PastTrain

Balashikha

2005-04-05T03:06:00.000-07:00

Also spelled Balašicha, city, Moscow oblast (province), western Russia, situated 15 miles (25 km) east of Moscow on the banks of the Pekhorka River. Balashikha developed in the 19th century, first as the site of a cloth factory and later as a centre for papermaking. In Soviet times it underwent rapid growth and was incorporated in 1939. The city is now a heavy-industrial centre, specializing in machine building.

Radial Keratotomy

2005-04-04T11:59:00.000-07:00

Surgical procedure to correct myopia (nearsightedness) by reducing the radius of curvature of the cornea and astigmatism (asymmetrical curvature of the cornea). A series of 4 to 8 equally spaced deep cuts are made in the peripheral cornea, leaving the central cornea above the pupil clear. Intraocular pressure then pushes the weakened central cornea outward, flattening

Pacific Islands, Plant and animal life

2005-04-04T07:48:00.000-07:00

Most island vegetations reveal Asian ancestries stemming from Indonesia and New Guinea. Generic variety declines eastward across the Pacific, providing evidence that seeds and fruits carried by ocean currents, birds, winds, and island voyagers encountered mounting obstacles to acceptance. The easternmost islands were host to limited plant dispersal movement

Roman Script

2005-04-03T00:24:00.000-08:00

Also called Antiqua Script, Italian Lettera Antica, in calligraphy, script based upon the clear, orderly Carolingian writing that Italian humanists mistook for the ancient Roman script used at the time of Cicero (1st century BC). They used the term roman to distinguish this supposedly classical style from black-letter and national hands. It was upon the model of antica, or roman, scripts that Renaissance scribes evolved

Adela

2005-04-02T15:39:00.000-08:00

Adela was married to Stephen, count of Meaux and Brie, in 1080 at Breteuil. Upon the death of his father in 1090, her husband succeeded to the countships of Blois and Chartres. She took an active interest in civil and ecclesiastical affairs and was

Aechmea

2005-04-02T11:45:00.000-08:00

Genus of epiphytes (plants that are supported by other plants and have aerial roots exposed to the humid atmosphere) of the pineapple family (Bromeliaceae), with more than 140 species distributed in South America. Spiny-edged leaves, usually about 30 to 60 cm (about 12 to 24 inches) long, grow in a rosette from the root. A spike of red and yellow flowers, often with blue

Paraguaná Peninsula

2005-04-01T23:35:00.000-08:00

Spanish Península De Paraguaná, Falcón estado (“state”), northwestern Venezuela. It lies between the Caribbean Sea on the east and the Gulf of Venezuela on the west. Of low elevation, the peninsula has infertile soil and is sparsely populated, but the development of the petroleum industry, especially in the 1950s and '60s, gave Paraguaná great economic importance. Pipelines lead from the oil fields at Lake Maracaibo

Philip V

2005-04-01T15:51:00.000-08:00

King of Macedonia from 221 to 179, whose attempt to extend Macedonian influence throughout Greece resulted in his defeat by Rome. His career is significant mainly as an episode in Rome's expansion. The son of Demetrius II and his wife Phthia (Chryseis), the young prince was adopted, after his father's death in 229, by his half-cousin Antigonus Doson, who took

Epistemology, Aristotle

2005-03-31T08:52:00.000-08:00

In Posterior Analytics, Aristotle (384–22 BC) analyzes scientific knowledge in terms of necessary propositions that express causal relations. Such knowledge takes the form of categorical syllogisms, in which the middle term causally and necessarily connects the major and minor terms. For example, because all stars are distant and all distant objects twinkle, it follows

épernon, Jean-louis De Nogaret De La Valette, Duke (duc) D'

2005-03-30T02:23:00.000-08:00

Of obscure nobility, La Valette rose to prominence as a favourite of Henry III, who created him duke and peer of France in 1582. He and Anne de Joyeuse acted virtually as prime ministers in the 1580s. His rapacity was notorious, but he also showed great political ability

Spoon

2005-03-29T21:15:00.000-08:00

An implement consisting of a small, shallow, bowl-shaped receptacle supported by a handle, used for eating, serving, and cooking foods. Spoons, together with forks, are known as flatware (q.v.).

