Austin P Torney Popular Books

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The Amber Room (Russian: Янтарная комната, tr. Yantarnaya Komnata, German: Bernsteinzimmer) was a chamber decorated in amber panels backed with gold leaf and mirrors, located in the Catherine Palace of Tsarskoye Selo near Saint Petersburg. Constructed in the 18th century in Prussia, the room was dismantled and eventually disappeared during World War II. Before its loss, it was considered an "Eighth Wonder of the World". A reconstruction was made, starting in 1979 and completed and installed in the Catherine Palace in 2003. The Amber Room was intended in 1701 for the Charlottenburg Palace, in Berlin, Prussia, but was eventually installed at the Berlin City Palace. It was designed by German baroque sculptor Andreas Schlüter and Danish amber craftsman Gottfried Wolfram. Schlüter and Wolfram worked on the room until 1707, when work was continued by amber masters Gottfried Turau and Ernst Schacht from Danzig (Gdańsk). It remained in Berlin until 1716, when it was given by the Prussian King Frederick William I to his ally Tsar Peter the Great of the Russian Empire. In Russia, the room was installed in the Catherine Palace. After expansion and several renovations, it covered more than 55 square metres (590 sq ft) and contained over 6 tonnes (13,000 lb) of amber. The Amber Room was looted during World War II by the Army Group North of Nazi Germany, and taken to Königsberg for reconstruction and display. Some time in early 1944, with Allied forces closing in on Germany, the room was disassembled and crated for storage in the Castle basement. Königsberg was destroyed by allied bombers in August 1944 and documentation of the room location ends there. Its eventual fate and current whereabouts, if it survives, remain a mystery. In 1979, the decision was taken to create a reconstructed Amber Room at the Catherine Palace in Pushkin. After decades of work by Russian craftsmen and donations from Germany, it was completed and inaugurated in 2003. Architecture The Amber Room is a priceless piece of art, with extraordinary architectural features such as gilding, carvings, 450 kg (990 lb) of amber panels, gold leaf, gemstones, and mirrors, all highlighted with candle light. Additional architectural and design features include statues of angels and children.Because of its unique features and singular beauty, the original Amber Room was sometimes dubbed the "Eighth Wonder of the World". Modern estimates of the room's value range from $142 million (2007) to over $500 million (2016). History Creation The Amber Room was begun in 1701 with the purpose of being installed at Charlottenburg Palace, the residence of Frederick, the first King in Prussia, at the urging of his second wife, Sophia Charlotte. The concept and design of the room was drafted by Andreas Schlüter. It was fabricated by Gottfried Wolfram, master craftsman to the Danish court of King Frederick IV of Denmark, with help from the amber masters Ernst Schacht and Gottfried Turau from Danzig, now Gdańsk in Poland.Although originally intended for installation at Charlottenburg Palace, the complete panels were eventually installed at Berlin City Palace. The Amber Room did not, however, remain at Berlin City Palace for long. Peter the Great of Russia admired it during a visit, and in 1716, King Frederick I's son Frederick William I presented the room to Peter as a gift, which forged a Russo-Prussian alliance against Sweden.The original Berlin design of the Amber Room was reworked in Russia in a joint effort by German and Russian craftsmen. It was Peter's daughter Empress Elizabeth who decided the amber treasure should be installed at Catherine Palace, where the Russian Imperial family typically spent their summers. After several other 18th-century renovations, the room covered more than 55 square metres (590 sq ft) and contained over 6 tonnes (13,000 lb) of amber. The room took over ten years to construct. Theft during World War II Shortly after the beginning of the German invasion of the Soviet Union in World War II, the curators responsible for removing the art treasures in Leningrad tried to disassemble and remove the Amber Room. However, over the years the amber had dried out and become brittle, making it impossible to move the room without the amber crumbling. The Amber Room was therefore hidden behind mundane wallpaper, in an attempt to keep German forces from seizing it, but the attempt to hide such a well-known piece of art failed.German soldiers of Army Group North disassembled the Amber Room within 36 hours under the supervision of two experts. On 14 October 1941, the priceless room reached Königsberg in East Prussia, for storage and display in the town's castle. On 13 November 1941, a Königsberg newspaper announced an exhibition of the Amber Room at Königsberg Castle. Last days in Königsberg Orders given by Hitler on 21 and 24 January 1945 ordered the movement of looted possessions from Königsberg. This allowed Albert Speer, Reichsminister of Armaments, and his administration team to transport cultural goods of priority. However, before the Amber Room could be moved, Erich Koch, who was in charge of civil administration in Königsberg during the final months of the war, abandoned his post and fled from the city, leaving General Otto Lasch in command.In August 1944, Königsberg was heavily fire-bombed by the Royal Air Force. It suffered further extensive damage from the artillery of the advancing Red Army before the final occupation on 9 April 1945. Disappearance and mysteries After the war, the Amber Room was never seen in public again, though reports have occasionally surfaced stating that pieces of the Amber Room survived the war. Several eyewitnesses claimed to have spotted the famous room being loaded on board the Wilhelm Gustloff, which left Gdynia on 30 January 1945, and was then promptly torpedoed and sunk by a Soviet submarine. In 1997, an Italian stone mosaic "Feel and Touch" that was part of a set of four stones which had decorated the Amber Room was found in Germany, in the possession of the family of a soldier who claimed to have helped pack up the amber chamber. The mosaic came into the hands of the Russian authorities and was used in the reconstruction. In 1998, two separate teams, one German and one Lithuanian, announced they had located the Amber Room. The German team pointed to a silver mine while the Lithuanian team believed the amber treasure was buried in a lagoon; neither of the two locations turned out to hold the Amber Room.In 2004, a lengthy investigation by British investigative journalists Catherine Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy concluded that the Amber Room was most likely destroyed when Königsberg Castle was damaged, first during the bombing of Königsberg by the Royal Air Force in 1944 and then by the Soviets' burning of the castle followed by shelling of the remaining walls. Official assessments, set out in documents from the Russian National Archives written by Alexander Brusov, head of the S.... Discover the Austin P Torney popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Austin P Torney books.

