Wikipedia:Main Page history/2012 October 11

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Today's featured article
Madagascar is an island country in the Indian Ocean, off the southeastern coast of Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar as well as numerous smaller peripheral islands. Madagascar split from India around 88 million years ago, allowing plants and animals on the island to evolve to a biodiversity hotspot; over 90 percent of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The island is among the last major land masses to be reached by humans; its first settlers arrived on outrigger canoes from Borneo around 2350 years ago, followed over 1000 years later by migrants from East Africa. The Malagasy people are often divided into eighteen or more sub-groups of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands. At the turn of the 19th century, most of the island's numerous kingdoms were united under Merina rulers as the Kingdom of Madagascar. The monarchy collapsed in 1897 when the island was absorbed into the French colonial empire, from which the island regained independence in 1960. Since 1992 the nation has officially been governed as a constitutional democracy from its capital at Antananarivo. However, in a popular uprising in 2009 the last elected president Marc Ravalomanana was made to resign and presidential power was transferred to Andry Rajoelina in a move widely viewed by the international community as a coup d'état. (more...) Recently featured: Allegro – Tool – Little Butte Creek Archive – By email – More featured articles...
Did you know...
From Wikipedia's newest content: ... that The Free Besieged, an unfinished epic by Dionysios Solomos (pictured) and one of his greatest works, was inspired by events from the Greek War of Independence? ... that in 1369, Count Eberhard I of Eppstein built a hunting lodge in the Schloßborn area? ... that Onufry Zagłoba, a character in Henryk Sienkiewicz' The Trilogy, has been compared to William Shakespeare's Falstaff? ... that despite being a centre back, Norwegian footballer Edvard Skagestad has played most of his matches as a striker? ... that the Leiden Glossary, produced c. 800 in St. Gallen, possibly preserves glosses by Aldhelm from Eusebius's Historia Ecclesiastica? ... that the Duchess of Marlborough kept a revolver in her bedroom in Blenheim Palace to prevent her husband from entering? Archive – Start a new article – Nominate an article

In the news
John Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery that mature cells can be converted to stem cells. SpaceX launches (pictured) the first commercially contracted re-supply mission to the International Space Station. Hildegard of Bingen and John of Ávila are named the 34th and 35th Doctors of the Church by Pope Benedict XVI. The Mexican Navy kills Los Zetas leader Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano. Hugo Chávez is re-elected President of Venezuela for a fourth term. Syrian civil war – Wikinews – Recent deaths – More current events...
On this day...
October 11 1492 – Members of the first voyage of Christopher Columbus reported the sighting of unknown light on their way to Guanahani. 1797 – French Revolutionary Wars: The Royal Navy captured eleven Dutch Navy ships without any losses in the Battle of Camperdown. 1809 – American explorer Meriwether Lewis (pictured) died along the Natchez Trace in Tennessee in an apparent suicide. 1950 – A field-sequential color system developed by Hungarian-American engineer Peter Goldmark became the first color television system to be adopted for commercial use, but it was abandoned only a year later. 1987 – Sri Lankan Civil War: The Indian Peace Keeping Force began Operation Pawan to take control of Jaffna from the Tamil Tigers to enforce their disarmament as a part of the Indo-Sri Lankan Accord. More anniversaries: October 10 – October 11 – October 12 Archive – By email – List of historical anniversaries It is now October 11, 2012 (UTC) – Refresh this page

Today's featured picture

The Nicholas Delmas, a 196 m (643 ft) long container ship operated by Delmas, unloading at the Zanzibar port in Tanzania. Container ships carry all of their load in large intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. They form a common means of commercial intermodal freight transport.

Photo: Muhammad Mahdi Karim

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