GeneralGlove

China, Confucianism

2005-04-05T14:21:00.000-07:00

Confucianism was perceived by the Mongols as a Chinese religion, and it had mixed fortunes under their rule. The teachings of the Neo-Confucian school of Chu Hsi from the Sung period were introduced to the Mongol court at Chung-tu in the late 1230s but were confined to limited circles there and in North China. Confucian scholars enjoyed the benefits extended to the clergy

Kerang

2005-04-04T20:20:00.000-07:00

Kerang is now on the rail line to Melbourne, 150 miles (240 km) southeast, and is the centre of an area of intensive irrigation

Nagaland

2005-04-04T09:41:00.000-07:00

State of India. It lies in the hills and mountains of the northeastern part of the country. One of the smallest states of India, it has a total area of just 6,401 square miles (16,579 square kilometres). It is bordered by the states of Manipur on the south, Assam on the west and northwest, and Arunachal Pradesh on the northeast. Myanmar (Burma) lies to the east. The capital is Kohima.

Dagestan

2005-04-03T18:33:00.000-07:00

Dagestan can be divided into five physical regions. The first, occupying most of the southern half of the republic, consists of the Caucasus Mountains, there at their widest.

Clotilda, Saint

2005-04-03T17:45:00.000-07:00

Clotilda was the granddaughter of Gundioc, king of Burgundy, who was related to the Visigothic kings and shared their Arian Christian faith. At Gundioc's death his kingdom was divided between his four sons, Gundobad, Godegesil,

Aztec

2005-04-03T08:19:00.000-07:00

Nahuatl-speaking people who in the 15th and early 16th centuries ruled a large empire in what is now central and southern Mexico. The Aztec are so called from Aztlán (“White Land”), an allusion to their origins, probably in northern Mexico. They were also called the Tenochca, from an eponymous ancestor, Tenoch, and the Mexica, probably from Metzliapán (“Moon Lake”), the mystical name

Mercator, Gerardus

2005-03-31T23:05:00.000-08:00

Original name Gerard De Cremer, or Kremer? Flemish cartographer whose most important innovation was a map, embodying what was later known as the Mercator projection, on which parallels and meridians are rendered as straight lines spaced so as to produce at any point an accurate ratio of latitude to longitude. He also introduced

Tillett, Benjamin

2005-03-31T13:28:00.000-08:00

The son of a railway labourer, Tillett settled in the East End of London when he was in his early 20s. There he helped to organize,

Arabia, History Of, The Qarmatians

2005-03-31T04:20:00.000-08:00

A more serious loss to 'Abbasid power in Arabia was occasioned by the appearance of Isma'ilite propaganda in Yemen about 880, in eastern Arabia about 899, and even briefly in Oman. From Yemen, Isma'ilis reached North Africa, where the Fatimid movement arose and conquered Egypt and for a time seriously threatened the 'Abbasids in Baghdad. The Qarmatians (Qaramitah), an extremist offshoot of

Gad

2005-03-29T22:08:00.000-08:00

After entering the Promised Land, each tribe was assigned a territory by Joshua, who replaced Moses as leader after the latter's death. The tribe

Ferdinand I

2005-03-29T08:33:00.000-08:00

Because his elder brother, Henry III, was an invalid, Ferdinand took the battlefield against the Muslims of Granada. When Henry III died in 1406, his son John II was an infant and the regency was divided between Henry's widow, Queen Catherine of Lancaster,

Rinehart, Mary Roberts

2005-03-29T06:34:00.000-08:00

Mary Roberts graduated from the Pittsburgh Training School for Nurses in 1896. That same year she married physician Stanley M. Rinehart. She and her husband started a family, and she took up writing in 1903 as a result of difficulties created by financial

Necker, Suzanne

2005-03-28T19:34:00.000-08:00

Née Curchod Swiss wife of the French finance minister under Louis XVI, Jacques Necker; mother of Madame de Staël; and mistress of a brilliant Parisian salon. At first she was engaged to the English historian Edward Gibbon, but his father broke off the match. In 1764 she married Necker, then a banker, and encouraged him in his political career.