Round, Henry Joseph

2005-03-29T03:48:00.000-08:00

Round worked with Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company, Ltd., from 1902 to 1914, first in the United States, where he improved the tuning components of radio receivers and built early radio direction

Oruro

2005-03-28T22:18:00.000-08:00

City, west-central Bolivia. It lies at 12,150 feet (3,702 m) above sea level in the Altiplano region, 30 miles (48 km) north of Poopó Lake. Founded in 1606 as Real Villa de San Felipe de Austria (“Royal Town of St. Philip of Austria”), Oruro rose to prominence during the Spanish colonial period as the centre of a rich silver-mining region. It lost importance with the decline of silver production in the 19th

Itaya Hazan

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

After studying sculpture at the Tokyo Fine Arts School, Itaya graduated in 1894 and then studied ceramics, building a kiln in Tokyo in 1904. In 1953 he received the Bunka Kunsho (“Order of Culture”). Itaya's most famous works include a pot decorated with flowers in bright glaze

Ahram, Al-

2005-03-28T07:17:00.000-08:00

It was founded in 1875 by two Lebanese-Christian brothers, Salim and Bishara Takla. As a daily from 1881, the paper became famous for its independence and objectivity, despite British censorship and control, and for its coverage of international

Kyongsang-puk

2005-03-26T11:40:00.000-08:00

Do (province), eastern South Korea. It is bounded on the east by the Sea of Japan (East Sea), on the south by Kyongsang-nam do, on the west by the do of Cholla-puk and Ch'ungch'ong-puk, and on the north by Kangwon do. It is South Korea's largest do in both size and population. The homeland of the Silla kingdom (57 BC–AD 935), of which there are historical remains, mainly in the Kyongju area, Kyongsang-puk has

Ch'i-lin

2005-03-25T13:42:00.000-08:00

Pinyin Qilin, in Chinese mythology, the unicorn whose rare appearance often coincides with the imminent birth or death of a sage or illustrious ruler. (The name is a combination of the two characters ch'i, “male,” and lin, “female.”) A ch'i-lin has a single horn on its forehead, a yellow belly, a multicoloured back, the hooves of a horse, the body of a deer, and the tail of an ox. Gentle of disposition,

Polar Coordinates

2005-03-24T21:24:00.000-08:00

System of locating points in a plane with reference to a fixed point (origin) and an axis through that point. The coordinates are written (r,q), in which r is the distance from the origin to any desired point and q is the angle made by the vector r and the axis. A simple relationship exists between Cartesian coordinates given in terms of two reference axes (x,y) and the polar coordinates

Biblical Literature, New Testament history

2005-03-24T09:26:00.000-08:00

(Jewish culture and history): Standard works are R.H. Pfeiffer (op. cit.); and George F. Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era, 3 vol. (1927–30). (Qumran, Dead Sea Scrolls): Frank Moore Cross. Jr. (op. cit.); on Qumran and New Testament problems, see Krister Stendahl (ed.), The Scrolls and the New Testament (1958). (Greco-Roman culture and history): William W. Tarn, Hellenistic Civilisation, 3rd ed. rev. (1952). For a broad cultural comparison, see Eric R. Dodds, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety (1965). (Pauline chronology): The debate can be best assessed by comparing John Knox, Chapters in a Life of Paul (1950), with Dieter Georgi, Die Geschichte der Kollekte des Paulus für Jerusalem (1965).

Papaloapan River

2005-03-23T22:47:00.000-08:00

Spanish Río Papaloapan, river in Veracruz estado (“state”), southeastern Mexico. It is formed by the junction of several rivers in Oaxaca estado, near the Veracruz-Oaxaca border, and meanders generally northeastward for 76 miles (122 km) to Alvarado Lagoon, just south of Alvarado. Its chief headstreams include the Santo Domingo, Tonto, and Valle Nacional, which rise in the Sierra Madre Oriental. Since

Bradley, James

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

Bradley was educated

Polignac Family

2005-03-22T09:47:00.000-08:00

From the 1050s and perhaps even from 860, the first viscounts of Polignac (in the modern département of Haute-Loire) were practically independent rulers of Velay, where the Loire River rises. Their ultimate heiress, Valpurge, was married in 1349 to Guillaume III de Chalençon, whose descendants assumed the Polignac name in 1421. The actual

Selinus

2005-03-22T08:00:00.000-08:00

Selinus was founded in 651 or 628 BC by colonists from Megara Hyblaea and from Megara in Greece. The city got its name from the wild celery (Greek: selinon) that still grows in the locality. It achieved great prosperity in the 5th century BC, when its