Best Seller Austin P Torney Books of 2024

  • The Ultimate Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam synopsis, comments

    The Ultimate Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

    Austin Torney

    This is truly my final effort. It is an all encompassing Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and contains the best from all my prior Omar rubaiyats, such as the Annotated, the Resplendent, th...

  • Sapiens Supreme synopsis, comments

    Sapiens Supreme

    Austin Torney

    Are we sapiens the product of evolution or are we special and supreme with a divine destiny?

  • The Solidarity of the Concordance synopsis, comments

    The Solidarity of the Concordance

    Austin P. Torney

    Wholeness arrives by mixing the suspension:Classicists drone toward dull perfection,Romanticists drown in feeling's affection;Worse, others alternate between extremesIt's not this ...

  • A Love Story of the Earth and the Moon synopsis, comments

    A Love Story of the Earth and the Moon

    Austin Torney

    Worldly Love. Around you I whirl, a necklace of pearl, Trailing afterimages of my world, Adorning you, thy bosom bountiful, With crystalline gems from another world. …

  • The Defense Intelligence Agent Enhanced Edition synopsis, comments

    The Defense Intelligence Agent Enhanced Edition

    Austin P. Torney

    This is the sequel to ‘Earth On the Edge of Forever’, completing the trilogy begun with ‘Butterflies At the Edge of Forever’, and relates the behind the scenes events of the Army a...

  • Starry Nights synopsis, comments

    Starry Nights

    Austin P. Torney

    Fully colorillustrated poetic observations about the stars.

  • How the Allies Won World War II synopsis, comments

    How the Allies Won World War II

    Austin P. Torney

    Free. Eyes Only Mysterious goingon with the German atom bomb.

  • Magical Moments synopsis, comments

    Magical Moments

    Austin P. Torney

    Color Illustrated. Magical scenes composited as they really could be on a perfect day. Revelations of nature. It wasn’t easy getting birds to pose for me and waiting for a glorious...

  • Magical Panoramas synopsis, comments

    Magical Panoramas

    Austin P. Torney

    Photorealistic panorama art of reality as it very well could be, at the rich time on the perfect day, each piece spanning two pages, which amazingly broadens the scope into the ove...

  • Omar Returns Rubaiyat Adorned synopsis, comments

    Omar Returns Rubaiyat Adorned

    Austin Torney

    This ‘Omar Returns Rubaiyat’ subsumes what was the small ‘Persian Dreams’ Rubaiyat that described Persian lore and poetry, and builds on it, with Omar returning to his beloved “Moo...

  • The God of the Old Testament synopsis, comments

    The God of the Old Testament

    Austin Torney

    An epic, artscaped, gothic masterpiece of a journey toward the Gods far and unknown. Video, too. My design, in this vaporous pipe dream, Is to converse with all the Gods who seem. ...

  • How the Allies Won World War II Top Secret synopsis, comments

    How the Allies Won World War II Top Secret

    Austin Torney

    Why Germany couldn’t perfect their Atomic Bomb. Top Secret.

  • The Happenstances of the Defense Intelligence Agent synopsis, comments

    The Happenstances of the Defense Intelligence Agent

    Austin P. Torney

    This is the sequel to ‘Earth On the Edge of Forever’, and relates the behind the scenes events of the Army and Defense Intelligence Agency in the Pacific, along with more of the Wo...

