refutes the report of Menumorut's rule in Bihar. Early medieval fortresses were unearthed at Bihar and other places east of the Tisza, but none of them definitively date to the 9th century. For instance, in the case of Doboka (Dăbâca), two pairs of bell-shaped pendants with analogues in sites in Austria, Bulgaria and Poland have been unearthed, but Florin Curta dates them to the 9th century, while Alexandru Madgearu to the period between 975 and 1050.


text: Three main theories attempt to explain the reasons for the "Hungarian land-taking". One argues that it was an intended military operation, prearranged following previous raids, with the express purpose of occupying a new homeland. This view (represented, for instance, by Bakay and Padányi) mainly follows the narration of Anonymous and later Hungarian chronicles. The opposite view maintains that a joint attack by the Pechenegs and the Bulgarians forced the Hungarians' hand. Kristó, Tóth and the theory's other followers refer to the unanimous testimony provided by the "Annals of Fulda", Regino of Prüm and Porphyrogenitus on the connection between the Hungarians' conflict with the Bulgar-Pecheneg coalition and their withdrawal from the Pontic steppes. An intermediate theory proposes that the Hungarians had for decades been considering a westward move when the Bulgarian-Pecheneg attack accelerated their decision to leave the Pontic steppes. For instance Róna-Tas argues, "[the] fact that, despite a series of unfortunate events, the Magyars managed to keep their heads above water goes to show that they were indeed ready to move on" when the Pechenegs attacked them.


text: In fact, following a break of eleven years, the Hungarians returned to the Carpathian Basin in 892. They came to assist Arnulf of East Francia against Svatopluk I of Moravia. Widukind of Corvey and Liutprand of Cremona condemned the Frankish monarch for destroying the defense lines built along the empire's borders, because this also enabled the Hungarians to attack East Francia within a decade.


text: A late source, Aventinus adds that Kurszán "(Cusala)", "king of the Hungarians" stipulated that his people would only fight the Moravians if they received the lands they were to occupy. Accordingly, Aventinus continues, the Hungarians took possession of "both Dacias on this side and beyond" the Tisza east of the rivers Danube and Garam already in 893. Indeed, the Hungarian chronicles unanimously state that the Székelys had already been present in the Carpathian Basin when the Hungarians moved in. Kristó argues that Aventinus and the Hungarian historical tradition together point to an early occupation of the eastern territories of the Carpathian Basin by auxiliary troops of the Hungarian tribal confederation.


text: The "Annals of Fulda" narrates in 894 that the Hungarians crossed the Danube into Pannonia where they "killed men and old women outright and carried off the young women alone with them like cattle to satisfy their lusts and reduced the whole" province "to desert". Although the annalist writes of this Hungarian attack after the passage narrating Svatopluk I's death, Györffy, Kristó, Róna-Tas and other historians suppose that the Hungarians invaded Pannonia in alliance with the Moravian monarch. They argue that the "Legend of the White Horse" in the Hungarian chronicles preserved the memory of a treaty the Hungarians had made with Svatopluk I according to pagan customs. The legend narrates that the Hungarians purchased their future homeland in the Carpathian Basin from Svatopluk for a white horse harnessed with gilded saddle and reins.


text: Ismail Ibn Ahmed, the emir of Khorasan, raided "the land of the Turks" (the Karluks) in 893. Later he caused a new movement of peoples who one by one invaded the lands of their western neighbors in the Eurasian Steppe. Al-Masudi clearly connects the westward movement of the Pechenegs and the Hungarians to previous fights between the Karluks, Ouzes and Kimeks. Porphyrogenitus writes of a joint attack by the Khazars and Ouzes that compelled the Pechenegs to cross the Volga River sometime between 893 and 902 (most probably around 894).


text: The relationship between Bulgaria and the Byzantine Empire sharpened in 894, because Emperor Leo the Wise forced the Bulgarian merchants to leave Constantinople and settle in Thessaloniki. Subsequently, Tzar Simeon I of Bulgaria invaded Byzantine territories and defeated a small imperial troop. The Byzantines approached the Hungarians to hire them to fight the Bulgarians. Nicetas Sclerus, the Byzantine envoy, concluded a treaty with their leaders, Árpád and Kurszán "(Kusan)," and Byzantine ships transferred Hungarian warriors across the Lower Danube. The Hungarians invaded Bulgaria, forced Tzar Simeon to flee to the fortress of Dristra (now Silistra, Bulgaria) and plundered Preslav. An interpolation in Porphyrogenitus's work states that the Hungarians had a prince named "Liountikas, son of Arpad" at that time, which suggests that he was the commander of the army, but he might have been mentioned in the war context by chance.