Gainsborough

2005-03-28T17:10:00.000-08:00

Town, West Lindsey district, administrative and historic county of Lincolnshire, England. It stands on the River Trent, bordering Nottinghamshire. Gainsborough's early importance as a Saxon settlement was augmented when it became a military centre under the Danes (9th–11th centuries). Its position on a navigable river and a main road between London and the north of England

Affre, Denis-auguste

2005-03-27T14:28:00.000-08:00

Affre was ordained a priest in 1818 and became a Sulpician and a teacher of theology in 1819. He successively became vicar-general of the French dioceses of Luçon (1821), Amiens (1823), and Paris

Irish Needle Lace

2005-03-26T23:11:00.000-08:00

Lace made with a needle in Ireland from the late 1840s, when the craft was introduced as a famine-relief measure. Technically and stylistically influenced by 17th-century Venetian needle lace, it arose in several centres through the enterprise of individuals, especially the mother superiors of convents, who unraveled old examples to learn the technique and then taught

Futurism

2005-03-26T14:55:00.000-08:00

Futurism was first announced on Feb. 20, 1909, when the Paris newspaper Le Figaro published a manifesto

Lippmann, Walter

2005-03-25T21:41:00.000-08:00

While studying at Harvard (B.A., 1909), Lippmann was influenced by the philosophers William James and George Santayana. He helped to found (1914) The New Republic and served as its assistant editor under

Hale, Sir Matthew

2005-03-24T11:45:00.000-08:00

Hale was the son of Robert Hale, a barrister. Orphaned at

Chiang Ching-kuo

2005-03-23T19:13:00.000-08:00

The son of Chiang

Subatomic Particle

2005-03-21T13:07:00.000-08:00

Subatomic particles are, literally, particles that are smaller than atoms. The physical study of such particles

Oberlin

2005-03-21T03:54:00.000-08:00

City, Lorain county, northern Ohio, U.S., 35 mi (56 km) west-southwest of Cleveland. In 1833 the Rev. John L. Shipherd, a Presbyterian minister, and Philo P. Steward, a former missionary to the Choctaw Indians, founded the community and established the Oberlin Collegiate Institute (1833; designated a college after 1850) to train ministers and teachers for the West. The name was chosen to honour Johann

Antarctica, The development of IGY

2005-03-21T01:24:00.000-08:00

The idea for more frequent programs was born in 1950, when it was proposed that scientists take advantage of increasing technological developments, interest in polar regions, and, not the least, the maximum sunspot activity expected in 1957–58. (The earlier, second polar year was a year of sunspot minimum.) The idea quickly germinated and grew: a formalized version was adopted by

Epistemology, Epistemology as a discipline

2005-03-20T23:39:00.000-08:00

Why should there be such a subject as epistemology? Aristotle provided the answer when he said that philosophy begins in wonder, in a kind of puzzlement about things. Nearly all human beings wish to comprehend the world they live in, a world that includes the individual as well as other persons, and most people construct hypotheses of varying degrees of sophistication

Gwynn, Tony

2005-03-20T23:05:00.000-08:00

Gwynn attended San Diego (California) State University on a basketball scholarship, where he set a school record for assists as the team's point guard. He also excelled at baseball and was drafted in 1981 by

Gershwin, Ira

2005-03-19T13:20:00.000-08:00

Original name Israel Gershvin American lyricist who collaborated with his younger brother, George Gershwin, on more than 20 Broadway musicals and motion pictures until George's death (1937) and who later collaborated on films and plays with others—Moss Hart, Kurt Weill, Jerome Kern, Harry Warren, and Harold Arlen—and contributed to Gershwin

Carnivore, Form and function

2005-03-18T22:27:00.000-08:00

Hyenas have a total of 34 teeth, fewer than the generalized number found in other carnivores. The aardwolf has fewer upper and lower premolars and molars, resulting in from 28 to 32 teeth. The incisors are unspecialized in all members of the Hyaenidae, with the third incisor being the largest. The canines are well-developed, sharp, and elongate. Premolars of hyenas have well-developed

