BARCELONA, THE CITY BUILT OVER HIDDEN STREAMS

After spending a few days in Lyon visiting old friends and enjoying an entertaining football match, yesterday, Joseph de Ca'th Lon returned to Genève, while Claire Fontaine and The Grandma headed back to Barcelona, ​​where a massive storm was awaiting them, just a day before their planned trip to Tarragona for the Concurs de Castells this afternoon.

Sudden, rain-heavy storms -featuring lightning and intense localized downpours- are common in the Mediterranean region during late August and September. They didn't appear this summer, but they have arrived this autumn, bringing a difficult weekend for many Catalan towns -especially those that expanded by burying streams and torrents, building over wetlands, or encroaching on rivers that had been artificially canalized.

Nature is, after all, unpredictable and uncontrollable; water always finds its way back to its natural paths, even if those paths have been altered -with varying degrees of ingenuity- by human hands.

After a night of record-breaking rainfall in the city -particularly in the Sants and Les Corts districts- The Grandma wants to talk about Barcelona and how it grew over dozens of river basins. While these are no longer visible as they once were, local place names remind us that they have always been here and remain so today: Riera Blanca, Riera Escuder, Riera d'Horta, Riera de Vallcarca, Riera de Cassoles, Torrent de l'Olla, Torrent de les Flors...

Barcelona is usually imagined as a Mediterranean city of stone, streets and avenues, lying between the mountains and the sea. Yet beneath this familiar urban landscape lies another Barcelona: a city shaped by water.

The map of its old streams and watercourses reveals a geography that has almost disappeared from sight but has never entirely ceased to exist.

Barcelona grew on a plain enclosed by four great geographical boundaries: the Mediterranean Sea, the Collserola range, the River Llobregat to the southwest and the River Besòs to the northeast. Between those two rivers, however, water followed countless smaller paths.

For centuries, rain falling on Collserola descended towards the sea through a dense network of streams, torrents and seasonal watercourses. Some were relatively important, such as the Riera d'Horta or the Riera Blanca; others were much smaller. Together, they carved shallow depressions into the Barcelona plain and carried sediments from the mountains towards the coast. They also helped create the land on which the city would eventually grow.

Long before Barcelona became an enormous urban landscape, water was one of the reasons why humans settled here. The prehistoric plain contained streams, wetlands and lagoons, while fresh water could be found relatively close to the Mediterranean. Later inhabitants exploited springs, wells and underground water, gradually transforming the natural hydrological system into an increasingly human landscape.

Then the city expanded. Streams were diverted, channelled, covered or incorporated into the urban drainage system. Roads and buildings occupied their former courses. The visible geography of water slowly disappeared beneath another geography made of streets. But it left traces. Some survive in place names. Others can still be recognised in the shape and slope of certain streets. And sometimes, during episodes of exceptionally heavy Mediterranean rain, water seems to remember paths that the modern city has forgotten. That is perhaps what makes maps of Barcelona's ancient streams so fascinating. They show us that the apparently orderly grid of the modern city was superimposed upon a much older landscape.

Before streets, there were streams. Before neighbourhoods, there were valleys, wetlands and torrents. Before the city organised the water, the water had already organised the land.

Barcelona has always lived with a geographical contradiction. It is squeezed between mountain and sea, yet protected and nourished by two rivers. Collserola collects the rain; gravity sends it towards the Mediterranean; and the urban plain lies directly in its path. For centuries, people adapted to that geography. Later, engineering attempted to control it. Yet geography never completely disappears.

The extraordinary rainfall that occasionally falls over Barcelona reminds us that a modern city is not separate from the landscape on which it was built. Asphalt can cover a stream, buildings can hide a valley and sewers can channel the rain underground, but the logic of the terrain remains. Perhaps that is the most beautiful lesson contained in this old hydrological map.

Barcelona is not simply a city between the Llobregat and the Besòs. It is a city born from the sea, the mountains, the rivers -and hundreds of forgotten paths of water running between them. A hidden blue Barcelona still exists beneath our feet.

This hidden geography is particularly meaningful to The Grandma because she lives between two names that preserve the memory of Barcelona's ancient waters: Riera Blanca and Riera Escuder.

But these were not simply two neighbouring streams. They belonged to the same hydrological landscape. The Torrent d'Escuder fed the Riera Blanca, which collected water descending from the slopes of Collserola before continuing across the plain and eventually reaching the Mediterranean west of Montjuïc.

Today, water has been replaced by streets, buildings and an administrative boundary. Riera Blanca (next to the Camp Nou) still separates Barcelona from L'Hospitalet, while Riera Escuder survives in the urban fabric of Sants. Yet the old landscape has not completely disappeared. It remains in street names, irregular plots, unexpected slopes and the shape of the neighbourhood itself.

The streams may have disappeared from sight, but they have survived in the language -and even in the geometry- of the city.

Perhaps Barcelona has not forgotten its water after all.

More information: Meet Barcelona

D'eix cavall de la riera
prenc la brida barroera,
i als torrents i a la ribera
vaig dient: pas al raier!

I seize the rough bridle

of this river's wild horse,

and to the torrents and the riverbanks

I cry: Make way for the raftsman!

Jacint Verdaguer

LA MERCÈ, BARCELONA ENJOYS AND RECOGNISES ITSELF

Leaving el Delta de l'Ebre is never easy, but knowing that on the way to Barcelona you'll make a morning stop in Tarragona to celebrate Santa Tecla with a spectacular castell event is always a great plan. 

If you then continue toward the capital and stop in Sitges in the afternoon -where they are also celebrating Santa Tecla- to enjoy the local culture and a delicious botifarrada by the sea, the journey home becomes much more pleasant, especially since your own city will be decked out the very next day to celebrate its own Festa Major.

Every September, Barcelona celebrates La Mercè.

For a few days, the city changes its rhythm. Squares become stages, streets become meeting places, balconies become viewpoints and thousands of people leave their homes to take possession of the city once again.

There are concerts, exhibitions, performances and events of every imaginable kind. Barcelona is a cosmopolitan city, home to people who have arrived from almost every corner of the world, and its Festa Major naturally reflects this diversity. And yet, year after year, some of the greatest crowds still gather around something much older.

A giant walking down a street. A human tower rising above a square. The sound of a gralla. The beating of drums. A dragon breathing fire into the darkness. 

Perhaps Joan Amades would not have been surprised. The great Catalan ethnologist devoted much of his life to collecting the customs, celebrations, songs, beliefs and traditions of ordinary people. His monumental Costumari Català understood popular culture not as something preserved behind glass, but as something alive: a collective language transmitted from one generation to another. La Mercè speaks that language extraordinarily well.

