Arsenius Autorianus

Patriarch of Constantinople, whose deposition caused a serious schism in the Byzantine Church. He took the name Arsenius on being appointed patriarch of Nicaea in 1255 by the Byzantine emperor Theodore II Lascaris. In 1259 he crowned John IV, Theodore's son and legitimate heir, and Michael VIII Palaeologus as co-emperors. Arsenius retired

Beirut

Beirut is a city of baffling contradictions whose character blends the sophisticated and cosmopolitan with the provincial and parochial. Before 1975 Beirut was widely considered the most thoroughly Westernized city in the Arab Middle East;

Plutarch

Greek  Plutarchos , Latin  Plutarchus  biographer and author whose works strongly influenced the evolution of the essay, the biography, and historical writing in Europe from the 16th to the 19th century. Among his approximately 227 works, the most important are the Bioi paralleloi (Parallel Lives), in which he recounts the noble deeds and characters of Greek and Roman soldiers, legislators,

Celebes Black Ape

Also called  Celebes Crested Macaque  (species Cynopithecus niger), arboreal monkey of the family Cercopithecidae, found on Celebes, Bacan, and nearby islands. The Celebes black ape is a stump-tailed monkey with overhanging brows, a hairless black face, and a long, flat muzzle. It is about the size of a baboon (55–65 cm [22–26 inches] long without the tail [1 to 2 cm]) and is covered with dark brown or black fur. The male, especially,

Eagle Ray

Any of about two dozen species of exclusively marine rays constituting the family Myliobatidae (order Rajiformes), occurring in the major oceans. They have the enlarged, winglike pectoral fins characteristic of the order. Some species have a sharp-edged serrated spine at the base of the long, whiplike tail. Their teeth are flat, for crushing and grinding mollusks

Quincy

City, seat (1825) of Adams county, western Illinois, U.S., on the Mississippi River, there bridged to Missouri. Settled in 1822 by John Wood (12th governor of Illinois, 1860–61), it was first known as Bluffs. It became the county seat on March 4, 1825, the day that President John Quincy Adams was inaugurated, and was renamed in his honour. As a river town, Quincy was an important stop for travelers. It became a

Albania, Flag Of

On November 28, 1443, the national hero of Albania, a prince known as Skanderbeg (George Kastrioti), raised his flag over the fortress of Krujë in defiance of the Turks who ruled the country. His small mountainous nation was able to resist the forces of the Ottoman Empire, although after Skanderbeg's death in 1468 independence was lost again. His flag was red and bore a black eagle, even

France, History Of, Financial crisis

The aftermath of the Ruhr occupation was to cast doubt on its apparent success. The German republic was weakened by the runaway inflation of 1923 and its future clouded; the occupation had embittered Britain and the United States. Even among Frenchmen, the victory had left a sour aftertaste because the costs of the occupation forced an increase in French taxes. In the

Furniture, Clocks

Clocks are considered furnishings if the movement is enclosed within a case, which need not necessarily be of wood. Clocks can be divided into table clocks and long-case clocks. There were two creative centres for table clocks, namely England and France. In 17th- and 18th-century France, the table clock became an object of monumental design, the best examples of which are

Margaret Of Scotland, Saint

Margaret was brought up at the Hungarian court, where her father, Edward, was in exile. After the Battle of Hastings, Edward's widow and children fled for safety to Scotland. Her brother Edgar the Aetheling, defeated

Zittel, Karl Alfred, Ritter (knight) Von

In 1863 Zittel became an assistant to the royal mineral cabinet of Vienna and professor of mineralogy, geognosy, and paleontology at the Karlsruhe Polytechnic. In 1866 he became professor of geology and paleontology at the University

Arminius, Jacobus

His father died when Arminius was an infant, and one Theodore Aemilius adopted the child and provided for his schooling in Utrecht. On the death of

Yad

Plural  Yadayim,   in Judaism, a ritual object, usually made of silver but sometimes of wood or other materials, that consists of a shaft affixed to a miniature representation of a hand with its index finger pointing. The yad is used optionally in liturgical services to indicate the place that is being read on a Torah (biblical) scroll, thus eliminating the necessity of touching the sacred

Henry I

The son of Otto the Illustrious, the Liudolfing duke of Saxony, Henry became duke at his

Arányi, Jelly D'