text: Simultaneously with the Hungarian attack from the north, the Byzantines invaded Bulgaria from the south. Tzar Simeon sent envoys to the Byzantine Empire to propose a truce. At the same time, he sent an embassy to the Pechenegs to incite them against the Hungarians. He succeeded, and the Pechenegs broke into Hungarian territories from the east, forcing the Hungarian warriors to withdraw from Bulgaria. The Bulgarians, according to Constantine Porphyrogenitus, attacked and routed the Hungarians.


text: The Pechenegs destroyed the Hungarians' dwelling places. Those who survived the double attack left the Pontic steppes and crossed the Carpathians in search of a new homeland. The memory of the destruction brought by the Pechenegs seems to have been preserved by the Hungarians. The Hungarian name of the Pechenegs "(besenyő)" corresponds to the old Hungarian word for eagle "(bese)". Thus the 14th-century Hungarian chronicles' story of eagles compelling the Hungarians' ancestors to cross the Carpathians most probably refers to the Pechenegs' attack.


text: The date of the Hungarian invasion varies according to the source. The earliest date (677) is preserved in the 14th-century versions of the "Hungarian Chronicle", while Anonymous supplies the latest date (902). Contemporaneous sources suggest that the invasion followed the 894 Bulgarian-Byzantine war. The route taken across the Carpathians is also contested. Anonymous and Simon of Kéza have the invading Hungarians crossing the northeastern passes, while the "Illuminated Chronicle" writes of their arrival in Transylvania.


text: Regino of Prüm states that the Hungarians "roamed the wildernesses of the Pannonians and the Avars and sought their daily food by hunting and fishing" following their arrival in the Carpathian Basin. Their advance towards the Danube seems to have stimulated Arnulf who was crowned emperor to entrust Braslav (the ruler of the region between the rivers Drava and Sava) with the defense of all Pannonia in 896. In 897 or 898 a civil war broke out between Mojmir II and Svatopluk II (two sons of the late Moravian ruler, Svatopluk I), in which Emperor Arnulf also intervened. There is no mention of the Hungarians' activities in those years.


text: The next event recorded in connection with the Hungarians is their raid against Italy in 899 and 900. The letter of Archbishop Theotmar of Salzburg and his suffragans suggests that Emperor Arnulf incited them to attack King Berengar I of Italy. They routed the Italian troops on 2 September at the river Brenta in a great battle and plundered the region of Vercelli and Modena in the winter, but the doge of Venice, Pietro Tribuno, defeated them at Venice on 29 June 900. They returned from Italy when they learned of the death of Emperor Arnulf at the end of 899.


text: According to Anonymous, the Hungarians fought with Menumorut before conquering Gelou's Transylvania. Subsequently, the Hungarians turned against Salan, the ruler of the central territories, according to this narrative. In contrast with Anonymous, Simon of Kéza writes of the Hungarians' fight with Svatopluk following their arrival. According to the "Illuminated Chronicle", the Hungarians "remained quietly in Erdelw and rested their herds" there after their crossing because of an attack by eagles.


text: The Hungarian chronicles preserved two separate lists of the Hungarians' leaders at the time of the conquest. Anonymous knows of Álmos, Előd, Künd, Ónd, Tas, Huba and Tétény, while Simon of Kéza and the "Illuminated Chronicle" list Árpád, Szabolcs, Gyula, Örs, Künd, Lél and Vérbulcsú. Contemporaneous or nearly contemporaneous sources make mention of Álmos (Constantine Porphyrogenitus), of Árpád ("Continuation of the Chronicle by George the Monk" and Constantine Porphyrogenitus), of Liountikas (Constantine Porphyrogenitus) and of Kurszán ("Continuation of the Chronicle by George the Monk").


text: According to the "Illuminated Chronicle", Álmos, Árpád's father "could not enter Pannonia, for he was killed in Erdelw". The episode implies that Álmos was the "kende", the sacred ruler of the Hungarians, at the time of their destruction by the Pechenegs, which caused his sacrifice. If his death was in fact the consequence of a ritual murder, his fate was similar to the Khazar "khagans" who were executed, according to Ibn Fadlan and al-Masudi, in case of disasters affecting their whole people.