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Romance languages, group of related languages all derived from Vulgar Latin within historical times and forming a subgroup of the Italic branch of the Indo-European language family. The major languages of the family include French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Romanian, all national languages. Catalan also has taken on a political and cultural significance; among the Romance languages that now have less political or literary significance or both are the Occitan and Rhaetian dialects, Sardinian, and Dalmatian (extinct), among others. Of all the so-called families of languages, the Romance group is perhaps the simplest to identify and the easiest to account for historically. Not only do Romance languages share a good proportion of basic vocabulary—still recognizably the same in spite of some phonological changes—and a number of similar grammatical forms, but they can be traced back, with but few breaks in continuity, to the language of the Roman Empire. So close is the similarity of each of the Romance languages to Latin as currently known from a rich literature and continuous religious and scholarly tradition that no one doubts the relationship. For the nonspecialist, the testimony of history is even more convincing than the linguistic evidence: Roman occupation of Italy, the Iberian Peninsula, Gaul, and the Balkans accounts for the "Roman" character of the major Romance languages. Later European colonial and commercial contacts with parts of the Americas, of Africa, and of Asia readily explain the French, Spanish, and Portuguese spoken in those regions.
General considerations
Origins and distribution
The name Romance indeed suggests the ultimate connection of these languages with Rome: the English word is derived from an Old French form of Latin Romanicus, used in the Middle Ages to designate a vernacular type of Latin speech (as distinct from the more learned form used by clerics) as well as literature written in the vernacular. The fact that the Romance languages share features not found in contemporary Latin textbooks suggests, however, that the version of Latin they continue is not identical with that of Classical Latin as known from literature. Nonetheless, although it is sometimes claimed that the other Italic languages (the Indo-European language group to which Latin belonged, spoken in Italy) did contribute features to Romance, it is fairly certain that it is specifically Latin itself, perhaps in a popular form, that is the precursor of the Romance languages.
By the beginning of the 21st century, some 920 million people claimed a Romance language as their mother tongue, 300 million people as a second language. To that number may be added the not-inconsiderable number of Romance creole speakers (a creole is a simplified or pidgin form of a language that has become the native language of a community) scattered around the world. French creoles are spoken by millions of people in the West Indies, North America, and islands of the Indian Ocean (e.g., Mauritius, Réunion, Rodrigues Island, the Seychelles); Portuguese creoles are spoken in Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Sao Tome and Principe, India (especially the state of Goa and the union territory of Daman and Diu), and Malaysia; and Spanish creoles (including Palenquero and Chavacano, as well as Papiamentu [based on Portuguese but heavily influenced by Spanish]) are spoken in the West Indies and the Philippines. Many speakers use creole for informal purposes and the standard language for formal occasions. Romance languages are also used formally in some countries where one or more non-Romance languages are used by most speakers for everyday purposes. French, for example, is used alongside Arabic in Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria, and it is an (or the) official language of 18 countries—Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, and Togo—on the continent of Africa and of Madagascar and several other islands off the coast of Africa. Portuguese is the official language of Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and Sao Tome and Principe.
Although its influence has waned before the growing popularity of English as an international language, French is still widely used today as a second language in many parts of the world. The wealth of French literary tradition, its precisely formulated grammar bequeathed by 17th- and 18th-century grammarians, and the pride of the French in their language may ensure it a lasting importance among languages of the world. By virtue of the vast territories in which Spanish and Portuguese hold sway, those languages will continue to be of prime importance. Even though territorially it has comparatively little extension, the Italian language, associated with Italy's great cultural heritage, is still popular with students.
Classification methods and problems
Though it is quite clear which languages can be classified as Romance, on the basis primarily of lexical (vocabulary) and morphological (structural) similarities, the subgrouping of the languages within the family is less straightforward. Most classifications are, overtly or covertly, historico-geographic—so that Spanish and Portuguese are Ibero-Romance, French and Franco-Provençal are Gallo-Romance, and so on. Shared features in each subgroup that are not seen in other such groups are assumed to be ultimately traceable to languages spoken before Romanization. The first subdivision of the Romance area is usually into West and East Romance, with a dividing line drawn across Italy between La Spezia and Rimini. On the basis of a few heterogeneous phonetic features, one theory maintains that separation into dialects began early, with the Eastern dialect areas (including central and south Italy) developing popular features and the school-influenced Western speech areas maintaining more literary standards. Beyond this, the substrata (indigenous languages eventually displaced by Latin) and superstrata (languages later superimposed on Latin by conquerors) are held to have occasioned further subdivisions. Within such a schema there remain problem cases. Is Catalan, for instance, Ibero-Romance or Gallo-Romance, given that its medieval literary language was close to Provençal? Do the Rhaetian dialects group together, even though the dialects found in Italy are closer to Italian and the Swiss ones closer to French? Sardinian is generally regarded as linguistically separate, its isolation from the rest of the Roman Empire by incorporation into the Vandal kingdom in the mid-5th century providing historical support for the thesis. The exact position of Dalmatian in any classification is open to dispute.
A family tree classification is commonly used for the Romance languages. If, however, historical treatment of one phonetic feature is taken as a classificatory criterion for construction of a tree, results differ. Classified according to the historical development of stressed vowels, French would be grouped with North Italian and Dalmatian but not with Occitan, while Central Italian would be isolated. Classifications that are not based on family trees usually involve ranking languages according to degree of differentiation rather than grouping them; thus, if the Romance languages are compared with Latin, it is seen that by most measures Sardinian and Italian are least differentiated and French most (though in vocabulary Romanian has changed most). By most nonhistorical measures, standard Italian is a "central" language (i.e., it is quite close and often readily intelligible to all other Romance languages), whereas French and Romanian are peripheral (they lack similarity to other Romance languages and require more effort for other Romance speakers to understand them).
Languages of the family
What constitutes a language, as distinct from a dialect, is a vexing question, and opinion varies on just how many Romance languages are spoken today. The political definition of a language—one that is accepted as standard by a nation or people—is the least ambiguous one; according to that definition, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Romanian are certainly languages and possibly also Romansh (since 1996 a semiofficial language of Switzerland, probably related to other Rhaetian dialects spoken in Italy) and Catalan (the official language of Andorra and the joint official language [together with Spanish] of the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, Valencia, and the Balearic Islands). On linguistic grounds Sardinian (not the language of an independent nation since the 14th century) and Occitan (the medieval Provençal) are usually regarded as languages rather than dialects. The Rhaetian dialects of Italy (Ladin in the Dolomites and Friulian around Udine) are sometimes regarded as non-Italian, sometimes as dialects of the Italian language. Sicilian is different enough from northern and central Italian dialects to be given separate status often, but in Italy all neighbouring dialects are mutually intelligible, with differences becoming more marked with geographic distance. Franco-Provençal (the name given to a group of dialects spoken around the Alpine region of France and Italy) is often considered to be different from both French and Occitan, though some linguists hold that it is merely a transitional dialect. In the 21st century, few of the French know Franco-Provençal, though it still survives in Italy's Valle d'Aosta region (where French, rather than Italian, remains the language of culture). Asturian and Galician (both spoken in Spain and Portugal), Corsican (France and Italy), and Piemontese, or Piedmontese (Italy), were once considered dialects of national languages, but by the 21st century they were considered distinct enough from the languages of their respective countries to be granted the status of languages. Other "dialects" also are fighting for "language" status on the basis of their written traditions or the active promotion of their use in writing.
Judeo-Spanish, or Ladino (not to be confused with Ladin), was once regarded not as an independent language but as an archaic form of Castilian Spanish preserving many features of the 15th-century language that was current when the Jews were expelled from Spain. There are some 100,000 to 200,000 speakers, mostly originating in the Balkans and Asia Minor but, after World War II, concentrated in Israel; most now reside in Israel, and others live in Turkey.
Some linguists believe that creoles are often different languages from their metropolitan counterparts. Haitian Creole, for instance, is said to be mutually unintelligible with French. Intelligibility varies so much with the speaker and the hearer, however, that it is difficult to formulate firm criteria on that basis.
Many Romance dialects literally or virtually ceased to be spoken in the 20th century. Of these, Dalmatian is the most striking, its last known speaker, one Tuone Udaina (Italian Antonio Udina), having been blown up by a land mine in 1898. He was the main source of knowledge for his parents' dialect (that of the island of Veglia [modern Krk], though he was hardly an ideal informant. Vegliot Dalmatian was not his native language, and he had learned it only from listening to his parents' private conversations. Moreover, he had not spoken the language for 20 years at the time he acted as an informant, and he was deaf and toothless as well. Most of the other evidence for Dalmatian derives from documents from Zara (modern Zadar) and Ragusa (modern Dubrovnik) dating to the 13th–16th centuries. It is possible that, apart from isolated pockets, the language was then replaced by Croatian and, to a lesser extent, by Venetian (a dialect of Italian). It is certain, even from scanty evidence, that Dalmatian was a language in its own right, noticeably different from other Romance languages.