One of its most symbolic moments is the Toc d'Inici. The Festa Major begins not merely with words but with music, movement and ritual. The city's festive figures enter the scene and Barcelona seems to summon its own imaginary world into existence.

Giants and giantesses, dwarfs, beasts and traditional dancers are no longer decorative figures. For a few hours, they become inhabitants of the city. Then come the cercaviles. The giants advance slowly through streets that normally belong to buses, bicycles, taxis and hurried pedestrians. Children look upwards. Adults do too. There is something wonderfully subversive about a giant walking through a modern city. For a moment, everyday Barcelona disappears and another Barcelona emerges from underneath it.

And then there are the castellers. Few images can explain Catalan popular culture so powerfully. A castell exists only because many people agree to build it together. At its base, the pinya becomes an extraordinary human architecture of arms, shoulders and trust. Above it, floor after floor rises until the smallest casteller reaches the top and raises a hand. For a few seconds, the whole square seems to breathe as one. Strength alone cannot build a castell. It requires balance, courage, technique and, above all, confidence in others. Perhaps this is why the Diada Castellera attracts such enormous crowds during La Mercè. People are not simply watching a spectacle. They are watching a community construct something impossible and then carefully dismantle it again.

But Barcelona has another face during its Festa Major. When darkness falls, fire arrives. The Correfoc transforms the streets into a territory of sparks, drums, devils and fantastic beasts. Dragons and other creatures spit fire while the diables dance beneath showers of sparks. People do not merely watch. They run with them. Fire has accompanied Mediterranean celebrations for centuries. In the Correfoc, something ancient survives inside the contemporary city: our fascination with darkness, noise, danger, light and collective excitement. For a while, Barcelona ceases to look like the carefully ordered city of maps and avenues. It becomes elemental. Fire, smoke, drums and people.

Perhaps this is the most fascinating thing about La Mercè. Barcelona changes constantly. Languages change. Neighbourhoods change. People arrive and people leave. Buildings disappear and new ones rise. The city absorbs influences from everywhere because it has always been a Mediterranean port open to the world.

But when the Festa Major arrives, thousands of people still crowd into the streets to watch traditions whose roots reach far beyond their own lives. They wait for the giants. They follow the gralles. They look upwards when the castell begins to rise. They run beneath the sparks of the Correfoc. Modernity has not made these traditions irrelevant. Perhaps it has made them even more necessary. Because popular culture gives a city something that cannot be built with concrete or designed by an urban planner: a shared memory. And memory does not mean remaining trapped in the past. It means knowing where we come from while continuing to change.

Barcelona has traditionally been called the Cap i Casal de Catalunya. The expression is difficult to translate perfectly. It means much more than capital. Cap is the head; casal evokes the house, the home, the place where a community recognises itself. During La Mercè, the expression acquires a particularly beautiful meaning.

Barcelona is cosmopolitan, Mediterranean, contradictory, noisy, changing and extraordinarily diverse. But it is also the capital of Catalunya. And when the giants dance, when the gralles sound, when the castellers raise their towers and when the dragons fill the streets with fire, the city remembers it.

Perhaps Joan Amades would have walked among those crowds with his notebook in his pocket, observing everything. Perhaps he would have recognised many of the gestures. And perhaps he would have understood something that La Mercè continues to demonstrate every September: tradition survives not because we preserve it, but because we practise it. A tradition nobody performs eventually becomes history. A tradition that still fills the streets belongs to the present. And every September, during La Mercè, Barcelona does something wonderfully simple.

Perhaps this is why Joan Amades still feels so extraordinarily present during La Mercè. His work was never merely a catalogue of curious things that people used to do. By collecting giants and dances, songs and sayings, legends, beasts, customs and celebrations, he helped preserve the collective memory of a country.

In 2009, when Barcelona dedicated part of La Mercè to Amades on the fiftieth anniversary of his death, he was beautifully introduced almost as the character of a folk tale:

Once upon a time, there was a man who travelled throughout Catalonia asking people to tell him about their customs and traditions, so that he could write them down in a book and make sure that nobody would forget them.

And perhaps that is the best way to understand both Amades and La Mercè. Because traditions do not survive simply because somebody once wrote them down. They survive because somebody still carries the giant. Because somebody still plays the gralla. Because somebody still climbs onto another person's shoulders. Because somebody still dresses as a diable and lights the fire. And because thousands of people still come out into the streets to see them.

Barcelona changes. It has always changed. But beneath that constantly changing city there is another Barcelona made of gestures, sounds, memories and rituals passed from one generation to another.

Barcelona is the Cap i Casal. And every September, when the drums begin to beat, the giants start to dance and the first sparks illuminate the streets, that old Barcelona does not return from the past. It reminds us that it never left.

For during La Mercè, the enchanting magic of popular culture takes over the city, and each of us transforms for a day into whatever we wish to be -a devil, a casteller, a capgròs, or a queen -because this is Barcelona, ​​the heart and soul of Catalunya.

The city recognises itself.

Come and enjoy it with us. You are all invited!

More information: Runner Bean Tours

He fet el pregó per ser barcelonina, 

per dir-me Mercè 

i per dur Catalunya dintre meu.

I gave this opening address because I am a Barcelonian, 

because my name is Mercè, 

and because I carry Catalunya within me.

Mercè Rodoreda, Pregó de La Mercè, Barcelona, 1980

BARCELONA-CAMBRILS, 2017 #17AVOLEMLAVERITAT

D'un vell color de plata
jo voldria que fossin
els meus versos: d’un noble,
antic color de plata.

Davant la mort, que porta
secrets senyals del rostre
que jo veig en mirar-me,
cerco amb ells extingides
veus del mar, pas de núvol,
les distants primaveres.

Trist i lliure, camino,
davant la mort que em mira,
a la llum, per la plata
antiga dels meus versos...

Mrs. Death, Salvador Espriu

PLUTO'S MOONS, NIX (134340 PII) & HYDRA (134340 PIII)

Last night in Mallorca and last chance to see a much clearer sky than in Barcelona. The Grandma has taken her telescope and has been observing a part of this majestic universe just on the same day that twenty years ago Pluto's newly discovered moons were officially named Nix and Hydra. Tomorrow it will be time to say goodbye to friends and family and return to Barcelona where three new formations await her during these months of June and July. In fact, it is not goodbye but a so far, because Mallorca, like Napoli, Montpelhièr, Lyon or Bergen is home for The Grandma.