Matteucci, Pellegrino

2005-03-18T19:57:00.000-08:00

Italian explorer who was the first European to traverse the whole of the African continent north of the equator from Egypt to the Gulf of Guinea. The journey took him through many parts of Africa that had been only marginally explored by Europeans. While his crossing is well remembered as an exploit, Matteucci failed to compile any

English Literature, Theatres in London and the provinces

2005-03-18T01:21:00.000-08:00

So the London theatres were a meeting ground of humanism and popular taste. They inherited, on the one hand, a tradition of humanistic drama current at court, the universities, and the Inns of Court (collegiate institutions responsible for legal education). This tradition involved the revival of classical plays and attempts to adapt Latin conventions to English,

Pregnancy, Vagina

2005-03-17T20:09:00.000-08:00

The pinkish tan colour of the lining of the vagina gradually takes on a bluish cast during the early months of pregnancy as a result of the dilation of the blood vessels in the vaginal wall; later the vaginal wall tends to become a purplish red colour as the blood vessels become further engorged. The cells of the vaginal mucosa increase in size. Added numbers of these

Cromwellian Chair

2005-03-16T18:18:00.000-08:00

Sturdy, squarish chair with a leather back and seat, studded with brass-headed nails, made in England in the mid-17th century during the Puritan period and named after Oliver Cromwell. Because luxury and almost any kind of ornament were shunned in the prevailing climate of austerity, the only decoration was the pattern of bright nail heads and bobbin turning, a series

Portico

2005-03-16T09:30:00.000-08:00

The portico is a principal feature of Greek temple architecture and thus a prominent element in Roman and all subsequent classically inspired structures. The types of portico furnish the main terms

Ampere

2005-03-15T06:50:00.000-08:00

Unit of electric current in the Système International d'Unités (SI), used by both scientists and technologists. Since 1948 the ampere has been defined as the constant current which, if maintained in two straight parallel conductors of infinite length of negligible circular cross section and placed one metre apart in a vacuum, would produce between these conductors

Zafrulla Khan, Sir Muhammad

2005-03-15T03:06:00.000-08:00

The son of the leading attorney of his native city, Zafrulla Khan studied at Government College in Lahore and received his LL.B. from King's College, London University, in 1914. He practiced

Icarus

2005-03-14T08:31:00.000-08:00

In Greek mythology, son of the inventor Daedalus who perished by flying too near the Sun with waxen wings. See Daedalus.

Jam And Lewis

2005-03-13T23:37:00.000-08:00

Jam and Lewis's emergence as major record producers was kick-started by Prince's pique. Keyboard player Jimmy Jam (James Harris III) and bassist Terry Lewis played together in local Minneapolis bands while in high school, graduating to Flyte Tyme, which evolved into Prince's backing band, the Time, in 1981. When Jam and Lewis produced the SOS Band's hit “Just Be Good to Me” in 1983, they

Instinct, Modifiable action patterns

2005-03-13T15:36:00.000-08:00

Some types of instinctive behaviour, while showing a rigid core of fixed action pattern, are still modifiable by conditioning and other learning processes (see above). A good example is provided by the nest-building behaviour of many birds: after the breeding female has chosen a nest site, she finds and deposits sticks or twigs or pieces of grass there. A jackdaw (Corvus

Wellman, William (augustus)

2005-03-13T14:01:00.000-08:00

Wellman left secondary school in Newton, Mass., to take up professional ice hockey. In 1917 he volunteered for ambulance duty in France, soon joined the French air corps, flew in combat, and was shot down. He returned to the United States

Wessel, Johan Herman

2005-03-11T14:33:00.000-08:00

From 1761 when he entered the University of Copenhagen until his death at 43, Wessel lived the bohemian life of a debt-ridden, perpetual student. He was one of the founders (1772) and the outstanding talent of the

Keeler, James (edward)

2005-03-11T08:34:00.000-08:00

Interested in astronomy from an early age, Keeler became assistant to the noted astronomer Samuel P. Langley at the Allegheny Observatory, Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1881. From 1886 to 1891 he was on the staff of the Lick

Ancona

2005-03-11T03:51:00.000-08:00

Capital of Ancona provincia and of Marche regione, in central Italy, on the Adriatic Sea on the farthest branch of the promontory that descends from the Conero massif. Founded by Syracusan colonists in about 390 BC, it was taken by Rome in the 2nd century BC and became a flourishing port, particularly favoured by the Roman emperor Trajan, who enlarged the harbour. Attacked by

Wyss, Johann Rudolf

2005-03-10T11:29:00.000-08:00

Wyss became professor of philosophy at the academy at Bern in 1805 and later chief librarian of the municipal library. He was a collector of Swiss tales and folklore, published in Idyllen,

Dan Takuma

2005-03-10T09:34:00.000-08:00

Manager of the giant Mitsui zaibatsu, the greatest of the family-owned combines in pre-World War II Japan. A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an important member of Japan's business elite, Dan was assassinated by right-wing nationalists who regarded him as a symbol of the evil power of high

Chamber Music

2005-03-09T17:38:00.000-08:00

For well over a century after its inception about 1600, chamber music was supported primarily by the nobility. Aristocratic establishments customarily employed groups of musicians who served as composers, conductors, and performers of a variety of operatic, orchestral, and chamber music; and traditionally the audiences were restricted to the patrons and their guests.

Turgot, Anne-robert-jacques, Baron De L'aulne

2005-03-08T17:59:00.000-08:00

French economist, who was an administrator under Louis XV and served as the comptroller general of finance (1774–76) under Louis XVI. His efforts at instituting financial reform were blocked by the privileged classes.

West Germany

2005-03-08T17:06:00.000-08:00

From 1949 to 1990, a republic consisting of the western two-thirds of what is now Germany. West Germany was created in 1949 when the United States, Great Britain, and France consolidated those zones, or portions, of Germany that they had occupied at the end of World War II. When West and East Germany were reunited in 1990, West Germany's constitution and official name (Federal Republic of Germany)

Woman Suffrage

2005-03-08T10:44:00.000-08:00

Women were excluded from voting in ancient Greece and Republican Rome, as well as in the few democracies that had emerged in Europe by the end of the 18th century. When the franchise was widened, as it was in the United Kingdom in 1832, women continued to be denied all voting rights. The question of women's voting

Gershwin, Ira

2005-03-08T02:11:00.000-08:00

Woman Suffrage

2005-03-06T21:28:00.000-08:00

Any of several viruses in the herpes family (Herpesviridae), frequently involved in human infection. The virus is so named for the enlarged cells produced by active infections; these cells are characterized by the inclusion of foreign matter, especially in the nucleus. Cytomegalovirus, which is transmitted by sexual contact or exposure to infected body fluids,

Girdle-tailed Lizard

2005-03-06T08:27:00.000-08:00

Their name is derived from the rings of spiny scales that encircle the tail, and sometimes the body, in a series of whorls. In some species the armoured girdles serve effectively as protection

Mountain, Crustal shortening

2005-03-06T07:16:00.000-08:00

In most mountain belts, terrains have been elevated as a result of crustal shortening by the thrusting of one block or slice of crust over another and/or by the folding of layers of rock. The topography of mountain ranges and mountain belts depends in part on the amount of displacement on such faults, on the angles at which faults dip, on the degree to which crustal shortening

Yoga

2005-03-05T20:38:00.000-08:00

The practical aspects of Yoga play a more important part than does its intellectual content, which is largely based on the philosophy of Sa

Lowell, A(bbott) Lawrence

2005-03-05T00:58:00.000-08:00

A member of a prominent Boston family, Lowell was the brother of the astronomer Percival Lowell and of the poet Amy Lowell. He graduated from Harvard (A.B. 1877, LL.B. 1880) and practiced law in Boston for 17 years before turning

Sanjo

2005-03-04T22:20:00.000-08:00

City, Niigata Prefecture (ken), Honshu, Japan, on the delta of the Shinano-gawa (Shinano River). Sanjo was founded as a castle town in the 16th century. It was a river port and post town during the Tokugawa era (1603–1867), when the city first became known as a centre of metal tool production. Carpenter tools and household hardware are still produced in more than 2,000 small workshops. Pop. (1980) 85,275.

Samarra'

2005-03-04T10:52:00.000-08:00

Town, central Iraq. Located on the Tigris River, it is the site of a prehistoric settlement of the 5th millennium BC. The town was founded between the 3rd and 7th centuries AD. In 836, when the 'Abbasid caliph al-Mu'tasim was pressured to leave Baghdad, he made Samarra' his new capital. He built a palace and gardens, and under his successors the town grew until it stretched along the Tigris for

Al-

2005-03-04T09:42:00.000-08:00

Arabic definite article, meaning “the.” It often prefixes Arabic proper nouns, especially place-names; an example is Al-Jazirah (Arabic: “The Island”), the name of an interfluvial region in The Sudan. The article is often used in lowercase form, hence al-Jazirah. Reference works, including Encyclopædia Britannica, often alphabetize names beginning with al- under the main part

John Day

2005-03-02T20:37:00.000-08:00

City, Grant county, northeast-central Oregon, U.S., situated at the confluence of John Day River and Canyon Creek, near the Strawberry Mountain Wilderness Area. (The North Fork of the John Day is part of the U.S. Wild and Scenic Rivers system.) A stopover on the Pony Express trail from The Dalles (220 miles [354 km] northwest), it originated in the early 1860s, along with adjacent Canyon City,

Zapolska, Gabriela

2005-03-02T20:09:00.000-08:00

Having tried unsuccessfully to pursue an acting career in Paris, Zapolska started writing cheap, sensationalist novels full of bitterness toward middle-class values, morality, and hypocrisy. Of her several novels written

Coal Mining, Mining methods

2005-03-01T17:32:00.000-08:00

Surface techniques can be broadly classified into (1) contour strip mining, (2) area strip mining, (3) open-pit mining, and (4) auger mining.

Empiricism, In contemporary philosophy

2005-03-01T15:46:00.000-08:00

The most influential Empiricist of the 20th century was the great British philosopher and logician Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), who at first was Lockean in his theory of knowledge—admitting both synthetic a priori knowledge and concepts of unobservable entities. Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951), the influential pioneer of the school of Linguistic Analysis, convinced Russell that

Canary Creeper

2005-02-28T10:58:00.000-08:00

Also called Canarybird Flower, Canarybird Vine, or Canary Nasturtium (species Tropaeolum peregrinum), annual climbing herb, of the family Tropaeolaceae, native to northwestern South America and introduced to other regions as a cultivated garden plant. It grows to a height of 1.8–3 m (6–10 feet). The leaves are round and deeply five-lobed. The flowers, about 2.5 cm (1 inch) across, are pale yellow and have a long, green spur.

Aryan

2005-02-27T19:30:00.000-08:00

(from Sanskrit arya, “noble”), a people who, in prehistoric times, settled in Iran and northern India. From their language, also called Aryan, the Indo-European languages of South Asia are descended. In the 19th century the term was used as a synonym for “Indo-European” and also, more restrictively, to refer to the Indo-Iranian languages (q.v.). It is now used in linguistics only in the

West Bengal

2005-02-27T17:02:00.000-08:00

State of India. It is located in the northeastern part of the country. It is bounded on the north by Bhutan and the state of Sikkim, on the east by Bangladesh, on the northeast by the state of Assam, on the south by the Bay of Bengal, on the southwest by the state of Orissa, on the northwest by Nepal, and on the west by the state of Bihar. Its area is 34,267 square miles (88,752 square kilometres). Although

Culavamsa

2005-02-26T06:08:00.000-08:00

The portion of the Culavamsa dealing with Ceylon's

Evolution, Selection against one of the homozygotes

2005-02-25T18:51:00.000-08:00

Suppose that one homozygous genotype, say A2A2, has lower fitness than the other two genotypes, A1A1 and A1A2. (This is the situation in many human diseases, such as phenylketonuria [PKU] and sickle-cell anemia. The heterozygotes and the homozygotes for the normal allele have equal fitness, higher than that of the homozygotes for the deleterious allele.) Call the fitness of these

Ya-an

2005-02-25T18:01:00.000-08:00

Established as the seat of a county under the Ch'in (221–206 BC) and Han (206 BC–AD 220) dynasties,

Lillehei, C(larence) Walton

2005-02-25T16:16:00.000-08:00

American surgeon who in 1952 performed the first successful open-heart operation; he also helped develop the first wearable pacemaker and artificial heart valves (b. Oct. 23, 1918, Minneapolis, Minn.—d. July 5, 1999, St. Paul, Minn.).

Gagaku

2005-02-25T07:11:00.000-08:00

(Japanese), Korean a-ak ancient court music. The name is a Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese characters for elegant music (ya yueh). Such music first appeared in Japan as an import from Korea in the 5th century and had become an established court tradition by the 8th century. The various forms of North Asian, Chinese, Indian, Southeast Asian, and indigenous Japanese music were organized in

Ear Disease, Ototoxic drugs

2005-02-24T18:57:00.000-08:00

Ototoxic (harmful to the ear) drugs can cause temporary and sometimes permanent impairment of auditory nerve function. Salicylates such as aspirin in large enough doses may cause ringing in the ears and then a temporary decrease in hearing that ceases when the person stops taking the drug. Quinine can have a similar effect but with a permanent impairment of auditory

Tung Chung-shu

2005-02-23T11:02:00.000-08:00

As a chief minister to the emperor Wu (c. 140–87) of the Han dynasty, Tung was chiefly responsible for the

Nephridium

2005-02-23T09:54:00.000-08:00

Nephridia occur in two

Literature, Norwegian.

2005-02-23T09:43:00.000-08:00

The year 2001 was a successful one for established authors in Norway. The 2001 Nordic Council Literature Prize was awarded to Jan Kjærstad for Oppdageren (1999). Lars Saabye Christensen won acclaim for his gigantic novel Halvbroren, which chronicled three generations in Oslo; it was awarded the Brage Prize and Bokhandlerprisen and was nominated for the 2002 Nordic Council Literature

Legal Ethics, Advertising and solicitation

2005-02-22T18:44:00.000-08:00

Traditionally, advertising by lawyers was forbidden almost everywhere. It has been a long-standing principle of professional ethics in Anglo-American countries that an attorney must not seek professional employment through advertising or solicitation, direct or indirect. The reasons commonly given have been that seeking employment through these means

Nagpur

2005-02-21T21:09:00.000-08:00

City, northeastern Maharashtra state, western India. It lies along the Nag River and is situated almost at the geographic centre of India. The present city was founded in the early 18th century by Bakht Buland, a Gond raja. It became the capital of the Bhonsles of the Maratha confederacy but in 1817 came under British influence. In 1853 the city lapsed into British control and in 1861 became

Ecstasy

2005-02-21T18:50:00.000-08:00

MDMA (3,4, Methylenedioxymethamphetamine), euphoria-inducing stimulant and hallucinogen. The use of Ecstasy, commonly known as “E,” has been widespread despite the drug's having been banned worldwide in 1985 by its addition to the international Convention on Psychotropic Substances. It is a derivative of the amphetamine family and a relative of the stimulant methamphetamine

Shiels, Robert

2005-02-20T08:48:00.000-08:00

Moving to London, where he was a printer, Shiels was employed by Samuel Johnson as an amanuensis on the Dictionary of the English Language. When this work was completed, Shiels, with others, began the compilation of a five-volume The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland, to the Time of Dean

Kilim

2005-02-20T04:06:00.000-08:00

Pileless floor covering handwoven by tapestry techniques in Anatolia, the Balkans, or parts of Iran. In the rest of Iran, the Caucasus, and Turkistan, the name for similar pieces is palas. In most kilims, a slit occurs wherever two colours meet along a vertical line in the pattern, but in a few Karabagh or South Caucasian pieces, interlocking methods are employed in order

Catania

2005-02-19T22:37:00.000-08:00

Latin Catana, or Catina, city, capital of Catania provincia, eastern Sicily, Italy, in the broad plain of Catania on the Ionian seacoast, south of Mount Etna. The city was founded in 729 BC by Chalcidians (settlers from Chalcis in the Greek island of Euboea) from Naxos, 50 miles (80 km) north. It acquired importance in the 5th century BC with Hieron I, tyrant of Syracuse, and his son Deinomenes, who conquered it and renamed

Chemical Compound, Monoterpenes

2005-02-19T21:49:00.000-08:00

The monoterpenes are isolated from their natural sources by distillation of the plant matter with steam. They are volatile oils, less dense than water, and have normal boiling points in the range 150°–185° C (300°–365° F). Purification is usually achieved by fractional distillation at reduced pressures or by regeneration from a crystalline derivative. Acyclic monoterpene hydrocarbons

France, History Of, The principalities of the south

2005-02-19T21:09:00.000-08:00

Provence lay in what is now the southeastern corner of France; it was not part of the west Frankish domains. Included in the Middle Kingdom from 843, it passed to the kings of Burgundy after 879 and to the emperors in the 11th century. But it was local counts once again who won prestige

Ardea

2005-02-18T22:47:00.000-08:00

Ancient town of the Rutuli people, and now a modern village in Roma provincia, Lazio regione, west-central Italy. It lies 23 miles (37 km) south of Rome. In ancient times it was an important centre of the cult of Juno. Ardea developed into one of the most important Latin cities and was a member of the Latin leagues of the 6th and 5th centuries BC. In 444 the town signed a treaty with the Romans,

Hexameter

2005-02-17T15:55:00.000-08:00

A line of verse containing six feet, usually dactyls (¢ {breve} {breve}). Dactylic hexameter is the oldest known form of Greek poetry and is the preeminent metre of narrative and didactic poetry in Greek and Latin, in which its position is comparable to that of iambic pentameter in English versification. The epics of Homer and of Virgil are composed in dactylic hexameter.

Celan, Paul

2005-02-17T10:45:00.000-08:00

When Romania came under virtual Nazi control in World War II, Celan was sent to

Haden, Charlie

2005-02-17T07:14:00.000-08:00

From the age of two Haden sang with his family's country music band on midwestern radio and television programs. He moved to Los Angeles and began to play jazz with Art Pepper and others. While working (1957–59) in pianist Paul

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler

2005-02-16T18:02:00.000-08:00

Ella Wheeler from an early age was an avid reader of popular literature, especially the novels of E.D.E.N. Southworth, Mary Jane Holmes, and Ouida

Aliger, Margarita Iosifovna

2005-02-16T03:26:00.000-08:00

Born into a poor family, Aliger was a committed communist from an early age. She studied writing in Moscow from 1934 to 1937 at what later became the Gorky Literary Institute. In the late 1930s she wrote prose sketches and verse diaries of her

Brabant Revolution

2005-02-15T19:24:00.000-08:00

(1789–90), a short-lived revolt of the Belgian provinces of the Austrian Netherlands against Habsburg rule. Centred in the province of Brabant, the revolution was precipitated by the comprehensive reforms of the Holy Roman emperor Joseph II (reigned 1765–90); these violated various medieval charters of provincial and local liberties, including Brabant's Joyeuse Entrée, which was