On the Istrian Peninsula of Croatia close to the island of Krk, another Romance variety precariously survives with probably fewer than one thousand speakers; known as Istriot, it may be related to Vegliot. Though some scholars connect it with Rhaetian Friulian dialects or with Venetian dialects of Italian, others maintain that it is an independent language. There are no texts except those collected by linguists. A little farther north in the same peninsula, another Romance dialect, Istro-Romanian (with about 300 mother tongue speakers in the second decade of the 21st century), is threatened with extinction. Usually classified as a Romanian dialect, it may have been carried to the Istrian Peninsula by Romanians from the northwestern part of the Balkan Peninsula who took refuge from the Turks in the 16th and 17th centuries; it has undergone strong Croatian influence. The first evidence of its existence is a short list of words in a historical work of 1698; there are also collections of folklore texts from the 19th century, but it is otherwise unwritten. Another isolated Romanian dialect that may be nearing extinction is Megleno-Romanian, spoken mainly in Kilkís prefecture, Greece, just west of the Vardar River, on the border between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece. In 1914 there were 13,000 speakers, but many emigrated to Asia Minor, other parts of what was once Yugoslavia, and Romania, where small pockets survive (they numbered about 5,000 speakers in the early 21st century). The only texts are those transcribed from oral traditions.
Other Romance tongues earlier ceased to be spoken. There is evidence, for instance, of an Ibero-Romance dialect spoken in Arab-occupied Spain until shortly after its reconquest by the Spanish, accomplished at the end of the 15th century. Usually known as Mozarabic, from the Arabic word meaning "Arabized person," or as ʿajamī ("barbarian language"), it was originally the spoken language of the urban bourgeoisie, who remained Christian while the peasantry generally converted to Islam, but it appears that many Arabs also came to speak Mozarabic. Because most of the evidence, apart from a 15th-century glossary from Granada, is written in Arabic script (which uses no vowel signs), it is difficult to reconstruct the phonology of the language, but it appears to be a very conservative Ibero-Romance dialect. Much of modern information about Mozarabic comes from medical and botanical works that give Mozarabic terms alongside the Arabic. To this was added the discovery of Mozarabic refrains (kharjahs) attached to Arabic love ballads (muwashshaḥs) of the 11th and 12th centuries; study of these began only in 1948. For much of the Muslim period (beginning in 711), Christians were treated tolerantly and became culturally Arabized. Even after persecution by zealous Muslim newcomers in the 12th century, the Mozarabs were often in conflict with Westernized "liberators" from the north. Their language died out soon after the Arabs were driven out of Spain at the end of the 15th century, though it is sometimes claimed that Mozarabic has left its mark on the dialects of southern Spain and Portugal.
Other Romance varieties may have developed in peripheral regions of the Roman Empire only to die out under pressure from neighbouring non-Italic languages; these regions are called Romania submersa by specialists. Often these extinct Romance varieties are known from words borrowed into surviving languages; the Afro-Asiatic Amazigh (Berber) languages, for instance, bear witness to the long and brilliant Roman period in North Africa that ended in the 7th century ce with Arab invasions, and the Brythonic, or British Celtic, languages (especially Welsh) retain many traces of what appears to have been a conservative Romance dialect, otherwise eliminated by Anglo-Saxon in the 5th century. Albanian contains so many Romance words that some style it "semi-Romance," and farther north, in what was formerly the Roman province of Pannonia (corresponding to modern western Hungary and parts of eastern Austria, Slovenia, and northern Serbia), Romance speech was probably not dead at the time of the Magyar invasion at the end of the 10th century. Thus, there is reason to believe that Romance dialects may have been spoken at one time over much of southeastern Europe. It is also evident that Romance languages have been retreating south before German for some time, and it is probable that Romance tongues were used in the whole of Switzerland and parts of Bavaria and Austria until roughly the 9th to 10th century.
Latin and the development of the Romance languages
Latin and the protolanguage
Latin is traditionally grouped with Faliscan among the Italic languages, of which the other main member is the Osco-Umbrian group. Oscan was the name given by the Romans to a group of dialects spoken by Samnite tribes to the south of Rome. It is well attested in inscriptions and texts for about five centuries before the Common Era and was used in official documents until approximately 90–89 bce. The absence of great dialectal variations in the texts suggests that they are written in a standardized form, though three alphabets are evident—the local one (derived from Etruscan), the Greek (in the southern cities), and the Latin (in more-recent inscriptions). In early times, Umbrian was spoken northeast of Rome, to the east of the Etruscan region, and possibly as far west as the Adriatic Sea at one period. It is attested mainly in one series of texts, the Iguvine Tables (Tabulae Iguvinae), dated from 400 to 90 bce, and it is similar to Oscan. Probably Latin and Osco-Umbrian were not mutually intelligible; some claim they are not closely related genetically but that their common features arose from convergence as a result of contact.
The Roman dialect was originally one of a number of Latinian dialects, of which the most important was Faliscan, the language of Falerii (modern Civita Castellana), the most-important Faliscan city, located 32 miles (51 kilometres) north of Rome. The Faliscans were probably a Sabine tribe that early fell under Etruscan domination. The dialect is known mainly from short inscriptions dating to the 3rd and 2nd centuries bce and probably survived until well after the conquest of Falerii by the Romans in 241 bce.
The earliest Latinian text is an inscription on a cloak pin (fibula) of the 6th century bce, from Palestrina (Praeneste). Other Latinian inscriptions show marked differences from Roman Latin, for which there is, however, little evidence before the end of the 3rd century bce. What is certain is that the language changed so rapidly between the 5th century (the date of a mutilated inscription, probably a religious prescription, found in the Roman Forum and of the Twelve Tables, the contents of which are known from later evidence) and the 3rd century bce that older texts were no longer intelligible.
During that period the Romans subjugated their Latin neighbours (by 335 bce), and their language began to establish itself as a standard form, absorbing features from other dialects. The first author of any note was the comic dramatist Plautus (c. 254–184 bce), whose language is thought to reflect a spoken idiom, some features of which appear to have survived into Romance.
By 265 Rome had conquered Magna Graecia, in the south of the Italian Peninsula, and had begun to absorb Greek literary and cultural ideals. Poetic language was especially influenced by Greek until Latin poetry reached its zenith with Virgil. In the 1st century bce a literary prose developed; it emphasized elegance and clarity and rejected vulgarity and rusticity. Grammatical rules were codified and tightened and vocabulary pruned, and the cult of the harmonious balanced period held sway in rhetorical circles. With Cicero the prose style of the Golden Age attained its highest point; for the linguist, the distinction Cicero makes between the style of his letters and that of his speeches is especially interesting in that it provides evidence that even educated speech differed from written language. When Cicero uses the sermo plebeius ("plebeian speech"), his language is more elliptical, with shorter, less-complex sentences and more-colourful vocabulary (including plentiful diminutives). It seems obvious that truly popular language differed even more from the elaborate sophisticated classical literary idiom. There is evidence that archaic features, banned from literary style, survived in common speech right through to the Romance stage of the language. It is sometimes claimed that the language of the Roman historian and politician Sallust (c. 86–35/34 bce) approximated popular usage, but it is more probable that his archaizing style derives more from conscious imitation of old Roman poetry. The Roman "judge of elegance" Petronius Arbiter (died 66 ce) is thought to be imitating vulgar speech in the language of the character Trimalchio in the Cena Trimalchionis ("Banquet of Trimalchio") section (chapters 26–78) of his Satyricon.
Notable characteristics of Classical Latin
The postclassical period
The emergence of Romance
In the European lands in which Romance languages are still spoken, it is of course certain that, at some point, Latin in some form was the normal language of most strata. Whether, however, the Romance languages continue rough peasant dialects of Latin or the usage of more cultured urban communities is open to question. There are those who maintain that the Latin used in each area differentiated as soon as local populations adopted the conqueror's language for any purpose. According to this belief, dialects of Latin result from divergent developments, either through innovations in restricted areas or through the geographically restricted preservation of some features. It is obvious that Latin usage must have differed over a wide area, but the differences may have been merely phonetic and lexical variations—regional accents and usage—not affecting mutual intelligibility; on the other hand, they may have been profound enough to form the basis of further differentiation when administrative unity was lost. The latter hypothesis would suggest a long period of bilingualism (up to perhaps 500 years), as linguistic interference between languages in contact rarely outlives the bilingual stage. Virtually nothing is known about the status of the indigenous languages during the imperial period, and only vague contemporary references can be found to linguistic differences within the empire. It seems odd that not one of the numerous Latin grammarians should have referred to well-known linguistic facts, but the absence of evidence does not justify the assertion that there was no real diversification during the imperial era. Historical parallels are lacking—although the British Empire, for example, did export English to widely different lands, it lasted a comparatively short time, and its linguistic contribution was backed by modern communications media, besides being to some extent negated by nationalist feeling.
What is certain is that, even if popular usage within the Roman Empire showed great diversification, it was overlaid by a standard written language that preserved a good degree of uniformity until well after the administrative collapse of the empire. As far as the speakers were concerned, they apparently thought they were using Latin, though they were often conscious that their language was, through sheer ignorance, not quite as it should be. Not until about the 8th or 9th century—later in some parts—did it strike them that Classical Latin was perceptibly a different language, rather than merely a more polished, cultured version of their own.
The language of religion and culture
With the spread of Christianity, Latin penetrated to new lands, and it was perhaps the cultivation of Latin in a "pure" form in Ireland, whence it was exported to England, that paved the way for an 8th-century reform of the language by Charlemagne. Conscious that current Latin usage was falling short of Classical Latin standards, Charlemagne invited Alcuin of York, a scholar and grammarian, to his court at Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen); there Alcuin remained from 782 to 796, inspiring and guiding an intellectual renaissance. It was perhaps as a result of the revival of so-called purer Latin that vernacular texts began to appear, for it now became obvious that the vernacular and Latin were not the same language. Thus, in 813, just before Charlemagne's death, the Council of Tours decreed that sermons should be delivered in rusticam Romanam linguam ("in the rustic Roman language") to make them intelligible to the congregation.