Nix, formal designation (134340) Pluto II, is a natural satellite of Pluto, with a diameter of 49.8 km across its longest dimension. It was discovered along with Pluto's outermost moon Hydra on 15 May 2005 by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope, and was named after Nyx, the Greek goddess of the night.  

Nix is the third moon of Pluto by distance, orbiting between the moons Styx and Kerberos.

Nix was imaged along with Pluto and its other moons by the New Horizons spacecraft as it flew by the Pluto system in July 2015. These images reveal a large reddish area on Nix that is likely an impact crater.

Nix was independently discovered by Max Mutchler and Andrew Steffl, members of the Pluto Companion Search Team, using the Hubble Space Telescope. The New Horizons team had suspected that Pluto and its moon Charon might be accompanied by other moons, hence they used Hubble to search for faint moons around Pluto in 2005. Since Nix's brightness is about 5,000 times fainter than Pluto, long exposure images were taken in order to find it.

The discovery images were taken on 15 May 2005 and 18 May 2005. The discoveries were announced on 31 October 2005, after confirmation by precovering archival Hubble images of Pluto from 2002. The two newly announced moons of Pluto were subsequently provisionally designated S/2005 P 1 for Hydra and S/2005 P 2 for Nix. The moons were informally referred to as "P1" and "P2", respectively by the discovery team.

The name Nix was approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and was announced on 21 June 2006 along with the naming of Hydra in the IAU Circular 8723. 

Nix was named after Nyx, the Greek goddess of darkness and night and mother of Charon, the ferryman of Hades in Greek mythology. The original proposal for the naming of Nix was to use the classical spelling Nyx, but to avoid confusion with the asteroid 3908 Nyx, the spelling was changed to Nix, the Coptic spelling of the name. The adjectival form of the name is Nictian (cf. Russian Никта Nikta).

More information: NASA

Hydra, formal designation (134340) Pluto III, is a natural satellite of Pluto, with a diameter of approximately 51 km across its longest dimension. It is the second-largest moon of Pluto, being slightly larger than Nix. Hydra was discovered along with Nix by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope on 15 May 2005, and was named after the Hydra, the nine-headed underworld serpent in Greek mythology. By distance, Hydra is the fifth and outermost moon of Pluto, orbiting beyond Pluto's fourth moon Kerberos.

Hydra has a highly reflective surface caused by the presence of water ice, similar to other Plutonian moons. Hydra's reflectivity is intermediate, in between those of Pluto and Charon. The New Horizons spacecraft imaged Pluto and its moons in July 2015 and returned multiple images of Hydra.

Members of the New Horizons team suspected that Pluto and Charon might be accompanied by other small, distant moons, weakly bound to the Pluto system. They used the Hubble Space Telescope to test this hypothesis. This led to the discovery of Nix and Hydra -both surprisingly close to Pluto/Charon- and that no significant moons existed in Pluto's extended sphere of influence.

The discovery images were taken on 15 May 2005 and 18 May 2005. Hydra and Nix were independently discovered by Max J. Mutchler on 15 June 2005 and by Andrew J. Steffl on 15 August 2005. The discoveries were announced on 31 October 2005, after confirmation by precovering archival Hubble images of Pluto from 2002. The two newly discovered moons were subsequently provisionally designated S/2005 P 1 for Hydra and S/2005 P 2 for Nix. The moons were informally referred to as "P1" and "P2" respectively, by the discovery team.

The name Hydra was approved on 21 June 2006 by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and was announced along with the naming of Nix in the IAU Circular 8723. 

Hydra was named after the Lernaean Hydra, a multi-headed serpent that battled Heracles/Hercules in Greek and Roman mythology. Particularly, the nine heads of Hydra subtly references Pluto's former ninth planetary status. The two newly named moons were intentionally named that the order of their initials N and H honors the New Horizons mission to Pluto, similarly to how the first two letters of Pluto's name honors Percival Lowell.

The names of features on the bodies in the Pluto system are related to mythology and the literature and history of exploration. In particular, the names of features on Hydra must be related to legendary serpents and dragons from literature, mythology, and history.

More information: NASA

 I tend to think of Pluto and its moons 
as presents sitting under a Christmas tree. 
They're wrapped, and from Earth 
all we can do is look at the boxes
 to see whether they're light or heavy, 
to see if something maybe jiggles a bit inside. 
We're seeing intriguing things, 
but we really don't know what's in there.

Alan Stern

AH, BUT I MAY AS WELL, TRY AND CATCH THE WIND...

Today is a special day for the city of Barcelona because it celebrates one of its three patron saints, Santa Eulàlia, the patron saint most beloved by Barcelona residents who know the history of the city and are aware of the symbolic and cultural importance of this religious figure.

The Grandma had planned to go out to enjoy the day and honour her patron saint but a strong wind advisory has stopped all outdoor events so she has stayed home reading and listening to songs that refer to the wind such as Wind of Change by Scorpions, Sempre Hi Ha Vent by Maria del Mar Bonet, Veles e Vents by Ausiàs Marc, Blowin' in the Wind by Bob Dylan, Candle in the Wind by Elton John, Against the Wind by Bob Seeger, The Wind by Cat Stevens, Wild Is the Wind by Nina Simone, Ride the Wild Wind by Queen, and one of her favourites Dust in the Wind by Kansas, a song that reminds us that time passes (tempus fugit) and we are an insignificant part of the universe. Although they are all beautiful and she can't just decide one, she has thought that today she would choose Catch The Wind by Donovan because it reminds her of the Joan Baez concert for her 75th birthday.

Despite hearing Joan Baez later at the Palau de la Música Catalana and at Festival Jardins de Pedralbes in Barcelona, at the Terramar Festival in Sitges, and at Portaferrada Festival in Sant Feliu de Guíxols, she didn't play it again in none of these four places.

Catch the Wind is a song written and recorded by Scottish singer-songwriter Donovan. Pye Records released Catch the Wind backed with Why Do You Treat Me Like You Do? as Donovan's debut release in the United Kingdom on 28 February 1965. The single reached No. 4 in the United Kingdom singles chart. Hickory Records released the single in the United States in April 1965, where it reached No. 23 in the United States Billboard Hot 100.

The single version of Catch the Wind was recorded at Olympic Studios in London. Donovan played guitar and sang on the recording, and was accompanied by nine session musicians: four viola players, four violin players and a string bass player. According to Donovan biographyer Lorne Murdoch, the string arrangement on the single version was performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, with an arrangement written by Ken Lewis of the Ivy League. He additionally opined that Donovan's commercial recording career commenced with the recording of Catch The Wind in February 1965.

