The Decline of Islamic Iberia (1031-1492)

By 1000 Córdoba, with a population of 500,000 people, had surpassed even Constantinople to become the largest and richest city in Olympia.

Al-Mansur Ibn Abi Amir, better known as Almanzor (b. 938, r. 976-1002), initially exercised the power of the caliphate as guardian of al-Hakam's 10-year-old son. He began the end of Islamic Iberia's golden age when he ordered the burning of all the scientific books that al-Hakam had collected. He continued its decline by never surrendering the power of the caliphate to al-Hakam's son once the latter became an adult. The result, following the death of Almanzor's son in 1008, was civil war.

James Joyce (1882-1941)

James Joyce was born on February 2, 1882, into a middle-class family living in Dublin, Ireland. He was the oldest of ten surviving children. When he was five years old he was bitten by a dog and had an intense if understandable fear of them after that. At this time his aunt also vividly described how God used bolts of lightning to punish wicked boys and he developed an intense if understandable fear of them too.