Latin has remained the official language of the Roman Catholic Church and as such has been in constant use by most Romance speakers; it was only within the last half of the 20th century that church services began to be conducted in the vernacular. As the language of science and scholarship, Latin held sway until the 16th century, when, under the influence of the Reformation, nascent nationalism, and the invention of the printing press, it began to be replaced by modern languages. Nevertheless, in the West, along with the knowledge of Greek, the knowledge of Latin has remained a mark of the educated person throughout the centuries, although in the mid-20th century the teaching of classical languages in schools declined significantly.
Latin in non-Romance languages
The prestige of Rome was such that Latin borrowings are to be found in virtually all European languages, as well as in the Berber languages of North Africa, which preserve a number of words, mainly agricultural terms, lost elsewhere. Basque has borrowed a good number of words, mainly from administrative, commercial, and military spheres, but it is difficult in some cases to determine whether the terms were later borrowings from Spanish, rather than from Latin. This uncertainty is not present in the case of the 800 Latin words found in three Celtic languages (Welsh, Cornish, and Breton)—words drawn from a wide sphere of activities. In the Germanic languages, borrowed Latin words principally involve trade and often reflect archaic forms. The very large number of Latin words in Albanian form part of the basic vocabulary of the language (including kinship terms) and cover such spheres as religion, although some of them may have been later borrowings from Romanian. In some cases the Latin words found in Albanian have survived in no other part of the former Roman Empire. Greek and Slavic languages have comparatively few Latin words, many of them administrative or commercial in character.
The development of the Romance languages
The question of when Latin ended and Romance began, which has occupied scholars in the past, is largely a problem created by terminology. In some senses, modern Romance languages are regional varieties of one uniform set of speech patterns that resembles the Vulgar Latin of attested texts fairly closely—indeed, the analyses of generative phonologists make the modern "underlying forms" (as distinct from their phonetic representation in speech) look almost identical with the reconstructed ancestor of the Romance languages, Proto-Romance. On the other hand, contemporary speakers are conscious that they are speaking a "different language" from their neighbours, even though they may understand a good deal of their neighbours' discourse. Perhaps the speaker's consciousness is the best measure of divergence; when, one may ask, did Romance speakers realize that they were not using Latin in their everyday speech? Some scholars suggest that the realization must have struck sometime in the 5th century, when barbarians were streaming into the Roman Empire and, supposedly, hindering communication. Others prefer to rely on positive textual evidence, indicative of efforts to make up a written form of Romance distinct from Latin. Such evidence begins to appear only in the 9th century, first in northern France and then in Spain and Italy. The reforms of Charlemagne, reestablishing more classical standards in written Latin, may have been at once cause and result of the development of conventional written forms for vernacular Romance. Perhaps it was also the emergence of a new type of social organization, feudalism, that had linguistic effects as a result of the splitting of the open society of Roman tradition into small closed territorial units.
Romance glosses to Latin texts
From the 7th century onward, consciousness of linguistic change was strong enough to prompt scribes to gloss little-known words in earlier Latin texts with more familiar terms. Though the glosses often reflect Romance forms, however, they are usually given in a Latinate form, and one gains the impression of a few superficial adjustments to archaic but fundamentally comprehensible texts. The best-known set of glosses—to the Vulgate Bible of St. Jerome—formerly belonged to the abbey of Reichenau, on an island in Lake Constance, Germany, and probably dates from the 8th century. The vocabulary of the Reichenau glosses appears to be French in flavour (e.g., arenam 'sand' glossed by sabulo, French sable; vespertiliones 'bats,' by calvas sorices, French chauvesouris), and some words of Frankish origin appear (e.g., scabrones 'beetles' is glossed by wapces 'wasps,' respectant 'they look about' by rewardant). Some of the glosses evince more widely spread innovations: emit 'has bought' is glossed by comparauit (Romanian cumpăra, Spanish comprar), fissura 'crack' by crepatura (Romanian crăpătură, Old French creveure). The glosses provide some evidence of morphological simplification (e.g., saniore 'healthier' is glossed by plus sano 'more healthy' and cecinit 'he sang' by cantavit), but for the most part only lexical items merit comment. Another well-known glossary, known as the Kassel (or Cassel) glosses, probably dates from the very early 9th century. It gives Latin equivalents of German (Bavarian) words and phrases and provides evidence of lexical and phonetic differentiation within Latin that permits scholars to localize the work as probably French or Rhaetian (e.g., mantun 'chin,' as compared with modern French menton). Although orthographically eccentric, however, the text is obviously meant to represent Latin, not a Romance tongue; when phrases rather than isolated words are glossed, the Latin is often very close to classical models.
The beginning of Romance literature
Later in the 9th century (with the Strasbourg Oaths, possibly, and more clearly in the Eulalia poem), deliberate attempts were made to write vernacular Romance, though the resources of the Latin alphabet were not wholly adequate to the task. That northern French texts were the first to appear is not surprising, for in that region Latin had changed more radically than elsewhere. By the 10th century the need to couch legal documents in more readily comprehensible vernacular, rather than Latin, was felt in other regions. Vernacular literature did not really get under way, however, until approximately the 12th century, when the arts flourished throughout western Europe. Rhaeto-Romance and Romanian, however, had to wait for the Reformation period to take on literary form.
There was a good deal of cross-fertilization between Romance literary languages during the period of development of medieval poetry; the example of the Provençal lyric especially left its mark on all vernacular literatures, and borrowing of lexical items from one language to another was abundant. The 13th century saw some shift of linguistic influence from southern to northern France and from Sicily to Tuscany, toward the politically and economically more powerful regions. Portuguese and Catalan developed flourishing literatures somewhat later, taking over some of the traditions of the badly battered southern French region and dominating the literary scene of the Iberian Peninsula. French was fast losing its hold in England, which, a century earlier, had boasted a rich Anglo-Norman literature, and within France the central Parisian dialect began to dominate. In Italy, the Florentine dialect was showing signs of rising to prominence and providing the base for a literary standard.
The rediscovery of classical literature and art, first in Italy and then in other Romance regions, had some considerable effect on the languages in the shape of extensive borrowing from Latin and Greek and, often, conscious attempts to model grammatical constructions in the vernacular on Classical Latin. The Italian standard language, in particular, owes much to the influence of Latin, which it resembles more closely than do the spoken dialects. French, except in the 16th century, was influenced grammatically less by Latin, but from the 14th century onward the habit of preferring words with a quasi-Latin shape to inherited forms became well established, so that much of the French vocabulary has a "learned" appearance. The trickle of Latinisms into Spanish became a flood in the 15th century, and, though Spanish has been more reluctant than French to reject old words, these Latinisms form a considerable proportion of the modern lexicon.
The standardization of the Romance languages
It was in Italy that the "question of the language" first became a matter of hot dispute. Dante himself made an important contribution to the debate on what should constitute a volgare illustre (an "illustrious popular speech") capable of rivaling Latin for literary and scholarly purposes. Controversy did not reach its peak, however, until the 16th century. In the Spain of 1492 the completion of the reconquest of Spain from the Arabs and the so-called discovery of America were accompanied by the appearance of Antonio de Nebrija's Gramática Castellana ("Grammar of the Castilian Language"), which argues the need for an ennobled language fit for imperial exportation. In 16th-century France, with the Renaissance backed by the Reformation and the advent of printing, French really assumed the remaining scholarly, scientific, and religious functions of Latin, and efforts were made to put together a worthy national language from dialect and Latin sources. The choice of standard was not made definitively, however, until the late 17th century, when, with political power and social influence centred exclusively at the royal court, the only acceptable usage became that of the court. It would seem that social acceptance and advancement were inextricably bound up with correct behaviour, especially linguistic behaviour, so that the well-to-do bourgeoisie set out to ape the speech habits of their "betters"—hence the popularity of works describing le bon usage 'good usage.' The influence of French, resplendent with the achievements of the French dramatic poet Racine and of Louis XIV, was destined to remain dominant within the Romance languages; the Golden Age of Spain and Portugal had already passed, and Italy was going through a period of comparative stagnation.
The French grammarians of the 18th century had lasting effect on all the Romance standards, concerned as they were with maintaining "purity," eliminating "vulgarity," and strictly codifying usage, often more in accord with logical than linguistic considerations. The belief that correct language is not a birthright but a tool to be carefully fashioned and skillfully handled, that conscious effort was required to allow it to mirror thought with the minimum of distortion, is one that has persisted in Romance and that still has important effects on educational practice. To many English speakers it seems ludicrous that the criterion of competence in a language should be strict adherence to grammar-book rules rather than nativelike performance, but in Romance countries a foreigner is often frowned upon if he permits himself the "negligence" of native usage, rather than the more stilted correct expression.
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Latin language…and ancestral to the modern Romance languages.…
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Italic languages
Italic languages, certain Indo-European languages that were once spoken in the Apennine Peninsula (modern Italy) and in the eastern part of the Po valley. These include the Latin, Faliscan, Osco-Umbrian, South Picene, and Venetic languages, which have in common a considerable number of features that separate them from the other…
Indo-European languages
Indo-European languages, family of languages spoken in most of Europe and areas of European settlement and in much of Southwest and South Asia. The term Indo-Hittite is used by scholars who believe that Hittite and the other Anatolian languages are not just one branch of Indo-European but rather a branch…
French language
French language, probably the most internationally significant Romance language in the world. At the beginning of the 21st century, French was an official language of more than 25 countries. In France and Corsica about 60 million individuals use it as their first…
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text:
In his 30 years as a pharmacist, including three at a CVS Caremark store in Northern California, Wayne Wilson said it was all too common for drugstore employees to steal prescription drugs, which would often make their way to the black market.