In May 1965, Pye Records released a different version of Catch the Wind on Donovan's debut LP record album What's Bin Did and What's Bin Hid, retitled Catch the Wind in the US. While the single version featured vocal echo and a string section, the album version lacked those elements and instead featured Donovan playing harmonica.

Cash Box described it as a medium-paced, folk-styled low-down bluesey romancer, with a Bob Dylan-like vocal. Record World likewise described it as Dylanesque.

When Epic Records was compiling Donovan's Greatest Hits in 1968, the label was either unable or unwilling to secure the rights to the original recordings of Catch the Wind" and Donovan's follow-up single, Colours. Donovan re-recorded both songs for the album, with a full backing band including Big Jim Sullivan playing guitar and Mickie Most producing.

In the chilly hours and minutes
Of uncertainty, I want to be
In the warm hold of your loving mind

To feel you all around me
And to take your hand, along the sand
Ah, but I may as well try and catch the wind

When sundown pales the sky
I want to hide a while, behind your smile
And everywhere I'd look, your eyes I'd find

For me to love you now
Would be the sweetest thing
That would make me sing
Ah, but I may as well, try and catch the wind

When rain has hung the leaves with tears
I want you near, to kill my fears
To help me to leave all my blues behind

For standin' in your heart
Is where I want to be, and I long to be
Ah, but I may as well, try and catch the wind
Ah, but I may as well, try and catch the wind

More information: Song of the Day for Today

The way I sing my songs leads the listener 
into a place of introspection, 
a state of mind that can trigger self-healing 
and the kind of profound rest 
you cannot get from sleep alone.

Donovan

LA NIT DE REIS N'ÉS VINGUDA / EPIPHANY HAS ARRIVED

Today, temperatures have plummeted and it is snowing all over Catalonia at low altitudes.  

 

Barcelona is, for the moment, an exception and this is especially pleasing to The Grandma, who despite being born in the country of the Pyrenees, does not like snow or extreme cold. Tonight will be a very special night for the little ones and The Grandma will participate, as every year, in the cavalcade of her neighbourhood, distributing smiles, candies and working all night so that the solidarity of the neighbours becomes an illusion for the children who will anxiously wait tomorrow to see what the Three Wise Men have brought them.

Every January 5th at night, The Grandma remembers her great-grandmother when she recited some verses from the poem by Dolors Monserdà "Nit de Reis".

Bona Nit de Reis a tothom!

Dins d'un piset xic i pobre
que hi ha a peu pla d'un terrat,
treballa una pobra dona,
treballa sens parar.
Si algun cop minven ses forces,
no desmaia, no, que sap
que al mirar a sa filleta,
les tornarà a recobrar.

Diuen tots quants la coneixen
que hermosa ha estat sens igual:
avui d'aquella hermosura
sols per record li han quedat,
unes trenes ondejades,
negres, sedoses, brillants,
que, a l'estendre's damunt d'ella
a besar ses plantes van.

La nit de Reis n'és vinguda,
i sembla que amb més afany,
treballa la pobra mare,
tot mirant-se el seu infant.
–Mareta, li diu la nina,
fiqueu-me al llit, que és prou tard,
i tinc por vindran los Reis
i encara no hi hauré anat.
–Qui sap si vindran, filleta!
lo nostre pis, és tan alt!
–Prou, com que baixen del cel,
ja els hi ve bé de passar!
i a fe mare que els espero
amb gran desig aquest any.
Vull que em portin una nina
com aquella que hi ha a baix!
–Les nines, són per les nenes
que ja res falta els hi fa;
tu fill meu, que estas descalça
los hi tens que demanar
que et portin sabates noves.
–Ai, mare, no em feu plorar!
ja n'estic aconhortada
de caminar a peu descalç,
de portar robeta vella,
de morir-me treballant;
però que em dugan la nina
que jo sempre he demanat!
Des de l'any que van portar-la
a la nena que està a baix,
jo hi he pensat cada dia,
jo de nit l'he somniat.
Ai, mare, i que n'és d'hermosa!
i que bonica que va!
Té una careta tan fina,
que sembla de setí blanc,
té una boqueta petita,
que fins dentetes hi ha!
Obre els ulls quan està dreta,
i, per dormir, els té tancats,
té uns cabellets com de seda
i els té rossos i rissats,
porta lo vestit amb róssec
i amb serrells i farbalans,
i fins mitges i polaques,
i fins sombrero, i fins guants!
Jo en vull una com aquella,
que tot l'any l'he demanat!
puix si demà quan me llevi,
la nina no haig de trobar,
com que de nit la somnio,
la toco i la duc a braç,
pregaré a Déu que al dormir-me
mai me torne a despertar!

Un gran crit llancí la mare,
del fons del cor arrencat,
i agafant a sa filleta
i estrenyent-la amb fort abraç:
–Vés-te'n al llit, amor meva
li digué amb febrós afany,
vés, mes a Déu no demanis
que no et vulla despertar,
que la nina que tu esperes,
com la desitges tindràs.
Quan tot just lo dia apunta,
ja la nena s'ha llevat;
plora i riu i salta i brinca,
i el que li passa no sap.
Li han portada aquella nina
que ella tant ha demanat:
li han portada i té la cara
que sembla de setí blanc,
té una boqueta petita
que fins dentetes hi ha!
porta vestidet amb róssec
i amb serrells i farbalans,
i fins mitges i polaques,
i fins sombrero; i fins guants!
Res li manca, res li manca
de quant ella ha demanat;
sols li falten a la mare,
les trenes negres, brillants,
que fins a terra arribaven,
que hermosejaven son cap,
que entre mig de sa pobresa
les havia tant guardat!

More information: EWTN

The star burned like a flame, 
pointing the way to God, the King of kings; 
the wise men saw the sign and brought 
their gifts in homage to their great King.

The Liturgy of the Hours, Epiphany

THE LEONIDS & THE METEOR SHOWERS OF STORM OF 1833

It is believed that there are about forty sextillion stars in our universe. Some are visible to the naked eye, others belong to more distant galaxies, but sometimes wonderful phenomena occur when specific stars suddenly appear, shining more intensely than ever in different places with common meaning. It can be a Universal Star or a Northern Star and both have the same effect on those who see them: admiration, happiness and nostalgia.

Barcelona has received the impact of two stars in the same week. It has been very emotional, although it is not usual, nor was the Leonid shower that occurred in the American continent on a day like today in 1833.

The Leonids are a prolific annual meteor shower associated with the comet Tempel–Tuttle, and are also known for their spectacular meteor storms that occur about every 33 years.

The Leonids get their name from the location of their radiant in the constellation Leo: the meteors appear to radiate from that point in the sky. The name is derived from Greek and Latin with the prefix Leo- referring to the constellation and the suffix -ids signifying that the meteor shower is the offspring of, descendant of, the constellation Leo.

Earth moves through meteoroid streams left from passages of a comet. The streams consist of solid particles, known as meteoroids, normally ejected by the comet as its frozen gases evaporate under the heat of the Sun once within Jupiter's orbit. Due to the retrograde orbit of 55P/Tempel-Tuttle, the Leonids are fast moving streams which encounter the path of Earth and impact at 252,000 km/h. It is the fastest annual meteor shower. Larger Leonids which are about 1 cm across have a mass of 0.5 g and are known for generating bright (apparent magnitude -1.5) meteors. An annual Leonid shower may deposit 12-13 t of particles across the entire plant.

The meteoroids left by the comet are organized in trails in orbits similar to-though different from-that of the comet. They are differentially disturbed by the planets, in particular Jupiter, and to a lesser extent by radiation pressure from the Sun -the Poynting-Robertson effect and the Yarkovsky effect. These trails of meteoroids cause meteor showers when Earth encounters them. Old trails are spatially not dense and compose the meteor shower with a few meteors per minute. In the case of the Leonids, that tends to peak around 18 November, but some are spread through several days on either side and the specific peak changes every year. Conversely, young trails are spatially very dense and the cause of meteor outbursts when the Earth enters one.

The Leonids also produce meteor storms (very large outbursts) about every 33 years, during which activity exceeds 1,000 meteors per hour, with some events exceeding 100,000 meteors per hour, in contrast to the sporadic background (5 to 8 meteors per hour) and the shower background (several meteors per hour).

The Leonids are famous because their meteor showers, or storms, can be among the most spectacular. Because of the storm of 1833 and the developments in scientific thought of the time, the Leonids have had a major effect on the scientific study of meteors, which had previously been thought to be atmospheric phenomena. Although it has been suggested the Leonid meteor shower and storms have been noted in ancient times, was the meteor storm of November 12-13, 1833 that broke into people's modern-day awareness. One estimate of the peak rate is over one hundred thousand meteors an hour, while another, done as the storm abated, estimated in excess of 240,000 meteors during the nine hours of the storm, over the entire region of North America east of the Rocky Mountains.

The event was marked by several nations of Native Americans: the Cheyenne established a peace treaty and the Lakota calendar was reset. Many Native American birthdays were calculated by reference to the 1833 Leonid event. Abolitionists including Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass as well as slave-owners took note and others. 

The New York Evening Post carried a series of articles on the event including reports from Canada to Jamaica, it made news in several states beyond New York and, though it appeared in North America, was talked about in Europe. The journalism of the event tended to rise above the partisan debates of the time and reviewed facts as they could be sought out. 

Abraham Lincoln commented on it years later. Near Independence, Missouri, in Clay County, a refugee Mormon community watched the meteor shower on the banks of the Missouri River after having been driven from their homes by local settlers. Joseph Smith, the founder and first leader of Mormonism, afterwards noted in his journal for November 1833 his belief that this event was a litteral [sic] fulfillment of the word of God and a harbinger of the imminent second coming of Christ. Though it was noted in the midwest and eastern areas, it was also noted in Far West, Missouri.

Denison Olmsted explained the event most accurately. After spending the last weeks of 1833 collecting information, he presented his findings in January 1834 to the American Journal of Science and Arts, published in January-April 1834, and January 1836. He noted the shower was of short duration and was not seen in Europe, and that the meteors radiated from a point in the constellation of Leo and he speculated the meteors had originated from a cloud of particles in space. 

Accounts of the 1866 repeat of the Leonids counted hundreds per minute/a few thousand per hour in Europe. The Leonids were again seen in 1867, when moonlight reduced the rates to 1,000 meteors per hour. 

Another strong appearance of the Leonids in 1868 reached an intensity of 1,000 meteors per hour in dark skies. It was in 1866-67 that information on Comet Tempel-Tuttle was gathered, pointing it out as the source of the meteor shower and meteor storms. When the storms failed to return in 1899, it was generally thought that the dust had moved on and the storms were a thing of the past.

More information: Sky and Telescope

 The stars look the same from night to night. 
Nebulae and galaxies are dully immutable, 
maintaining the same overall appearance 
for thousands or millions of years. 
Indeed, only the sun, moon and planets 
-together with the occasional comet, 
asteroid or meteor- seem dynamic.

Seth Shostak

MERCÈ RODOREDA & EL PREGÓ DE LES FESTES DE LA MERCÈ

Today is a special day in Barcelona. The city celebrates one of its three patron saints, La Mercè.

The city is not having its best moments and we, Barcelonans, miss the cultured, creative, innovative, cheerful, full of life, clean, and safe Barcelona, the city that was proud of being the Catalan capital. 

The city is still under the shadows of the dark power. That is why today, The Grandma has remembered one of the best readings ever made in the city, the one made in 1980 by Mercè Rodoreda, the most universal Catalan writer.

 

Barcelonines, barcelonins

Si em trobo aquí, en aquest històric Saló de Cent, per pronunciar el pregó de les Festes de la Mercè, és perquè el senyor batlle i tot el seu consistori m'ho van demanar. I van demanar-m'ho amb tanta elegància, que hauria estat una gran descortesia per part meva no acceptar. De moment vaig creure que jo no era la persona més indicada, d'altres podrien sortir-se'n més airosament que jo; però, reflexionant, vaig pensar que potser sí. I per tres raons: pel fet de ser barcelonina, per dir-me Mercè i per dur Catalunya dintre meu.

Us puc assegurar que, durant anys, l'allunyament del meu país va aprofundir el meu amor per Barcelona, per la Barcelona catalana de la meva joventut. Amb els seus carrers, amb les seves places, amb la seva càrrega d'història, amb la seva bona gent. El meu barri de Sant Gervasi, tocant a la vila de Gràcia, amb el carrer Elisa, amb la plaça de la Bonanova, amb els Josepets i amb tants camps de flors. La Barcelona d'una determinada claror en una determinada tarda a la Plaça de Catalunya amb el cel ratllat per tropes i tropes d'estornells cridaners; amb una determinada claror a la falda verda del Tibidabo, Passeig de Gràcia amunt, en un acabament de dies amb una determinada claror d'un matí de març amb el sol entaforat a dintre d'una branca a dalt de tot d'una paret. Les petites torres del meu Sant Gervasi, polides i netes, amb els seus jardins assolellats, ventejats i florits.