Low, Juliette Gordon

2005-03-22T00:17:00.000-08:00

Juliette Gordon was born into a prominent Georgia family. She was educated at private schools in Virginia and New York City and for some years thereafter traveled widely. She married William M. Low, a fellow native of Savannah, Georgia, who was living in England,

Algeria, Resources

2005-03-21T17:06:00.000-08:00

Deposits of natural gas were first discovered at Hassi R'Mel in 1956, and since

Peninsular Campaign

2005-03-20T22:21:00.000-08:00

(April 4–July 1, 1862), in the American Civil War, large-scale but unsuccessful Union effort to capture the Confederate capital at Richmond, Va., by way of the peninsula formed by the York and the James rivers. Following the engagement between the ironclads Monitor and Merrimack at nearby Hampton Roads (March 9), Federal supplies and 100,000 troops were disembarked at Fort Monroe under

Moleschott, Jacob

2005-03-19T19:08:00.000-08:00

Moleschott studied medicine (1842–45) at the University

Polignac Family

2005-03-19T04:23:00.000-08:00

The BJP traces its roots to the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS; Indian People's Association), which was established in 1951 as the political wing of the Hindu paramilitary group Rashtriya Swayamesevak Sangh (RSS; National Volunteers Corps) by Shyama Prasad Mukherjee. The BJS advocated the rebuilding of India in accordance

Roseburg

2005-03-18T13:32:00.000-08:00

City, seat (1854) of Douglas county, southwestern Oregon, U.S., on the South Umpqua River, between the Coast (west) and Cascade (east) ranges. Settled in 1851, it was known as Deer Creek but was renamed for Aaron Rose, who laid out the town site in 1854. The city's economy was based for many years on wood-products industries and sawmills; sheep raising and wine making are other economic factors. There

Anthony Of Kiev

2005-03-18T11:33:00.000-08:00

Seeking a solitary life, Anthony became a monk about 1028 at the Greek Orthodox monastery of Esphigmenon on Mount Athos, in Greece. According to an account contained in the 12th-century The Russian Primary Chronicle (Povest vremennykh let), Anthony

Kashmir, Vale Of

2005-03-17T08:21:00.000-08:00

Scenic intermontane valley between the main Himalayan ranges (northeast) and the Pir Panjal Range (southwest), in northwestern India. The valley is an ancient lake basin 85 mi (140 km) long, 20 mi wide, and 5,300 ft (1,620 m) high. Drained by the upper Jhelum River, the valley is lined by 12,000–16,000-ft-high mountains that help shelter it from the wet southwest monsoon. It is the centre of population for the Kashmir

Mckinley, Ida

2005-03-17T06:18:00.000-08:00

After William was shot in Buffalo, New York, in 1901, he whispered to an aide as he fell, “My wife, be careful how you tell her—Oh be careful.” Although deeply grieved by her husband's death, she apparently suffered no more seizures for the rest of her life, though some believe a seizure caused her death in 1907. She was entombed in the McKinley Memorial Mausoleum in Canton.

Costanoan

2005-03-16T11:09:00.000-08:00

Any of several dialectally related California Indian peoples speaking a Penutian language and originally living in an area stretching from the San Francisco Bay region southward to Point Sur. The people were scattered in villages, and groupings were only later identified on the basis of proximity to the Franciscan missions established among them (see Mission

Cushing, Caleb

2005-03-15T05:03:00.000-08:00

After serving in the state legislature and the U.S. Congress (1835–43), Cushing was appointed U.S. commissioner to China. There he negotiated the Treaty of Wanghia (1844) establishing the principle of extraterritoriality. In 1852 he became an associate

Hagia Sophia

2005-03-15T03:27:00.000-08:00

Also called Church Of The Holy Wisdom, Turkish Ayasofya, cathedral built at Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) under the direction of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I. It is a unique building and one of the world's great monuments, despite time's ravages. The structure, a domed basilica, was built in the amazingly short time of about six years, being completed in AD 537. The architects were Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus.

