In Assisi, Italy, the feast of St. Francis commemorates the saint’s transition to the afterlife. For two days the entire town is illuminated by oil lamps burning consecrated oil brought from a different Italian town each year. A parchment in St. Francis’s handwriting is taken to the top of the Santa Maria degli Angeli basilica and the people are blessed by the pope’s representative. In the United States, people bring their pets to church to be blessed on St. Francis’s feast day, because of his love for animals as expressed in his Canticle of Creatures. Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Louis the Stubborn became king of Navarre, a region in the north of Spain bordering France, upon the death of his mother, Joan of Navarre. Upon the death of his father, Philip IV, in 1314, he became king of France. His rule was short-lived. Following a game of tennis in 1316, he drank a large amount of wine and died from an unverified illness. He is remembered primarily for his concessions to the nobility. At the time of his death, his wife was pregnant with his heir. What happened to the child? 
Several militaries have developed programs that train dolphins to perform a variety of tasks, such as rescuing divers and locating underwater mines. The US Navy’s Marine Mammal Program, which played a role in both the Gulf and Iraq Wars, is comprised of approximately 75 dolphins. Rumors abound regarding the use of these mammals, and while the US denies training them to harm humans in any way, it was reported in 2000 that dolphins trained to kill by the Russian Navy had been sold to what country? 
Though the feast held in 1621 may be better remembered, the first official national Thanksgiving in the US was declared in 1789. On that day, Washington, the president at the time, offered thanks for “the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty” following the revolution. Thanksgiving feasts were declared sporadically until 1863, when President Lincoln established it as a lasting holiday. Traditionally, the president pardons a live turkey each year. Why have recent presidents pardoned two? 
This national holiday in the Republic of Korea (
Henri-Alban Fournier, who published as Alain-Fournier, was a French novelist known for his single full-length work, Le Grand Meaulnes. The poetic novel about a youthful search for the ideal was published in 1913 and is now considered a classic of French literature. Set in an imaginary locale, it is a blend of the author’s own childhood and his mystical ideas. Though he began work on a second novel in 1914, he was killed in action in WWI that year. When was his body finally identified? 
A Latin phrase meaning “course of honors,” the cursus honorum was the sequential order of public offices held by politicians in both the Roman Republic and the early Empire. The cursus honorum forbade repeating an office, and it set a minimum age for election to each post and minimum intervals between holding successive offices. However, these rules were often ignored toward the end of the Republic. At what age could candidates be elected to their first official post?