Welcome to Wikipedia

the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit
Editing 6,822,413 articles, since January 2001

Almanac · Categories · Glossaries · Lists · Overviews · Portals · Search · Questions · Site news · Index

	Art		Geography		History		Philosophy		Society
	Culture		Health		People		Science		Technology

Today's featured article

Leucippus was a Greek philosopher of the 5th century BCE. He is credited with founding atomism, with his student Democritus. Leucippus divided the world into two entities: atoms, indivisible particles that make up all things, and the void, the nothingness between the atoms. Leucippus's ideas were influential in ancient and Renaissance philosophy. They were a precursor to modern atomic theory, but the two are only superficially similar. Leucippus's atoms come in infinitely many forms, all in constant motion, creating a deterministic world created by the collisions of atoms. The soul is viewed as an arrangement of spherical atoms, cycled through the body by respiration and creating thought and sensory input. Little is known of his life, with a few scholars doubting that he existed, attributing his ideas purely to Democritus. Two works are attributed to Leucippus, The Great World System and On Mind, but all of his writing has been lost except for one sentence. (Full article...)

Recently featured:

Today's featured picture

Sagunto is a municipality of Spain, located in the province of Valencia, approximately 30 km (19 mi) north of the city of Valencia. The municipality includes three differentiated urban nuclei: Ciutat Vella (Sagunto), Grau Vella and Puerto de Sagunto. More than half of the population lives in Puerto de Sagunto, situated on the Mediterranean Costa del Azahar. The Ciutat Vella is the site of the ancient Iberian and Roman city of Saguntum and a siege in 219 BC which was the trigger of the Second Punic War between the Carthaginians and the Romans. This panorama shows the Ciutat Vella, looking north from the hill on which Sagunto Castle stands.

Photograph credit: Diego Delso

Wikipedia community

Every page on Wikipedia is a collaborative effort. But there are some special places reserved for specific types of discussion and assistance. Find what you're looking for here:

Help (contents) — Use this if you need help editing. There is also a comprehensive range of help articles available here. You can ask a question about using Wikipedia at the Help Desk.
Community bulletin board — Requests for help within the Wikipedia community.
The Village Pump — These are main discussion forums for Wikipedia.
The Signpost — This is Wikipedia's local newspaper.
The Community Portal — This is the center of community involvement. Learn about projects and activities you can join to help improve Wikipedia.

Collaborations — Weekly, monthly, and ongoing collaborative article improvement drives within specific subject areas.
Reference Desk — Help other Wikipedians who are looking for specific information by answering their subject-related questions at the reference desk (like a library's information desk).
Local Embassy — For Wikipedia-related communication in languages other than English.
Department of Fun — Dedicated to FUN on Wikipedia.
Clinic for Wikipediholics — Sign-in to Wikipedia!
Welcoming committee — Greet newcomers.
Wikipedia Boot Camp — Take a crash course about Wikipedia!

In the News

Frank Bainimarama

Former prime minister of Fiji Frank Bainimarama (pictured) is sentenced to one year in prison for attempting to pervert the course of justice.
Flooding in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, leaves more than 110 people dead and at least 140 others missing.
Kyren Wilson wins the World Snooker Championship.
In horse racing, Mystik Dan wins the Kentucky Derby.
Following the Solomon Islands general election, Jeremiah Manele becomes the prime minister.

Did you know?

Forever Young

... that fans speculate that Forever Young (pictured), the winner of the Saudi Derby, might become a "horse girl" in the game Uma Musume Pretty Derby?
... that Addie Viola Smith was the first female Foreign Service officer to serve under the United States Department of Commerce?
... that in 88 BC, Lucius Cornelius Sulla carried out the first coup d'état in Roman history?
... that during a soccer game, Mike Watts and his co-commentator wove more than 200 Taylor Swift song titles into the broadcast?
... that Bedok Reservoir MRT station features a public artwork including a message that "dribbles down" the lift shaft in motifs of droplets?
... that Cinda Firestone, the heiress to the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company, directed a documentary about the 1971 Attica Prison riot?
... that in 1850s New Orleans, the French revolutionary Joseph Déjacque called for black slaves and the white working class to overthrow the United States in a social revolution?
... that The Ugly Black Bird, a Polish book that discredited the autobiographical value of Kosiński's The Painted Bird, initially received reviews that were "more negative than favourable"?
... that Cam Booser retired from baseball to work as a carpenter in 2017 and made it to Major League Baseball in 2024?

On this day...

May 11

Frontispiece of the Diamond Sutra

868 – A copy of the Diamond Sutra was printed in Tang-dynasty China, making it the world's oldest dated printed book (frontispiece pictured).
1889 – Bandits attacked a U.S. Army paymaster's escort in the Arizona Territory, stealing more than $28,000.
1970 – Lubbock, Texas, was struck by a tornado that left 26 people dead.
2010 – Gordon Brown resigned as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party after failing to strike a coalition agreement with the Liberal Democrats.
2022 – Myanmar civil war: Government troops killed 37 unarmed civilians in Mondaingbin.

Richard Feynman (b. 1918)
Judy Ann Santos (b. 1978)
Zenna Henderson (d. 1983)

More anniversaries:

Wikipedia's sister projects

Wikipedia is written by volunteer editors and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization that also hosts a range of other volunteer projects: