Culture of Europe

The culture of Europe is rooted in the art, architecture, music, literature, and philosophy that originated from the European cultural region.[1]

Art

Leonardo da Vinci. Among his works are the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, with their fame approached only by Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam.
Main article: Western painting

The oldest known cave paintings are at the El Castillo cave (Spain), older than 40,800 years.[2] The history of Western painting represents a continuous, though disrupted, tradition from antiquity. Until the mid 19th century it was primarily concerned with representational and Classical modes of production, after which time more modern, abstract and conceptual forms gained favor. Developments in Western painting historically parallel those in Eastern painting, in general a few centuries later.

Main article: Sculpture

The earliest European sculpture to date portrays a female form, and has been estimated at dating from 35,000 years ago. See Classical sculpture, Ancient Greek sculpture, Gothic art, Renaissance, Mannerist, Baroque, Neoclassicism, Modernism, Postminimalism, found art, Postmodern art, Conceptual art.

Ludwig van Beethoven
The Beatles are the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed band in the history of music, with sales of over one billion units.[3][4][5][6]

Main festivals includes: Sanremo Music Festival, Coca-Cola Summer Festival (Italy), Glastonbury, Reading and Leeds Festivals, Isle of Wight Festival, T in the Park (UK), Fête de la Musique, Eurockéennes, Vieilles Charrues Festival, Hellfest (France), Wacken (Germany), Festival Internacional de Benicàssim, Primavera Sound (Spain), Exit Festival (Serbia), Sziget Festival (Hungary), Roskilde Festival (Denmark), Rock Werchter, Tomorrowland (Belgium) & Eurovision (music competition between European countries). Domino Recording Company, Bertelsmann Music Group, PolyGram, EMI, Universal Music Group (Subsidiary of French company Vivendi) are the largest European music companies.

Neolithic architecture : Born in the Levant, Neolithic architecture spread to Europe. The Mediterranean neolithic cultures of Malta worshiped in megalithic temples. In Europe, long houses built from wattle and daub were constructed. Elaborate tombs for the dead were also built. These tombs are particularly numerous in Ireland, where there are many thousand still in existence. Neolithic people built long barrows and chamber tombs for their dead and causewayed camps, henges flint mines and cursus monuments., Architecture of ancient Greece, Roman architecture, Medieval architecture, Renaissance architecture, Baroque architecture, Beaux-Arts architecture, Expressionist architecture, Stalinist architecture, Deconstructivism.

Homer
Sappho
William Shakespeare
Dostoyevsky
Virginia Woolf

Europe has produced some of the most prominent or popular fiction and nonfiction writers of all time :

See Western art history, dance, drama, and circus arts.

Sir Alfred Hitchcock, often regarded the greatest British filmmaker of all time.[8]

Antoine Lumière realized, on 28 December 1895, the first projection, with the Cinematograph, in Paris.[9] Philippe Binant realized, on 2 February 2000, the first digital cinema projection in Europe, with the DLP CINEMA technology developed by Texas Instruments, in Paris.[10] In 1897, Georges Méliès established the first cinema studio on a rooftop property in Montreuil, near Paris. Some notable European film movements include German Expressionism, Italian neorealism, French New Wave, Polish Film School, New German Cinema, Portuguese Cinema Novo, Czechoslovak New Wave, Dogme 95, New French Extremity, and Romanian New Wave. The cinema of Europe has its own awards, the European Film Awards. Main festivals : Cannes Film Festival (France), Berlin International Film Festival (Germany). The Venice Film Festival (Italy) or Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica di Venezia, is the oldest film festival in the world.

Some of the most popular games of all time come from Europe: the Grand Theft Auto (series), Tomb Raider, The Witcher, Cossacks: European Wars, Colin McRae: Dirt, Far Cry 3, Asphalt (series), The Settlers, The Patrician, Need For Speed, Angry Birds, Cut the Rope, Brain Challenge, Rayman, Beyond Good & Evil, Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, Watch Dogs, Batman: Arkham City, Banjo-Kazooie (series), LittleBigPlanet, Block Breaker Deluxe, Crysis, Tetris, Assassin's Creed, Europa Universalis, Kinect Sports, Hysteria Project.

Science

Main article: History of science
Marie Curie
Albert Einstein
Isaac Newton

Europe has produced some of the greatest scientists, inventors and intellectuals in history. Germany; Albert Einstein, Johannes Kepler, Johannes Gutenberg, Gottfried Leibniz, Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, Max Planck, Karl Benz. United Kingdom; Isaac Newton, Charles K. Kao, Charles Darwin, Robert Hooke, Michael Faraday, James Joule, Edward Jenner, John Dalton, George Stephenson, Florence Nightingale, George Cayley, Frank Whittle, Alan Turing, Stephen Hawking, Tim Berners Lee, James Watt, Alexander Fleming, Alexander Graham Bell, John Logie Baird, James Clerk Maxwell, Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes. Russia: Dmitri Mendeleev, Ivan Pavlov, Ilya Mechnikov, Nikolai Lobachevsky, Mikhail Lomonosov, Lev Landau, Aleksandr Butlerov, Alexander Stepanovich Popov, Igor Sikorsky, Sergey Korolyov. France; Pierre Abelard, Michel de Montaigne, Louis Pasteur, Antoine Lavoisier, Henri Becquerel, René Descartes, Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot, Pierre de Fermat, Blaise Pascal, the Montgolfier brothers, Denis Diderot, Jean le Rond d'Alembert, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Léon Foucault, Auguste and Louis Lumière, Pierre Curie, Marie Curie, Jacques Lacan, Luc Montagnier, Albert Jacquard. Italy; Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo Galilei, Evangelista Torricelli, Niccolò Machiavelli, Alessandro Volta, Guglielmo Marconi, Enrico Fermi. Poland; Nicolaus Copernicus, Maria Skłodowska-Curie, Ignacy Łukasiewicz, Rudolf Weigl. Greece: Archimedes, Euclid, Ptolemy. Hungary: Ottó Bláthy, Ányos Jedlik, John von Neumann, Leó Szilárd, Edward Teller. Austria: Ludwig Boltzmann, Sigmund Freud, Kurt Gödel. Ireland; Lord Kelvin, Robert Boyle, William Rowan Hamilton. Spain; Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Isaac Peral, Leonardo Torres Quevedo. Sweden; Alfred Nobel, Anders Celsius. Denmark; Niels Bohr. Serbia; Nikola Tesla, Mihajlo Pupin, Milutin Milanković, Miomir Vukobratović. Switzerland; Carl Jung.

Philosophy

European philosophy is a predominant strand of philosophy globally, and is central to philosophical enquiry in America and most other parts of the world which have fallen under its influence.

The Greek schools of philosophy in antiquity provide the basis of philosophical discourse that extends to today. Christian thought had a huge influence on many fields of European philosophy (as European philosophy has been on Christian thought too), sometimes as a reaction.

Perhaps one of the most important single philosophical periods since the classical era were the Renaissance, the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment. There are many disputes as to its value and even its timescale. What is indisputable is that the tenets of reason and rational discourse owe much to René Descartes, John Locke and others working at the time.

Other important European philosophical strands include: Analytic philosophy, Anarchism, Christian Democracy, Communism, Conservatism, Constructionism, Deconstructionism, Empiricism, Epicureanism, Existentialism, Fascism, Humanism, Idealism, Internationalism, Liberalism, Logical positivism, Marxism, Materialism, Monarchism, Nationalism, Perspectivism, Platonism, Positivism, Postmodernism, Protestantism, Rationalism, Relativism, Republicanism, Romanticism, Scepticism, Scholasticism, Social Democracy, Socialism, Stoicism, Structuralism, Thomism, Utilitarianism, Spenglerism.

Religion

Main article: Religion in Europe

Indo-European religions were: Uralic mythologies, Celtic polytheism, Germanic paganism, Ancient Greek religion, Etruscan religion, and Slavic mythology.

The Eurobarometer Poll 2005[12] found that, on average, 52% of the citizens of EU member states state that they "believe in God", 27% believe there is some sort of spirit or life force while 18% do not believe there is any sort of spirit, God or life force. 3% declined to answer.

Christianity has been the dominant religion shaping European culture for at least the last 1700 years.[13][14][15][16][17] Modern philosophical thought has very much been influenced by Christian philosophers such as St Thomas Aquinas and Erasmus. And throughout most of its history, Europe has been nearly equivalent to Christian culture,[18] The Christian culture was the predominant force in western civilization, guiding the course of philosophy, art, and science.[19][20]

The most popular religions of Europe are the following (by dominant religion):

There are significant Catholic minorities in the Netherlands,[37] southern Germany,[38] Switzerland, the Czech Republic,[39] western and central Belarus, western Ukraine,[40] Hungarian-speaking Romania, Albania, parts of Russia, the Latgale region of Latvia, The Netherlands, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, England (UK), Scotland (UK),[41] and Wales (UK),[42] and indeed small minorities in most of the other European countries.

Cuisine

Main article: European cuisine

The cuisines of Western countries are diverse by themselves, although there are common characteristics that distinguishes Western cooking from cuisines of Asian countries and others. Compared with traditional cooking of Asian countries, for example, meat is more prominent and substantial in serving-size. Steak in particular is a common dish across the West. Similarly to some Asian cuisines, Western cuisines also put substantial emphasis on sauces as condiments, seasonings, or accompaniments (in part due to the difficulty of seasonings penetrating the often larger pieces of meat used in Western cooking). Many dairy products are utilized in the cooking process, except in nouvelle cuisine. Wheat-flour bread has long been the most common sources of starch in this cuisine, along with pasta, dumplings and pastries, although the potato has become a major starch plant in the diet of Europeans and their diaspora since the European colonization of the Americas.

Clothing

The earliest definite examples of needles originate from the Solutrean culture, which existed in France from 19,000 BC to 15,000 BC. The earliest dyed flax fibers have been found in a cave the Republic of Georgia and date back to 36,000 BP. See Clothing in ancient Rome, 1100–1200 in fashion, 1200–1300 in fashion, 1300–1400 in fashion, 1400–1500 in fashion, 1500–1550 in fashion, 1550–1600 in fashion, 1600–1650 in fashion, 1650–1700 in fashion, Textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution.

Sport

Main article: Sport in Europe

Europe's influence on sport is enormous. Indeed, it is difficult to think of a modern sport, apart from basketball and related sports, that does not have its origins in Europe. European sports include:

In addition, Europe has numerous national or regional sports which do not command a large international following outside of emigrant groups. These include:

Some sporting organisations hold European Championships.

Some sport competitions feature a European team gathering athletes from different European countries. These teams use the European flag as an emblem. The most famous of these competitions is the Ryder Cup in golf .

Capitals of Culture

Each year since 1985 one or more cities across Europe are chosen as European Capital of Culture. Here are the past and future capitals:

Symbols

See also

References

  1. ↑ Mason, D. (2015). A Concise History of Modern Europe: Liberty, Equality, Solidarity. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 2.
  2. ↑ "Red dot becomes 'oldest cave art'". BBC News. 15 June 2012.
  3. ↑ 1960–1969, EMI Group Ltd, archived from the original on 28 May 2008, retrieved 31 May 2008
  4. ↑ Paul At Fifty: Paul McCartney Time Magazine'.' Retrieved 30 April 2010.
  5. ↑ Most Successful Group The Guinness Book of Records 1999, p.230. Retrieved 19 March 2011.
  6. ↑ 100 Greatest Artists Of All Time: The Beatles (No.1) Rolling Stone'.' Retrieved 19 March 2011.
  7. ↑ Rivadavia, Eduardo. "allmusic ((( New Wave of British Heavy Metal '79 Revisited - Overview )))".
  8. ↑ Avedon, Richard (14 April 2007). "The top 21 British directors of all time". The Daily Telegraph (UK). Retrieved 8 July 2009. Unquestionably the greatest filmmaker to emerge from these islands, Hitchcock did more than any director to shape modern cinema, which would be utterly different without him. His flair was for narrative, cruelly withholding crucial information (from his characters and from the audience) and engaging the emotions of the audience like no one else.
  9. ↑ December 28, 1895.
  10. ↑ Cahiers du cinéma, n°hors-série, Paris, April 2000, p. 32 (cf. also Histoire des communications, 2011, p. 10.).
  11. ↑ "Large Hadron Collider (LHC) generates a 'mini-Big Bang'". BBC News. 8 November 2010.
  12. ↑ http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_225_report_en.pdf
  13. ↑ Religions in Global Society - Page 146, Peter Beyer - 2006
  14. ↑ Cambridge University Historical Series, An Essay on Western Civilization in Its Economic Aspects, p.40: Hebraism, like Hellenism, has been an all-important factor in the development of Western Civilization; Judaism, as the precursor of Christianity, has indirectly had had much to do with shaping the ideals and morality of western nations since the christian era.
  15. ↑ Caltron J.H Hayas, Christianity and Western Civilization (1953),Stanford University Press, p.2: That certain distinctive features of our Western civilization — the civilization of western Europe and of America— have been shaped chiefly by Judaeo - Graeco - Christianity, Catholic and Protestant.
  16. ↑ Horst Hutter‏, University of New York, Shaping the Future: Nietzsche's New Regime of the Soul And Its Ascetic Practices (2004), p.111:three mighty founders of Western culture, namely Socrates, Jesus, and Plato.
  17. ↑ Fred Reinhard Dallmayr‏, Dialogue Among Civilizations: Some Exemplary Voices (2004), p.22: Western civilization is also sometimes described as "Christian" or "Judaeo- Christian" civilization.
  18. ↑ Dawson, Christopher; Glenn Olsen (1961). Crisis in Western Education (reprint ed.). p. 108. ISBN 978-0-8132-1683-6.
  19. ↑ Koch, Carl (1994). The Catholic Church: Journey, Wisdom, and Mission. Early Middle Ages: St. Mary's Press. ISBN 978-0-88489-298-4.
  20. ↑ Dawson, Christopher; Glenn Olsen (1961). Crisis in Western Education (reprint ed.). ISBN 978-0-8132-1683-6.
  21. ↑ Global Christianity.
  22. ↑ "Census - Final results : Portugal - 2011". Statistics Portugal. 20 November 2012. Retrieved 2012-11-21.
  23. ↑ Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas (Centre for Sociological Research) (April 2014). "Barómetro Abril 2014" (PDF). p. 153. Retrieved 28 June 2014.
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 Discrimination in the European Union in 2012 - T98 and T99.
  25. ↑ "Observatoire du patrimoine religieux". 1 February 2012. 94 % des édifices sont catholiques (dont 50 % églises paroissiales, 25 % chapelles, 25 % édifices appartenant au clergé régulier)
  26. ↑ EVS Luxembourg 2008 CEPS/INSTEAD
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 "Table 36: Persons, male and female, classified by religious denomination with actual percentage change, 2006 and 2011" (PDF). This is Ireland, Highlights from Census 2011, Part 1. Central Statistics Office. p. 104. Retrieved 14 April 2012.
  28. ↑ "Census 2011: Religion: KS211NI (administrative geographies)". nisra.gov.uk. Retrieved 11 December 2012.
  29. ↑ Ipsos MORI, Views on globalisation and faith, 5 July 2011
  30. ↑ http://www.clerus.org/clerus/dati/2008-12/05-6/proportioncathos08.htm
  31. ↑ Kirchenaustritte gingen 2012 um elf Prozent zurück
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 2011 Hungary Census Report