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Wilson said he personally intervened after a CVS pharmacy worker in Eureka was caught slipping painkillers into his pocket. That worker was arrested and fired, he said.
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"You'd basically be reporting yourself," Wilson said.
I heard numerous such anecdotes from pharmacists throughout the state after reporting Tuesday that CVS could face as much as $29 million in fines for allegedly losing track of prescription painkillers at stores in Modesto, Fairfield, Dixon and Turlock.
Officials at the Drug Enforcement Administration and the California Board of Pharmacy said that more than 37,000 pills, primarily the generic version of Vicodin, were apparently missing. Each has a street value of as much as $10, they said.
Michele Leonhart, head of the DEA, testified before Congress last year that abuse of prescription medications "is the nation's fastest-growing drug problem."
She said there are more people taking painkillers and similar drugs for non-medical reasons — diversion, in official-speak — than there are users of cocaine, heroin and hallucinogens combined.
How do so many prescription drugs make their way to the street? Often they're obtained by people with legitimate prescriptions who choose to sell some or all of their pills. Some receive prescriptions for the same drug from multiple doctors.
In many cases, though, the pills are stolen from manufacturers, distributors, hospitals and drugstores.
As I reported Tuesday, DEA affidavits related to the missing CVS painkillers suggested that employee theft is suspected.
The affidavits said federal investigators began looking into CVS stores in California after a company employee in Rocklin, northeast of Sacramento, was spotted hiding a bottle of hydrocodone in her pants.
Hydrocodone is a narcotic painkiller sold under various brand names, including Vicodin and Norco. It's the most frequently prescribed opiate in the United States with more than 140 million prescriptions dispensed annually, according to the DEA.
"There's more hydrocodone on the street these days than in the pharmacy," said Vicken Gulvartian, a pharmacist in Hollywood. "It's an industry."
How can that be remedied?
Tighter security is one obvious answer. In 2012, drugstore chains reported 517 armed robberies of prescription meds to the DEA. They reported 851 instances of employee theft during the same period.
And that may be just the tip of the iceberg. Pharmacists say heavy workloads and limited staffing make it difficult to stay on top of what drugstore clerks and technicians are doing.
Background checks for all pharmacy employees are required by federal law. But with median pay for technicians running about $30,000 a year, some employees may find ready access to lucrative drugs too great a temptation.
"It's a challenge," said Sam Lee, who works part-time as a pharmacist at his family's drugstore in South Los Angeles and part-time at the pharmacy of a major supermarket chain. "We're just so busy all the time. It's hard to keep up."
Bill Bradshaw, a Walgreens pharmacist in Fort Worth, said there are cameras in almost all drugstores. "But they can't see everything," he said. "There are plenty of little corners where someone can hide."
Wilson, the Northern California pharmacist who worked for CVS from 2009 to 2012 before leaving for medical reasons, said surveillance cameras aren't a very effective deterrent.
"It's not like the company has someone watching what's going on all the time," he said. "They only check the tapes after they have reason to suspect someone."
Wilson also said CVS and other big pharmacy chains may be reluctant to report all instances of employee theft to federal and state authorities.
"They often like to handle things quietly, firing or suspending people," he said. "They don't want to look bad to regulators."
Michael DeAngelis, a CVS spokesman, denied such allegations.
"CVS pharmacy takes very seriously the challenge of combating prescription drug abuse and diversion to help support safer communities, and we recognize the important role our pharmacists and technicians play on the front lines of solving this problem," he said.
DeAngelis said CVS is "enhancing" its internal auditing procedures to better monitor drug inventories and is implementing "new storage and control measures for highly diverted controlled substances."
"Drug diversion is a serious criminal offense that we work hard to prevent in our pharmacies," he said. "We have security procedures in place to detect drug diversion when it occurs and we cooperate fully with law enforcement and regulators in any investigation into these incidents."
All the pharmacists I spoke with said the best way to curb theft of hydrocodone would be to change its regulatory status.
Hydrocodone is classified by the government as a Schedule III drug, which means it represents only a "moderate to low" risk of being habit forming and has little potential for abuse.
Schedule II drugs have a higher potential for abuse and addiction. Cocaine and PCP are in this category.
Schedule I drugs are considered the most dangerous. They include heroin, LSD, ecstasy and, weirdly, marijuana.
The DEA last month proposed switching hydrocodone from Schedule III to Schedule II, arguing, correctly, that "hydrocodone is one of the most abused drugs in the nation."
For drugstores, such a change would have an immediate and significant impact. It would mean that hydrocodone would no longer sit out on pharmacy shelves with other Schedule III meds, easily accessed by workers.
Instead, it would be kept under lock and key with other Schedule II drugs, requiring a pharmacist's involvement for a technician to gain access.
Reclassifying hydrocodone is a simple and common-sense move. The big drugstore chains, however, think otherwise.
The National Assn. of Chain Drug Stores, the National Alliance of State Pharmacy Assns. and other industry groups banded together last year to oppose tighter restrictions on hydrocodone.
"Rescheduling will have a profoundly negative impact on patients who legitimately need these medications and a negligible impact on drug abuse," they wrote in a November letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sibelius
The groups said a Schedule II classification for hydrocodone would make it harder for people to obtain the drug because doctors would no longer be able to call in a prescription. Patients instead would have to hand-deliver prescriptions to pharmacists.
The industry groups said this requirement could force people "to travel long distances and suffer significant discomfort to see their physician for refills and to have their prescriptions filled."
That's a cynical way of saying that drugstore chains are worried about less-easy access to hydrocodone cutting into sales of one of their bestselling drugs.
The reality is this: Hydrocodone has no business being a Schedule III drug.
If reclassifying hydrocodone is the best bet for helping to keep this widely abused narcotic off streets — as both the DEA and the Food and Drug Administration believe — then such a change isn't just warranted; it's required.
Otherwise, there's a word for what the big drugstores are doing — enabling.
David Lazarus' column runs Tuesdays and Fridays. He also can be seen daily on KTLA-TV Channel 5 and followed on Twitter @Davidlaz. Send your tips or feedback to firstname.lastname@example.com.

subset: commoncrawl


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این برنامه شامل بیش از صد دستور پخت ساده برای غذاهایی است که هم خوشمزه هستند و هم برای بدنتان مفیدند. همه بر پایه ی گیاهان و سبزیجات هستند و فاقد گلوتن و شکر تصفیه شده هستند.
The Deliciously Ella app has over 300 plant based recipes, which focus on simple methods and everyday ingredients, to make eating well a little easier and hopefully a lot more delicious. From one-pot meals to batch cooking recipes, weeknight suppers, delicious breakfasts, big brunches, smoothies, juices, sweets, treats and snacks, we've got every moment of the day covered. Each recipe is vegan-friendly and gluten free, and they're separated into simple categories, so that you can quickly find what you're looking for. Many of the recipes you'll find have been created exclusively for the app, from our lentil Bolognese to our sweet potato, black bean and corn stew; speedy sun-dried tomato pasta; rosemary polenta chips; roasted cauliflower and tahini salad; our ultimate green smoothie; pistachio matcha energy balls and so much more. The remainder of the recipes are taken from our website, so each user will have all of those in an easy to use format too. We hope the recipes will inspire you to get cooking and make getting your five portions of fruit and veg a day more achievable. The app is updated every three months with with around twenty new recipes, so I hope you'll never be short of inspiration. In addition, we have a few in-app purchases in the format of seasonal recipe bundles for those looking for extra ideas. Happy cooking! Love Ella and the Deliciously Ella team x Features: - Over 300 simple, easy to follow recipes - Plant based recipes, which are vegan-friendly and gluten free - Clear images, instructions, methods, serving quantities and ingredient lists for each recipe - Icon to distinguish new recipes and exclusive app recipes - Save your favourites - Search tool to find specific recipes - Share the recipes with friends by email or text - Share on Facebook, Twitter and other social networks


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Discovery Communications (NASDAQ:DISCA) has inked a deal to buy 12 television networks in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland from Germany's largest television company ProSiebenSat.1 for $1.7 billion.
The Silver Spring, Md.-based company, whose cable networks include Discovery Channel, TLC and Animal Planet, said the purchase of SBS Nordic further solidifies Discovery's long-term growth in the profitable Nordic TV markets.
Continue Reading Below
It also adds general entertainment programs, including sports programming, to Discovery's suite of service for the first time.
SBS has the No. 2 TV portfolio in Norway with four networks and an overall viewership share of 34%, as well as the third largest portfolio in both Sweden and Denmark.
"SBS Nordic has a fully distributed portfolio of dual revenue stream networks with a terrific management team that will expand Discovery's footprint across the Nordic region, which includes some of the most well-penetrated and stable TV markets in the world," Discovery CEO David Zaslav said in a statement.
The transaction, subject regulatory review, is expected to close in early 2013. Citigroup (NYSE:C) acted as financial advisor to Discovery Communications.
Also on Friday, Discovery said its board approved a $1 billion increase to the company's existing stock repurchase program.


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A "Negative" Outlook: Dr. Steve Natterstad Shares Secrets to a Successful Magnetic Relationship
August 10, 2010
Steven M. Natterstad, M.D.
When "Dr. Steve" isn't responding to questions from our Spanish-speaking readers on TheBody.com's Tratamientos forum, he runs the Frascino Medical Group, which provides comprehensive care for people living with HIV/AIDS. With his partner of nearly 17 years, Dr. Bob Frascino, he cofounded the Robert James Frascino AIDS Foundation -- a philanthropic nonprofit organization dedicated to raising awareness and funds for HIV/AIDS services. Drs. Steve and Bob live with their dog, Presto Frascino-Natterstad, in northern California.