Japanism

2005-03-14T20:32:00.000-08:00

The prints

Indiana State University

2005-03-14T19:01:00.000-08:00

Public, coeducational institution of higher learning in Terre Haute, Ind., U.S. It comprises the College of Arts and Sciences and schools of Business, Education, Nursing, Technology, Graduate Studies, and Health, Physical Education, and Recreation. The university offers a range of undergraduate and graduate degree programs. Campus facilities include an observatory,

Arabia, History Of, Quraysh

2005-03-13T21:39:00.000-08:00

According to Muslim tradition, Mecca had at one time been in the hands of Jurhum, a people living on the central west coast recorded in Greco-Latin sources as Gorrhamites. But sometime about AD 500 (“five generations before the Prophet Muhammad”) Qusayy ibn Kilab, called al-Mujammi' (“The Unifier”), is credited with having brought together scattered groups of Bedouin and installed

Kadet

2005-03-13T02:11:00.000-08:00

The Kadets dominated the first Duma in 1906, but the tradition

Rabemananjara, Jacques

2005-03-12T07:59:00.000-08:00

Rabemananjara began writing in the early 1940s and published his first volume of verse, Sur les marches du soir (“On the Edges of Evening”), in 1942. A death sentence imposed on him for his alleged participation in the 1947 revolt in Madagascar embittered him, despite a later reprieve, and the poems of Antidote, written

Dachau

2005-03-11T21:31:00.000-08:00

Dachau is situated on a hill, on the summit of which are the castle of the Wittelsbachs and a parish church (1625). The city's picturesque natural setting has long attracted landscape painters.

Munk, Walter

2005-03-11T10:18:00.000-08:00

On June 18, 1999, American oceanographer Walter Munk of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, at the University of California, San Diego, won the 15th annual Kyoto Prize in Basic Sciences for his work in physical oceanography and geophysics; he became the first in his field to be honoured with this award. At a ceremony in Kyoto, Japan, the Inamori Foundation presented him with

Prophets, The Lives Of The

2005-03-11T04:15:00.000-08:00

Pseudepigraphal collection (not in any scriptural canon) of folk stories and legends about the major and minor biblical prophets and a number of other prophetic figures from the Old Testament books of I Kings, II Chronicles, and Nehemiah. The work demonstrates the popularity of religious and philosophical biography in the Mediterranean and Near Eastern areas

Abu'l-wafa'

2005-03-10T20:14:00.000-08:00

Abu'l-Wafa' worked in a private observatory in Baghdad, where he made observations to determine, among other astronomical parameters, the obliquity of the ecliptic, the length of the seasons, and the latitude of the city.

Brian

2005-03-10T19:20:00.000-08:00

In 976 Brian became king of a small state, later called Dál Cais, and also king of Munster, whose Eóghanachta rulers had been defeated (964) by Brian's half brother. Brian destroyed first the Eóghanachta septs and then the Northmen, constructing a fleet to drive them from the Shannon. Under his rule Munster

Cáceres

2005-03-10T06:28:00.000-08:00

Town, capital of Cáceres provincia, in the Extremadura comunidad autónoma (“autonomous community”), western Spain. It is built on a low east-west ridge, south of the Tagus River and about 50 miles (80 km) northeast of Badajoz. Originating as the Roman town of Norba Caesarina, it was under Moorish control from the 9th century and was known as Alkazares until reconquered for the Christians

Wickerwork

2005-03-09T05:05:00.000-08:00

Furniture made of real or simulated osier (rods or twigs) plaited into appropriate shapes. The Egyptians made furniture of this kind in the 3rd millennium BC, and it has always flourished in those regions in which there is a plentiful supply of riverside vegetation. A well-known example of Roman wickerwork is the chair on a 3rd-century-AD relief in the Rheinisches Landesmuseum

Füssen

2005-03-08T17:30:00.000-08:00

City, Bavaria Land (state), extreme southern Germany. It lies along the Lech River, at the east foot of the Allgäu Alps, near the Austrian border. The site of a Roman frontier station, the city developed around the Benedictine abbey of St. Magnus (founded 628) and was chartered about 1294. A treaty concluded there in 1745 led to the withdrawal of Bavaria from the War of the Austrian Succession.