Lluny del meu país no em feia mal l'enyorament. Em feia mal la tristesa pel destí tan dur dels catalans. Quan havíem aconseguit que la nostra identitat fos acceptada i reconeguda, ens ho van fer tot a miques, ens ho van prendre tot. Vam haver d'enterrar la il·lusió de ser simplement un poble que treballa i viu en català i per Catalunya.

Ha estat llarg el temps de ser tinguts com a ciutadans d'ínfima categoria, amb la nostra llengua prohibida i escarnida. Humiliats. Però enmig de l'enfonsament, no vam cedir. No podíem deixar-nos vèncer per l'adversitat. Ofegats, escampats, vam continuar pensant en el nostre país, treballant pel nostre país. Tant els de dintre com els de fora. Som catalans i jo diria que la tenacitat és la nostra divisa. I l'espera ens ha valgut un miracle. Jo crec en miracles, i el miracle ha començat: tenim un govern de patriotes, de gent profundament catalana i tenaç, amb unes arrels catalanes que ningú ni res no ha pogut arrencar. Tenim, tots, una tasca a emprendre, una tasca difícil i per això apassionant: ajudar. Tots hem desitjat en un moment o altre de la nostra vida una ciutat ideal, una pàtria ideal: la més alta i la més bella. Com diu patriòticament un dels nostres poetes: "Salut a la pàtria en segles de saba crescuda, salut a la Pàtria encara no nascuda com l'hem somniada els seus fills". Aquesta pàtria ideal nosaltres l'hem de fer! Tots els que vindran darrere de nosaltres, generació darrera generació, lligats tots pel mateix desig. De cara, avui, a una nova renaixença.

De vós, Mare de Déu de la Mercè, daurada i reposada a dintre de la vostra església amb l'Infant Jesús a la falda, jo n'havia tingut la imatge, de petita i de jove, en el meu dormitori, a dintre d'una vitrina, tota vestida de setí brodat d'or i de perles, de pedres tallades lluents de color de gra de magrana, coronada d'argent. Als vostres peus, agenollats un a cada banda, hi havia dos captius: un amb l'armilla morada i pantalons bombats verd fosc, l'altre amb pantalons bombats morats i armilla verd oliva. Tots dos amb camisa blanca, tots dos amb les mans encadenades, i els ulls alçats cap a Vós implorant la vostra protecció. Mare de Déu de la Mercè, feu que els catalans no hàgim de sentir-nos mai més captius, que la nostra aspiració tan justa i tan humana de néixer i de morir catalans ens sigui reconeguda per sempre de sempre. Depèn de vós i depèn de nosaltres, sobretot d'aquesta joventut treballadora i estudiosa, d'aquestes dones catalanes, valentes i fortes, conscients que una de les coses més nobles del món és pujar una família, que han ensenyat i ensenyen als seus fills a estimar Catalunya, sense estridències, quietament, eficaçment. Catalunya, "terra dels pins iguals, de l'alzinar planyent vessant amunt fins a carena viva", serà el que voldrem que sigui; la força de tantes voluntats pot abatre muralles. El temps no compta. Hem après a esperar. Hem de pensar que tots, cadascú en el seu lloc, som necessaris, som importants. Tan important és una pintura d’Antoni Tàpies o de Joan Miró o una escultura de Subirachs, com un càntir de Breda ben fet o un gerro de la Bisbal ben acabat; tan important és un artista com un obrer, un pescador com un pagès. Gent de totes les nostres comarques, unida per formar un sol poble, Catalunya ens necessita.

Voldria, en aquest dia tan assenyalat, comunicar la meva fe en la meva terra, en la força indestructible de la paciència dels catalans. En la Catalunya que "treballa, pensa, lluita i que creu, espera i ora". Tenim a la porta la Festa Major de la ciutat organitzada pel nostre batlle, pel nostre Ajuntament. Tot nostre. Voldria demanar als barcelonins que celebrin la Festa Major d'aquest any amb esperança, amb el cor content, amb banderes als balcons, amb cobles per places i carrers, amb tot l'esclat de les nostres flors a les Rambles, amb el mar ben blau en aquest mes de setembre dolç de raïms.

A totes les nostres autoritats, ara, per fi, ben legítimes, a totes les barcelonines i barcelonins, a totes les catalanes i catalans, vagi la meva salutació més cordial; i a la Santíssima Verge, en la seva advocació de la Mercè, la meva pregària per mi, per tots nosaltres, per la nostra ciutat i per la nostra pàtria.

Barcelonines, barcelonins, queden obertes les Festes de la Mercè de l'any 1980.

More information: Fundació Mercè Rodoreda

 La vida, perquè sigui vida, s'ha de viure a poc a poc...

Life, for it to be life, must be lived little by little...

Mercè Rodoreda

ILDEFONS CERDÀ SUNYER, FOUNDER OF MODERN TOWN

After three amazing days in Lyon, The Grandma has returned to Barcelona. One of the good experiences when you arrive in Barcelona by plane is to contemplate the Eixample, one of the symbols of the city, which was designed by Ildefons Cerdà, the Catalan engineer, who died on a day like today in 1876.

Ildefons Cerdà Sunyer (23 December 1815-21 August 1876) was a Catalan urban planner and civil engineer who designed the 19th-century "extension" of Barcelona called the Eixample. Because of his extensive theoretical and practical work, he is considered the founder of modern town planning as a discipline, having coined the word urbanization.

Cerdà was born in Centelles, Catalonia, in 1815. He trained as a civil engineer at the Escuela de Ingenieros de Caminos, Canales y Puertos, in Madrid. He joined the Corps of Engineers and lived in various cities before settling in Barcelona in 1848 and marrying Clotilde Bosch. After the death of his brothers, Cerdà inherited the family fortune, and left the civil service. He became interested in politics and the study of urban planning.

When the government of the time finally gave in to public pressure and allowed Barcelona's city walls to be torn down, he realized the need to plan the city's expansion so that the new extension would become an efficient and livable place, unlike the congested, epidemic-prone old town within the walls. When he failed to find suitable reference works, he undertook the task of writing one from scratch while designing what he called the Eixample, borrowing a few technological ideas from his contemporaries to create a unique, thoroughly modern integrated concept that was carefully considered rather than whimsically designed.

He continued to create projects and improve existing designs throughout his lifetime, as well as to develop his theories taking on larger planning scopes (at the regional planning level), until the very end. In the process, he lost all his family's inheritance and he died in 1876 a heavily indebted near-pauper, never having been paid for his chief masterpiece, the design of Barcelona's Eixample.

