title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary is today chiefly remembered for her letters, particularly her "Turkish Embassy Letters" describing her travels to the Ottoman Empire, as wife to the British ambassador to Turkey, which Billie Melman describes as "the very first example of a secular work by a woman about the Muslim Orient". Aside from her writing, Mary is also known for introducing and advocating for smallpox inoculation to Britain after her return from Turkey. Her writings address and challenge the hindering contemporary social attitudes towards women and their intellectual and social growth.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary Pierrepont was born on 15 May 1689 at Holme Pierrepont Hall in Nottinghamshire, and baptised on 26 May 1689 at St. Paul's Church in Covent Garden, London. She was the eldest child of Evelyn Pierrepont, 1st Duke of Kingston-upon-Hull (c.1655–1726), and his first wife Mary Feilding (d. 20 December 1697), the only daughter of the third Earl of Denbigh (d.1685). Lady Mary had three younger siblings, two girls, Frances and Evelyn, and a boy, William.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary was a bright, free-spirited child who dreamed of greatness. She wrote in her diary, "I am going to write a history so uncommon." Aged seven, members of the newly formed Kit-Cat Club, a group of fashionable men, nominated her as the subject of their toast to the beauty of the season, and they had her name engraved on the glass goblet used for this purpose. As a child, she had a "desire of catching the setting sun"  and she would run across the meadow to "catch hold of the great golden ball of fire sinking on the horizon". However, she then realized that this activity "was impossible". Overall, the pursuit of achieving the impossible became a recurring pattern throughout her life.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: However, misfortune occurred. Her mother, who she thought would have supported her aspirations, died. Then her paternal grandmother Elizabeth Pierrepont raised Mary and her siblings until she died when Mary was eight years old. Then, after Mrs. Pierrepont's death, Mary was passed to the care of her father, who did not believe he was obliged to assist with her education.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Mary Wortley Montagu's education was divided between a governess and the use of the library at the family property Thoresby Hall. According to Lady Mary, the governess gave her "one of the worst [educations] in the world" by teaching Lady Mary "superstitious tales and false notions". To supplement the instruction of a despised governess, Lady Mary used the well-furnished library to "steal" her education by hiding in the library, between 10am and 2pm, and "every afternoon from four to eight". She taught herself Latin, a language usually reserved for men at the time. She secretly got a hold of a "Latin dictionary and grammar" and by the age of thirteen, her handling with the language was on par to most men. Furthermore, she was also a voracious reader. She jotted the list of characters and titles she read into a notebook. Some of the works she read included "plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, Dryden, Rowe, Lee Otway" and French and English romances, including ""Grand Cyrus", "Pharamond", "Almahide", and "Parthenissa"." By 1705, at the age of fourteen or fifteen, Mary Pierrepont had written two albums entitled "Poems, Songs &c" filled with poetry, a brief epistolary novel, and a prose-and-verse romance modelled after Aphra Behn's "Voyage to the Isle of Love" (1684). She also corresponded with two bishops, Thomas Tenison and Gilbert Burnet, who supplemented the instruction of the governess. Overall, Mary impressed her father, who was not a scholar, with her progress.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: By 1710, Lady Mary had two possible suitors to choose from: Edward Wortley Montagu (born 8 February 1678) and Clotworthy Skeffington. The friendship between Lady Mary and Edward Wortley Montagu, the son of Sidney Wortley Montagu, began through Edward's younger sister Anne Wortley. In London, Anne and Lady Mary met frequently at social functions and exchanged visits to each other's homes. They also communicated through writing, in which they filled their letters with "trivial gossip" and "effusive compliments". After Anne died in November 1709, Lady Mary began conversing with Anne's brother Edward Wortley Montagu. Lady Mary often met Edward at "friends’ houses" and "at Court". On 28 March 1710, she wrote the first letter she addressed to Edward. Lady Mary corresponded with Edward Wortley Montagu via letters until 2 May 1711 without her father's permission.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Keeping up with their communication became harder when Lady Mary's father bought a house at Acton, a suburban village famous for its mineral springs. Lady Mary hated the house because it was ‘dull and disagreeable,’ and it did not have a library in it. A few weeks after moving, Lady Mary had the measles, and she asked her maid to write Edward a letter to tell him about the illness. Soon, there were misunderstandings between Edward and Lady Mary. Edward hurried to Acton. There, he left a note, revealing his love: "I should be overjoyed to hear your Beauty is very much impaired, could I be pleased with anything that would give you displeasure, for it would lessen the number of Admirers." In response, she scolded his indiscretion by saying, "Forgive and forget me." Then, in his reply, Edward stated that "he would deal with her father if he were sure they could be happy together." This reply helped Lady Mary forget her irritation. Lady Mary in Acton and Edward in London kept writing to each other until the early summer of 1710.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary's primary concern with her engagement was financial, not romantic. Lady Mary denied transient emotions guiding her life: "I can esteem, I can be a friend, but I don’t know whether I can love." Then, after setting forth all her terms, including her deference, she warned to Edward that "Make no answer to this, if you can like me on my own terms" and that his proposals not be made for her. However, these correspondences soon endangered Edward. In one particular letter, Edward wrote, "Her being better in 1710, the consequence of its being known that I write to her." A servant in Lady Mary's household found this letter and gave it to her father; this letter put her father "in the utmost rage." However, Wortley was flattered that Lady Mary "had given the father as ‘an artifice to bring the affair to a proper conclusion.’" The next day, Wortley called Lady Mary’s father about a formal proposal. Mary's father, now Marquess of Dorchester had insisted on one condition in the marriage contract: "that Wortley’s estate be entailed on the first son born to him." However, Wortley refused to do this as it would require £10,000.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Consequently, in order to convince Lady Mary's father, Edward thought of publishing the marriage contract in the "Tatler", a British journal. On the "Tatler"s issue of 18 July, Wortley wrote the following: "Her first lover has ten to one against him. The very hour after he has opened his heart and his rent rolls he is made no other use of but to raise her price…While the poor lover very innocently waits, till the plenipotentiaries at the inns of court have debated about the alliance, all the partisans of the lady throw difficulties in the way, till other offers come in; and the man who came first is not put in possession, until she has been refused by half the town." These arguments did not persuade Lord Dorchester. Even though these negotiations reached an impasse, Lady Mary and Edward continued corresponding with one another.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: At the end of March 1711, Lady Mary's father 'determined to end her friendship with Wortley'. Her father summoned her to a conference, forced her to promise to not to write, and hustled her to West Dean. However, Lady Mary broke her promise to tell Wortley about her rights and duty: "Had you had any real Affection for me, you would have long go applied yourself to him, from whose hand only you can receive me." After their exchanges of disagreements and realizing she did not like him, he realized their friendship must end. On 2 May, he replied, "Adieu, Dearest L[ady] M[ary]. This once be assur’d you will not deceive me. I expect no answer." Consequently, Lady Mary did not respond that summer. In that same summer, her father Lord Dorchester decided to find a husband other than Edward Wortley Montagu for his daughter.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary's father pressured her to marry Clotworthy Skeffington, the heir to the Irish Viscount Massereene. Skeffington's marriage contract included "an allowance of £500 a year as ‘pin-money,’ and £1,200 a year if he died." However, she rejected him. Thus, to avoid marriage to Skeffington, she eloped with Montagu. In a letter to Wortley, she wrote, "He [my father] will have a thousand plausible reasons for being irreconcilable, and ‘tis very probable the world will be on his side…I shall come to you with only a night-gown and petticoat, and that is all you will get with me. I told a lady of my friends what I intended to do. You will think her a very good friend when I tell you she has proffered to lend us her house if we would come there the first night…If you determine to go to that lady’s house, you had better come with a coach and six at seven o’clock to-morrow." The marriage license is dated 17 August 1712,