  33. ↑ Census 2002 "population by religions"
  34. ↑ "STANOVNIŠTVO PREMA VJERI, POPISI 2001. I 2011." [POPULATION BY RELIGION, 2001 AND 2011 CENSUSES] (in Croatian). Croatian Bureau of Statistics. 17 December 2012. Retrieved 12 May 2013.
  35. ↑ "Table 14 Population by religion" (PDF). Statistical Office of the SR. 2011. Retrieved Jun 8, 2012.
  36. ↑ Department of Statistics to the Government of the Republic of Lithuania. "Ethnicity, mother tongue and religion".. 2013-03-15.
  37. ↑ "Kerkelijke gezindte en kerkbezoek; vanaf 1849; 18 jaar of ouder". 15 October 2010.
  38. ↑ "Kirchenmitgliederzahlen am 31. Dezember 2010" (PDF). ekd.de. Retrieved 2012-03-10.
  39. ↑ "Population by religious belief and by municipality size groups" (PDF). Czech Statistical Office. Retrieved 23 April 2012.
  40. ↑ Piotr Eberhardt. Ethnic groups and population changes in twentieth-century Central-Eastern Europe: history, data, analysis. M.E. Sharpe, 2003. pp.92–93. ISBN 978-0-7656-0665-5
  41. ↑ "Scotland's Census 2011 – Table KS209SCb" (PDF). scotlandscensus.gov.uk. Retrieved 26 September 2013.
  42. ↑ "2011 Census: Key Statistics for Wales, March 2011". Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 15 December 2012.
  43. ↑ "Albania". International Religious Freedom Report 2009. Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, United States Department of State. 26 October 2009. Retrieved 7 November 2009.
  44. ↑ Religion and denominations in the Republic of Belarus by the Commissioner on Religions and Nationalities of the Republic of Belarus from November 2011
  45. ↑ http://features.pewforum.org/grl/population-percentage.php
  46. ↑ "International Religious Freedom Report 2008 – Bosnia and Herzegovina".
  47. ↑ 2011 census, p. 5.
  48. ↑ .
  49. ↑ 2002 Census Results. p. 132
  50. ↑ https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gr.html
  51. ↑ The newest polls show about 20% Greek citizens being irreligious which is much more than 1%. Ultimately, the statistics are disputed until the results of the new census.
  52. ↑ "Religions". CIA World Factbook. 2002 est. Retrieved 2013-06-21. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  53. ↑ http://www.rferl.mobi/a/moldovans_rally_against_recognition_of_islam/24179150.html
  54. ↑ 2011 Census Religion Statistics (final results) (Romanian)
  55. ↑ http://www.pewforum.org/2011/12/19/global-christianity-exec/ Pew
  56. ↑ Book 3 Page 13
  57. ↑ "What religious group do you belong to?". Sociology poll by Razumkov Centre about the religious situation in Ukraine (2006)
  58. ↑ "Religious communities and life stance communities, 1 January 2013". Statistics Norway. Retrieved 3 July 2014.
  59. ↑ "Populations by religious organizations 1998-2014". Reykjavík, Iceland: Statistics Iceland.
  60. ↑ name="svenskakyrkan 2013">Svenska kyrkan i siffror Svenska kyrkan
  61. ↑ Religious affiliation of the population, share of population, % 1950–2013 Statistics Finland
  62. ↑ "PC0454: AT LEAST 15-YEAR-OLD PERSONS BY RELIGION, SEX, AGE GROUP, ETHNIC NATIONALITY AND COUNTY, 31 DECEMBER 2011". Statistics Estonia. 31 December 2011. Retrieved 9 January 2014.
  63. ↑ "Tieslietu ministrijā iesniegtie reliģisko organizāciju pārskati par darbību 2011. gadā" (in Latvian). Retrieved 2012-07-25.
  64. ↑ "2011 Census: KS209EW Religion, local authorities in England and Wales". ons.gov.uk. Retrieved 18 December 2012.
  65. ↑ Church membership 1990–2014 Kirkeministeriet (Danish)
  66. ↑ Donk, W.B.H.J. van de; Jonkers, A.P.; Kronjee, G.J.; Plum, R.J.J.M. (2006). Geloven in het publieke domein, verkenningen van een dubbele transformatie, WRR, Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam
  67. ↑ . Zensus 2011 - Page 10.
  68. ↑ "Ständige Wohnbevölkerung ab 15 Jahren nach Religions- / Konfessionszugehörigkeit, 2012" (XLS). http://www.bfs.admin.ch'' (Statistics) (in German, French, and or Italian). Neuchâtel: Swiss Federal Statistical Office. 2014. Retrieved 2014-04-05.
  69. ↑ http://www.pewforum.org/uploadedfiles/Topics/Demographics/Muslimpopulation.pdf Islam in Europe states 3.2% Muslims in European Union, but non-European Union countries harbour even more Muslims so percents go to about 5.2%.
  70. ↑ "Table: Muslim Population by Country". PEW Research Centre.
  71. ↑ Alice Bertha Gomme, Traditional Games of England, Scotland, and Ireland. Volume 2, 1898
  72. ↑ NRA-rounders.co.uk History of Rounders

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