Cerdà was a multi-faceted man who, in pursuit of his vision, gave up a steady job in the civil engineering service, stood for election and became a member of the Cortes; drafted useful ground-breaking legislation, drew up a detailed topographical survey map of Barcelona's surroundings, and wrote a theoretical treatise to support each of his major planning projects.

Cerdà focused on key needs: chiefly, the need for sunlight, natural lighting and ventilation in homes (he was heavily influenced by the sanitarian movement), the need for greenery in people's surroundings, the need for effective waste disposal including good sewerage, and the need for seamless movement of people, goods, energy, and information.

His designs belie a network-oriented approach far ahead of his time. His street layout and grid plan were optimized to accommodate pedestrians, carriages, horse-drawn trams, urban railway lines (as yet unheard-of), gas supply and large-capacity sewers to prevent frequent floods, without neglecting public and private gardens and other key amenities. The latest technical innovations were incorporated in his designs if they could further the cause of better integration, but he also came up with remarkable new concepts of his own, including a logical system of land readjustment that was essential to the success of his project, and produced a thorough statistical analysis of working-class conditions at the time, which he undertook in order to demonstrate the ills of congestion.

Cerdà's plan for Barcelona underwent two major revisions; the second version, is the one still recognizable in the layout of today's Eixample, though the low height of buildings and the gardens within every city block were soon dispensed with by politicians inclined toward property speculation.

In addition, only one of the two planned diagonal streets was realized. Culturally, the Eixample was (and still is) inhabited by the well-to-do, instead of integrating social classes. Many of the architects of his time opposed Cerdà's ideas, even accusing him of promoting socialism; in the end, however, they designed the Modernista façades that brought fame to the district.

Political developments in Spain and Catalonia eventually led to the enshrinement of a revisionist version of how Cerdà secured official approval of his plan. 

Cerdà actually drew up his plan under the commission of the then competent authority with the support of the city council.

A political reversal led to a change in local government, and the new council sought to preempt the previous central government's decision by holding a project competition in 1859, which Cerdà lost; nevertheless, Cerdà's design prevailed, much to the chagrin of the major property owners.

More information: The Guardian

 The industrial revolution has tended 
to produce everywhere great urban masses 
that seem to be increasingly careless of ethical standards.

Irving Babbitt

BARCELONA-CAMBRILS, 2017 #17AVOLEMLAVERITAT

S'enduien veus d'infants
el sol que jo mirava.
Tota la llum d'estiu
se'm feia enyor de somni.

El rellotge, al blanc mur,
diu com se'n va la tarda.
S'encalma un vent suau
pels camins del capvespre.

Potser demà vindran
encara lentes hores
de claror per als ulls
d'aquest esguard tan àvid.

Però ara és la nit.
I he quedat solitari
a la casa dels morts
que només jo recordo.

Cançó de Capvespre, Salvador Espriu 

ESTADI OLÍMPIC LLUÍS COMPANYS, ENJOYING MONTJUÏC

Today, The Grandma has been enjoying football. In the afternoon, she has stayed at Johan Cruyff Stadium in Sant Joan Despí, and in the evening, at Lluís Companys Olympic Stadium in Montjuïc, Barcelona. It has been a fantastic day.

Lluís Companys Olympic Stadium formerly known as the Estadi de Montjuïc and Estadi Olímpic de Montjuïc and also known in English as the Barcelona Olympic Stadium, is a stadium in Barcelona, Catalonia.

Originally built in 1927 for the 1929 International Exposition in the city and Barcelona's failed bid for the 1936 Summer Olympics, which were awarded to Berlin, it was renovated in 1989 to be the main stadium for the 1992 Summer Olympics and 1992 Summer Paralympics. 

It is used mostly for football matches and is the home stadium of Barcelona since the 2023-24 season, due to the renovation of their regular ground, the Camp Nou. 

The stadium is named after Lluís Companys, a president of the Generalitat de Catalunya (Government of Catalonia) executed by Francoist Spain.

With its current capacity of 55,926 seats (67,007 during the 1992 Olympics), it is the second largest stadium in Catalonia.

The stadium is located in kir the Anella Olímpica, on Montjuïc, a hill to the southwest of the city that overlooks the harbour.

Designed by architect Pere Domènech i Roura for the 1929 Expo, the stadium was officially opened on 20 May 1929. The opening ceremonies included Spain's first official rugby international game against Italy, and a friendly football match between the Catalan national team and Bolton Wanderers, which the Catalan team won by a shocking score of 4–0 with goals from Josep Samitier, Martí Ventolrà and Manuel Parera.

It was meant to host the People's Olympiad in 1936, a protest event against the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, but the event had to be canceled due to the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War.

In the fifties, the stadium was the centerpiece of the 1955 Mediterranean Games, and in 1957 it hosted the only national football cup final between Barcelona and Espanyol, the two local clubs.

In the seventies, the stadium was disused and the stands deteriorated. When the Spanish Grand Prix and other races were held at the Montjuïc racing circuit, the stadium was used as a paddock for the teams. Due to safety concerns, the 1975 F1 race was nearly boycotted by drivers.

During Barcelona's bid for the 1992 Summer Olympics, the stadium was totally renovated with the involvement of Italian architect Vittorio Gregotti. The stadium was gutted, preserving parts of the original facades, and new grandstands were built. In 1989, the venue was re-inaugurated for the World Cup in Athletics, and three years later it hosted the opening and closing ceremonies and all the athletics competitions of the Olympic Games and also the same functions during the Paralympics.

The stadium served as the home of Espanyol from 1997 until 2009. It also served as the home of the Barcelona Dragons American football team from 1991 until 2002. Because the size of the playing surface was slightly shorter than the regulation American football length, the stadium only had seven-yard end zones, three yards shorter than regulation NFL size in 1991 and 1992. They were later lengthened to the standard ten yards. The stadium also played host to the National Football League's American Bowl in 1993 and in 1994. The San Francisco 49ers played the Pittsburgh Steelers on 1 August 1993. The second game was played on 31 July 1994 between the Los Angeles Raiders and the Denver Broncos.

In 2001, the stadium was renamed after the former president of the Generalitat de Catalunya Lluís Companys, who was executed at the nearby Montjuïc Castle in 1940 by the Franco regime. 

In 2010, the stadium hosted the 20th European Athletics Championships.

Since the 2023-24 season, the stadium has served as the home ground for Barcelona during the redevelopment of the Camp Nou. The club plans to continue playing at the Estadi Olímpic until the redevelopment of the Camp Nou is completed by the 2025-26 season.