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and Edward Wortley Montagu spent the first years of their married life in England. She had a son, Edward Wortley Montagu the younger, named after his father Edward Wortley Montagu, on 16 May 1713, in London. On 13 October 1714, her husband accepted the post of Junior Commissioner of the Treasury. When Lady Mary joined him in London, her wit and beauty soon made her a prominent figure at court. She was among the society of George I and George Augustus, Prince of Wales, and counted amongst her friends Molly Skerritt, Lady Walpole, John, Lord Hervey, Mary Astell, Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, Alexander Pope, John Gay, and Abbé Antonio Schinella Conti.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In December 1715, at the age of twenty-six, Lady Mary contracted smallpox. She survived, but while she was ill someone circulated the satirical "court eclogues" she had been writing. One of the poems was read as an attack on Caroline, Princess of Wales, in spite of the fact that the "attack" was voiced by a character who was herself heavily satirised.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In 1716, Edward Wortley Montagu was appointed Ambassador at Constantinople to negotiate an end to the Austro-Turkish War. In August 1716, Lady Mary accompanied him to Vienna, and thence to Adrianople and Constantinople. He was recalled in 1717, but they remained at Constantinople until 1718. While away from England, the Wortley Montagus had a daughter on 19 January 1718, who would grow up to be Mary, Countess of Bute. After an unsuccessful delegation between Austria and the Ottoman Empire, they set sail for England via the Mediterranean, and reached London on 2 October 1718. In the same year, the Austrians and Turkish signed the Treaty of Passarowitz at the conclusion of the Austro-Turkish War.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: The story of this voyage and of her observations of Eastern life is told in "Letters from Turkey", a series of lively letters full of graphic descriptions; "Letters" is often credited as being an inspiration for subsequent female travelers and writers, as well as for much Orientalist art. During her visit she was sincerely charmed by the beauty and hospitality of the Ottoman women she encountered. In letters she wrote about how different fashion was as she made her way to Turkey. In a letter to Lady Mar, from Vienna, she wrote: "They build certain fabrics of gauze on their heads, about a yard high, consisting of three or four stories, fortified with numberless yards of heavy ribbon…Their whalebone petticoats outdo ours by several yards’ circumference, and cover some acres of ground." Furthermore, she recorded her experiences in a Turkish bath, which are reserved for both diversion and health. In a letter, she wrote, "They [Ottoman women] generally take this diversion once a week, and stay there at least four or five hours, without getting cold immediately coming out of the hot bath into the cold room, which was surprising to me." She also recorded a particularly amusing incident in which a group of Turkish women at a bath in Sofia, horrified by the sight of the stays she was wearing, exclaimed that "they believed I was so locked up in that machine that it was not in my own power to open it, which contrivance they attributed to my husband." Lady Mary wrote about the misconceptions that previous travelers, specifically male travelers, had recorded about the religion, traditions and the treatment of women in the Ottoman Empire. Her gender and class status provided her with access to female spaces that were closed off to males. Her personal interactions with Ottoman women enabled her to provide, in her view, a more accurate account of Turkish women, their dress, habits, traditions, limitations and liberties, at times irrefutably more a critique of the Occident than a praise of the Orient. Montagu also carefully constructed Ottoman female spaces, and her own engagement with Ottoman women, as full of homoerotic desire, which is consistent with the gender and sexual fluidity that characterized much of her life and writings.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In the 18th century, Europeans began an experiment known as "inoculation or variolation" to prevent, not cure the smallpox. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu defied convention, most memorably by introducing smallpox inoculation to Western medicine after witnessing it during her travels and stay in the Ottoman Empire. Previously, Lady Mary's brother had died of smallpox in 1713, and although Lady Mary recovered from the disease in 1715, it left her with a disfigured face. In the Ottoman Empire, she visited the women in their segregated zenanas, a house for Muslims and Hindus, making friends and learning about Turkish customs. There in March 1717, she witnessed the practice of inoculation against smallpox – variolation – which she called engrafting, and wrote home about it in a number of her letters. The most famous of these letters was her "Letter to a Friend" of 1 April 1717. Variolation used live smallpox virus in the pus taken from a mild smallpox blister and introduced it into scratched skin of the arm or leg (the most usual spots) of a previously uninfected person to promote immunity to the disease. Consequently, the inoculate would develop a milder case of smallpox than the one he/she might have contracted.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary was eager to spare her children, thus, in March 1718 she had her nearly five-year-old son, Edward, inoculated there with the help of Embassy surgeon Charles Maitland. In fact, her son was the "first English person to undergo the operation." In a letter to a friend in England, Montagu wrote, "There is a set of old women [here], who make it their business to perform the operation, every autumn…when then great heat is abated…thousands undergo this operation...[and there] is not one example of anyone that has died in it." Afterwards, she updated the status of Edward to her husband: "The Boy was engrafted last Tuesday, and is at this time singing and playing, and very impatient for his supper. I pray God my next may give as good an account of him." On her return to London, she enthusiastically promoted the procedure, but encountered a great deal of resistance from the medical establishment, because it was a folk treatment process.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In April 1721, when a smallpox epidemic struck England, she had her daughter inoculated by Maitland, the same physician who had inoculated her son at the Embassy in Turkey, and publicised the event. This was the first such operation done in Britain. She persuaded Caroline of Ansbach, the Princess of Wales, to test the treatment. In August 1721, seven prisoners at Newgate Prison awaiting execution were offered the chance to undergo variolation instead of execution: they all survived and were released. Despite this, controversy over smallpox inoculation intensified. However Caroline, Princess of Wales, was convinced of its value. The Princess's two daughters Amelia and Caroline were successfully inoculated in April 1722 by French-born surgeon Claudius Amyand. In response to the general fear of inoculation, Lady Mary, under a pseudonym, wrote and published an article describing and advocating in favour of inoculation in September 1722. Later, other royal families soon followed Montagu's act. For instance, in 1768, Catherine the Great of Russia had herself and her son, the future Tsar Paul, inoculated. The Russians continued to refine the process.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Nevertheless, inoculation was not always a safe process; inoculates developed a real case of smallpox and could infect others. The inoculation resulted in a "small number of deaths and complications, including serious infections." Subsequently, Edward Jenner, who was 13 years old when Lady Mary died in 1762, developed the much safer technique of vaccination using cowpox instead of smallpox. Jenner's method involves "engrafting lymph taken from a pustulate of cowpox on the hand of a milkmaid into the arm of an inoculate." Jenner first tested his method on James Phipps, an eight-year-old boy, and when Phipps did not have any reaction after the procedure, Jenner claimed that his procedure "bestowed immunity against smallpox." Then, after spending the next few years experimenting his new procedure, he discovered that his hypothesis was correct. As vaccination gained acceptance, variolation gradually fell out of favour. In the 20th century, a concerted campaign by the WHO to eradicate smallpox via vaccination would succeed by 1979. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's introduction of smallpox inoculation had ultimately led to the development of vaccines, and the later eradication of smallpox.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: After returning to England, Lady Mary took less interest in court compared to her earlier years. Instead, she was more focused on the upbringing of her children, reading, writing and editing her travel letters—which she then chose not to publish.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Before starting for the East, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu had met Alexander Pope, and during her Embassy travels with her husband, they wrote each other a series of letters. While Pope may have been fascinated by her wit and elegance, Lady Mary's replies to his letters reveal that she was not equally smitten. Very few letters passed between them after Lady Mary's return to England, and various reasons have been suggested for the subsequent estrangement. In 1728, Pope attacked Lady Mary in his "Dunciad", which inaugurated a decade in which most of his publications made some sort of allegation against her.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary went through a series of trials with her children. In 1726 and 1727, Lady Mary's son Edward ran away from Westminster School several times. He was then entrusted to a tutor with strict orders to keep him abroad. In later years, her son managed to return to England without permission and continued to have a strained relationship with both his parents. In the summer of 1736, Lady Mary's daughter fell in love with John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, but he had little fortune; Lady Mary warned her daughter about the disadvantages of living in poverty. In August 1736, Lady Mary's daughter married Bute, despite her parents' disapproval of the match. Later, Lady Mary wrote to Lord Gower, 1st Earl Gower, about her daughter's disobedience. In response, Lord Gower tried to console Lady Mary: "I hope by her future conducts she will atone for her past, and that choice will prove more happy than you and Mr. Wortley expect." In the same year, she met and fell in love with Count Francesco Algarotti, who competed with an equally smitten John Hervey for her affections.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary wrote many letters to Francesco Algarotti in English and in French after his departure from England in September 1736. In July 1739, Lady Mary departed England without her husband ostensibly for health reasons, possibly from a disfiguring skin disease, and declared her intentions to winter in the south of France; after she left England, she and her husband never met again. In reality, she left to visit and live with Algarotti in Venice. Their relationship ended in 1741 after Lady Mary and Algarotti were both on a diplomatic mission in Turin. Lady Mary stayed abroad and travelled extensively. After travelling to Venice, Florence, Rome, Genoa and Geneva, she finally settled in Avignon in 1742. She left Avignon in 1746 for Brescia, where she fell ill and stayed for nearly a decade, leaving for Lovere in 1754. In the summer of 1756, Lady Mary travelled to Venice for an undisclosed business errand. After August 1756, she resided in Venice and Padua and saw Algarotti again in November. Throughout the time, Lady Mary exchanged letters with her daughter, Lady Bute, discussing topics such as philosophy, literature, and the education of girls, as well as conveying details of her geographical and social surroundings.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Lady Mary received news of her husband Edward Wortley Montagu's death on 1 January 1761, and he was buried at Wortley. As soon as she learned of her husband's death, Lady Mary left Venice for England. She had a self-imposed exile because of her strained relationship with , but her return made sense because she wanted to see her daughter and her grandchildren before she died. On 1 September 1761, she began her journey back home; she decided to go through Germany and Holland because France, which was deemed the easier route, was at war. However, the journey was dangerous and exhausting. When she reached Augsburg on 1 October, she wrote to Sir James and Lady Francis Steuart that "she hoped to meet them in Holland." She recorded her perils and fatigues to Sir James in a letter: "I am dragging my ragged remnant of life to England. The wind and the tide are against me; how far I have strength to struggle against both, I know not." While detained at Rotterdam, she handed her "Embassy Letters" to the Reverend Benjamin Sowden of Rotterdam, for safe keeping and "to be dispos'd of as he thinks proper." After she left Rotterdam on 12 December, a hard, impenetrable frost hindered her voyage. Towards the end of the month, she sailed for England, but a mountainous sea obstructed the passage and the captain returned to harbor. On the next attempt a few days later, Lady Mary reached London in January 1762. After arriving in London, Lady Mary rented a house in Great George Street, Hanover Square, and her daughter and grandchildren often visited her.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In June 1762, it became known that Lady Mary was suffering from cancer. Even though she tried to conceal her illness from her family as long as possible, she grew rapidly weaker that month. She wrote her last letter but with difficulty on 2 July to Lady Frances Steuart; in this letter, she wrote "I have been ill a long time, and am now so bad I am little capable of writing, but I would not pass in your opinion as either stupid or ungrateful. My heart is always warm in your service, and I am always told your affairs shall be taken care of." Lady Frances's son was in London, and when he visited Lady Mary's house, he was summoned to her bedroom where he was surrounded by her relatives, including Lord and Lady Bute. Lady Mary then ordered her relatives to leave the room, saying of Lady Frances's son, "My dear young friend has come to see me before I die, and I desire to be left alone with him." She died on 21 August 1762 at her house in Great George Street, and was buried in Grosvenor Chapel the day after she died.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Although Lady Mary Wortley Montagu is now best known for her "Turkish Embassy Letters", she wrote poetry and essays as well. A number of Lady Mary's poems and essays were printed in her lifetime, either without or with her permission, in newspapers, in miscellanies, and independently.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Montagu did not intend to publish her poetry, but it did circulate widely, in manuscript, among members of her own social circle. Lady Mary was highly suspicious of any idealizing literary language. She wrote most often in heroic couplets, a serious poetic form to employ, and, according to Susan Staves, "excelled at answer poems". Some of her widely anthologized poems include "Constantinople" and "Epistle from Mrs. Yonge to her Husband". "Constantinople", written in January 1718, is a beautiful poem in heroic couplets describing Britain and Turkey through human history, and representing the states of mind "of knaves, coxcombs, the mob, and party zealous—all characteristic of the London of her time". "Epistle from Mrs. Yonge to her Husband", written in 1724, stages a letter from Mrs. Yonge to her libertine husband and exposes the social double standard which led to the shaming and distress of Mrs. Yonge after her divorce. In 1737 and 1738, Lady Mary published anonymously a political periodical called the "Nonsense of Common-Sense", supporting the Robert Walpole government. The title was a reference to a journal of the liberal opposition entitled "Common Sense". She wrote six Town Eclogues and other poems.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: During the twentieth century Lady Mary's letters were edited separately from her essays, poems and plays. She wrote notable letters describing her travels through Europe and the Ottoman Empire; these appeared after her death in three volumes. Lady Mary corresponded with Anne Wortley and wrote courtship letters to her future husband Edward Wortley Montagu, as well as love letters to Francesco Algarotti. She corresponded with notable writers, intellectuals and aristocrats of her day. She wrote gossip letters and letters berating the vagaries of fashionable people to her sister, Lady Mar, the daughter of the Whig Duke of Kingston. They met when the Wortleys visited Paris, France on 29 September 1718. During her visit, Montagu observed the beauties and behaviors of Parisian women. She wrote "their hair cut short and curled round their faces, loaded with powder that makes it look like white wool!" In one of their correspondences, Lady Mary informed her sister of the ‘surprising death’ of her father. Furthermore, they exchanged intellectual letters with Montagu's only daughter, Lady Bute. Lady Mary and Lady Mar discontinued their correspondence in 1727. Although not published during her lifetime, her letters from Turkey were clearly intended for print. She revised them extensively and gave a transcript to the Reverend Benjamin Sowden, a British clergyman, in Rotterdam in 1761. Sowden also lent the book to two English travelers, including Thomas Becket. Furthermore, during that night, the travelers made copies of her letters. After the travelers returned the book, Sowden handed the book to Lord Bute, the husband of Lady Mary's only daughter, in exchange for two hundred pounds. In 1763 in London, the year after Montagu's death, Becket and De Hondt published this error-laden version manuscript in three volumes, entitled "Letters of the Right Honourable Lady My W—y M----e: Written, during her Travels in Europe, Asia and Africa, to Persons of Distinction, Men of Letters, &c. in different Parts of Europe; Which contain, Among other curious Relations, Accounts of the Policy and Manners of the Turks", commonly referred to as the "Embassy Letters" or "Turkish Embassy Letters" because it was "composed during and after Montagu’s journey through Europe to Constantinople in the company of her husband"."" The first edition of the book sold out; in fact, the "Critical Review" newspaper editor, Tobias Smollett, wrote that the letters were "never equaled by any letter-writer of any sex, age or nation" and Voltaire also had high praise of these letters. Four years later in 1767, editor John Cleland added five spurious letters, along with previous printed essays and verses, to the previous edition of the book.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Despite the immediate success following the publication of "Turkish Embassy Letters", Lady Bute was furious and worried about how an unauthorized publication would impact the family's reputation. One of the manuscript volumes that others found was Lady Mary's famous diary, and Lady Bute did not have any knowledge of this existence until a few days before her mother's death. After she received these volumes, Lady Bute "kept it always under lock and key, and though she often looked over it herself, and read passages aloud to her daughters and friends, excepting the first five or six copy-books, which at a late period, she permitted Lady Louisa Stuart to peruse alone, upon condition that nothing should be transcribed." Lady Louisa Stuart, the youngest of Lady Bute's daughters, was scolded for reading books and wanting to be like her grandmother. Later, Lady Louisa followed her grandmother's footsteps and became a writer. Then when Lady Bute felt that the end of her life was near, in 1794, she burnt the diary that her mother kept since her marriage. She chose to burn the diary because Lady Bute always spoke to her mother with great respect, and she feared the possibility of a scandal.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: According to O'Quinn, although "The Turkish Embassy Letters" has been considered one of the best literary works published in the eighteenth century, the work has not been as appreciated as those published by her male peers, such as Alexander Pope and Horace Walpole. She was the "target of vicious attacks" from printing presses and male peers. Although she describes her travels through Europe to the Ottoman Empire in "The Turkish Embassy Letters" to her correspondents, very few of the letters survived, and the letters in the book may not be accurate transcriptions of the actual correspondence. According to Daniel O'Quinn, the book was not a culmination of facts but of opinions, and there must be some filtering during the editing processes. Furthermore, to avoid public censure, Montagu used pseudonyms, such as "a Turkey merchant" and "Lady President", in her publications. Lastly, Montagu’s "The Turkish Embassy Letters" was published posthumously-Walpole affirmed that it was Montagu’s deathbed wish to get the letters published.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: An important early letter was published, probably without Montagu's consent, titled "The Genuine Copy of a Letter Written From Constantinople by an English Lady" in 1719. Both in this letter and in the "Turkish Embassy Letters" more broadly, particularly in the letters about the scholar Achmet Beg, Montagu participates in a wider English dialogue on Enlightenment ideas about religion, particularly deism, and their overlap with Islamic theology. Montagu, along with many others, including the freethinking scholar Henry Stubbe, celebrated Islam for what they saw as its rational approach to theology, for its strict monotheism, and for its teaching and practice around religious tolerance. In short, Montagu and other thinkers in this tradition saw Islam as a source of Enlightenment, as evidenced in her calling the Qur'an "the purest morality delivered in the very best language" By comparison, Montagu dedicated large portions of the "Turkish Embassy Letters" to criticizing Catholic religious practices, particularly Catholic beliefs around sainthood, miracles, and religious relics, which she frequently excoriated. In relation to these practices, she wrote, "I cannot fancy there is anything new in letting you know that priests can lie, and the mob believe all over the world."


