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Æthelred the Unready (c. 968 – 1016) was King of the English from 978 to 1013 and from 1014 until his death. He came to the throne as a boy after the killing of his half-brother King Edward the Martyr. During his reign, raids by the Vikings escalated to large-scale invasions, and the English paid increasingly large amounts of tribute. In December 1013, King Swein Forkbeard of Denmark conquered England. Æthelred fled to Normandy, but when Swein died in February 1014 he returned and drove out Swein's son Cnut, who returned the following year. English resistance was hampered by the treachery of Æthelred's chief advisor, Eadric Streona, and by distrust between Æthelred and his eldest son, Edmund Ironside. Æthelred died in April 1016 and Edmund became king. He put up stronger resistance than his father, but died in December, and Cnut then became king. Æthelred's reign was nevertheless a period of cultural achievements, and some historians see its first half as moderately successful. (Full article...)
Did you know ...
- ... that Nellie Breen (pictured) is believed to have performed the first tap dance broadcast on radio in 1922?
- ... that American basketball player Jaxson Davis was cradled by Kobe Bryant when he was an infant?
- ... that Waverly is one of the largest surviving domestic residences in London, Ontario?
- ... that the gold-medal favourite for the men's 73 kg weightlifting competition at the 2024 Summer Olympics was eliminated in the last qualifying tournament?
- ... that Meng Qingshu married Wang Ming only one day after she was released from prison?
- ... that a song from Friko's Something Worth Waiting For was inspired by the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta?
- ... that Perrine Dugué's brutal murder and the rumoured miraculous healing powers of her grave led to the creation of a popular cult in 1796?
- ... that Nilotica shea butter, found only in the Nile basin of Uganda, represents less than five percent of the global shea butter supply?
- ... that the developer of Agreeee wanted to use the game to "draw people's attention to the fact that nobody reads the terms of service"?
In the news
- In Myanmar, an explosion at a Ta'ang National Liberation Army base leaves 43 people dead.
- In Twenty20 cricket, the Indian Premier League concludes with Royal Challengers Bengaluru defeating Gujarat Titans in the final (player of the match Virat Kohli pictured).
- Following the collapse of Evika Siliņa's coalition, Andris Kulbergs is appointed prime minister of Latvia.
- Pope Leo XIV issues his first encyclical, Magnifica humanitas, which expresses concerns about artificial intelligence.
On this day
June 4: Flag Day of the Finnish Defence Forces in Finland; Trianon Treaty Day in Romania (1920)
- 1411 – King Charles VI of France granted a monopoly to the people of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon for the ripening of Roquefort cheese (example pictured).
- 1561 – The spire of Old St Paul's Cathedral in London was destroyed by fire.
- 1913 – Emily Davison, an activist for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, was fatally injured after being trampled by a horse owned by King George V at the Epsom Derby.
- 1989 – The People's Liberation Army suppressed the Tiananmen Square protests in Beijing, leaving hundreds of people dead and wounded.
- 2004 – In Granby, Colorado, U.S., Marvin Heemeyer went on a rampage with a modified bulldozer over a zoning dispute, destroying several buildings before dying by suicide.
- Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1039)
- Robert Earl Hughes (b. 1926)
- Linda Martell (b. 1941)
- Princess Lilibet of Sussex (b. 2021)
Today's featured video
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The Beaufort Gyre is a large wind-driven ocean circulation in the western Arctic Ocean, north of Alaska and Canada. Together with the Transpolar Drift, it is one of the Arctic's two major sea-ice circulation systems. Within the gyre, free-floating sea ice is very mobile and susceptible to winds, drifting in a clockwise direction due to a high-pressure system that fosters anti-cyclonic winds. This allows Arctic sea ice to survive multiple summers and develop into long-lasting multi-year ice. This animation, produced by NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio, shows the variation in the age of ice in the Arctic at weekly intervals from 1984 to 2019, with darker colours representing younger ice and white indicating ice at least four years old. It illustrates the dramatic decline of older sea ice and its retreat toward the Canadian Arctic, a trend largely attributed to climate change. The Beaufort Gyre also stores vast quantities of freshwater whose release could influence the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation and the global climate. Animation credit: NASA
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