Bohemian Confession

2005-03-07T09:36:00.000-08:00

Latin Confessio Bohemica, Protestant doctrinal statement formulated in Bohemia by the Czech Utraquists (moderate Hussites) in 1575 and subscribed to by the Unitas Fratrum, Lutherans, and Calvinists in the kingdom. The document was based on the Augsburg Confession, and it upheld the Lutheran position on justification and the Calvinist interpretation of the Eucharist. Though Emperor Maximilian

Plant Disease, Biological control

2005-03-07T06:39:00.000-08:00

Biological control of plant diseases involves the use of organisms other than humans to reduce or prevent infection by a pathogen. These organisms are called antagonists; they may occur naturally within the host's environment, or they may be purposefully applied to those parts of the potential host plant where they can act directly or indirectly on the

Bridgeport

2005-03-07T06:13:00.000-08:00

City, coextensive with the town (township) of Bridgeport, Fairfield county, southwestern Connecticut, U.S. The city, the most populous in the state, is a port on Long Island Sound at the mouth of the Pequonnock River. Settled in 1639, it was first known as Newfield and later as Stratfield. In 1800 it was incorporated as a borough and named Bridgeport for the first drawbridge over the

Tébessa

2005-03-06T23:21:00.000-08:00

Latin Theveste town, northeastern Algeria. It is located 146 miles (235 km) by road south of Annaba and 12 miles (19 km) west of the Tunisian frontier. Tébessa was an outpost of Carthage in the 7th century BC and a Roman garrison town in 146 BC. It declined in the 5th and 6th centuries AD and disappeared from history after the Arab invasion of the 7th century. The Turks stationed a small military garrison there, and, after

Argentina, Overviews

2005-03-06T10:54:00.000-08:00

The colonial and early national periods are variously covered in Eduardo Crawley, A House Divided: Argentina, 1880–1980 (1984); John Lynch, Argentine Dictator: Juan Manuel De Rosas, 1829–1852 (1981); David Rock, Argentina, 1516–1987: From Spanish Colonization to Alfonsín (1987); James R. Scobie, Argentina: A City and a Nation, 2nd ed. (1971); and Ione S. Wright and Lisa M. Nekhom, Historical Dictionary of Argentina (1978).

Permafrost, Effects of solar radiation, vegetation, and snow cover

2005-03-06T05:36:00.000-08:00

Inasmuch as south-facing hillslopes receive more incoming solar energy per unit area than other slopes, they are warmer; permafrost is generally absent on these in the discontinuous zone and is thinner in the continuous zone. The main role of vegetation in permafrost areas is to shield perennially frozen ground from solar energy. Vegetation is an excellent insulating

Gymnure

2005-03-05T00:06:00.000-08:00

Also called Hairy Hedgehog, any of five species of Asian mammals composing the subfamily Echinosoricinae of the hedgehog (q.v.) family (Erinaceidae). These ratlike animals lack the short, barbless spines of spiny hedgehogs but have coarse guard hairs. Their tails are well developed. Gymnures are extremely malodorous. An example is the common gymnure (Echinosorex

Nicholas Of Cusa

2005-03-03T14:59:00.000-08:00

At the Council of Basel in 1432, he gained recognition for his opposition to the candidate put forward by Pope Eugenius IV for the archbishopric of Trier. To his colleagues

France, History Of, Demographic changes

2005-03-03T13:50:00.000-08:00

Rates of demographic growth varied greatly from place to place: in Brittany, where typhoid fever was endemic, population figures peaked in 1700. In Quercy they grew by 70 percent between 1700 and 1786. But, regardless of local variations, France as a whole counted two million more peasants in 1790 than during the reign of Louis XIV. Better preventive medicine, a decline in infant mortality,

Gymnure

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

Formerly (1947–98) South Pacific Commission organization founded in 1947 by the governments of Australia, France, New Zealand, The Netherlands, Great Britain, and the United States to advise them on economic, social, and health matters affecting the South Pacific island territories they administered. It is the oldest regional organization in the Pacific and is headquartered in Nouméa, New Caledonia. Guam and the

Molecular Biology

2005-03-02T08:47:00.000-08:00

Field of science concerned with studying the chemical structures and processes of biological phenomena at the molecular level. Of growing importance since the 1940s, molecular biology developed out of the related fields of biochemistry, genetics, and biophysics. The discipline is particularly concerned with the study of proteins, nucleic acids, and enzymes—i.e., the

Jackfruit

2005-03-01T21:13:00.000-08:00

(species Artocarpus heterophyllus), tree native to tropical Asia and widely grown throughout the wetland tropics for its large fruits and durable wood. Like its relative the breadfruit, it belongs to the mulberry family (Moraceae). The jackfruit is 15 to 20 m (50 to 70 feet) tall at maturity, has large stiff, glossy green leaves 15 to 20 cm (6 to 8 inches) long, and fruit up to 60 cm (about 2 feet) long

Cyrene

2005-03-01T07:13:00.000-08:00

Ancient Greek colony in Libya, founded c. 631 BC by a group of emigrants from the island of Thera in the Aegean. Their leader, Battus, became the first king, founding the dynasty of the Battiads, whose members, named alternately Battus and Arcesilaus, ruled Cyrene for eight generations (until c. 440 BC). Under their rule, the city prospered economically and expanded, establishing its

Rif War

2005-02-28T22:57:00.000-08:00

By the Treaty of Fez (1912), Spain had been awarded the mountainous zones around Melilla and Ceuta, in Morocco. The two zones had few, if any, roads and were separated by the Bay of Alhucemas, making communications and development difficult. In 1920 the Spanish commissioner, General Dámaso Berenguer, decided

Ryzhkov, Nikolay

2005-02-28T18:37:00.000-08:00

Little is known with certainty of Ryzhkov's early career. He seems to have begun his working career as a miner and then, by 1950, was a shift foreman at the Ordzhonikidze Uralmash plant (for heavy machinery) in the Urals, later rising to positions of shop superintendent and deputy manager. In 1956 he joined the Communist Party, and in 1959 he graduated

Subgraywacke

2005-02-28T13:25:00.000-08:00

Dark-coloured sedimentary rock that contains from 65 to 95 percent free quartz, in grains 0.06 to 2 mm in diameter, held together by a matrix with a low mud content and often a high carbonate content. Some geologists favour a definition of graywacke (q.v.) that permits no more than 75 percent free quartz in the rock, and they thus would class as subgraywackes those rocks with (1) over 25 percent

Domeykite

2005-02-26T18:25:00.000-08:00

A copper arsenide mineral (formulated Cu3As) that is often intergrown with algodonite, another copper arsenide. Both are classified among the sulfide minerals, although they contain no sulfur. They occur in Chile, in Keweenaw County, Mich., and in other localities. Domeykite crystallizes in the isometric system. For detailed physical properties, see sulfide

Sun Yat-sen

2005-02-26T07:37:00.000-08:00

Leader of the Chinese Kuomintang (Nationalist Party), known as the father of modern China. Influential in overthrowing the Manchu dynasty (1911), he served as the first provisional

California, Industry

2005-02-25T09:32:00.000-08:00

The aircraft plants and shipyards were supplemented after World War II by branch plants of many Eastern and Midwestern industries. Federal research-and-development funds allocated to California organizations also contributed to the postwar economy. By the 1970s and '80s, California's industries had diversified to include computer sciences, biotechnology, and health

Ocean, Spreading centre zones and associated phenomena

2005-02-24T22:12:00.000-08:00

Spreading centres are divided

Arts, Central Asian, Uighurs

2005-02-24T06:34:00.000-08:00

The figural arts found new patrons in eastern Turkistan among the Turkic Uighurs, who while living in T'ang dynasty China had been influenced by Manichaean figurative art. The overthrow in China in AD 846 of Buddhism by official Confucianism forced the Buddhist Uighurs to migrate to eastern Turkistan. Gradually, they gained control over the Tien Shan region, Turfan, and

Ahab

2005-02-23T10:49:00.000-08:00

Omri left to Ahab an empire that comprised not only territory east of the Jordan River, in Gilead and probably Bashan, but also the land of Moab, whose king was tributary. The southern kingdom of Judah, if not actually subject to Omri, was certainly a

Tasmania, Ethnic and religious groups

2005-02-23T10:42:00.000-08:00

The original Tasmanians were an anthropologically interesting Negritoid people, with the widest nasal index ever recorded and shorter and broader heads than the Aboriginal peoples of the continental mainland. They may originally have drifted across from the mainland or arrived from as far as the New Hebrides, several thousand miles to the northeast. Estimates

Computers, Early experiments

2005-02-22T22:22:00.000-08:00

As the technology for realizing a computer was being honed by the business machine companies in the early 20th century, the theoretical foundations were being laid in academia. During the 1930s, two important strains of computer-related research were being pursued at two universities in Cambridge, Massachusetts. One strain produced the Differential Analyzer, the other

Mies Van Der Rohe, Ludwig

2005-02-22T01:10:00.000-08:00

Original name Maria Ludwig Michael Mies German-born American architect whose rectilinear forms, crafted in elegant simplicity, epitomized the International Style (q.v.) of architecture.