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Montagu's Turkish letters were to prove an inspiration to later generations of European women travellers and writers. In particular, Montagu staked a claim to the authority of women's writing, due to their ability to access private homes and female-only spaces where men were not permitted. The title of her published letters is "Sources that Have Been Inaccessible to Other Travellers". The letters themselves frequently draw attention to the fact that they present a different, and Montagu asserts more accurate description than that provided by previous (male) travellers: "You will perhaps be surpriz'd at an Account so different from what you have been entertained with by the common Voyage-writers who are very fond of speaking of what they don't know." In general, Montagu dismisses the quality of European travel literature of the 18th century as nothing more than "trite observations…superficial…[of] boys [who] only remember where they met with the best wine or the prettiest women". Montagu writes about the "warmth and civility" of Ottoman women. She describes the "hammam", a Turkish bath, "as a space of urbane homosociality, free of cruel satire and disdain". She mentions that ""hammam" are remarkable for their undisguised admiration of the women's beauty and demeanor", which creates a space for female authority. Montagu provides an intimate description of the women's bathhouse in Sofia, in which she derides male descriptions of the bathhouse as a site for unnatural sexual practices, instead insisting that it was "the Women's coffee house, where all the news of the Town is told, Scandal invented, etc." Montagu's reference to "women's coffee house" represents the political and social freedom that women had access to in the Ottoman Empire during the 18th century. Even though Montagu refused to undress for the bath at first, the girls managed to persuade her to "open my shirt, and show them my stays, which satisfied them very well". In one letter to her sister Lady Mar, she wrote, "nothing will surprise you more than the sight of my person, as I am now in my Turkish habit."


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: During Montagu's time in the Ottoman Empire, she saw and wrote extensively concerning the practise of slavery along with the treatment of slaves by the Turks. Montagu wrote many letters with positive descriptions of the various enslaved people that she saw in the elite circles of Istanbul, including eunuchs and large collections of serving and dancing girls dressed in expensive outfits. In one of her letters written back home, famously from the interior of a bath house, she dismisses the idea that slaves of the Ottoman elite should be figures to be pitied. In response to her visit to the slave market in Istanbul, she wrote "you will imagine me half a Turk when I don't speak of it with the same horror other Christians have done before me, but I cannot forbear applauding the humanity of the Turks to those creatures. They are never ill-used, and their slavery is in my opinion no worse than servitude all over the world."


