historys

Rottweilers have a history that goes way back through times. There are as with most different breeds, different versions of their past. Some claim the rottweiler is entirely German developed by butchers. Others say it is a descendent from the Bouvier. Yet others tell the story as we tell it below.

Lets return to the time of the great Roman Empire where they controlled large portions of land. In Germany there was a small market town called Rottweil, hence the name rottweiler. In these times the legions got their supply of meat by having it mobile, meaning they brought their cattle with them.

The assistance of working dogs was needed to herd the cattle and this is where the rottweilers come in to business. One travel route was through the town Wurttemberg and on to the market town of Rottweil mentioned above. This region became an imporant cattle area and here the cattle dogs really proved their worth. In these times the rottweilers were thought to be called Rover dogs and they also carried wood and other products to the market.

Not only did the rottweilers herd the cattle, they also protected it from anyone trying to steal some of them. It took quite some courage to even try to bypass this strong and intelligent dog. They did service also by guarding supply dumps and were the camp dogs of preference.

There is a painting by flemish painter Peter Paul Reubens (1577-1640) that depicts a dog biting a wof in the back. This dog carries strong reassemblences with rottweilers.

In the years to follow the breed started to decline though and it went so far that in the year of 1900 there was only one female dog left in the town of Rottweil. Then in the start of the 20th century came the First World War. This increased the demand for police dogs and the best dogs that could be found for this purpose was of course the rottweiler. As demand increased the breed flourished and again become well known for its strength, intelligence and ability to be well trained.

After those days the rottweiler also became very popular with dog owners. In 1935 the breed was recognized officialy by the American Kennel Club. A year later they were exhibited in Britain. It was widely used again as a guard dog during the second world war.

Through the years the rottweilers have gained a proven reputation as the best and most efficient guard dogs there are.

Kari Eriksson is an infopreneur and a dog lover since many years. Lately Rottweilers have become a special interest and he operates The Rottweiler Directory at http://www.rottweilerdirectory.com alongsides with http://www.rottweilers-online.com where you can find articles, links and useful resources.

Tags: rottweiler, rottweilersrottweiler, rottweilers

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I was in the supermarket this morning (nothing unusual in that) and pushing my trolley to the checkout. Well, my wife was pushing and I was away in airy-fairy land when it suddenly dawned on me that I was walking past water. Not just any water but a whole world of the stuff. A complete representation of nations: a veritable United Nations of water in one aisle.

There, in your local Supermarket: Highland Spring Water all the way from Scotland or water drawn from the speckled valleys in the Black Mountains of the Canadian Rockies. Or you prefer Continental European? How about Spa Reine Water from Germany (hope it wasn’t a public Spa) or Vittel from the French Societe Generale des Eaux Minerales de Vittel, whatever that is. Even Australia is represented by Wattle Water - Pure Water from the Australian outback and complete with a sprinkling of dust. And from the Continent of Africa comes “Oasis Pure” shipped out from the Negrev by Camel Train. China and Japan had ambassadors at the Supermarket I attended and the pictures on the bottles looked great, but the price of $4.50 was pushing my ability to grasp the essentials behind buying water a bit far.

Yes, one can buy water from almost any place in the world right in your local shop. You can even get water from the Three Gorges Damn in China at your local Chinese Take-away, which is a bit weird as the damn is not ready for completion for another six years or so.

How true the advertising of water is can be anybody’s guess, but to me it seems a mite strange to ship small bottles of water half way across the world when a quite decent reservoir exists just up the road. I realize that in an effort to promote certain brands you can pay twice as much for water in a colorful green bottle or in a bottle shaped like a duck - but is it all so necessary. The cost of this water is outrageous yet nobody seems to realize what they are actually doing when they faithfully buy bottled water everyday of the week. The way I see it is that people are buying water that comes from the other side of the world and costs them money that could be otherwise spent. Why not just go to the tap as we used to do and use the water from there? If concerned boil it, let it cool and put it in the fridge for later. That is what we used to do until all of these fancy and expensive bottles came on the scene.

In an attempt to understand this bottled water phenomena I decided to put the words “bottled” and “water” into the search engine on my computer. The first entry that came up surprised me greatly. There is a whole association dedicated to bottled water; a whole business geared up to its welfare. I mean I can understand the International Association for Rail Workers or for Medical Supplies, but the International Bottled Water Association (IBWA) shocked me to the core. After this surprise I noticed that the whole Industry is massive, that not only this association exists but so do hundreds of others! Wow!

Anyway, it matters not. Looking through the IBWA site for inspiration I came to their “tip of the week” page. And here is the tip that they had for this week:

“Cool water is absorbed much more quickly than warm fluids and may help to cool off your overheated body”. Source: Nutrition Information Center in partnership with IBWA

Handy stuff! I got another useful hint from some other association that told me to drink two glasses of water every morning to offset imperceptible water loss that I have had during the night. Excellent stuff. This “handy tip” was given out by a Dr Fereydon Batmanghelidj and he wrote a book called, “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water”. I doubt that it is fictional in content.

