Foreign Missionary Activity Prior to and During the Armenian Genocide

This article discusses how pre-Genocide foreign missionary activity prepared the way for relief and existential support during and after the Armenian Genocide of 1915–1921. Examples are drawn from American, British, and German Protestant missionary organisations, especially the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, the Turkish Missions Aid Society or Bible Lands Missions Aid Society, and the Christlicher Hilfsbund im Orient. These agencies developed missionary and relief methods and transnational networks which were utilised by the Action Chrétienne en Orient (ACO) and other twentieth-century mission agencies in their work among Armenian communities.

New topographic maps for the Czech Armed Forces

Geographic services of NATO member states produce standardised topographic maps for geographic support of their foreign missions. The MGCP data are used for the maps creation of the scales of 1:50,000 and 1:100,000. Topographic maps used for military training in own territory mostly remain in original form without full standardisation. NATO with support of the Defence Geospatial Information Working Group prepares a new standard for the Defence Topographic Map. The geographic service of the Armed Forces of the Czech Republic has started the preparation process of the new topographic maps edition compliant with the new standard. Two prototypes of map sheets of scales of 1:25,000 and 1:50,000 were created in 2020, which serve for basic verification of map content symbolisation and applied technology. Procedures for generalization of the map content for the scale of 1:100,000 will be completed in next two years.

City Hall v. The World – Seeking New Paradigms for Foreign Missions Municipal Taxation

Studies of international law and cities have been attracting the attention of scholars and policy makers alike in attempts to understand the complex nature of the central versus municipal government relationship in respect of international legally binding frameworks. One example of such an intricate relationship is the implementation of treaty and customary international law in respect of taxation of foreign missions. Alongside the importance of the issue to the day to day life and functioning of international relations it can present challenges to policy and decision makers of various layers of government. The paper offers an analysis of the foreign missions’ taxation case study in the context of the theme of law and international law and the city. Discussion focuses on the basics of the applicable regimes and their history and rationales, as well as on the dilemmas associated with more contemporary forms of municipal taxes. Aiming for developing means to address the challenges presented, a new paradigm is offered, focusing on new methodologies to bring cities to the table to discuss together with state actors how to optimize the balance between the need to facilitate bilateral cross-border relationships and the needs of cities and residents. In the final stage of the debate, the paper offers potential lessons which can learned from the analysis of the foreign missions’ taxation case study for engagement of cities and states in international policy and law making for central and municipal government. The modality offered can hopefully facilitate the development of processes conducive to enhanced cooperation between cities and states in making and implementing better and more balanced international law.

The Conflicts Among Religious Orders of Christianity in China During the 17th and 18th Centuries

Introduction. The article studies the conflicts between the Spanish Mendicant Orders (Dominican Order, Franciscan Order, etc.) as well as the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris with Portuguese Society of Jesus, which took place during the 17th and 18th centuries in China. Methods and materials. To study this issue, the author used the original historical materials recorded by Western missionaries working in China during the 17th and 18th centuries and research works by Chinese and international scholars related to the Chinese Rites Controversy as well as the process of introduction and development of Christianity in this country during the 17th and 18th centuries. The author combines two main research methods of History Science (historical and logical methods) with other research methods (systemic approach, analysis, synthesis, comparison, etc.) to complete the study of this issue. Analysis. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the struggle for faith of the peoples in the Far East, especially China, became the desirable goal of religious orders of Christianity. Therefore, during this period, Western missionaries belonging to various religious orders of Christianity, such as the Society of Jesus, Mendicant Orders, Society of Foreign Missions of Paris, etc., gradually entered this country. In the course of evangelization, the struggle for influence as well as the right to manage missionary affairs in China at that time created conflicts among Christian religious orders. It is manifested in the form of a debate about Chinese rituals. In fact, these conflicts not only caused great losses to the missionary career of contemporary Christian religious orders taking place in China but also made the relationship between China’s ruling authorities and The Holy See became very tense. Results. Based on the study of the conflicts among religious orders of Christianity in China during the 17th and 18th centuries, the article clarifies characteristics, the root and direct causes leading to this phenomenon, making a certain contribution to the study of the relationship among religious orders in the process of introduction and development of Christianity in China in particular and the history of East-West cultural exchange in this country in general in the 17th and 18th centuries.

Chronicles of Bailundo: a fragmentary account in Umbundu of life before and after Portuguese colonial rule

Abstract‘Chronicles of Bailundo’ is a fragmentary account of life in Bailundo, Central Angola. The manuscript, whose authorship and exact date are unknown, is available at the archives of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) at Houghton Library, Harvard University. It was written in Umbundu, the vernacular spoken in Bailundo, by North American Congregational missionaries between 1903 and the 1930s. Although the source mentions no dates, it refers roughly to the period between the seventeenth century and the gradual establishment of Portuguese colonial rule and Christian missions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It gives access to both the Umbundu then spoken in Bailundo and the perspective of Umbundu-speaking subjects on what it was like to live in this polity. The source addresses socio-cultural, political and economic aspects of life in Bailundo as well as significant historical events, such as the Bailundo War (1902–03). The text in Umbundu, published as supplementary material with this article, has been transcribed, translated into Portuguese and English, and annotated. The version published following the main introduction of the article presents an annotated sample of the source in English. The full version, published as supplementary material, comprises the complete original in Umbundu, its complete annotated translation into English, and a complete annotated translation into Portuguese. The article addresses the authorship, contents, form and context of production of the source.

Recent mosaic floors restorations in Cyrene

This article showcases the importance of preserving the neglected mosaic floors in Cyrene, especially during the last decade when foreign missions have had limited access due to the uprising of February 2011. With the limited resources available to them, the author and his colleagues at the local restoration department sought to protect the cultural heritage of Libya at an extremely challenging time. This article highlights the tangible results of their efforts.

Activities of Consulates of Socialist Countries in Kyiv (Late 1940s – 1980s)

The purpose of the study is to clarify the main activities of foreign consulates in Kyiv in the period after World War II to the restoration of state independence of Ukraine in 1991 and to determine the features of their interaction with public authorities and NGOs of the Ukrainian SSR. The research methodology is based on the principles of scientificity, historicism, systematization. General scientific and special scientific methods are used, in particular archival heuristics, potestar imagology, prosopography. The scientific novelty of the research results consists in the reconstruction of activities of foreign consulates in Kyiv during the researched period, the creation of a collective portrait of foreign representatives in Kyiv, the clarification of the personalities of consuls general and features of their interaction with the state government and public organizations of the Ukrainian SSR based on the archival information found in published and unpublished sources by the author. Conclusions: The right of the Ukrainian SSR to foreign policy was restored on February 1, 1944, but the Soviet leadership did not intend to give the republic real powers. This decision was due to the desire of the USSR to get the opportunity for the largest possible representation in the emerging UN. The center of the formation of organizational and legal bases of the interaction of the Ukrainian foreign policy department was the Soviet People's Commissariat (later - the Ministry of Foreign Affairs), the Central Committee of the CPU exercised control over the implementation of the center's decisions. In the cities of destination, foreign missions were under the triple supervision of the foreign ministry, party bodies and the soviet KGB structures, which led to their balancing between official cooperation and veiled ideological confrontation. Given the subordinate status of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, there were established not diplomatic missions (embassies), but consular offices (consulates general and consulates) in its administrative center Kyiv. Foreign consuls were mostly career diplomats with work or study experience in the USSR or party workers