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Montagu's Turkish letters were frequently cited by Western female travellers, more than a century after her journey. Such writers cited Montagu's assertion that women travellers could gain an intimate view of Turkish life that was not available to their male counterparts. However, they also added corrections or elaborations to her observations.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: In 1739, a book was printed by an unknown author under the pseudonym "Sophia, a person of quality", titled "Woman not Inferior to Man". This book is often attributed to Lady Mary.


title: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

text: Her "Letters and Works" were published in 1837. Montagu's octogenarian granddaughter Lady Louisa Stuart contributed to this, anonymously, an introductory essay titled "Biographical Anecdotes of Lady M. W. Montagu", from which it was clear that Stuart was troubled by her grandmother's focus on sexual intrigues and did not see Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's "Account of the Court of George I at his Accession" as history. However, Montagu's historical observations, both in the "Anecdotes" and the "Turkish Embassy Letters", prove quite accurate when put in context. Despite the availability of her work in print and the revival efforts of feminist scholars, the complexity and brilliance of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's extensive body of work has not yet been recognized to the fullest.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Alan Martin Smith (born 21 November 1962) is an English former professional footballer who played as a striker. He is a co-commentator, and sometimes studio pundit for Sky Sports.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith started his career at non-league Alvechurch in north-east Worcestershire. He then signed professional forms with Leicester City in June 1982. In his first season, he scored 13 goals in partnership with Gary Lineker, as the Foxes won promotion to the First Division. He spent five seasons at Leicester, scoring 84 goals in 217 appearances. In Smith's final season with the club they were relegated and he signed for Arsenal for £850.000 in March 1987, but was then loaned back to Leicester for the rest of the season.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith was one of George Graham's first major signings, and despite a hat-trick on 29 August 1987 against Portsmouth at Highbury, Smith endured a difficult start to his Arsenal career, at one point going a full two months without scoring. But Smith would prove his worth in the long term, and topped their scoring charts in four of his first five seasons. The purchase of winger Brian Marwood in March 1988 proved to be a significant turning point for Smith and Arsenal.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: The first season ended with a Littlewoods Cup final appearance at Wembley where he scored in a 3-2 defeat by Luton. The following season was his best with 23 goals from 36 League games, the most important being the first goal in Arsenal's 2-0 victory at Anfield on 26 May 1989 which saw them lift that season's league championship.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith was top scorer again when Arsenal claimed the title in 1991 and won his second Golden Boot. But then the goals dried up and he was battled with Kevin Campbell for the position alongside Ian Wright. Smith was an unused substitute in the League Cup triumph 1993 against Sheffield Wednesday after scoring twice in the 3-1 semi-final first leg at Crystal Palace. But he played in the FA Cup success 1993, also against Sheffield Wednesday, when he was booked for the first and only time in his career. Smith never scored a more important or perfectly struck goal than the one in the 1994 European Cup Winners' Cup Final, his left-foot shot in Copenhagen stunned Parma.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: His last goal for Arsenal came against Manchester City 12 December 1994 in a 2-1 win at Maine Road, and his last appearance for Arsenal came in the FA-cup third round, 7 January 1995 in a goalless draw against Millwall at The Den. A knee injury forced him to retire. Several clubs, including Watford, had expressed an interest in signing Smith just before he announced an end to his playing days in July 1995.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith scored 115 goals for Arsenal. Smith has been ranked at 27th within the club's listing of the 50 greatest Gunners of all time.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith gained his first full England cap against Saudi Arabia 16 November 1988. His first goal came against Turkey in the Euro 1992 qualifying group match at Wembley 16 October 1991 in a 1–0 win. The last of his 13 caps came when he replaced Gary Lineker in the 2–1 defeat by Sweden in the 1992 European Championship.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Smith is currently a regular co-commentator and sometime studio pundit for Sky Sports for the Premier League coverage. In 2011, he commentated on the Champions League final alongside Martin Tyler for the English–language world feed commentary and then in 2015, he became the regular co-commentator for the Champions League competition proper with Tyler except the final.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: On 30 June 2011, EA Sports announced that Smith would replace Andy Gray as Martin Tyler's partner in commentating in "FIFA 12". The pair commentated on the games up until FIFA 20 but they were both cut from the games for FIFA 21. Smith said on Twitter "Yes, gutted not to be involved with @EASPORTSFIFA anymore. For Martin Tyler and myself, it was an honour to voice the game for so long. But nothing lasts forever."


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: Tall and slim, Alan Smith was well known for his headers, but during his career he demonstrated all round skills, including a deft first touch and the ability to chest the ball down or head it on for teammates to run onto. Though primarily left-footed, he scored a number of goals with his right foot. He was also known for his hold-up play.


title: Alan Smith (footballer, born 1962)

text: He scored in a number of important games for Arsenal, including the 1993–94 European Cup Winners' Cup final and scored one goal in Arsenal's decisive victory at Anfield in 1989. Former Arsenal marksman Olivier Giroud has been compared to Smith.


title: Heart block

text: Heart block (HB) is a disorder in the heart's rhythm due to a fault in the natural pacemaker. This is caused by an obstruction – a block – in the electrical conduction system of the heart. Sometimes a disorder can be inherited. Despite the severe-sounding name, heart block may cause no symptoms at all in some cases, or occasional missed heartbeats in other cases (which can cause light-headedness, syncope (fainting), and palpitations), or may require the implantation of an artificial pacemaker, depending upon exactly where in the heart conduction is being impaired and how significantly it is affected.


title: Heart block

text: Heart block should not be confused with other conditions, which may or may not be co-occurring, relating to the heart and/or other nearby organs that are or can be serious, including angina (heart-related chest pain), heart attack (myocardial infarction), any type of heart failure, cardiogenic shock or other types of shock, different types of abnormal heart rhythms (arrhythmias), cardiac arrest, or respiratory arrest.


title: Heart block

text: In severe cases where the heart's ability to control and trigger heartbeats may be completely ineffective or unreliable, heart block can usually be treated by inserting an artificial pacemaker, a medical device that provides correct electrical impulses to trigger heart beats, compensating for the natural pacemaker's unreliability. Therefore, heart block frequently has no effects, or mild and occasional effects, and is not life-threatening in the vast majority of cases, and is usually treatable in more serious cases.


title: Heart block

text: The human heart uses electrical signals to maintain and initiate the regular heartbeat in a living person; incorrect conduction or interference from external sources can lead to mild or serious symptoms depending upon the location of the blockage and how severely conduction is being blocked. Conduction is initiated by the sinoatrial node ("sinus node" or "SA node"), and then travels to the atrioventricular node ("AV node") which also contains a secondary "pacemaker" that acts as a backup for the SA nodes, then to the bundle of His and then via the bundle branches to the point of the apex of the fascicular branches. Blockages are therefore classified based on where the blockage occurs - namely the SA node ("Sinoatrial block"), AV node ("AV block" or AVB), and at or below the bundle of His ("Intra-Hisian" or "Infra-Hisian block" respectively). Infra-Hisian blocks may occur at the left or right bundle branches ("bundle branch block") or the fascicles of the left bundle branch ("fascicular block" or "Hemiblock"). SA and AV node blocks are each divided into three degrees, with second-degree blocks being divided into two types (written either "type I or II" or "type 1 or 2"). The term "Wenckebach block" is also used for second degree type 1 blocks of either the SA or AV node; in addition second-degree blocks type 1 and 2 are also sometimes known as " Mobitz 1" and "Mobitz 2".


title: Heart block

text: Clinically speaking, the blocks tend to have more serious potential the closer they are to the "end" of the electrical path (the muscles of the heart regulated by the heartbeat), and less serious effects the closer they are to the "start" (at the SA node), because the potential disruption becomes greater as more of the "path" is "blocked" from its "end" point. Therefore, most of the important heart blocks are AV nodal blocks and infra-Hisian blocks. SA blocks are usually of lesser clinical significance, since in the event of SA block, the AV node contains a secondary pacemaker which would still maintain a heart rate of around 40 - 60 beats per minute, sufficient for consciousness and much of daily life in the majority of individuals.


title: Heart block

text: Following the path of the electrical signals, the places where conduction can be blocked give rise to different kinds of heart blocks:


title: Heart block

text: SA and AV node blocks are each divided into three degrees, with second degree blocks being divided into two types (written either "type I or II" or "type 1 or 2"). In an SA block, the electrical impulse is delayed or blocked on the way to the atria, thus delaying atrial depolarization. By contrast, an AV block occurs in the AV node and delays ventricular depolarization. The term "Wenckebach block" is also used for some heart blocks, and can refer to a second degree type I block in "either the SA node or the AV node", however the ECG features of the two are quite distinctly different.


title: Heart block

text: SA blocks rarely give severe symptoms, because even if an individual had complete block at this level of the conduction system (which is uncommon), the secondary pacemaker of the heart would be at the AV node, which would fire at 40 to 60 beats a minute, which is enough to retain consciousness in the resting state. However SA block is capable of causing problematic symptoms even so, and may also hint at conduction issues elsewhere in the heart, and therefore SA blocks are - despite their lower level of life-threatening risk - still "the most common indication for pacemaker implantation in the US".


title: Heart block

text: In addition to the above blocks, the SA node can be suppressed by any other arrhythmia that reaches it. This includes retrograde conduction from the ventricles, ectopic atrial beats, atrial fibrillation, and atrial flutter.


title: Heart block

text: The difference between SA node block and SA node suppression is that in SA node block an electrical impulse is generated by the SA node that doesn't make the atria contract. In SA node suppression, on the other hand, the SA node doesn't generate an electrical impulse because it is reset by the electrical impulse that enters the SA node.