Welcome once again to TheBody.com, Dr. Steve!
Thank you. Good to be here.
Tell us a little bit about yourself. We can just start from the beginning. Can you talk a little bit about the community where you grew up?
Sure. I was born in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. I guess you could call it the "flyover zone" of the U.S. Shortly after my birth, my family actually relocated to Fresno, California, in the Central Valley. I guess as you might think of Sioux Falls, South Dakota as a flyover zone, a lot of us Californians might think of Fresno as that "drive-through zone" of California. They're actually quite similar culturally, those two places, even though they're a couple thousand miles apart.
Essentially I grew up a straight child in a very straight, conservative, religious family. My father was a minister, my mother an elementary school teacher -- in addition to her role as first lady of the church, of course. So I've been in California ever since I was three months old, first in central California, and then fortunately we relocated to southern California, the Los Angeles area, when I was in junior high school. I expanded my horizons a bit in that region, in junior high school and high school.
Then, believe it or not, I went from the thriving metropolis of L.A. to Fargo, North Dakota, for college, to go to Concordia College, which is a family school on both sides of my family. Both my parents went there and met there, so there was a long tradition of going to that school. So I ended up going back to the Midwest for four years before I escaped once again to the West Coast and ended up at UCLA [University of California, Los Angeles] med school and continued on at UCLA to do my internal medicine residency and fellowship. And then I came to the Bay Area.
What year did you come to the Bay Area?
In the early '90s, actually. In 1991 I moved up the Bay Area and took a job at a large multi-specialty group on the Peninsula and actually met Dr. Bob before I had even taken the job. Kind of an interesting story. I was getting ready to accept the position. I was sitting outside a boardroom waiting to be offered the job, and Bob was waiting to meet with the board as well. (I'm going to call him "Bob" rather than Dr. Bob -- he only asks that I call him Dr. Bob under very unusual circumstances, so I'll just call him Bob for now) So I actually met Bob before I even moved up to the Bay Area.
I knew him for a couple of years, even after I started working at the group. We became good friends but didn't actually become involved with each other until 1993, largely due to my being unsure of who I was. I was closeted to everyone at that time, including myself. I was quite clueless and searching. As I searched and figured some things out then, suddenly, Bob took on a new aura; and the rest is history, as you might say.
I should back up a bit: The reason we got to know each other is that I had interest in HIV medicine even back then. As I said, I went to medical school in UCLA and did my training there, and of course, L.A. was one of the Ground Zeros of the epidemic in the '80s. When I joined the group up here in the Bay Area, Bob was already doing the lion's share of the HIV work at this clinic. But he was primarily interested in doing more of the outpatient work, so he welcomed an internist like me, who was more interested in doing some of the inpatient work, of which there was a fair amount back in the early '90s, of course. So we started working together, basically both working in HIV medicine, and got to know each other as colleagues quite well.
But I do remember having a conversation with him and discussing some of our interests, which include classical piano -- we're both classical pianists -- and just having a great conversation. I remember thinking to myself, "If only Bob was a woman, he would just be the perfect life partner for me," because that's where I was back then in those days. So things have changed considerably.
Can you talk a little bit about how you went from being colleagues and friends, with you wishing Bob were a woman so you two could date each other, to actually being involved in a relationship?
Well, as I mentioned, I was at that point in my life where I was starting to question things. I had gotten through medical training and basically had my first real job. I had bought a house up here in the Bay Area. I think I was starting to reflect on my life seriously, trying to figure out what was missing. Everything else seemed to be going along quite well professionally, but personally there was definitely a void.
I had experiences over the years having to do with figuring out my sexuality, but those had been earlier in life. I spent my 20s trying to convince myself and everyone else that I was straight. I think by that point in my life, my early 30s, I finally started entertaining seriously that that might not be the case.
They say timing is everything. I think at that point in my life, I was becoming more open to other possibilities for who I was as a sexual being, and Bob was there. As many of your readers know, he's pretty much Mr. Wonderful in many ways. So it didn't take much convincing for that to all happen. It all progressed pretty quickly.
More From This Resource Center
Undetectable Viral Load and HIV Prevention: What Do Gay and Bi Men Need to Know?
Do HIV-Negative Gay Men Need Condoms if They're on PrEP? Here's What I Tell My Patients
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adding your comment, please read TheBody.com's Comment Policy.)


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St. Michael's College (Burlington, VT)
St. Michaels is truly a "hidden gem," at least to us in the South. It frequently places high on lists of "happiest students" and that was evident the day I visited. Even in pouring rain, students were smiling and laughing as they walked around the compact but open and well-manicured campus. It's not hard to see why students love St. Mike's, a small liberal arts college of 2000 students located in one of the country's great college towns of Burlington, Vermont on the shores of Lake Champlain. Home to five colleges, Burlington is the Northeast version of Asheville, NC or Boulder, CO, a progressive small city with great restaurants, culture and outdoor recreational opportunities. Only a half-hour away from some of Vermont's best ski areas, St. Mike's students enjoy $25 season passes at Smugglers' Notch ski resort and busses back and forth every weekend. Professors love teaching here and share close relationships with their students. With all students required to live on campus all four years, this is certainly a close-knit community. There is a strong liberal arts core curriculum, but business and journalism are strong majors, as are psychology. KRead More


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The Nation's Food Bank Network reported the results of a new survey that found 100 percent of food bank respondents have seen an increase in the number of clients served within the past year. The increase is estimated at 15 percent to 20 percent.
Of those surveyed, 84 percent indicated they are currently unable to adequately meet the increased demand without having to reduce the amount of food they distribute or people they serve.
Testifying at a special hearing of Congress' Joint Economic Committee, America's Second Harvest pointed to the alarming survey results as the organization urged passage of the farm bill. The farm bill includes a strong nutrition title, including $250 million with the amount indexed for inflation for the Emergency Food Assistance Program and an increase in benefits levels and eligibility for the food stamp program.
While Congress struggles to complete work on the farm bill, hungry Americans need relief now. America's Second Harvest also requested an immediate $100 million in emergency funding to address the increased need for emergency food brought on by the demands of a falling economy and rapid increases in food prices.
"The America's Second Harvest Network and food service organizations nationwide have been absolutely overwhelmed by demand," said Vicki Escarra, president and CEO of America's Second Harvest. "Supply is not keeping up with demand and we must do something quickly to meet the needs of the more than 35 million struggling Americans trying to make ends meet and feed themselves and their families."
Conducted April 28-29, 2008, the survey asked the 49 food banks in the states and districts of committee members to report on the impact of rising food prices on their operations. One food bank reports, "Short term, we are limiting the amount of food we can provide agencies. Agencies are limiting the amount of food they provide families." This operation is not alone. Of those who stated they cannot meet demand, 39 percent have already, or are considering, reducing the amount of food offered at their food bank. Even more food banks — 46 percent — have reduced, or are considering reducing the variety of foods offered to agencies. One food bank reported, "People seeking assistance need to go to more than one agency."
All of the participating food banks said their agencies are seeing families and faces they haven't seen before — working people who never thought they would have trouble making ends meet. One food banker in Minneola, N.Y., noted, "The middle class is accessing food from our agencies." Another relayed the story of a professional consultant that asked about emergency food assistance, "because her clients had not paid her yet and she was concerned that she may possibly be in need."
America's Second Harvest, the nation's largest charitable domestic hunger-relief organization, and its network of 205 food banks coast-to-coast are confronting three major challenges: (1) substantially reduced donations of federally purchased commodities; (2) a rise in the number of people seeking emergency food because of the declining economy, and (3) more recently, rapidly rising food prices that seriously undermine the ability to serve the increasing numbers of hungry people seeking help.
"Any one of these challenges would be hard to deal with alone, but they have compounded and we have a significant crisis on our hands," said Escarra. "The need is unprecedented. Former donors are now showing up as clients. Some food banks have resorted to reducing the amount of food offered. Others are closing doors early when they run out of food."
"The time to act is now. Congress and the president must move quickly to complete their work on the farm bill so that we can enact long-term reforms in Federal Nutrition Programs and put in place protections against an unsure economy so that we do not find ourselves in the same place in years to come."
America's Second Harvest is the largest charitable domestic hunger-relief organization in the United States. Through its network of more than 200 member food banks, America's Second Harvest annually provides assistance to more than 25 million people in need, including more than 9 million children and nearly 3 million seniors in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Each year, America's Second Harvest secures and distributes more than 2 billion pounds of donated food and grocery products to support feeding programs at approximately 50,000 local charitable agencies, including food pantries, soup kitchens, emergency shelters, after-school programs, and Kids Cafes.


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Definitions of mir
n. - A Russian village community. 2
n. - Same as Emir. 2
The word "mir" uses 3 letters: I M R.
Direct anagrams of mir:
Words formed by adding one letter before or after mir (in bold), or to imr in any order:
a - amir mair rami b - brim e - emir mire rime f - firm g - grim i - miri k - mirk p - prim s - mirs rims t - trim y - miry rimy
Shorter words found within mir:
Words formed from any letters in mir, plus an optional blank or existing letter
List all words starting with mir, words containing mir or words ending with mir
All words formed from mir by changing one letter
Other words with the same letter pairs: mi ir
Browse words starting with mir by next letter
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Some random words: glabella its oersted ukase caique trabeate clabber
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After what seemed like weeks of daily leaks and then a cancelled launch event due to Hurricane Sandy, Google has finally announced its latest Nexus Android phone, the Nexus 4. Manufactured by LG, the Google Nexus 4 features a 4.7in IPS screen, is powered by a 1.5GHz quad-core processor and has an 8-megapixel camera with a 360 degree panorama feature.
