The six smallest European countries by size are, from the smallest, Vatican City, Monaco, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Malta, and Andorra.
The six largest are, from the largest, Ukraine, France, Spain, Sweden, Norway, and Kazakhstan.
Russia is partly in Europe and mostly in Asia. If it is considered then it is the largest country.
Kazakhstan is the world’s largest landlocked country, at 2,724,900 km2, larger than all of Western Europe. Yet it maintains a small navy.
Kazakhstan’s navy is based on the Hyrcanian Ocean. The navy has about 3,000 sailors. Its main base became active in 1996. Its ships are mainly patrol crafts, minesweepers and a research vessel. They even have a unit for coastal artillery.
The Hyrcanian Ocean (a name from antiquity) is also known as the Mazandaran Sea. It is also known as the Caspian Sea.
In the Cold War era, the Caspian Sea was the home base of the world’s largest ekranoplan, the Lun. Nicknamed “The Caspian Sea Monster”, it was a ground-effects machine with short stubby wings, designed to “fly” at a maximum altitude of about 5 meters where it would skim the surface of the water, supported on a cushion of air. Powered by eight turbofan jet engines, it was designed for anti-ship warfare and as such was fitted with six tubes to carry and launch six missiles, which were believed to be capable of delivering a nuclear warhead if required.
Only one “Monster” ever became operational, although a second was partially completed when the former Soviet Union collapsed, halting construction. Both vessels still exist, although in dilapidated condition – the completed vessel is currently stranded on a beach about 20 km south of Derbent in Dagestan, where it was being towed to become part of a Patriot Park, and the unfinished craft is still in situ alongside the Volga River in an industrial area within the central Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod.
… … (addendum: they are large enough that they can be viewed on Google maps)
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Prince Caspian appears in three of the books of the Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian where he takes his rightful throne, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader where the now King Caspian X sails to the end of the Narnian world and The Silver Chair where Caspian in a minor character and the story focuses on his son Prince Rilian
[Not in play]
Caspian does appear very very briefly near the end of The Last Battle:
“Everyone you had ever heard of (if you knew the history of those countries) seemed to be there. There was Glimfeather the Owl and Puddleglum the Marshwiggle, and King Rilian the Disenchanted, and his mother, the Star’s daughter, and his great father, Caspian himself.”
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C.S. Lewis, when asked where he had found the name “Narnia”, pointed to a map of Ancient Italy, in Murray’s Small Classical Atlas, ed. G.B. Grundy (1904), which he had used as a teenager when studying Classics. The town of Narnia (Narni in modern Italian) is in Umbria, close to the geographic center of Italy, and currently has around 19,000 inhabitants.
The DC Comics villain Solomon Grundy has been in multiple TV series like “Arrow”, “Gotham”, and even “The Super Friends” as part of the Legion of Doom, but he has never been in any DCU movies, even though he is older than many other characters such as the Joker, the Riddler and Bane.
The Joker, Batman’s greatest nemesis, has been portrayed by a number of famous actors on television and in film, including Cesar Romero, Jack Nicholson, Mark Hamill, Heath Ledger, Joaquin Phoenix, and Jared Leto.
The Joker first appeared in card decks in the 1860s. It was introduced as an enhancement to the game of Euchre and was originally called the ‘Best Bower’, a card that ranked as the highest trump card in play. It was soon called the Jolly Joker, and then became simply the Joker.
“Bower” in Euchre is an anglicisme for the original term “Bauer” - German for “farmer”.
Pitcher Trevor Bauer is the only Cy Young Award winner in franchise history for the Cincinnati Reds baseball team (founded 1881).
In 1892 the Cincinnati Reds had a game called (canceled) by too much sunlight. Not rain, not lightning and thunder, and not wing. Sunlight.
It was May 6, 1892, in League Park, the ancestor of Crosley Field. League Park was built facing west and, after 14 innings of scoreless play, the catchers and hitters complained they couldn’t see the ball as the sun slowly settled behind Price Hill. Umpire Jack Sheridan agreed and called the tie game on account of sunshine. The next day’s Cincinnati Enquirer called the decision “just and sensible.”
While the Cincinnati Reds have had just one Cy Young winner in their franchise history, there are 3 major league teams that have never had a pitcher win that award.
Those teams are the Texas Rangers, Miami Marlin, and Colorado Rockies. The Marlins came into existence in 1993; the Rockies in 1991; the Rangers began play in 1961 as the Washington Senators. They moved to Texas and became the Rangers in 1972.
Walker, Texas Ranger was a television series, airing on the CBS network in the U.S. from 1993 through 2001. The crime/action series starred martial artist Chuck Norris, as an officer in the Texas Ranger Division.
Oops, didn’t see Kenobi’s reply. Removed.
The noted Continental Navy officer John Paul Jones was concerned about mutinies throughout his assignment as captain of the 18-gun sloop-of-war USS Ranger, and always took care to have pistol within arm’s reach.
In American football, the shotgun formation has both the quarterback and running back start the play 7 yds behind the line of scrimmage. In the pistol formation the running back stays 7 yds back but the quarterback moves up to only 4 yds behind the line of scrimmage (effectively halfway between the offensive line and the running back)
Joseph Manton, a London gunmaker, was known for the elegance and accuracy of his dueling pistols. A pair manufactured in the early 1800s sold at auction at Bonhams in 2011 for GBP 55,000 (US$74000).
A man once attempted to assassinate President Andrew Jackson with two pistols; however, both pistols misfired and Jackson proceeded to beat the man to near death with his cane.
Just to elaborate — This was the SECOND iteration of the Washington Senators, an expansion team that was a replacement for the original Washington Senators. That team, which had called Washington home since 1901, relocated to Minneapolis–St. Paul after 1960 to become the Minnesota Twins in time for the start of the 1961 season.
In play:
Three of the four American presidents who have been assassinated were shot at close range with pistols (Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley). In addition, assailants armed with pistols also made successful, close-range attacks on Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan, but failed to inflict fatal wounds.
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