title: Heart block

text: Of these types of infra-Hisian block, Mobitz II heart block is considered most important because of the possible progression to complete heart block.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: Westside Xtreme Wrestling, commonly shortened to wXw, is a German professional wrestling promotion based in Gelsenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia. wXw has been one of the leading professional wrestling promotions in Germany, and most of its events have been held in the Ruhr district, primarily in Oberhausen. Since 2013, wXw regularly tours throughout Germany, adding tour stops outside the country including Switzerland, the Czech Republic and the United Kingdom.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: Westside Xtreme Wrestling was founded on December 24, 2000, by Peter Wiechers, a professional wrestler with the ring name Hate. Together with SigMasta Rappo, Tyrant, Mark Hammer, Blue Adonis, Barish, Thunder and Claudio Castagnoli, he held an event called "wXw Extreme Wrestling Party" in the disco "Roxy" in Essen. wXw has become one of the most notable professional wrestling promotions in Germany.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: In 2016, wXw became the first German wrestling promotion with an on demand service similar to WWE's network, called wXwNOW.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: wXwNOW is a subscription-based video streaming service owned by German professional wrestling promotion Westside Xtreme Wrestling (wXw). In 2016, wXw started "wXwNOW", a new worldwide streaming site for the promotion's events. All major wXw events air live on the service, which also features matches from the promotion's archives, dating back to 2002. wXwNOW Network operates similarly to WWE Network. The service has a current monthly subscription price of €9.99.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: Since its creation, wXw has developed working relationships with several American promotions including Chikara, Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, Beyond Wrestling, Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW) and Evolve and several Japanese promotions including Dragon Gate, Pro Wrestling Noah, Dramatic Dream Team and Big Japan Pro Wrestling. Through the working relationship with wXw, Big Japan's World Strong Heavyweight Championship features both the CZW and wXw logos.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: wXw has also maintained relationship withs several European-based promotions, including British promotions , Preston City Wrestling, All Star Wrestling, and Progress Wrestling.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: wXw has held several interpromotional events, including "Gorefest – European King of the Death Matches 2006" took place in the United Kingdom, a hardcore-focused event co-promoted with the English-based X-Sports: Wrestling. The second "Gorefest", held in 2009, included a title match between Drake Younger and Devon Moore for Combat Zone Wrestling's Heavyweight Championship.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: The 2008 event "Dead End VIII" featured the Japanese-based Pro Wrestling Noah and its rosters such as KENTA, Go Shiozaki, Takashi Sugiura and Kenta Kobashi. The 2009 events, "Open the Spanish Gate" and "Open The German Gate"


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: took place in Barcelona, Spain and Oberhausen, Germany, respectively, were co-promoted with the Japanese-based Dragon Gate.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On March 13, 2010, wXw held its first event in the US, "The Vision" took place in front of an audience of over 450 at The Arena in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The event also featured a title match for one of CZW's titles, the CZW Ultraviolent Underground Championship, along with wXw's famous feud being between Thumbtack Jack and Drake Younger.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On April 8, 9, and 10, 2011, wXw held its second and third events in the USA first with F1 vs. wXw on April 8 in Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey, USA at the Spontaneous Sports Complex and wXw Kreuzzug ZXI day 1 being in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the Asylum Arena and day 2 being in Union City, New Jersey in the ACE Arena.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On July 24, 2014, wXw started a partnership with Jeff Jarrett's Global Force Wrestling promotion which ended in 2017 due to GFW ending.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On July 18, 2015, New Japan Pro-Wrestling started a working relationship with wXw as part of New Japan's international expansion plans which ended in early 2016 due to wXw working with too many promotions, not having any collaborated events, not being in NJPW events in Europe, not having wXw titles being defended in NJPW events and no talent exchanges.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On July 2, 2018, wXw started a working relationship with WWNLive, with wXw becoming an official partner of the WWN Training Center. Later that year on October 1, a relationship with WWE began.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: On April 4, 2019 wXw held its fourth event in the US, "wXw Amerika Ist Wunderbar Live From New York City" took place in La Boom in Queens, New York.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: 16 Carat Gold Tournament is a single-elimination tournament annually held by the wXw. The sixteen-man tournament was first conceived by wXw in 2006 and has been held every year since then.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: The wXw 16 Carat Gold Tournament of 2020 was a three-night event which started on March 6 and culminated on March 8.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: wXw Catch Grand Prix was a tournament consisting of two blocks of seven participants each. The tournament started on October 26 and culminated on December 13. The matches are disputed in five rounds and each one grants two points for the winner and one point for each competitor if the result is a draw by reaching the time limit. There is a fifteen minute time limit for each match. The digits next to the time indicate the round in which the match ended.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: The wXw Hall of Fame is a German professional wrestling hall of fame maintained by the Oberhausen-based promotion Westside Xtreme Wrestling (wXw). It was established in 2005 to honor wrestlers who have wrestled for the promotion.


title: Westside Xtreme Wrestling

text: In 2016, wXw opened the first German wrestling academy with a seven-days course schedule in Essen. The wXw Academy training is open for members as well as guests that can also book a stay in an apartment adjoined to the academy. With "Scouting the next Generation", the wXw Academy introduced a series of monthly events in 2015 that provides trainees of the academy the opportunity to perform in front of a crowd.


title: Mary Mara

text: Mary T. Mara (September 21, 1960 – June 26, 2022) was an American television and film actress known for her main role as Inspector Bryn Carson on "Nash Bridges" and appearances on primetime dramas "ER" and "Law & Order". She also appeared in "Mr. Saturday Night".


title: Mary Mara

text: Mara was born in Syracuse, New York, on September 21, 1960. Her father, Roger, worked as the director of special events for the New York State Fair; her mother, Lucille, was an accountant. Mara had a brother and two sisters. She attended Corcoran High School in Syracuse. After graduating, she studied at San Francisco State University and the Yale School of Drama, obtaining a Master of Fine Arts from the latter institution.


title: Mary Mara

text: Mara made her film debut in the 1989 television film "The Preppie Murder". In the same year, she participated in the New York Shakespeare Festival's production of "Twelfth Night", alongside Michelle Pfeiffer, Jeff Goldblum and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio. She later featured in "Mr. Saturday Night" (1992), starring alongside Billy Crystal as his character's estranged daughter.


title: Mary Mara

text: Mara's breakthrough role came on "ER", which was the most popular medical drama airing on prime time television during the mid-1990s. She played Loretta Sweets, a patient with cervical cancer, in nine episodes from 1995 to 1996. This helped spur her into the starring role of Inspector Bryn Carson on "Nash Bridges" from 1996 to 1997. When reflecting on that role several years later, she noted that it was a "male-dominated show", adding that although the writers "started to write for me really well about halfway through the season", the producers "were afraid I would stand out too much." She also featured on shows such as "Law & Order", "NYPD Blue", and "Ally McBeal" around this time.


title: Mary Mara

text: During the later part of her career, Mara appeared as a recurring character in "Dexter" (2009) as Valerie Hodges and "Ray Donovan" (2013) as Mrs. Sullivan. She also starred in the horror film "Prom Night" (2008). Her final role was in the 2020 film "Break Even". After appearing in the film, Mara retired from acting.


title: Mary Mara

text: Mara lived a bicoastal life at New York City and Southern California. According to Jon Lindstrom, she underwent chemotherapy for cancer in 2008, when they performed together in the play "In Heat" by Malcolm Danare. Following her retirement from acting, she returned to Syracuse. She resided in Cape Vincent, New York, at the time of her death. Mara had a stepdaughter.


title: Mary Mara

text: Mara died on the morning of June 26, 2022, in Cape Vincent. She was 61, and drowned while swimming in the St. Lawrence River. Tributes to Mara were posted on social media by Billy Crystal, Annette O'Toole, and Jon Lindstrom. Her death was ruled an accident.


title: Bouncer

text: A bouncer (also known as a doorman or door supervisor) is a type of security guard, employed at venues such as bars, nightclubs, cabaret clubs, stripclubs, casinos, hotels, billiard halls, restaurants, sporting events, schools, concerts, or movie theaters. A bouncer's duties are to provide security, to check legal age and drinking age, to refuse entry for intoxicated persons, and to deal with aggressive behavior or non-compliance with statutory or establishment rules.


title: Bouncer

text: They are civilians and they are often hired directly by the venue, rather than by a security firm. Bouncers are often required where crowd size, clientele or alcohol consumption may make arguments or fights a possibility, or where the threat or presence of criminal gang activity or violence is high. At some clubs, bouncers are also responsible for "face control", choosing who is allowed to patronize the establishment. In the United States, civil liability and court costs related to the use of force by bouncers are "the highest preventable loss found within the [bar] industry", as many United States bouncers are often taken to court and other countries have similar problems of excessive force. In many countries, federal or state governments have taken steps to professionalise the industry by requiring bouncers to have training, licensing, and a criminal records background check.


title: Bouncer

text: Other terms include "cooler" in the US and "door supervisor" in the UK. In US bars, "cooler" is often the term for the head bouncer. In the UK, the terms "floor man" or "floor person" may be used for the bouncer role. The "cooler" is expected to have the same ability to respond to physical situations as the rest of the bouncers, but should also have reliable interpersonal skills that can be used to de-escalate situations without violence.


title: Bouncer

text: In the 1990s and 2000s, increased awareness of the risks of lawsuits and criminal charges have led many bars and venues to train their bouncers to use communication and conflict resolution skills before, or rather than, resorting to brute force against troublemakers. However, the earlier history of the occupation suggests that the stereotype of bouncers as rough, tough, physical enforcers has indeed been the case in many countries and cultures throughout history. Historical references also suggest that the 'doorman' function of guarding a place and selecting who can have entry to it (the stereotypical task of the modern bouncer) could at times be an honorific and evolve into a relatively important position.


title: Bouncer

text: The significance of the doorman as the person allowing (or barring) entry is found in a number of Mesopotamian myths (and later in Greek myths descended from them), including that of Nergal overcoming the seven doormen guarding the gates to the Underworld.


title: Bouncer

text: In 1 Chronicles 26 of the Old Testament, the Levitical Temple is described as having a number of 'gatekeepers'—amongst their duties are "protect[ing] the temple from theft", from "illegal entry into sacred areas" and "maintain[ing] order", all functions they share with the modern concept of the bouncer, though the described temple servants also serve as holy persons and administrators themselves (it is noted that some administrative function is still present in today's bouncing in the higher position of the supervisor).


title: Bouncer

text: The Romans had a position known as the "ostiarius" (doorkeeper), initially a slave, who guarded the door, and sometimes ejected unwanted people from the house whose gate he guarded. The term later become a low-ranking clergy title.


title: Bouncer

text: Plautus, in his play "Bacchides" (written approximately 194–184 BC), mentions a "large and powerful" doorman / bouncer as a threat to get an unwelcome visitor to leave.


title: Bouncer

text: Tertullian, an early Christian author living mainly in the 2nd century AD, while reporting on the casual oppression of Christians in Carthage, noted that bouncers were counted as part of a semi-legal underworld, amongst other 'shady' characters such as gamblers and pimps.