While much had already been known about the Google Nexus 4 before the official announcement, there were conflicting reports about the design. The Nexus 4 is constructed from matte black plastic and is based on the design of LG's Optimus G smartphone. However, a distinctive highlight appears to be an etched panel of glass on the back that sparkles. It's definitely a unique look and helps the Nexus 4 immediately stand out among a sea of black slabs that have populated the market.
Google's Nexus devices usually focus on software innovation, but the Nexus 4 certainly boasts impressive specifications. It's powered by a quad-core 1.5GHz Snapdragon S4 Pro processor that Google says is the fastest on the market, has 2GB RAM and comes with 8GB or 16GB of internal memory. In a move that may disappoint current Android users, the Nexus 4 lacks a microSD card slot so the on-board memory isn't expandable.
[Slideshow: Google Nexus 10 - Hands on with new tablet]
The Nexus 4 has a 4.7-inch IPS display with a resolution of 1280×768 display. This gives it an impressive pixel density rating of 320ppi, only just behind the Apple iPhone 5 (326ppi) and ahead of both the HTC One X (312ppi) and the Samsung Galaxy S III (306ppi). Google says the screen is coated in Corning's latest Gorilla Glass 2.
The Nexus 4 also supports wireless charging out of the box, based on the Qi wireless charging standard. Google will sell a wireless charger called the Wireless Charging Orb as an optional accessory.
The Google Nexus 4 has a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera for video calls and a rear-facing 8-megapixel camera for photos and video capture. The highlight appears to be a 360 degree panorama mode that Google is calling photo sphere, allowing users to capture a scene in multiple directions including above and below. The photos can then be published to Google maps or shared through Google+, though the feature is a software one and will be available on any Android device running 4.2.
Speaking of Android 4.2, Google has added a number of new features to the software. Highlights include a new gesture typing feature on the keyboard that replicates Swype, the ability to add widgets to the lockscreen, expandable notifications that can be actioned, and a new quick settings menu that can be accessed by swiping down the notifications panel with two fingers instead of one. There's also been some enhancements to the Google Now personal assistant, which now uses your Gmail account as a data source for new cards.
The Google Nexus 4 will sell online through Google's Play Store from Tuesday 13 November, when orders will open. The 8GB model will sell for £239 and the 16GB model will retail for £279.
Google's latest Nexus smartphone is the LG-manufactured Nexus 4. It features a 4.7in IPS screen, is powered by a 1.5GHz quad-core processor and has an 8-megapixel camera with a 360 degree panorama feature. However, it lacks 4G connectivity and doesn't have any expandable memory.


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If you are looking for balanced, non-judgemental, politically correct opinion and comment - you are definitely in the wrong place!
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Slaying the beasts
This resulted in that decade being marked by over the top demands for pay rises, shorter hours, longer holidays and frequent, prolonged and very damaging strikes in all sectors of manufacturing/production. The nationalised industries and the power of the unions represented a beast created by Labour policy which the Tories under Thatcher, on coming to power in 1979, were determined to slay.
They had a plan and slay it they did. Unfortunately, in killing the beast of too powerful unions and nationalised industry, they also struck the coup de grace for manufacturing/production. This was not accidental - as I said, the Tories had a plan.
Their plan was to switch Britain from a manufacturing/production led economy to a service based economy - and financial services in particular. It was the perfect solution - a stable, conservative industry, solid and dependable with little or no union ties. A loose monetary policy followed allowing an expansion of easy credit and the de-regulation of the financial services industry. The "Big Bang" of 1986 led to a huge expansion of this industry, the rise of the "yuppie" yelling "buy, buy" into his brick of a mobile phone and the "greed is good" generation.
Pretty soon Britain had moved from a primarily manufacturing based economy to a service based economy - the Labour beast of trade union power was dead and the future looked rosy. Unfortunately, there was a flaw to the plan. A service based economy requires something to service and the market in Britain is very very limited for such services. Take out a huge chunk of that market - in the shape of productive industry - and the service industry will have to look elsewhere for business if it is to expand and meet the demands asked of it.
Never fear - something came along that enabled this expansion. The rise of interconnected computer technology and, in particular, the Internet. This meant that financial transactions could be conducted from anywhere to anywhere. You didn't need to be in Hong Kong to buy a business in Hong Kong. Globalisation was born - again.
The trouble was, it was hard to compete against the massive foreign financial companies in a global market. So British financial industries had to become bigger and more powerful - so they started gobbling up one another and then started to gobble up whatever they could abroad - and, unfortunately for us, it also meant that foreign companies could equally gobble up our companies.
This had the opposite effect from that intended. Instead of making the industry more competitive it made it less so. Instead of there being hundreds of banks and building societies to entrust your money to there were less and less as more and more were taken over by the giants of the industry.
Ultimately, in slaying the Labour beast of trade union power, the Tories had created one of their own - bank power. Only this was even more powerful, more demanding and even less controllable. While the unions only had power in Britain, the banks had tentacles that reached all over the world - it was impossible to impose regulation on an industry which could just decamp to another part of the world where the regulation was less stringent and yet still retain its influence and share of the market in the UK.
The solid, conservative, safe and dependable industry that had been the basis for their creation had turned into a ravenous, insatiable monster incapable of self-restraint and increasingly demanding as it became aware of its own awesome power.
The upshot of all this is that the beast created by the Tory Party has wreaked even more devastation and harm on Britain than that of the Labour Party. What is more, the Labour Party were utterly in awe of the beast; afraid to confront it and unable to slay it - and that task has now fallen to the Tory Party.
"I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart."
The Frankenstein Tories must slay the monster they created.
4 comments:
But I think we can all agree that the problem was caused by the Left. The Tories had to do something. When faced with a problem, having a plan of attack is essential, so, yet again, the Tories have a plan (whether it be right or wrong) to tackle the deficit; Labour either deny there's a problem, or attack any plan Tories have for tackling it without positing an alternative plan.
On a side note, Stan, and off topic, if you didn't see Daily Politics today, check it out on BBC Iplayer. James Delingpole was debating Caroline Lucas, and he told it like it is - he called her a watermelon.
- 3:06 pm
- Stan said...
I certainly agree that the problem of union power was caused by the left and I definitely agree that something had to be done about that - but I also believe that throwing the baby out with the bath water by destroying our manufacturing base was unnecessary at best and disastrous at worst.
I don't think the Tories have a plan as such for tackling our economic problems either. Sure they plan not to spend quite so much more than we have as Labour were - but they have no plans to actually keep spending within their means.
There isn't any plan - none at all - to actually deal with the fundamental weaknesses of our economy.
- 4:06 pm
I hate to admit it, but I fear you're right Stan.
That was the one criticism of Thatcher I had - how she got rid of the manufacturing base.
On a side note . . . you like your cars, Stan. Have you heard, there's a new Rover coming out very soon. It's Chinese owned, but I think there's quite a bit of British input.
- 7:53 pm
- Barnacle Bill said...
I think you have hit the nail on it's head with this proposition Stan.
However will the financial beast be slain by the rioters out on the streets, or will it be in a more gentlemanly manner?
I think the beast had better sit down and think this one thru.
- 10:51 am


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My U.S. roots are mostly Southern. And some of my ancestors were slave owners. It's not a pretty fact, but it's true. While I can't change history, I can help descendants of slaves find their roots by posting the information I have.
Thanks to recent blog posts by Sandra of "I Never Knew My Father" and Luckie at "Our Georgia Roots", I feel I should go ahead and post whatever small amounts of info I might find--whether beautifully researched and explained or not--especially info from primary sources. I hope this might someday reunite a seeking descendant with their ancestor(s).
So, here's what I have so far:
DAVIS in Louisiana:
The probate record of Mary Ratcliff (Ratliff) Davis, wife of John Davis (my 4th-great grandparents), dated 19 Oct. 1836 in Catahoula Parish, La., lists the following slaves:
"1 negro man--Jack, one woman--Hannah, children Marie, Walker, Betsy"
These notes come via my mom and don't include the whole probate file, so I don't know at this point what happened to Jack, Hannah, and the children, but I may have more notes in files inherited from a cousin. I have not really worked the Davis family yet. (I'm still working on organizing some files I have and will post if I come across more info.)
Excerpt of photocopied estate inventory listing slaves owned by Paul Légère, Sept. 1822, Opelousas District, St. Landry Parish, La. Photocopy owned by Liz Hall Morgan.
LEGERE in Louisiana:
Paul Légère (Legere, Leger) (my great-great-great grandfather), had no slaves in the 1796 census for Opelousas District in Louisiana (according to the Acadian Memorial and Acadians in Gray web sites), but his estate inventory of Sept. 1822 in St. Landry Parish, La., lists the following slaves:
"a negro man named Sam aged about twenty two years"
"a mulato [sic] woman named Mary aged about twenty one years with her child a girl named Susanne about eighteen months old"
Paul's widow, Marie Constance Potier (Potie) Légère, bought the slaves from her husband's estate. She died in Jan. 1844 in the same parish. I don't have her estate record, so I don't [yet] know what happened to Sam, Mary and Susanne. Southwest Louisiana Records by Rev. Donald Hebert could also have records of them in a volume (vol. 33) partially devoted to Catholic church records for slaves.