Arts, Central Asian, Siberian tribes

2005-02-14T15:10:00.000-08:00

In the virtually contemporary metalwork of Siberian nomads, single animals of the cat family, such as panthers, carry the Altaic tendency of exaggeration further by twisting their bodies into a circle. In slightly later Siberian plaques, subtle openwork is used, a feature rarely present in Altaic or Scythian objects but frequently encountered in the more rounded

Dziady

2005-02-13T16:30:00.000-08:00

In Slavic religion, all the dead ancestors of a family, the rites that are performed in their memory, and the day on which those rites are performed. Dziady take place three or four times a year; though the dates vary in different localities, dziady are generally celebrated in the winter before the beginning of Advent and in the spring on the Sunday of Doubting Thomas.

Resserella

2005-02-13T13:29:00.000-08:00

Extinct genus of brachiopods (lamp shells) that occurs as fossils in marine rocks of Middle Ordovician to Lower Silurian age (421 to 478 million years old).Resserella has a dorsal shell whose margin is horizontal, and a distal, or upper, shell with an arcuate (bow-shaped) margin. Both valves are often gently convex. Surface markings consist of fine lines, and the internal structure

Abdul Razak Bin Hussein, Tun Haji

2005-02-13T02:33:00.000-08:00

A lawyer by training, Abdul Razak joined the civil service in 1950, entered politics in 1955, and was a key figure in gaining his country's independence from Britain in 1957. As deputy prime minister and defense minister (1957–70) and as minister

Insurance, Types of policies

2005-02-13T00:19:00.000-08:00

Hospitalization insurance indemnifies for room

Novial

2005-02-12T18:05:00.000-08:00

Artificial language constructed in 1928 by the Danish philologist Otto Jespersen, intended for use as an international auxiliary language, but little used today. Its grammar is similar in type to that of Esperanto or Ido. Novial has one definite article, no gender for nouns except those denoting persons, noun plurals in -s, forms for a possessive (genitive) and an objective

Arts, Islamic, Early Islamic literature

2005-02-12T06:27:00.000-08:00

With the coming of Islam the attitude of the Arabs toward poetry seems to have changed. The new Muslims, despite their long-standing admiration for powerful language, often shunned poetry as reminiscent of pagan ideals now overthrown. For the Qur'an, in surah 26:225 ff., condemned the poets “who err in every valley, and say what they do not do. Only the perverse follow them!” The Qur'an,

Eylau, Battle Of

2005-02-11T11:28:00.000-08:00

(Feb. 7–8, 1807), one of the engagements in the Napoleonic War of the Third Coalition. The first major deadlock suffered by Napoleon, the battle was fought around the East Prussian town of Eylau (modern Bagrationovsk, Russia), 23 miles (37 km) south of Königsberg (Kaliningrad). The 76,000 Russians and Prussians under Leonty Leontyevich Bennigsen confronted 74,000 men under Napoleon shortly after

Boitano, Brian

2005-02-10T19:49:00.000-08:00

Boitano began skating at age eight. Shortly after that, he began taking skating lessons from Linda Leaver, who remained his only coach throughout his career. He quickly gained

Córdoba

2005-02-10T06:31:00.000-08:00

The city was founded in June 1573 by Jerónimo Luis de Cabrera, then governor of Tucumán, who named it Córdoba de la Nueva Andalucía (Córdoba of the

Quinton, Amelia Stone

2005-02-09T20:24:00.000-08:00

Amelia Stone grew up in a deeply religious Baptist household. As a young woman, she worked as a teacher and did charitable work at almshouses and prisons. She joined the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) in 1874 and worked as its New York organizer until 1877, when she

Annexation

2005-02-09T20:04:00.000-08:00

Annexation is frequently preceded by conquest and military occupation of the conquered

Alzheimer Disease

2005-02-08T13:07:00.000-08:00

Degenerative brain disorder that develops in mid to late adulthood. It results in a progressive and irreversible decline in memory and a deterioration of various other cognitive abilities. The disease is characterized by the destruction of nerve cells and neural connections in the cerebral cortex of the brain and by a significant loss of brain mass. The disease