title: Bouncer

text: Within Buddhist lore, the Nio, the twin guardian statues who decorate the entrances of temples, dojos, and various places related with religious importance, are believed to be the embodiment of wrathful deity bodhisattvas such as Vajrapani, Mahasthamaprapta, Vajrasattva, Acala, or various figures within Buddhist legend who accompanied Gautama Buddha during his journeys to spread his teachings to protect him and aid in cases needing justified force.


title: Bouncer

text: During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, US saloon-keepers and brothel madams hired bouncers to remove troublesome, violent, or dead-drunk patrons, and to protect the saloon girls and prostitutes. The word "bouncer" was first popularized in a novel by Horatio Alger, called The "Young Outlaw", which was first published in 1875. Alger was an immensely popular author in the 19th century, especially with young people and his books were widely quoted. In Chapter XIV, entitled "Bounced", a boy is thrown out of a restaurant because he has no money to pay for his meal:


title: Bouncer

text: An 1883 newspaper article stated that "'The Bouncer' is merely the English 'chucker out'. When liberty verges on license and gaiety on wanton delirium, the Bouncer selects the gayest of the gay, and—bounces him!"


title: Bouncer

text: In US Western towns in the 1870s, high-class brothels known as "good houses" or "parlour houses" hired bouncers for security and to prevent patrons from evading payment. "Good house"-style brothels "... considered themselves the cream of the crop, and [the prostitutes working there] scorned those who worked in (or out of) saloons, dance halls, and theatres." The best bordellos looked like respectable mansions, with attractively decorated parlours, a game room and a dance hall. For security, "somewhere in every parlor house there was always a bouncer, a giant of a man who stayed sober to handle any customer who got too rough with one of the girls or didn't want to pay his bill." The "protective presence" of bouncers in high-class brothels was "... one of the reasons the girls considered themselves superior to [lower-class] free-lancers, who lacked any such shepherds."


title: Bouncer

text: In Wisconsin's lumberjack days, bouncers would physically remove drinkers who were too drunk to keep buying drinks, and thus free up space in the bar for new patrons. The slang term 'snake-room' was used to describe a "...room off a saloon, usually two or three steps down, into which a bar-keeper or the bouncer could slide drunk lumber-jacks head first through swinging doors from the bar-room." In the late 19th century, until Prohibition, bouncers also had the unusual role of protecting the saloon's buffet. To attract business, "...many saloons lured customers with offers of a "free lunch"—usually well salted to inspire drinking, and the saloon "bouncer" was generally on hand to discourage [those with too] hearty appetites".


title: Bouncer

text: In the late 19th century, bouncers at small town dances and bars physically resolved disputes and removed troublemakers, without worrying about lawsuits. In the main bar in one Iowa town, "...there were many quarrels, many fights, but all were settled on the spot. There were no court costs [for the bouncers or the bar]; only some aches and pains [for the troublemakers]."


title: Bouncer

text: In the 1880s and 1890s, bouncers were used to maintain order in "The Gut", the roughest part of New York City's Coney Island, which was filled with "ramshackle groups of wooden shanties", bars, cabarets, fleabag hotels and brothels. Huge bouncers patrolled these venues of vice and "roughly ejected anyone who violated the loose rules of decorum" by engaging in pick-pocketing, jewelry thieving, or bloody fights.


title: Bouncer

text: During the 1890s, San Diego had a similarly rough waterfront area and red-light district called the 'Stingaree', where bouncers worked the door at brothels. Prostitutes worked at the area's 120 bawdy houses in small rooms, paying a fee to the procurer who usually was the bouncer or 'protector' of the brothel. The more expensive, higher-class brothels were called "parlour houses", and they were "run most decorously", and the "best of food and drink was served." To maintain the high-class atmosphere at these establishments, male patrons were expected to act like gentlemen; "... if any customer did or said anything out of line, he was asked to leave. A bouncer made sure he did".


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers in pre-World War I United States were also sometimes used as the guardians of morality. As ballroom dancing was often considered as an activity which could lead to immoral conduct if the dancers got too close, some of the more reputable venues had bouncers to remind patrons not to dance closer than nine inches to their partners. The bouncers' warnings tended to consist of light taps on the shoulder at first, and then progressed to sterner remonstrations.


title: Bouncer

text: In the 1930s, bars in the bawdiest parts of Baltimore, Maryland docks hired bouncers to maintain order and eject aggressive patrons. The Oasis club, operated by Max Cohen, hired "...a lady bouncer by the name of Mickey Steele, a six-foot acrobat from the Pennsylvania coal fields. Mickey was always considerate of the people she bounced; first asking them where they lived and then throwing them in that general direction. She was succeeded by a character known as 'Machine-Gun Butch' who was a long-time bouncer at the club".


title: Bouncer

text: In the Weimar Republic in the Germany of the 1920s and early 1930s, doormen protected venues from the fights caused by Nazis and other potentially violent groups (such as Communists). Such scenes were fictionalised in the movie "Cabaret". Hitler surrounded himself with a number of former bouncers such as Christian Weber; the SS originated as a group designated to protect party meetings.


title: Bouncer

text: In early Nazi Germany, some bouncers in underground jazz clubs were also hired to screen for Nazi spies, because jazz was considered a "degenerate" form of music by the Nazi party. Later during the Nazi regime, bouncers also increasingly barred non-German people (such as foreign workers) from public functions, such as 'German' dances at dance halls.


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers also often come into conflict with football hooligans, due to the tendency of groups of hooligans to congregate at pubs and bars before and after games. In the United Kingdom for example, long-running series of feuds between fan groups like The Blades and groups of bouncers in the 1990s were described by researchers.


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers have also been known to be associated with criminal gangs, especially in places like Russia, Hong Kong or Japan, where bouncers may often belong to these groups or have to pay the crime syndicates to be able to operate. In Hong Kong, triad-connected reprisal or intimidation attacks against bouncers have been known to occur.


title: Bouncer

text: Hong Kong also features a somewhat unusual situation where some bouncers are known to work for prostitutes, instead of being their pimps. Hong Kong police have noted that due to the letter of the law, they sometimes had to charge the bouncer for illegally extorting the women when the usually expected dominance situation between the sex worker and her "protector" was in fact reversed.


title: Bouncer

text: In the 1990s and 2000s, a number of bouncers have written "tell-all" books about their experiences on the door. They indicate that male bouncers are respected by some club-goers as the ultimate 'hard men', while at the same time, these bouncers can also be lightning rods for aggression and macho posturing on the part of obnoxious male customers wanting to prove themselves. Bouncing has also started to attract some academic interest as part of ethnographic studies into violent subcultures. Bouncers were selected as one of the groups studied by several English researchers in the 1990s because their culture was seen as "grounded in violence", as well as because the group had increasingly been "demonised", especially in common liberal discourse (see Research section of this article).


title: Bouncer

text: In 2006, a German newspaper reported that organized crime is operating bouncer extortion rackets in "Berlin, Hamburg, the Ruhr Valley and the Rhein-Main region" in which bar owners are "compelled to hire a bouncer, for 100 euros ($128) per hour", to "protect" against damage to their venue from the "wrong" type of patron or violence. In 2008, newspapers reported that some bouncers in London and other northern UK towns were "extorting cash from [club] businesses" by operating protection rackets, in which they offer to sell "protection" to club owners, telling them "you're going to pay us, or else" the club owner's venue may be damaged.


title: Bouncer

text: In the early 1990s, an Australian government study on violence stated that violent incidents in public drinking locations are caused by the interaction of five factors: aggressive and unreasonable bouncers, groups of male strangers, low comfort (e.g., unventilated, hot clubs), high boredom, and high drunkenness. The research indicated that bouncers did not play as large a role "... as expected in the creation of an aggressive or violence prone atmosphere [in bars]." However, the study did show that "...edgy and aggressive bouncers, especially when they are arbitrary or petty in their manner, do have an adverse effect." The study stated that bouncers:


title: Bouncer

text: ...have been observed to initiate fights or further encourage them on several occasions. Many seem poorly trained, obsessed with their own machismo, and relate badly to groups of male strangers. Some of them appear to regard their employment as giving them a licence to assault people. This may be encouraged by management adherence to a repressive model of supervision of patrons ("if they play up, thump 'em"), which in fact does not reduce trouble, and exacerbates an already hostile and aggressive situation. In practice many bouncers are not well managed in their work, and appear to be given a job autonomy and discretion that they cannot handle well.


title: Bouncer

text: A 1998 article "Responses by Security Staff to Aggressive Incidents in Public Settings" in the "Journal of Drug Issues" examined 182 violent incidents involving crowd controllers (bouncers) that occurred in bars in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The study indicated that in 12% of the incidents the bouncers had good responses, in 20% of the incidents, the bouncers had a neutral response; and in 36% of the incidents, the bouncers "... responses were rated as bad—that is, the crowd controllers enhanced the likelihood of violence but were themselves not violent." Finally, "... in almost one-third of incidents, 31 per cent, the crowd controllers' responses were rated as ugly. The controllers' actions involved gratuitous aggression, harassment of patrons and provocative behaviour."


title: Bouncer

text: At least one major ethnographic study also observed bouncing from within, as part of a British project to study violent subcultures. Beyond studying the bouncer culture from the outside, the group selected a suitable candidate for covert, long-term research. The man had previously worked as a bouncer before becoming an academic, and while conversant with the milieu, it required some time for him to re-enter bouncing work in a new locality. The study has, however, attracted some criticism due to the fact that the researcher, while fulfilling his duties as a bouncer and being required to set aside his academic distance, would have been at risk of losing objectivity—though it was accepted that this quandary might be difficult to resolve.


title: Bouncer

text: One of the main ethical issues of the research was the participation of the researcher in violence, and to what degree he would be allowed to participate. The group could not fully resolve this issue, as the undercover researcher would not have been able to gain the trust of his peers while shying away from the use of force. As part of the study it eventually became clear that bouncers themselves were similarly and constantly weighing up the limits and uses of their participation in violence. The research however found that instead of being a part of the occupation, violence itself was the defining characteristic, a "culture created around violence and violent expectation".


title: Bouncer

text: The bouncing culture's insular attitudes also extended to the recruitment process, which was mainly by word of mouth as opposed to typical job recruitment, and also depended heavily on previous familiarity with violence. This does not extend to the prospective bouncer himself having to have a reputation for violence—rather a perception was needed that he could deal with it if required. Various other elements, such as body language or physical looks (muscles, shaved heads) were also described as often expected for entry into bouncing—being part of the symbolic 'narratives of intimidation' that set bouncers apart in their work environment.


title: Bouncer

text: Training on the job was described as very limited, with the new bouncers being 'thrown into the deep end'—the fact that they had been accepted for the job in the first place including the assessment that they should know what they are doing (though informal observation of a beginner's behaviour was commonplace). In the case of the British research project, the legally required licensing as a bouncer was also found to be expected by employers before applicants started the job (and as licensing generally excluded people with criminal convictions, this kept out some of the more unstable violent personalities).


