Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 August 17

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From today's featured article

William de Cantilupe was killed by multiple stab wounds in Scotton, Lincolnshire, in March 1375. The de Cantilupes were a wealthy English family and had a history of service to the crown. They were major landholders in the Midlands, with estates in Greasley, Ilkeston, and Withcall. William de Cantilupe's ancestors included royal councillors and, distantly, Saint Thomas de Cantilupe. Among the suspects in the murder were his wife Maud and the sheriff Thomas Kydale. Maud may have had an affair with Kydale during her husband's frequent absences on service during the war in France. Fifteen members of the household were also accused. De Cantilupe's murder was the first to come within the purview of the Treason Act 1351, a statute which declared the murder of a man by his wife or servants to be petty treason. Maud was tried and acquitted. She then married Kydale. Two members of the household staff were convicted and executed. Others who were indicted did not appear for trial and were outlawed. One of the outlaws, de Cantilupe's steward, John Tailour of Barneby, was pardoned by Richard II. (Full article...)

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In the news

Hakainde Hichilema

Hakainde Hichilema (pictured) is elected President of Zambia.
The Afghan government collapses as the capital city of Kabul falls to the Taliban offensive.
A 7.2-magnitude earthquake in Haiti kills more than 1,400 people.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change releases the first part of its Sixth Assessment Report on the state of knowledge of climate change and its effects.

On this day

August 17: Day of Tasu'a (Shia Islam, 2021); Independence Day in Indonesia (1945)

Pike Place Market

1424 – Hundred Years' War: Allied English and Burgundian forces gained a strategically important victory at the bloody Battle of Verneuil in Normandy, France.
1676 – Scanian War: Swedish forces defeated Danish troops at the Battle of Halmstad, the last battle in Halland between the two countries.
1907 – Pike Place Market (pictured), one of the oldest continuously operated public farmers' markets in the U.S. and a popular tourist attraction, opened in Seattle, Washington.
2009 – A hydroelectric turbine at the Sayano-Shushenskaya Dam in Russia catastrophically failed, flooding the turbine hall, killing 75 people and causing widespread power outages.

Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen (d. 1676)
Leslie Groves (b. 1896)
Thierry Henry (b. 1977)

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Today's featured picture

The panther chameleon (Furcifer pardalis) is a species of lizard found in tropical forests in the eastern and northern parts of Madagascar. Like all chameleons, the species exhibits a specialized arrangement of toes in which the digits are fused into a group of two and a group of three. On the forelimbs, there are two toes on the outer side of each foot and three on the inside, with the arrangement reversed on the hind legs. Their specialized feet allow them a tight grip on narrow branches, and their sharp claws give them traction when climbing on bark. This male panther chameleon was photographed on the island of Nosy Be, off the northwestern coast of Madagascar.

Photograph credit: Charles James Sharp

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