More information: Estadi Olímpic

The Olympic Games showed us that with self-discipline
and dedication we can be champions.

Anurag Thakur

THE BREAKING OF THE ROUND TABLE, THE END IS NEAR

Today, The Grandma is still ill. She has a terrible cold, and she has continued reading about King Arthur and The Round Table.

The Round Table is King Arthur's famed table in the Arthurian legend, around which he and his knights congregate. As its name suggests, it has no head, implying that everyone who sits there has equal status. The table was first described in 1155 by Wace, who relied on previous depictions of Arthur's fabulous retinue. 

The symbolism of the Round Table developed over time; by the close of the 12th century it had come to represent the chivalric order associated with Arthur's court, the Knights of the Round Table.

Though the Round Table itself is not mentioned, the concept of Arthur havinga marvelous court made up of many prominent warriors is much older. 

Geoffrey of Monmouth says that after establishing peace throughout Britain, Arthur increased his personal entourage by inviting very distinguished men from far-distant kingdoms to join it. The code of chivalry so important in later romance figures in as well, as Geoffrey says Arthur established such a code of courtliness in his household that he inspired peoples living far away to imitate him.

Long before Geoffrey, Arthur's court was well known to Welsh storytellers; in the romance Culhwch and Olwen, written around 1100, the protagonist Culhwch invokes the names of 225 individuals affiliated with Arthur

More information: King Arthur's Knights

In fact, the fame of Arthur's entourage became so prominent in Welsh tradition that in the later additions to the Welsh Triads, the formula tying named individuals to Arthur's Court in the triad titles began to supersede the older Island of Britain formula.

Though the code of chivalry crucial to later continental romances dealing with the Round Table is mostly absent from the earlier Welsh material, some passages of Culhwch and Olwen seem to prefigure it, for instance when Arthur explains the ethos of his court, saying [w]e are nobles as long as we are sought out: the greater the bounty we may give, the greater our nobility, fame and honour.

Though no Round Table appears in the early Welsh texts, Arthur is associated with various items of household furniture.

The earliest of these is Saint Carannog's mystical floating altar in that saint's 12th century Vita; in the story Arthur has found the altar and attempts unsuccessfully to use it for a table, and returns it to Carannog in exchange for the saint ridding the land of a meddlesome dragon. Arthur's household furniture figures into local topographical folklore throughout Britain as early as the early 12th century, with various landmarks being named Arthur's Seat, Arthur's Oven, and Arthur's Bed-chamber.

A henge at Eamont Bridge near Penrith, Cumbria is known as King Arthur's Round Table. The still-visible Roman amphitheatre at Caerleon has been associated with the Round Table and has been suggested as a possible source for the legend.

More information: Britannica

Following archaeological discoveries at the Roman ruins in Chester, some writers suggested that the Chester Roman Amphitheatre was the true prototype of the Round Table, but the English Heritage Commission, acting as consultants to a History Channel documentary in which the claim was made, declared that there was no archaeological basis to the story.

The Round Table first appeared in Wace's Roman de Brut, a Norman language adaptation of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae finished in 1155. Wace says Arthur created the Round Table to prevent quarrels among his barons, none of whom would accept a lower place than the others. Layamon added to the story when he adapted Wace's work into the Middle English Brut in the early 13th century, saying that the quarrel between Arthur's vassals led to violence at a Yuletide feast. 

In response a Cornish carpenter built an enormous but easily transportable Round Table to prevent further dispute. Wace claims he was not the source of the Round Table; both he and Layamon credited it instead to the Bretons.

Some scholars have doubted this claim, while others believe it may be true. There is some similarity between the chroniclers' description of the Round Table and a custom recorded in Celtic stories, in which warriors sit in a circle around the king or lead warrior, in some cases feuding over the order of precedence as in Layamon. There is a possibility that Wace, contrary to his own claims, derived Arthur's round table not from any Breton source, but rather from medieval biographies of Charlemagne, notably Einhard's Vita Caroli and Notker the Stammerer's De Carolo Magno, in which the king is said to have possessed a round table decorated with a map of Rome.

More information: Ancient Fortresses

The Round Table takes on new dimensions in the romances of the late 12th and early 13th century, where it becomes a symbol of the famed order of chivalry which flourishes under Arthur. In Robert de Boron's Merlin, written around the 1190s, the wizard Merlin creates the Round Table in imitation of the table of the Last Supper and of Joseph of Arimathea's Holy Grail table.

This table, here made for Arthur's father Uther Pendragon rather than Arthur himself, has twelve seats and one empty place to mark the betrayal of Judas. This seat must remain empty until the coming of the knight who will achieve the Grail.

The Didot Perceval, a prose continuation of Robert's work, takes up the story, and the knight Percival sits in the seat and initiates the Grail quest. The prose cycles of the 13th century, the Lancelot-Grail cycle and the Post-Vulgate Cycle, further adapt the chivalric attributes of the Round Table. Here it is the perfect knight Galahad, rather than Percival, who assumes the empty seat, now called the Siege Perilous.  

Galahad's arrival marks the start of the Grail quest as well as the end of the Arthurian era. In these works the Round Table is kept by King Leodegrance of Cameliard after Uther's death; Arthur inherits it when he marries Leodegrance's daughter Guinevere. Other versions treat the Round Table differently, for instance Arthurian works from Italy often distinguish between the Old Table of Uther's time and Arthur's New Table.

The artifact known as the Winchester Round Table, a large tabletop hanging in Winchester Castle bearing the names of various knights of Arthur's court, was probably created for a Round Table tournament. The current paintwork is late; it was done by order of Henry VIII of England for Holy Roman Emperor Charles V's 1522 state visit, and depicts Henry himself sitting in Arthur's seat above a Tudor rose. 

The table itself is considerably older; dendrochronology calculates the date of construction to 1250–1280, during the reign of Edward I, using timber from store felled over a period of years. Edward was an Arthurian enthusiast who attended at least five Round Tables and hosted one himself in 1299, which may have been the occasion for the creation of the Winchester Round Table. Martin Biddle, from an examination of Edward's financial accounts, links it instead with a tournament Edward held near Winchester on April 20, 1290, to mark the betrothal of one of his daughters.

More information: Study

 

 

Knights! The gift of freedom is yours by right. 

But the home we seek resides not in some distant land. 

It's in us! And in our actions on this day! 

If this be our destiny, then so be it. 

But let history remember that as free men, 

we chose to make it so. 

King Arthur