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers monitor a club or venue to "detect, report and correct any condition inside/outside the club" which could lead to injuries of patrons or staff or to damage of the club or its equipment. A key role for bouncers is communicating information within a club to the venue employees who need to know (e.g., regarding injuries, size of crowd outside, capacity of venue, incidents, etc.). Bouncers answer questions about club policies and procedures while controlling crowds (by asking people not to block entrances, exits, stairwells, and other high-traffic areas). Bouncers lead "injury and emergency procedures" if a patron is injured and requires first aid. In a large nightclub, the bouncers may be part of a security team that includes friskers (who check for weapons and drugs), surveillance staff, a doorman, and floor men, with all of these security staff reporting to a chief of security, who in turn, reports to the general manager.


title: Bouncer

text: Although a common stereotype of bouncers is that of the thuggish brute, a good club security staff member requires more than just physical qualities such as strength and size: "The best bouncers don’t "bounce" anyone... they talk to people" (and remind them of the venue rules). Lee Vineyard states that the "tough guy" mentality and look of some bouncers, in which they have their sleeves rolled up to show off their biceps and they have their arms crossed, can actually create more potential for fights than a bouncer who greets patrons with a "hello", and is thus approachable.


title: Bouncer

text: An ability to judge and communicate well with people will reduce the need for physical intervention, while a steady personality will prevent the bouncer from being easily provoked by customers. Bouncers need to be able to detect the early warning signs of a potential confrontation with a patron, by observing crowds and individuals and spotting the signs of a "heated" interaction that could become a fight.


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers also profit from good written communication skills, because they are often required to document assaults in an incident log or using an incident form. Well-kept incident logs can protect the employee from any potential criminal charges or lawsuits that later arise from an incident. Bouncers need to be polite when answering questions or controlling crowds. In larger clubs, bouncers need to be able to work with a team of bouncers, which may require the use of radios to stay in contact and communicate (particularly between the inside and outside of a club). In bouncer teams, the bouncers must be aware of the location of the other bouncers, and ensure that when one bouncer relocates (e.g., to go to the bathroom), a gap is not left in the venue security.


title: Bouncer

text: However, British research from the 1990s also indicates that a major part of both the group identity and the job satisfaction of bouncers is related to their self image as a strongly masculine person who is capable of dealing with – and dealing out – violence; their employment income plays a lesser role in their job satisfaction. Bouncer subculture is strongly influenced by perceptions of honour and shame, a typical characteristic of groups that are in the public eye. Factors in enjoying work as a bouncer were also found in the general prestige and respect that was accorded to bouncers, sometimes bordering on hero worship. The camaraderie between bouncers (even of different clubs), as well as the ability to work "in the moment" and outside of the drudgery of typical jobs were also often cited.


title: Bouncer

text: The same research has also indicated that the decisions made by bouncers, while seeming haphazard to an outsider, often have a basis in rational logic. The decision to turn certain customers away at the door because of too casual clothing (face control) is for example often based on the perception that the person will be more willing to fight (compared to someone dressed in expensive attire). Many similar decisions taken by a bouncer during the course of a night are also being described as based on experience rather than just personality.


title: Bouncer

text: Movies often depict bouncers physically throwing patrons out of clubs and restraining drunk customers with headlocks, which has led to a popular misconception that bouncers have (or reserve) the right to use physical force freely. However, in many countries bouncers have no legal authority to use physical force more freely than any other civilian—meaning they are restricted to reasonable levels of force used in self defense, to eject drunk or aggressive patrons refusing to leave a venue, or when restraining a patron who has committed an offence until police arrive. Lawsuits are possible if injuries occur, even if the patron was drunk or using aggressive language.


title: Bouncer

text: With civil liability and court costs related to the use of force as "the highest preventable loss found within the industry..." (US) and bars being "sued more often for using unnecessary or excessive force than for any other reason" (Canada), substantial costs may be incurred by indiscriminate violence against patrons—though this depends heavily on the laws and customs of the country. In Australia, the number of complaints and lawsuits against venues due to the behaviour of their bouncers has been credited with turning many establishments to using former police officers to head their in-house security, instead of hiring private firms. In 2007, a bouncer firm in Toronto stated that a major issue for his bouncers is the risk of being charged with assault if a patron is injured because bouncers are dealing with a fight. The concerns about being charged by police may make bouncers reticent to call the police after they break up a bar fight. Lee Vineyard states that judges tend to be prejudiced against bouncers if there are injuries to patrons after bouncers break up a bar fight; as such, he recommends restraint in all bouncer actions, even if the bouncer is defending him or herself from a patron.


title: Bouncer

text: According to statistical research in Canada, bouncers are as likely to face physical violence in their work as urban-area police officers. The research also found that the likelihood of such encounters increased (with statistical significance) with the number of years the bouncer had worked in his occupation. Despite popular misconceptions, bouncers in Western countries are normally unarmed. Some bouncers may carry weapons such as expandable batons for personal protection, but they may not have a legal right to carry a weapon even if they would prefer to do so. An article from 2007 about bouncers in Toronto (Canada) stated that a major security firm instructs its bouncers to buy bulletproof vests, as they have to deal with armed patrons on a nightly basis. Bouncers also face patrons armed with brass knuckles, screwdrivers, and improvised weapons such as broken bottles.


title: Bouncer

text: Lee Vineyard recommends that bouncers be provided with uniforms by the club, so that patrons can identify the bouncers. During a fight in a bar, if the bouncers are un-uniformed as they approach the altercation, the fighting patrons may believe that the bouncers who are intervening are other fighting patrons, rather than security staff.


title: Bouncer

text: Use of force training programs teach bouncers ways to avoid using force and explain what types of force are considered allowable by the courts. Some bars have gone so far as to institute policies barring physical contact, where bouncers are instructed to ask a drunk or disorderly patron to leave—if the patron refuses, the bouncers call police. However, if the police are called too frequently, it can reflect badly on the venue upon renewal of its liquor licence.


title: Bouncer

text: Another strategy used in some bars is to hire smaller, less threatening or female bouncers, because they may be better able to defuse conflicts than large, intimidating bouncers. The more 'impressive' bouncers, in the often tense environments they are supposed to supervise, are also often challenged by aggressive males wanting to prove their machismo. Large and intimidating bouncers, whilst providing an appearance of strong security, may also drive customers away in cases where a more relaxed environment is desired. In addition, female security staff, apart from having fewer problems searching female patrons for drugs or weapons and entering women's washrooms to check for illegal activities, are also considered as better able to deal with drunk or aggressive women.


title: Bouncer

text: In Australia, for example, women comprise almost 20% of the security industry and increasingly work the door as well, using "a smile, chat and a friendly but firm demeanor" to resolve tense situations. Nearly one in nine of Britain's nightclub bouncers are also women, with the UK's 2003 Licensing Act giving the authorities "discretionary power to withhold a venue's licence if it does not employ female door staff". This is credited with having "opened the door for women to enter the profession". However, female bouncers are still a rarity in many countries, such as in India, where two women who became media celebrities in 2008 for being "Punjab's first female bouncers" were soon sacked again after accusations of unbecoming behaviour.


title: Bouncer

text: The Victoria Event Center has hired a sexual health educator/intimacy coach who acts as a type of bouncer called a "consent captain". The consent captain monitors bar patrons to stop sexual harassment and sexual assault at social activities at venues and bars. The consent captain intervenes if she sees people who are getting stared at, harassed, or touched without sexual consent. She talks to the person who is feeling uncomfortable and then, if the first person agrees, speaks to the individual whose conduct is unwanted. Like a regular bouncer, the consent captain warns the person engaging in unwanted behavior that those acts are not tolerated in the venue; if the unwanted acts continue, she may "eventually ask them to leave". The consent captain also checks on people who are intoxicated, to prevent people from taking advantage of their impaired state. Since the consent captain is, in this case, a sexual health educator, she is better able to notice risk situations regarding consent and harassment that regular bouncers might not notice.


title: Bouncer

text: In many countries, a bouncer must be licensed and lacking a criminal record to gain employment within the security/crowd control sector. In some countries or regions, bouncers may be required to have extra skills or special licenses and certification for first aid, alcohol distribution, crowd control, or fire safety.