The grandniece of the celebrated violinist Joseph Joachim, she made her debut

Abel, Niels Henrik

Abel's father was a poor Lutheran minister who moved his family to the parish of Gjerstad, near the town of Risør in southeast Norway, soon after Niels Henrik was born. In 1815 Niels entered the cathedral school

Bruegel, Pieter, Ii, The Younger

The eldest son of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, the young Pieter studied first under his grandmother, the miniaturist Maria Verhulst, and then in Antwerp. He painted largely in the manner of his father and even copied many of his works; some of his copies cannot

Kazaure

Town and traditional emirate in Jigawa state, northern Nigeria. The town has been the emirate's headquarters since 1819. It was founded by Dan Tunku, a Fulani warrior who was one of the 14 flag bearers for the Fulani jihad (holy war) leader Usman dan Fodio. Dan Tunku arrived from the nearby town of Dambatta (Dambarta) at a stockaded village that he named Kazaure and established

New England Range

Also called  Northern Tableland,   section of the Eastern Highlands, or Great Dividing Range, northeastern New South Wales, Australia. The range extends 200 mi (320 km) north from the Moonbi Range (near Tamworth) to the Queensland border and 80 mi from east to west (10–50 mi inland from the coast). It is Australia's largest plateau, having 9,000 sq mi (23,000 sq km) above an elevation of 3,000 ft (900 m). The loftiest point is at Round Mountain (5,300 ft) on the eastern

Adams, William

At the age of 12 Adams was apprenticed in the merchant marine, afterward sailing in the British navy and later serving a company of Barbary merchants. In 1598 he shipped as pilot major with five Dutch ships bound from Europe for the East Indies via the Straits of Magellan.

Bruegel, Pieter, Ii, The Younger

In American history, major New Deal program to restore agricultural prosperity by curtailing farm production, reducing export surpluses, and raising prices. The Agricultural Adjustment Act (May 1933) was an omnibus farm-relief bill embodying the schemes of the major national farm organizations. It established the Agricultural Adjustment Administration under

Arras

Town, capital of Pas-de-Calais département, Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, former capital of Artois, northern France, on the Scarpe River, southwest of Lille. Of Gallo-Roman origin, it was the chief town (Nemetacum or Nemetocenna) of the Atrebates, one of the last Gallic peoples to surrender to Caesar. The woollen industry dates from the 4th century. The Middle Ages was a period

Cabrillo, Juan Rodríguez

Virtually nothing is known of Cabrillo's early life, though he might have been born in Portugal. As a young man, he appears to have accompanied the Spanish soldier Pánfilo de Narváez (1520) in his unsuccessful punitive expedition against

Tirmidhi, At-

The life of at-Tirmidhi is poorly documented. He journeyed to Khorasan, to Iraq, and to the Hejaz in search of material for his collection and studied with such renowned scholars of Had

Yusuf Ibn Tashufin

Tashufin also spelled  Tashfin  Almoravid ruler who, during his reign from 1061 to 1106, expanded Almoravid land holdings from a small, insecurely held area in the Maghrib into a huge empire that included major portions of present-day Morocco and Algeria, Muslim Spain as far north as Fraga, and the islands of Majorca, Minorca, and Ibiza. A Berber by origin, Ibn Tashufin was an excellent general and a devoutly religious

Bagirmi, Kingdom Of

Bagirmi also spelled  Baguirmi,  historic African state founded in the 16th century in the region just southeast of Lake Chad. Europeans first learned about the existence of Bagirmi and the other powerful states of central Africa (Wadai Bornu-Kanem) when Dixon Denham penetrated the Lake Chad region in 1823. Details became known particularly from written records of the later explorers Heinrich Barth

Abernathy, Ralph David

The son of a successful farmer, Abernathy was ordained as a Baptist minister in 1948 and graduated with a B.S. degree from Alabama State University in 1950. His interest then shifted from

Wigglesworth, Sir Vincent (brian)

English entomologist, noted for his contribution to the study of insect physiology. His investigations of the living insect body and its tissues and organs revealed much about the dynamic complexity of individual insects and their interactions with the environment. His Insect Physiology (1934) is often

Xiaozhuan

Wade-Giles romanization  hsiao-chuan  in Chinese calligraphy, a standardized and simplified form of the earlier dazhuan script, in which all lines are of even thickness and curves and circles are relatively predominant. Its development during the Qin dynasty (221–206 BC) is traditionally attributed to Li Si, a minister of that dynasty. The Qin dynasty created the first Chinese empire, under which customs, laws, and