CARRIERE, LANGLOIS in New Orleans, LA and Mobile, AL:
I also have assorted notes on the Carrière (Carriere, Carrier--Joseph and daughter Françoise) and Langlois (Augustin and son Antoine, who married Françoise Carrière) families of colonial Mobile and New Orleans (early 1700s), but I am trying to organize that info, and will post it in a coherent form in the future. Most of it is from secondary sources, with some estate info that was posted on a now-defunct web site.
Meanwhile, I hope these tidbits will be of help to someone.


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thehippo8 wrote:You know, I reckon the problem is with the lines. They look a little "drawn on". Whilst that may be what you wanted, I feel it may be sistracting you. Maybe play with smoothing the edges of the lines into the territory or something? I am still learning my graphics programme so please don't hit me if I am asking too much!!
The lines where drawn on and still are. It fitted the earlier version but not this one. Will get round to doing that. Finally found a look that I am happy with.
Version 9.


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|Beck Oliver
|General Information
|Hair Color:
|Dark Brown
|Eye Color:
|5'11.5" (1.82 m)
|140 lbs (63.6 kg)
| Elvis
Malcolm Winchester Figglesworth
|Family & Friends
| Mr. Oliver (Father)
Mrs. Oliver (Mother)
Uncle Barbara (Uncle)
Grandmother (unnamed)
Aunt (unnamed)
| André Harris (Best friend)
Sinjin Van Cleef
Cat Valentine
Robbie Shapiro
Tori Vega
Jade West (girlfriend)
Trina Vega (on-and-off)
Rex Powers
|Jade West (Girlfriend)
|Fish (several)
| Hayley Ferguson
Tara Ganz
|Other Information
| Acting
Drag Racing
|Hollywood Arts High School
| Yerbanian Prison
Rocks (game)
|Series Information
|First appearance:
|Last appearance:
|Portrayed By:
|Avan Jogia
Beck Oliver is one of the seven main characters of Victorious. He is Jade West's boyfriend and seems to be good friends with the rest of the gang. Because of his talents and good looks and particularly his fluffy hair, he is very popular with girls. He also seems to be very calm, wise, and mature at most times. His talent is acting and can be described as a pretty boy.
He is portrayed by Avan Jogia.
Beck is very attractive and, because of this, he gets a lot of attention from other girls, such as socialite Alyssa Vaughn; the female ambulance driver in Jade Dumps Beck. As seen in A Film by Dale Squires, when he says he will be able to get some cheerleaders to come over and talk to Robbie, he seems to be aware of the effect his looks have on the opposite sex. However, Beck stays pretty modest about this, and it seems that he only takes advantage of his appearance to make Jade jealous. He's known to be labeled as a "pretty boy" because of his appearance.
His hair is considered to be one of his most attractive features, as mentioned in Freak the Freak Out, Locked Up!, Helen Back Again, and Driving Tori Crazy. Jade even mentioned on TheSlap that she would be taking his gel and other products with her on a trip that weekend so that he "wouldn't look good while she was gone".
Beck is very kind, rational, soft-spoken, laid back, level headed, mature beyond his years who seems to get along with everyone, even people like Robbie, Cat, and Sinjin, who are considered quite weird. Although he does not always get involved in drama, he's quick to help someone out, such as when he fixed Robbie's car in A Film by Dale Squires, helped find the letters to spell Ke$ha in Ice Cream for Ke$ha, and did Tori's stunt for her in Beck Falls for Tori.
Although Beck is probably the most normal and sane of all the characters, he doesn't talk much and seems to be fairly quiet, deep, and mysterious. His locker is clear to represent the fact that he "has no secrets." He takes acting very seriously, and believes that acting is really about "not acting at all, but letting the emotions inside of you come out and represent moments..." (The Wood). Another thing that indicates his quiet, independent personality is the fact that he lives by himself in an RV, instead of with his parents, so he can have his own rules. Not much is known about his family or history.
Beck is a very talented and highly respected actor at Hollywood Arts. Although it has been shown that he can play the guitar, sing, and dance, he seems to be much more focused on acting than music. He got second place in Sikowitz's method acting challenge in Sleepover at Sikowitz's and can also speak in different accents very well.
Being the leader of the group, Beck seems to take charge a lot and be the mediator, such as when he ripped up Cat's copy of the Sky Store catalog in Robarazzi to help her move on and gave Jade a time out in the episode Beggin' on Your Knees. In Locked Up!, he was the one to hold the door open for everyone and guide them to the truck to escape, and in the episode Helen Back Again he was the one to take charge and tell Helen that Tori should stay at Hollywood Arts. He also seems to be quite protective of the gang, especially with Jade, the love of his life. One example of this is when he grabs Jade to lead her to the exit of Sikowitz's class, as he thought there was a fire in the Pilot or when he grabs Tori and Jade's hands in The Breakfast Bunch so they won't slip. He sometimes calls his friends, including Jade, "you kids," showing that he is often the leader. He claims that he isn't afraid of anything, and usually stays calm and emotionless in even the worst situations.
Relationships with Other Characters
Jade West
(2008- present, on-and-off: Girlfriend)
"Jade: "You love me again?"
Beck and Jade have been boyfriend and girlfriend for over three years. Their relationship is a bit confusing, as Jade is the "mean girl" and is prone to frequent fits of jealousy and anger, while Beck is friendly and laid back. However, Beck does have his moments, frequently teasing Jade to provoke reactions out of her. This is quite common among most teen couples.
They broke up briefly in Jade Dumps Beck, after Jade became jealous over Beck's friendship with socialite Alyssa Vaughn. She quickly regretted it and tried to get him back, even enlisting Tori Vega to help her do so. By the end of the episode, Beck admitted that he missed her and never stopped loving her, and they got back together.
Throughout the series, Beck seems to have a lot of control and authority over Jade. He is the only person that can reach her and make her be (somewhat) polite. Although she refuses to do what anyone tells her, she is quick to obey Beck, and seems to respect him and long for his approval. They're frequently seen holding hands, hugging, and/or kissing in the background while other events are going on. Beck has not been possessive of Jade like she is with him, however he can get protective over her since he loves her so much, such as when he directed her out of the classroom in the Pilot because they thought there was a fire, and when he protected her from the soldiers in Locked Up! Beck also loves making Jade jealous of him.
Sadly, Beck and Jade broke up in The Worst Couple, and they rarely interacted since then. In the episode Tori Fixes Beck and Jade, Beck realized that he still loves Jade, so he ran onstage to Jade, after she sang a song dedicated to him. He admitted that he missed her, kissed her in front of the whole school, and they finally got back together. Since then, they have gotten a much more strong and stable relationship, they no longer fight and they have become more intimate and affectionate than before. According to social media posts from Avan Jogia and Liz Gillies, Beck and Jade are still together and live in Beck's trailer with a child of their own (according to Jogia, Beck couldn't afford a house).
Tori Vega
(2010-present: Close Friend)
""The world needs to see who you really are...'cause you're awesome.""
Tori and Beck very close friends, and it was revealed in Tori Goes Platinum that they may have romantic feelings for each other. Tori respected Beck and Jade's relationship when they were a couple despite kissing him in Pilot. They seem to be the most normal ones out of all the characters. In Beck's Big Break, it is shown that Tori cares for him when she gets him his part in a movie back, and in Beck Falls for Tori Beck does Tori's stunt for her when she is afraid to. Beck often stands up for Tori, like in Helen Back Again and Locked Up!. They both have each others' backs and both care for each other. For example, in The Gorilla Club, Beck was very caring and protective of her, gave her advice on how to take risks as an actor, and helped with her audition for a movie for three nights. In the episode Driving Tori Crazy, Beck drove Tori when she had no way to get to school. In Tori Goes Platinum, Beck and Tori almost kiss after Beck tells her she is awesome; however, Mrs. Vega interrupts them by coming into the living room. Beck tries to kiss Tori again later in the episode, but Tori says she doesn't feel right about kissing him, because she considers Jade to be her friend, and she wouldn't hurt a friend by kissing her ex-boyfriend. However, it was implied she would have kissed him if he hadn't dated Jade.