title: Bouncer

text: In Australia, bouncers are required to be legally licensed as crowd controllers. Licensing varies across the states and territories, and a crowd controller needs to apply under the Mutual Recognition Scheme to work in another state, having their license formally recognised by the state they wish to work in. In Queensland, these licenses require the undertaking of a security provider course, which teaches the licensee techniques in physical restraints, use of force, conflict negotiation and deescalation, first-aid and CPR, and details the legal requirements and obligations of the crowd controller.


title: Bouncer

text: In Canada, bouncers have the right to use reasonable force to expel intoxicated or aggressive patrons. First, the patron must be asked to leave the premises. If the patron refuses to leave, the bouncer can use reasonable force to expel the patron. This guideline has been upheld in a number of court cases. Under the definition of 'reasonable force', "it is perfectly acceptable [for the bouncer] to grab a patron’s arm to remove the patron from the premises". However, "Only in situations where employees reasonably believe that the conduct of the patron puts them in danger can they inflict harm on a patron and then only to the extent that such force is necessary for self defence".


title: Bouncer

text: In the Newfoundland and Labrador capital of Saint John's, certification of doormen is voluntary. Some establishments require a "doorman's certificate", provided by the St. Johns Fire Department, that deals with Fire Code. This process requires answering test questions that apply to fire code for the most part, and a basic understanding of the criminal code as it applies to drug use and the use of force. Unfortunately it does not cover the Use of Force Model for all Canadian citizens. including law enforcement, which states that an assault is considered a crime covered by "citizens arrest" under Canadian law. Other municipalities in the province have no training. Municipal or provincial governance does not exist at the time of this publishing.


title: Bouncer

text: In British Columbia, door staff security (bouncers) are required to become certified under the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General Office. The course called BST (Basic Security Training) is a 40-hour program that covers law, customer service, and other issue related to security operation.


title: Bouncer

text: In Alberta, bar and nightclub security staff will have to take a new, government-run training course on correct bouncer behaviour and skills before the end of 2008. The six-hour 'ProTect' course will, among other subjects, teach staff to identify conflicts before they become violent, and how to defuse situations without resorting to force.


title: Bouncer

text: In Ontario, courts have ruled that "a tavern owes a twofold duty of care to its patrons. It must ensure that it does not serve alcohol which would apparently intoxicate or increase the patron's intoxication. Further, it must take positive steps to protect patrons and others from the dangers of intoxication". Regarding the second requirement of protecting patrons, the law holds that "customers cannot be ejected from your premises if doing so would put them in danger [e.g., due to the patron's intoxication]. Bars can be held liable for ejecting a customer who they know, or should know, is at risk of injury by being ejected."


title: Bouncer

text: In Ontario, bartenders and servers must complete the Smart Serve Training Program, which teaches them to recognise the signs of intoxication. The Smart Serve program is also recommended for other staff in bars who have contact with potentially intoxicated patrons, such as bouncers, coat check staff, and valets. The Smart Serve certification program encourages bars to keep Incident Reporting Logs, to use as evidence if an incident goes to court. With the August 2007 "Private Security and Investigative Services Act", Ontario law also requires security industry workers, including bouncers, to be licensed.


title: Bouncer

text: In Germany, doormen may – like any other citizen – defend themselves in self-defense situations using physical force, but they must not interfere with the police work. Their responsibility is limited locally by the property boundaries and content by the personal rights of the guests. Specifically, this means that they can not enforce a person control or search for people. Such on-the-spot checks are always voluntary, but a criterion for entry. Bouncers own like every other the right to detain under § 127 StPO. In addition, the guards are usually also "possessor" of the security object, which led to many racism-related issues regarding the entry of foreign customers.


title: Bouncer

text: However, bouncers at discotheques, who work for a security company or are self-employed, have to take a so-called () with the responsible . This is prescribed in § 34 (a) of the Industrial Code. The certificate issued by the Chamber of Industry and Commerce after passing the exam is colloquially called "bouncer certificate" or simply "certificate" or "34 a". The exam consists of a written part with multiple-choice questions and an oral part. The latter can be repeated at a reduced price if it does not exist. Currently, the number of retry attempts is not limited. The costs for the examination depending on IHK location between 150 and 190 euros.


title: Bouncer

text: In the Netherlands doormen (portiers) of bouncers (uitsmijters) are 2 different specialties. Doormen are mostly seen as concierges and have primary tasks involving hospitality, such as greeting customers, providing services, supporting customer needs and some security tasks. However, bouncers are required, since 1999 by law ( WPBR) to be in possession of a specialized diploma (SVH Diploma Horecaportier). The course contains both theoretical and practical training and exams and can only be entered if the subject does not have any antecedents, which will be checked by a screening by Police departments in the region where the company is located. Also, this background check is repeated every 3 years, after which a renewed Security ID will be handed to the subject. With this ID, the subject is allowed to work as a bouncer. In case he/she doesn't have this ID on his/her person at work, he/she will be liable for a fine, which will be written by a department of the Police, called Bijzondere Wetten. Not only will the bouncer be charged, but also the company. Because of the relatively strong bar-, club- and catering industry in the Netherlands, bouncers are necessary to act as host, problem solver and mediator. They are mainly tasked with preventive searches and checks, supervision of customers, keeping out drugs and weapons and maintaining a safe atmosphere in the premises.


title: Bouncer

text: In Italy, the law defines bouncers as "security subsidiary unarmed operator" and they must have specific requisites:


title: Bouncer

text: Bouncers must not have ownership of any type of firearm during their service even if they have a valid firearms license.


title: Bouncer

text: In New Zealand, as of 2011, bouncers are required to have a COA (Certificate of approval). Like other security work, the person who has the COA has been vetted by the police and cleared through security checks, as well as the courts, to show the person is suitable for the job, and knows New Zealand law to prevent Security Officers going to court for using excessive force and assault on patrons.


title: Bouncer

text: In the Republic of Ireland all potential doormen (bouncers) must complete a QQI level 4 course in Door Security Procedures. This allows them to apply for a PSA license (Private Security Authority). The PSA vet all applicants before issuing a license. Some past convictions will disqualify an applicant from working in the security industry. The license issued by the PSA entitles the holder of the license to work on pubs, clubs and event security. The PSA now requires a person to have a license to work in Event Security.


title: Bouncer

text: Singapore requires all bouncers to undergo a background check and attend a 5-day 'National Skills Recognition System' course for security staff. However, many of the more professional security companies (and larger venues with their own dedicated security staff) have noted that the course is insufficient for the specific requirements of a bouncer and provide their own additional training.


title: Bouncer

text: In Sweden, there are special security officers referred to as Ordningsvakt with limited policing duties who share the use of force monopoly with the police, thus having more or less the same obligations as the police to report crime and intervene when on duty. They are trained and ordained by the Swedish Police Authority to maintain and enforce public order at venues or areas where the police cannot permanently divert resources to enforce public order themselves. These security officers have powers of citizen's arrest and to verbally dismiss, physically remove, or detain those who disturb or pose an immediate threat to public order or safety, by using a reasonable amount of force. They can also detain or otherwise take into custody those who are drunk and disorderly and turn them over to police custody as soon as possible. An "Ordningsvakt" is recruited by the police and must go through a battery of physical tests, a language test, and an interview board before going through a two-week training program which teaches behaviour, conflict management, criminal law, physical intervention, the use of telescopic batons and handcuffs, first aid, equal opportunities and discrimination, and arrest procedures. He or she must then be re-certified every three years. At the end of each shift, a written shift report must always be submitted to the police.


title: Bouncer

text: An "Ordningsvakt" is either employed by a private security company, such as Securitas or G4S, where they commonly work at shopping malls, hospitals, public transportation, or as privateers employed by bar or nightclub owners. But despite employment, their first and foremost loyalty lies with the police, who manage and supervise them in the field. They can also be used to augment the police at football matches and high-risk football derbies (after receiving special training). An Ordningsvakt is required to wear a special uniform, which is similar to that of a police officer, but made out of a brighter blue colour and with slightly different emblems so they are easily identified as an Ordningsvakt but also make their connection to the police as obvious as possible. Some security officers are allowed to carry firearms, but this is rare. While on duty, an Ordningsvakt, just like a police officer, is regarded as a public servant, and an assault or threats against one will be punished more harshly. A lawful order given by an Ordningsvakt must be obeyed; otherwise, physical force may be used to enforce that order. Resisting at this point is illegal and punishable by prison.


title: Bouncer

text: In the UK, "door supervisors"—as they are termed—must hold a licence from the Security Industry Authority. The training for a door supervisor licence takes 32.5 hours since the current changes were implemented on 1 January 2015, and includes issues such as behaviour, conflict management, civil and criminal law, search and arrest procedures, drug awareness, recording of incidents and crime scene preservation, licensing law, equal opportunities and discrimination, health and safety at work, physical intervention, and emergency procedures. Licenses must be renewed every three years. One current provider of training is the British Institute of Innkeeping Awarding Body.


title: Bouncer

text: Licensed door supervisors must wear a blue plastic licence (often worn on the upper arm) whilst on duty. This led to the common misconception that door supervisors are legally obliged to show their ID to members of the public upon request; in reality they only have to present it to police and licensing authorities in order to protect their identities from aggressive clients. The 2010 UK quango reforms includes the SIA amongst many other Quangos the coalition government intended to be disbanded, ostensibly on the overall grounds of cost, despite the SIA being essentially self-funding via licence payments. Whilst this may alleviate to some extent the financial burden on employers and individuals alike, some members of the industry see this as a retrograde step, fearing a return of the organised criminal element to the currently regulated industry.


title: Bouncer

text: In California, Senate Bill 194 requires any bouncer or security guard to be registered with the State of California Department of Consumer Affairs Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. These guards must also complete a criminal background check, including submitting their fingerprints to the California Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Californians must undertake the "Skills Training Course for Security Guards" before receiving a security licence. Further courses allow for qualified security personnel to carry batons upon completion of training.