Manawatu River

River, in south-central North Island, New Zealand, rising on the east slopes of the Ruahine Range. The river, 113 miles (182 km) long, flows west and southwest for 30 miles (48 km) to Woodville and turns sharply northwest to pass between the Ruahine and Tararua ranges through the 4-mile- (6.4-kilometre-) long Manawatu Gorge. Emerging from the gorge at Ashhurst, the river runs southwest past Palmerston

Tzara, Tristan

The Dadaist movement originated in Zürich during World War I, with the participation of the artists Jean Arp, Francis Picabia, and

Ahmadiyah

A modern Islamic sect and the generic name for various Sufi (Muslim mystic) orders. The sect was founded in Qadian, the Punjab, India, in 1889 by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (c. 1839–1908), who claimed to be the mahdi (a figure expected by some Muslims at the end of the world), the Christian Messiah, an incarnation of the Hindu god Krishna, and a reappearance (buruz) of Muhammad. The sect's doctrine, in some aspects, is unorthodox:

Anatolia

This article discusses the history and cultures of ancient Anatolia beginning

Mammal, Natural history

The hallmarks of the mammalian level of organization are advanced reproduction and parental care, behavioral flexibility, and endothermy (the physiological maintenance of a relatively constant body temperature independent of that of the environment, allowing a high level of activity). Within the class, ecological diversity has resulted from adaptive specialization

Coleman, James S(amuel)

Coleman received his B.S. from Purdue University (1949) and his Ph.D. from Columbia University (1955), where he was a research associate in the Bureau of Applied Social Research (1953–55). While there he was influenced by the style

Fuchs, Ruth

In 1972, just 35 minutes after Polish athlete Ewa Gryziecka had set a record for the women's javelin throw, Fuchs threw the javelin more than 2.3 m (7 feet 6 inches) farther, a total of 65.06 m (213 feet 5 1/2 inches), her first world record. She went on to set a

Radical Empiricism

A theory of knowledge and a metaphysics (theory of Being) advanced by William James, an American pragmatist philosopher and psychologist, based on the pragmatic theory of truth and the principle of pure experience, which contends that the relations between things are at least as real as the things themselves, that their function is real, and that no hidden substrata

Earth Sciences, Knowledge of landforms and of land–sea relations

The early Chinese writers were not outdone by the Romans

Biblical Literature, Nature and significance

General articles and notes in The Oxford Annotated Bible (1962), The Jerusalem Bible (1966), and the Genesis volume of The Anchor Bible, by E.A. Speiser (1964); E. H. Gombrich, The Story of Art, 12th rev. ed. (1972); Abraham J. Heschel, Man Is Not Alone (1951), a classic statement of modern Judaism; Erich Auerbach, Mimesis: Dargestellte Wirklichkeit in der abendländischen Literatur (1946; Eng. trans., Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature, 1953), a classic work; William R. Mueller, The Prophetic Voice in Modern Fiction (1959), religious themes interpreting Joyce, Camus, Kafka, Faulkner, Greene, and Silone; Nathan A. Scott, Jr. (ed.), The Tragic Vision and the Christian Faith (1957), essays by 12 writers on faith and the tragic dimension of existence; James Barr, The Scope and Authority of the Bible (1981), questions the divine inspiration of biblical texts.

Szentkuthy, Miklos

After attending Budapest University, Szentkuthy taught secondary school in Budapest (1932–57). After publishing several avant-garde novels, including the

Armour

Types of armour generally fall into one of three main categories: (1) armour made of leather, fabric, or mixed layers of both, sometimes reinforced by quilting or felt, (2) mail, made of interwoven rings of iron or steel,

Obesity

Also called  Corpulence, or Fatness,   excessive accumulation of body fat, usually caused by the consumption of more calories than the body can use. The excess calories are then stored as fat, or adipose tissue. Overweight, if moderate, is not necessarily obesity, particularly in muscular or large-boned individuals. In general, however, a body weight 20 percent or more over the optimum tends to be associated

Seleucus I Nicator

Macedonian army officer, founder of the Seleucid kingdom. In the struggles following the death of Alexander the Great, he rose from governor of Babylon to king of an empire centring on Syria and Iran.

Narathiwat

Town, extreme southern Thailand, on the east coast of the Malay Peninsula. Narathiwat is a minor port inhabited largely by Malay Muslims. Fishing and shipping are the main activities. The surrounding area is heavily planted in coconuts, rice, and rubber. Pop. (1985 est.) 36,956.

Amman

Its focus of settlement throughout history has been the small, high, triangular plateau (modern

Can Tho

Municipality and provincial seat of Hau Giang tinh (province), Mekong delta region, southeastern Vietnam. Situated on the left bank of the Song (river) Hau Giang, 90 mi (145 km) southwest of Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon), it is an industrial centre and the largest city of the flat delta region, which includes the Ca Mau Peninsula and the principal rice-growing areas of the country.

Performing Arts, Popular - International.

The year 2002 was a classic one for African music, and arguably the finest of a batch of great new albums came from the celebrated Malian singer Salif Keita. His recent work had included excursions into jazz-rock and funk, but the album Moffou was very different—an acoustic set that marked a return to his African roots. The relaxed, gently rhythmic backing was provided by

Qatar

Little is known of Qatar's history before the 18th century, when the region's population consisted largely of transient nomads and a few small fishing villages. Qatar's modern history begins conventionally in 1766 with the migration to the peninsula of families from Kuwait, notably the Al Khalifahs. Their settlement at the new town of Az-Zubarah grew into a small pearl-diving

Kirk, Sir John

The son of a clergyman, Kirk studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh, served on the civil medical staff in the Crimean War, and was appointed in February 1858 physician and naturalist for Livingstone's

Basil Ii

The reign of Basil II, widely acknowledged to be one of the outstanding Byzantine emperors, admirably illustrates both

Taliban

Persian  Taleban (“Students”) , also spelled  Taleban  ultraconservative political and religious faction that emerged in Afghanistan in the mid 1990s following the withdrawal of Soviet troops, the collapse of Afghanistan's communist regime, and the subsequent breakdown in civil order. The faction took its name from its membership, which consisted largely of students trained in madrasahs (Islamic religious schools)

Suchocka, Hanna

The daughter of a pharmacist, Suchocka specialized in constitutional law at the University of Adam Mickiewicz in Poznan, from which she graduated in 1968. She lectured in law there and at the Catholic University of Lublin. In 1980 she joined the Sejm (parliament) as a member of the Democratic Party, which was then

Atchafalaya River

Distributary of the Red and Mississippi rivers in Louisiana, U.S. It branches southwest from the Red River near a point in east-central Louisiana where the Old River (about 7 miles [11 km] long) links the Red River with the Mississippi, and it flows generally south for about 140 miles (225 km) to Atchafalaya Bay, an inlet of the Gulf of Mexico in southern Louisiana. Its length including

Ayer, Sir A.j.

Ayer graduated from Eton College and from Christ Church, Oxford (B.A., 1932; M.A., 1936). He was exposed to logical positivism in 1932 during a stay in Vienna. He began teaching at the University of Oxford in 1932 and served in

Vajra

Vajra, in Sanskrit, has both the meanings of “thunderbolt” and “diamond.” Like the thunderbolt, the vajra cleaves through ignorance. The thunderbolt was originally the symbol of the Hindu rain god Indra (who became the Buddhist Sakra)

Agricultural Technology

Application of techniques to control the growth and harvesting of animal and vegetable products.

Asthenia

A condition in which the body lacks or has lost strength either as a whole or in any of its parts. General asthenia occurs in many chronic wasting diseases, such as anemia and cancer, and is probably most marked in diseases of the adrenal gland. Asthenia may be limited to certain organs or systems of organs, as in asthenopia, characterized by ready fatigability of vision,

Coleman, Georgia

Coleman had been diving for just six months when she entered the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, where she won a silver medal in the 10-metre platform competition

Biblical Literature, Composition and authorship

The Torah, or Pentateuch (Five Scrolls), traditionally the most revered portion of the Hebrew canon, comprises a series of narratives, interspersed with law codes, providing an account of events from the beginning of the world to the death of Moses. Modern critical scholarship tends to hold that there were originally four books (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers)

France, History Of, Early Frankish period

In the second quarter of the 5th century, various groups of Franks moved southward toward the middle Rhine area (Cologne), the lower branches of the Moselle and Meuse, and the Atlantic coastal region. In the latter area, separate groups took possession of Tournai and Cambrai and reached the Somme. These Franks along the coast were divided into many small kingdoms. One

Jack

The jack's effectiveness stems from the ratio of the load, or weight of the object

Berain, Jean, The Elder

Trained under the great French decorator Charles Le Brun, Berain was working at the Louvre when appointed, in 1674, royal designer to King Louis XIV of France. After the death