Steamer Duck

2005-02-21T13:48:00.000-08:00

(genus Tachyeres), any of four species of heavily built, big-billed sea ducks of southernmost South America and the Falkland Islands. The bird is named for its habit of running across the water with wings thrashing like a paddle-wheel steamboat. Of the four species, T. pteneres, T. brachypterus, and T. leucocephalus are flightless and a bit larger than the mallard-size flying

Sibasa

2005-02-21T07:42:00.000-08:00

Village, Northern province, South Africa. It was once the capital of the nonindependent black state of Venda. A station was established there in 1872 by Carl Beuster of the Berlin Mission. The village is an industrial growth centre just northeast of Thohoyandou and about 4 miles (7 km) north of the Luvuvhu River. Located at an elevation of 2,428 feet (740 m) and named after a Venda chief, Tshivhase,

Fuzzy Logic

2005-02-20T11:53:00.000-08:00

Fuzzy logic and fuzzy sets were first described in the mid-1960s by Lotfi Zadeh. According to fuzzy-logic theorists, classical logic oversimplifies the concept of set membership by flatly

New Castle

2005-02-19T17:10:00.000-08:00

County, northern Delaware, U.S., bounded by Pennsylvania to the north, New Jersey to the east (the Delaware River constituting the border), the Smyrna River to the south, and Maryland to the west. The county is bisected east-west by the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (completed 1829), around which are state parks and wildlife areas. Other waterways are the Christina River and the

Shimabara Rebellion

2005-02-19T13:10:00.000-08:00

The revolt began as a result of dissatisfaction with the heavy taxation and abuses of local officials on the Shimabara Peninsula and the Amakusa-retto Islands.

Leadbelly

2005-02-18T13:27:00.000-08:00

Musical from childhood, Leadbelly played accordion, 6- and 12-string guitar, bass, and harmonica. He led a wandering life, learning songs by absorbing oral tradition.

Gobi

2005-02-18T09:11:00.000-08:00

The population density is small—fewer than three persons per square mile (one per square kilometre)—mostly Mongols with Chinese in Inner Mongolia. The Chinese population has increased greatly since 1950. The main occupation of the inhabitants is nomadic cattle raising, though agriculture is predominant in regions where the Chinese are concentrated. The traditional

Elf

2005-02-17T06:49:00.000-08:00

Plural Elves, in Germanic folklore, originally, a spirit of any kind, later specialized into a diminutive creature, usually in tiny human form. In the Prose, or Younger, Edda, elves were classified as light elves (who were fair) and dark elves (who were darker than pitch); these classifications are roughly equivalent to the Scottish seelie court and unseelie court. The notable characteristics

Hurley, Patrick J(ay)

2005-02-17T00:48:00.000-08:00

Beginning the practice of law in Oklahoma (1908), Hurley served as a colonel in the American Expeditionary Force in World War I. During the 1920s he became active in Republican Party politics,

Elizabethton

2005-02-16T04:59:00.000-08:00

City, seat (1796) of Carter county, northeastern Tennessee, U.S. It lies at the confluence of the Doe and Watauga rivers, in the southern Appalachian Mountains, about 105 miles (170 km) northeast of Knoxville and just east of Johnson City. Situated in the valley of the Watauga, it is one of the region's oldest settlements, where a compact for self-government (the Watauga Association) was

China, Hsi (Western) Han

2005-02-16T02:35:00.000-08:00

Since at least as early as the Shang dynasty the Chinese had been accustomed to acknowledging the temporal and spiritual authority of a single leader and its transmission within a family, at first from brother to brother and later from father to son. Some of the early kings had been military commanders, and they may have organized the corporate work of the community,

Kaneohe

2005-02-15T06:59:00.000-08:00

Town, Honolulu County, northeastern Oahu Island, Hawaii, U.S. Spreading from the foothills of the Koolau Range to Kaneohe Bay, it is primarily residential and is the seat of Windward Community College (1972). Like neighbouring Kailua to the east, the Kaneohe (meaning “bamboo husband”) area was once the residence of the island's early kings. Local attractions include Waikalua,

Uzhhorod

2005-02-13T14:23:00.000-08:00

Russian Uzhgorod, also spelled Uzgorod, Hungarian Ungvár, city and administrative centre of Zakarpattya oblast (province), western Ukraine. It is situated along the Uzh River just east of the Slovakian border. It was first mentioned in 903, and its position has long given it trading and military significance. Formerly in Austria-Hungary, it passed to Czechoslovakia in 1919, to Hungary in 1938, back to Czechoslovakia in 1945, and to the Soviet