Must try and get hold of that book - only joking. Another piece that I found was Ed Ford’s views on the matter of water:

“Human beings were invented by water as a device for transporting itself from one place to another”.

I am completely stuck for something to say after reading that weird statement. I must move onto other things or I will end up trying to find this man to see if he is for real.

As a kid in Edinburgh (which is not that long ago) we always used to drink water from the tap. If you wanted a glass of water then go to the kitchen sink and open the cold tap, let it run for a few seconds, more to make it cold than to clear the line and then fill your glass. Final step: drink it. This was always the case and 99% of the population of Britain (one percent lived on whisky) lived quite happily in this way with no notable side-effects form the tap water. And then suddenly bottled water came on the scene and life changed without noticeable falter, now 100% of the population drink from bottles.

Edinburgh Water shocks a lot of people when they find out the cycle that it goes through before it arrives in the glass that they are busy drinking from. Recycled sewage water is the ingredient of the stuff now inside their stomachs at the point when they grasp what you are telling them. Edinburgh has for many years removed the dung from the sewage (this used to be shipped out to sea in a special ship called the Gardyloo), it is then treated and passed through charcoal beds and retreated and analyzed endlessly before it is sent back into the system. And believe it or not Edinburgh has some of the highest quality water in Europe - and it comes straight from the tap!

Countries like Taiwan, the Philippines to name but a few do need treated water as the quality available from the tap could kill at ten yards. Taiwan has an extremely efficient system going - just go outside of your house to any one of the many machines dotted along the streets and by putting in 5NTD (8 pence) you will get a few gallons of clean and drinkable water in return. Not that the tap water is that bad (some waste chemicals and untreated sewage have been diverted to another river) and a boil in the kettle does me perfectly if I am feeling lazy.

It seems to me as if the whole world is shifting water around constantly. Singapore is a good example of the state of water today. Singapore has to buy water from Malaysia to survive and without such the whole of the Singapore economy would grind to a halt. This water is actually under serious contention as Malaysia has been complaining that Singapore does not pay enough for the water they pump everyday.

The Malaysian state of Johor provides 350 million gallons of water per day to Singapore at $0.007 per 1000 gallons, while Singapore has to resell a minimum 17 million gallons per day of treated water to Johor at $0.13 per 1000 gallons. The price differential has prompted calls from numerous Malaysian politicians that Singapore is profiteering from the deal. It also rankles the Malaysians that the price paid was derived from an agreement made decades ago and is still due to run for another few (until 2061). In basis: they want more for the water and Singapore doesn’t want to pay. They are even threatening to go to war over this!

In an attempt by Singapore to reduce their reliance on Malaysia they have started a program to build recycling plants around the Island. Great idea -convert dirty water into drinking water - and although it will take many years before the balance changes it is a good start. I am not sure about their marketing campaign - you can buy this water from the chosen outlets and it is called “New Water”. Sounds like a religious order.

The worlds shifting of water (despite Ed Fords thinking that water made humans so that it can transport itself) is none greater than what is going on in China as we speak. The Three Gorges Dam! China’s largest project since the Great Wall of China: and one with greater impact on China and the rest of the world than any other project underway today.

Some facts about the Three Gorges project:

• Project expected to take 17 years; completion expected in 2009.

• An estimated 250,000 workers are involved in the project.

• The Three Gorges Reservoir will inundate 632 square kilometers (395 square miles) of land.

• An estimated 1.2 million people will be resettled by the dam.

• The project’s 26 hydropower turbines are expected to produce 18.2 million kilowatts, up to one-ninth of China’s output.

• The amount of concrete totals 26.43 million cubic meters, twice that of the Itaipu project in Brazil, currently the world’s largest hydroelectric dam.

Source: Chinese government

Alongside of this massive shifting of natural resources we have the ice caps melting North and South of us, floods occurring worldwide where they should not and abnormal rainfalls flooding towns that usually do not see water for months on end. And of course the Meeting of Nations on the Supermarket shelves!

The world has water on the brain!

Just make sure that when you buy water from the supermarket that you try and miss out the “Clouds Recycled with Flouride” and the “Occaneechi Local Spa” and maybe go for the Deep Rock Crystal Drop and Whistlers Pure Glacial. It’s all in a name!

About The Author

Author and Webmaster of Seamania. As a Chief Engineer in the Merchant Navy Ieuan Dolby has sailed the world for fifteen years. Now living in Taiwan he writes about cultures across the globe and life as he sees it.

Tags: bottled water, distilled water, h2o, spring water, water, water facts, water historybottled water, distilled water, h2o, spring water, water, water facts, water history

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One of the few remaining original ancient Maya city names designated by the Maya that still exists today is Lamanai. This site itself is located in northern Belize on the west bank of the New River Lagoon. The ancient name of Lamanai was recorded by the Spanish in the 16th century and brought to light again by historian Grant Jones through his work in the archives in Seville, Spain. The name Lamanai is loosely translated as “Submerged Crocodile”. Knowing these two facts tells us two very important things, one, the ancient Maya were still residing at Lamanai when the Spanish arrived. And two, the site name indicates the importance of the Morelets’ Crocodile whose remains are rarely found in midden deposits indicating they were rarely consumed due to their important status within the community. As one visits this site it becomes apparent that this translation is fitting because there are numerous representations of crocodiles that appear on ceramics, stone, architecture and accompanying stucco facades.

An estimated 30 - 60,000 Maya may have resided at Lamanai during the height of the civilization and the occupational history well exceeds many other Maya cities with 3,000 years of unbroken human history. This history of occupation carries right through to contact period, and it certainly is the case that the Spanish would not have constructed two churches at this Maya site if there were not a population residing at Lamanai to convert. The first Spanish church, Structure N12-13, dates to approximately AD 1570; it was constructed some time after Lamanai became part of the Spanish encomienda system (royal grant to a Spaniard for the right to labor and tribute a native population, who is also responsible for christianizing the natives). This first church was built over an existing Tulum-style Postclassic building that contained painted murals; in this case it appears the Spanish were attempting to convert the Maya to Catholicism by substituting one religious practice for another. Conversion was difficult and the archaeological evidence for this exists in the form of a burned and destroyed first church and the caching of various figurines around and near the churches in traditional Maya fashion. Although a second Spanish church was constructed, Structure N12-11, ultimately the Spanish were never able to establish a strong hold in this area. It was in AD 1638 that there was a widespread revolt by the Maya that ended in the retreat of the Spanish at least for the time being.

The Late Postclassic and historic/colonial periods at Lamanai are certainly fascinating and are what the majority of current research is focusing on. But the fact that Lamanai has one of the tallest securely dated Preclassic structures in the Maya world, Structure N10-43, indicates that it certainly had a strong foundation upon which to build and thrive. This Preclassic stronghold may have been one of the reasons why Lamanai survived what many other major city-states suffered during the 9th century.

It was during the Late Classic period that there was a decline or collapse of the Maya civilization that consisted of a political and/or economic breakdown, a possible drought, and possibly a population increase that severely stressed the food supply. This decline affected numerous Classic period city-states such as Tikal, Copan, Palenque, and Caracol. During this time these city-states were almost completely abandoned and monumental architecture was no longer constructed, production of pottery declined, and carved stone monuments no longer told the stories of the elite ruling class of the Maya. Lamanai survived this decline or collapse and there are several theories why, one already mentioned is the strong Preclassic foundation, and a second being the construction of the city on a large body of fresh water today called the New River Lagoon. During ancient times, as well as modern, this lagoon provided food, a means of transportation, drinking and bathing water, a sacred haven for the revered crocodile, and a suitable setting to carry out sacred rituals.

Due to Lamanai’s close proximity to the New River Lagoon the ancient Maya residing there may have escaped the possible environmental degradation seen elsewhere. It has also been suggested that Lamanai was fairly isolated from other major cities, we know the Maya never had a central, capital city, and that there were constant conflicts during the Classic period. It may have been the case that Lamanai’s somewhat isolated location, to some extent still the case today, again protected it from this decline or collapse.

Ancient and more recent history of Lamanai (see Belize History: The Maya, Spanish, and British Occupation, by L. Howard) mirrors the development of the young nation of Belize with occupation by the Maya, Spanish, and British. The British commercial pursuits during the colonial period at Lamanai included production of 200 acres of sugar cane by the British who constructed a mill whose success was really never seen during the 15 years of operation from 1860 - 1875. The extensive iron works that were once one of the only steam-operated mills in Belize is located in the western portion of the Lamanai Archaeological Reserve.

Laura J. Howard holds a Masters’ of Science degree in Anthropology with a specilization in Maya archaeology. After researching in Belize for five years after her graduate work she now splits her time between south Florida and Belize. She has been active in Belize tourism and Maya archaeology since 1996, and now has a unique ecotourism company, Beyond Touring, that focuses soley on Belize, the ancient Maya, and natural history. Beyond Touring also offers an authentic cross-cultural experience that allows clients to ‘give back’ to the wonderful areas they visit in Belize. The projects Beyond Touring supports aim to provide sustainable economic endeavors for local residents of Belize, specifically Indian Church Village, located in northern Belize and adjacent to the Lamanai Archaeological Reserve.

Belize or Travel Information: http://www.beyondtouring.com

For Community Development: http://www.beyondtouring.com/Giveback/Scholarship.htm

Tags: Belize, Lamanai, Maya ruinsBelize, Lamanai, Maya ruins

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