  • The Extended Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Via Its Equal Interspersed synopsis, comments

    The Extended Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Via Its Equal Interspersed

    Austin Torney

    Greatly illustrated. Interwoven into FitzOmar's 115 original Rubaiyat quatrains are many additional, improved 'Omar Khayyam' quatrains from the Bodleian and Calcutta manuscripts, a...

  • The Narrative Uni-Versed Poem-Story of Our Poetic Universe synopsis, comments

    The Narrative Uni-Versed Poem-Story of Our Poetic Universe

    Austin Torney

    Why there has to be a Permanent Existent and 'Nothing' could not obtainA Theory of Everything.

  • The Gods Meet Each Other synopsis, comments

    The Gods Meet Each Other

    Austin Torney

    An epic, artscaped, gothic masterpiece of a journey toward the Gods far and unknown. Video, too. My design, in this vaporous pipe dream, Is to converse with all the Gods who seem. ...

  • Scientific Exploits, Revelations, Realizations, and Implications synopsis, comments

    Scientific Exploits, Revelations, Realizations, and Implications

    Austin P. Torney

    Video; illustrated. The “dry” formulas from science books are depended on for a large portion of our existence, and while we may stand in awe at their deeper meaning and even enjoy...

  • Illuminated, the Good Book of the Humanist Bible synopsis, comments

    Illuminated, the Good Book of the Humanist Bible

    Austin P. Torney

    Lavish illustrations ,and video. The title says it all. An antiword. Both inspirational and funny.

  • Rubaiyat II Illustrated An Omarian Universal Day synopsis, comments

    Rubaiyat II Illustrated An Omarian Universal Day

    Austin Torney

    The light of Omar Khayyam shines again, in this epic successor to the FitzOmar Rubaiyat, via Omar’s quatrain conversations with his beloved female, the Moon of his Delight who know...

  • Flora Symbolica Lore of the Flowers Painted by MidJourney synopsis, comments

    Flora Symbolica Lore of the Flowers Painted by MidJourney

    Austin Torney

    390 pages. Herein we have the language of the flowers with beautiful Midjourney AI art.

  • The God of Irreducible Complexity synopsis, comments

    The God of Irreducible Complexity

    Austin Torney

    An epic, artscaped, gothic masterpiece of a journey toward the Gods far and unknown. Video, too. My design, in this vaporous pipe dream, Is to converse with all the Gods who seem. ...

  • Being Explained Enhanced Edition synopsis, comments

    Being Explained Enhanced Edition

    Austin Torney

    Why the reality of being is the way it is and what makes it up.

  • The God of the Agnostics synopsis, comments

    The God of the Agnostics

    Austin Torney

    An epic, artscaped, gothic masterpiece of a journey toward the Gods far and unknown. Video, too. My design, in this vaporous pipe dream, Is to converse with all the Gods who seem. ...

  • Illustrated Take-Offs synopsis, comments

    Illustrated Take-Offs

    Austin Torney

    Humorous illustrations, many of which I made, mainly those that are lists of things. Much original humor. It took ages to make and/or collect all these.

  • The Art of Love synopsis, comments

    The Art of Love

    Austin P. Torney

    The Love Life of the GlowwormFlashing desire, the glowfly twinkled acrossThe starry summer sky, love’s energy unspent,Searching through the darkness,With passion’s might,For the be...

  • Selected Ornamented Quatrains of Austin P. Torney synopsis, comments

    Selected Ornamented Quatrains of Austin P. Torney

    Austin Torney

    Beautiful floral framed selections from my quatrains, with one or a few per page.

  • The Great Omar synopsis, comments

    The Great Omar

    Austin Torney

    The book had 1,051 semiprecious stones, Set in 18carat gold, many in the cover alone, 5,000 separate pieces of collared leathers, And 100 square feet of 22carat feathered Gold ...

  • Elfin Legends Enhanced synopsis, comments

    Elfin Legends Enhanced

    Austin P. Torney

    Lavish color illustration; video. An epically rendered and fabulous journey through the otherworlds and netherworlds of phantoms and phantasms.

  • Persian Dreams synopsis, comments

    Persian Dreams

    Austin Torney

    A short 'rubaiyat' on Persian dreams and poetry, finely illustrated. 18 quatrains. Perhaps it will continue someday, but for now here it is.

  • The God of Nature synopsis, comments

    The God of Nature

    Austin Torney

    An epic, artscaped, gothic masterpiece of a journey toward the Gods far and unknown. Video, too. My design, in this vaporous pipe dream, Is to converse with all the Gods who seem. ...

  • Fantastic Tales Ornamented synopsis, comments

    Fantastic Tales Ornamented

    Austin Torney

    Misc. ornamented/embellished/decorated short tales and poems along with ‘Spring Fever’