Babylonian Exile

2005-02-13T10:31:00.000-08:00

Also called Babylonian Captivity, the forced detention of Jews in Babylonia following the latter's conquest of the kingdom of Judah in 598/7 and 587/6 BC. The exile formally ended in 538 BC, when the Persian conqueror of Babylonia, Cyrus the Great, gave the Jews permission to return to Palestine. Historians agree that several deportations took place (each the result of uprisings in Palestine), that not all Jews were forced

Computers, Grace Murray Hopper

2005-02-12T23:26:00.000-08:00

While the high cost of computer resources placed a premium on fast hand-coded machine-language programs, one individual worked tirelessly to promote high-level programming languages and their associated compilers. Grace Murray Hopper taught mathematics at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, from 1931 to 1943 before joining the United States Naval Reserve. In 1944 she

Libya, Relief

2005-02-12T19:46:00.000-08:00

The Al-Jifarah Plain

Biblical Literature, The Revised Standard Version

2005-02-12T18:13:00.000-08:00

The American Standard Version had been an expression of sensitivity to the needs of the American public. At the same time, several individual and unofficial translations into modern speech made from 1885 on had gained popularity, their appeal reinforced by the discovery that the Greek of the New Testament used the common nonliterary variety of the language spoken

Hippie

2005-02-11T16:31:00.000-08:00

Also spelled hippy member, during the 1960s and 1970s, of a countercultural movement that rejected the mores of mainstream American life. The movement originated on U.S. college campuses, although it spread to other countries, including Canada and Britain. The name derived from “hip,” a term applied to the Beats of the 1950s, such as Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, who were generally considered to be the

Biblical Literature, The Revised Standard Version

2005-02-10T19:54:00.000-08:00

Price, Reynolds

2005-02-10T16:36:00.000-08:00

Price grew up in small towns and attended Duke University in Durham, N.C. (A.B. 1955), where the works of Eudora Welty became a primary influence on his writing. After receiving a B.Litt. degree in 1958 from the University of Oxford in England, he began his

Wolfe, Charles

2005-02-09T19:54:00.000-08:00

Irish poet and clergyman, whose “Burial of Sir John Moore” (1817), commemorating the commander of the British forces at the Battle of Corunna (La Coruña, Spain) during the Peninsular War, is one of the best-known funeral elegies in English. Wolfe attended Trinity College, Dublin, was ordained in 1817, and held curacies in County Tyrone.

Aldosterone

2005-02-09T00:33:00.000-08:00

Aldosterone is synthesized in the body from corticosterone, a steroid derived from cholesterol. Production of aldosterone (in adult humans,

Mitropoulos, Dimitri

2005-02-08T19:29:00.000-08:00

Mitropoulos studied in Athens, where his opera Soeur Béatrice (after Maeterlinck) was performed in 1919. Later in Berlin he studied piano under the brilliant pianist, composer, and teacher Ferruccio Busoni. An excellent pianist, Mitropoulos sometimes conducted from the keyboard (e.g., in 1930 and

Osborne, John

2005-02-08T11:48:00.000-08:00

The son of a commercial artist and a barmaid, Osborne used insurance money from his father's death in 1941 for a boarding- school education at Belmont College, Devon. He hated

Ibrahim

2005-02-08T06:15:00.000-08:00

Early in his reign under the guidance of the able but ambitious grand vizier Kemankes Kara Mustafa

China, The Tarim Basin

2005-02-07T07:28:00.000-08:00

North of the Plateau of Tibet and at the much lower level of about 3,000 feet lies the Tarim Basin. It is hemmed in by great mountain ranges: the Tien Shan (“Celestial Mountains”) on the north, the Pamirs on the west, and the Kunlun Mountains on the south. From these heights glacier-fed streams descend, only to lose themselves in the loose sands and gravels of the Takla Makan

Henrician Articles

2005-02-06T22:45:00.000-08:00

Polish Artykuly Henrykowskie (1573) statement of the rights and privileges of the Polish gentry (szlachta) that all elected kings of Poland, beginning with Henry of Valois (elected May 11, 1573), were obliged to confirm and that severely limited the authority of the Polish monarchy. After King Sigismund II Augustus died (July 1572), Henry of Valois, duc d'Anjou and the future Henry III of France, emerged as the favourite