In Opposite Date, Beck and Tori were asked by a patient at the animal shelter if they both had feelings for each other and they didn't deny it, even so Tori says she doesn't want Beck for herself. (See: Bori)
Cat Valentine
(2008-present: Good Friend)
Although Cat and Beck do not have many scenes together, it is likely that they are very good friends (as they've known each other for years prior to the start of the show), and they are seen sitting together at lunch often. They have never shown a reason for not liking each other. Beck, just like everyone else, seems to find Cat harmless and amusing. Beck may also think Cat is funny as seen in Beck Falls for Tori when he chuckled when Cat felt sad that there wasn't going to be a funeral. Cat says she admires Beck, thinks he has great hair and loves him as a big brother. She called him "really cool" on TheSlap.com in a post. Also, because she and Cat are best friends, Beck's girlfriend, Jade, has never once shown any signs of jealousy when Beck and Cat are shown together, because as Jade knows, Cat would never do anything to hurt her and Beck's relationship. In A Film by Dale Squires, Beck and Cat kissed for the movie Tori was directing. In André's Horrible Girl, Beck is seen protecting Cat from the earthquake. (See: Bat)
Robbie Shapiro
(2008-present: Good Friend)
Robbie and Beck are great friends. It can be assumed from the episode The Great Ping-Pong Scam that they are good friends and have been for more than a year. Also in A Film by Dale Squires, Beck helps Robbie fix his car. They created an even better bond in the episode. Beck respects Robbie and is kinder towards him more than the others (even though he does joke at him at some points in the series), and Robbie doesn't feel weird around Beck like he easily would next to everyone else. (See: Reck)
André Harris
(2008-present: Best Friend) André and Beck are best buddies. They have been seen hanging out together on multiple occasions. In Jade Gets Crushed, André was really worried about upsetting Beck, and did everything he could do hide his crush on Beck's girlfriend, Jade. When approached by Beck and Jade the same episode, he panics when Beck suggests they (Jade and Andre) listen to the song together, quickly saying he didn't do anything. The only time these two have ever fought was while acting, in "Car, Rain & Fire" and "The Wood," and have had no legitimate problems with each other (on screen). Beck and André's opposing reactions to fear and danger counter each other nicely, since Beck plays it off cool, while André freaks out under pressure. In "Locked Up," Beck tries to calm André down, as well as take care of him when he gets bitten by a Vampire Moth. For Sikowitz's play in "Tori and Jade's Play Date," Beck and André play the identical twins Tommy and Carter Swain. (See: Bendré)
Trina Vega
(2010-present: Acquaintance; Frenemy)
Beck and Trina are not shown to interact much, but it can be assumed from Survival of the Hottest, Freak the Freak Out, and Terror on Cupcake Street that he isn't too fond of her. He, like all the other characters, didn't seem too thrilled when Trina invited herself to go to the beach with them in Survival of the Hottest. Then after the horrible experience in the RV, she told him she thought it was stupid, taking back her comment of how cool it was. In Freak the Freak Out, he wasn't happy about taking care of her and was the first to say they were leaving. It was revealed in The Worst Couple that Trina has a crush on Beck and thinks that they would make a perfect couple because they are both "hot and talented." In Car, Rain & Fire, Trina spreads a rumor saying that she was dating Beck just to get more popular with boys, and she kisses Beck. Beck later kisses her and asks her out on a date, although later in the episode it was shown to be a prank the boys played on her. In Tori Goes Platinum, Trina flirts a bit with Beck, and Beck laughs, amused by the mayonnaise on her face. In The Hambone King, Trina jumps into Beck's lap (much to his protests) and snuggles up with him. Trina comes downstairs in one of Beck's slap videos, commenting on how good the cereal he had made was. And in The Worst Couple, Beck allows Trina to lay her head on his shoulder during the poker game, but this is most likely simply because he didn't care, given he's probably consumed in his own thoughts. (See: Brina)
Sinjin Van Cleef
(2014-present: Friend; Acquaintance)Beck refers to Sinjin as his friend in The Worst Couple, and sticks up for him in The Bad Roommate. Although the two aren't very close, they appear to get along okay, and don't have any huge problems with each other. In one of Sinjin's sock puppet segments on the slap, Sock Puppet Sinjin explains to Sock Puppet Jade that, "You belong to Beck. And Sinjin don't cuddle what ain't his," showing that in his mind, he has respect for Beck and Jade's relationship, despite his crush on Jade. And in Victori-Yes, Beck and Sinjin go to a drag race together, where Beck is surprised to learn he and Sinjin actually have a lot in common, and admits that, although he wasn't sure about hanging out with him, he thinks Sinjin's pretty cool. On The Slap, where Sinjin tweets that he had an awesome "man-date" with Beck and hopes to do it again sometime, Beck replies, "Anytime you want... as long as you don't call it a man-date."
Erwin Sikowitz
(2008-present: Teacher; Friend)
Beck, along with the rest of the main characters, are shown to have a good relationship with their acting teacher, Sikowitz. Beck sometimes doesn't understand Sikowitz's habits but considers him a good teacher much like the rest of his class. Sikowitz thinks Beck is a very good actor. (See: Beckowitz)
Season One
Solos in a Group Number
|Season 3
|Sing Also With:
|Driving Tori Crazy
|Five Fingaz To the Face
|Dr. Rhapsody, Trina, Tori, Jade, Rex, Robbie, André, and Cat
Back Up Vocals
Season One
- Favorite Food in The Diddly-Bops
Season Two
- I Want You Back in Locked Up!
Season Three
- Shut Up N' Dance in April Fools' Blank
- Unlike Robbie and André, Beck is the only male main character who has been absent throughout the series.
- He is the only main character to kiss Jade so far (besides the Rade "illusion" kiss in The Bad Roommate).
- As of Car, Rain & Fire, he has kissed every girl in the main cast.
- His screen name is 'GotBeck', a play on Got Milk?.
- He has several fish in a 10 gallon tank (which he did not realize had to be cleaned).
- Beck and Jade, as of Jade Dumps Beck, have been dating for a year and eleven months, but after getting back together, they were a couple for almost three years until The Worst Couple. They are back together for a third time as of Tori Fixes Beck and Jade.
- To get his hair so fluffy, he has stated that he uses a quality shampoo and conditioner, as said in Locked Up!. According to The Slap, he also uses an array of gels and products to style his hair.
- Beck seems to attract girls with his hair like Hayley Ferguson and Tara Ganz in Freak the Freak Out, the girls who admire him in A Film by Dale Squires and two Yerbanian women in Locked Up!.
- Beck moved out of his parents house and lives in a RV parked in their driveway. It is named The Silver Streak.
- Beck wears a lot of what Cat refers to as 'man-jewelry,' even when he is in the hospital (Cat's New Boyfriend). One of these is a gold circle on a black string, and Jade has also been seen wearing one that matches this one.
- Beck has taken a stage fighting class with Russ (Stage Fighting).
- Beck has his own car, a 1967 Pontiac GTO.
- According to a picture on TheSlap.com, Beck has no body fat.
- His favorite movie of all time is "On the Waterfront".
- According to Survival of the Hottest, Beck never knew that you had to clean out a fish tank.
- Beck can be seen in the theme song playing an electric guitar.
- Beck is known to be a fan of iCarly: in a photo on TheSlap, Beck shows his trailer with the door broken, apparently because Jade thought she heard another girl in there. He said it was just an iCarly episode.
- Beck wrote the short film in the episode A Film by Dale Squires.
- It is noted in A Film by Dale Squires that he has an "Uncle" Barbara.
- Beck is a fan of the band Care Bears on Fire (There is a poster close to the door of his RV) as seen in Jade Dumps Beck.
- According to Jade from Beggin' On Your Knees, he was born in Canada. Coincidentally, Avan himself was born in Canada.
- As seen in Beck Falls for Tori, Beck chews on his pen.
- As seen in many of the episodes, Beck likes to make Jade jealous and tease her, as her reaction seems to amuse him.
- According to Jade in "The Wood", Beck likes having his tummy tickled.
- Beck likes buffalo nuggets (as stated in "Freak the Freak Out").
- Beck has some mechanic skills and seems to know a lot about cars, as seen on TheSlap (fixes his own) and in A Film by Dale Squires (fixes Robbie's).
- As stated on the Slap, Beck does not like refrigerated mussels.
- Beck doesn't drink water from mountain streams (because he thinks the water contains fish pee).
- Not much can really scare Beck, as seen in iParty with Victorious. This is evidence of his laid-back personality.
- On TheSlap, he has mentioned having a Great Aunt Ruthie (picture gallery from Tori the Zombie).
- According to André on TheSlap, he is famous for his grilled BBQ ribs.
- He is the only main male character to make an episode absence, following Cat, then Trina.
- According to his TheSlap page, Beck's hair is too thick for him to wear a baseball cap over it.
- Beck is one of six characters who can drive. The other five are André (Ice Cream for Ke$ha and Driving Tori Crazy), Trina (Tori the Zombie and Driving Tori Crazy), Jade (Jade Dumps Beck, Car, Rain & Fire, Driving Tori Crazy and Opposite Date), Robbie (A Film by Dale Squires), and Cat (Cat's New Boyfriend).
- Beck's family seems to dislike Jade, as his dad said for Father's Day he wanted Beck to break up with her and he said in Locked Up! that his aunt refused to take them to Cancun when she found out that he was taking Jade along.
- He is the only student who has yet to interact with Lane, the guidance counselor.
- According to an update on TheSlap, his fashion style is inspired by 1980s teen movies.
- He seems to be the only one who isn't scared of Jade (besides maybe Tori).
- He is the only main character who has not cried at all on the show revealing him to be very emotionally stable.
- Beck is the only main character who has not mentioned a sibling. It is likely that he is an only child.
- He is the only main character who has not made any of his own videos on TheSlap. He does not have any video segments and his profile video was shot with Jade.
- He likes to drink hot sauce, and is apparently unaffected by the spiciness (seen in The Breakfast Bunch).
- His parents have never been shown on the show (exept for his father's hand) but have been mentioned a few times in the show.
- Beck is the only main character who has not had a scene at Nozu.
- He has a black PearPhone XT.
- Beck is the only person who saw through Tori's diva act in Tori Goes Platinum.
- He has a swimming pool.
- He bought his RV from Fat Biscuit, a rapper who, after having stomach surgery, is not longer fat (Survival of the Hottest).
- According to Jade, he is "unscareable." This theory is tested by Sikowitz, who doesn't manage to scare him, although he does terriorize Tori, Jade, and Spencer in the process of trying. (iParty with Victorious). However, when he, Andre, and Robbie have to babysit a delirious Trina in Freak the Freak Out, she jumps up behind them, causing Beck to scream in fear along with the others.
- He has an epiphany in Tori Fixes Beck and Jade, realizing he was more into difficult girls, because it's not easy, and "easy's boring."
- Beck is the last person in the series to post on TheSlap during a cutscene in "Victori-Yes".
Click here to see the photo gallery for Beck Oliver.