ProbablePlanet

serviced offices

2006-11-01T07:15:00.000-08:00

Office planet have a huge database of serviced offices throughout the UK. serviced offices provide an affordable and hassle free office solution

Armenia

2005-04-04T03:38:00.000-07:00

City, capital of Quindío departamento, west-central Colombia. It lies on the western slopes of the Cordillera Central at an elevation of 4,865 feet (1,483 m), between the Espejo and Quindío rivers. The city lies along a spur of the railway from Puerto Berrío to Popayán and is the transfer point for road traffic to Bogotá via Ibagué (30 miles [50 km] southeast). Armenia (named for the ancient

T'ien-shui

2005-04-04T01:03:00.000-07:00

The area,

Oboe

2005-04-02T22:09:00.000-08:00

Hautbois (French: “high [i.e., loud] wood”), or oboe, was originally one of the names of the shawm, the violently powerful instrument of

Saint Charles

2005-04-01T13:21:00.000-08:00

City, seat of St. Charles county, eastern Missouri, U.S., on bluffs overlooking the Missouri River, there bridged to St. Louis, 22 miles (35 km) southeast. One of the earliest white settlements on the Missouri, it was founded in 1769 by Louis Blanchette as Les Petites Côtes (“The Little Hills”). The site, transferred to Spain in 1770, was dedicated in 1771 as the village of San Carlos Borromeo after a church

Gagnoa

2005-04-01T11:55:00.000-08:00

Town, southern Côte d'Ivoire. It is the chief collecting point for a forest region that sends coffee, cocoa, and timber (sipo and mahogany) to the coast for export and is a major market centre (rice, bananas, and yams) for the Bete and Gagu (Gagou) peoples. A paved road connects Gagnoa with Abidjan, the capital of Côte d'Ivoire. The town is the site of the government's first rural technical

Roosevelt, Franklin D., Supreme Court fight

2005-03-31T10:33:00.000-08:00

Declaring in his Second Inaugural Address (see original text) that “I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished,” Roosevelt was determined to push forward with further New Deal reforms. With large Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress, there remained only one obstacle to his objectives: the Supreme Court. During Roosevelt's first term, the court, which consisted entirely of pre-Roosevelt appointees, had invalidated several key New Deal measures, and cases challenging the Social Security Act and the Wagner Act were pending. To make the court more supportive of reform legislation, Roosevelt proposed a reorganization plan that would have allowed him to appoint one new justice for every sitting justice aged 70 years or older. Widely viewed as a court-packing scheme (even by Roosevelt's supporters), the reorganization bill provoked heated debate in Congress and eventually was voted down, which handed Roosevelt his first major legislative defeat. Meanwhile, the fight over court packing seemed to alter the Supreme Court's attitude toward the New Deal, and both the Social Security Act and the Wagner Act were upheld.

Incremental Repetition

2005-03-31T05:08:00.000-08:00

A device used in poetry of the oral tradition, especially English and Scottish ballads, in which a line is repeated in a changed context or with minor changes in the repeated part. The device is illustrated in the following stanzas from the ballad “Lord Randal”: “O where ha' you been, Lord Randal, my son? And where ha' you been, my handsome young man?”“I ha' been at the greenwood; mother,

Burgos

2005-03-30T15:54:00.000-08:00

City, capital of Burgos province, in the Castile-León comunidad autónoma (“autonomous community”), northern Spain. It is located on the lower slopes of a castle-crowned hill overlooking the Arlanzón River, about 2,600 feet (800 m) above sea level. Founded in 884 as an eastern outpost of the Asturian kingdom by the Castilian count Diego Rodríguez Porcelos, it became the capital of the

Japanese Yew

2005-03-29T18:03:00.000-08:00

Also called spreading yew (Taxus cuspidata) an ornamental evergreen shrub or tree of the yew family (Taxaceae), native to Japan and widely cultivated in the Northern Hemisphere. Rising to a height of 16 m (about 52 feet), it resembles the English yew but is hardier and faster-growing. Each leaf has two distinct, yellowish bands on its underside. There are many horticultural varieties of Japanese yew. Plants

Amphibian, Embryonic stage

2005-03-29T10:55:00.000-08:00

Within the egg a series of semipermeable gelatinous capsules enclose the embryo suspended in fluid surrounding the yolk (perivitelline fluid). These capsules can be eventually digested by hatching enzymes that are produced by frontal glands on the snouts of embryos. All nutrients necessary for egg development within the ovary are supplied by the yolk in the

Pyrolusite

2005-03-28T22:17:00.000-08:00

Common manganese mineral, manganese dioxide (MnO2), that constitutes an important ore. Always formed under highly oxidizing conditions, it forms light-gray to black, metallic, moderately heavy coatings, crusts, or fibres that are alteration products of other manganese ores (e.g., rhodochrosite); bog, lake, or shallow marine products; or deposits left by circulating waters.

Cartago

2005-03-27T15:33:00.000-08:00

City, east-central Costa Rica. Lying at 4,720 feet (1,439 m) above sea level, the city is located on the fertile Central Plateau, at the foot of Irazú Volcano. Cartago was founded in 1563 and was the capital of Costa Rica until 1823. There are, however, no authentic colonial buildings since the town was attacked repeatedly by pirates during the 17th century and has also been damaged severely by earthquakes.

Glaucophane

2005-03-27T04:29:00.000-08:00

Common amphibole mineral, a sodium, magnesium, and aluminum silicate that occurs only in crystalline schists formed from sodium-rich rocks by low-grade metamorphism. It also forms from sedimentary rocks by the introduction of sodium oxide (Na2O). Glaucophane typically occurs in folded rocks associated with epidote amphibolites and greenschists. Both ferrous

Zinn, Walter Henry

2005-03-26T07:20:00.000-08:00

In 1934 Zinn received a Ph.D. from Columbia University in New York. He was recruited by Enrico Fermi for the Manhattan Project, and it was he who, at the University

Domestic Tragedy

2005-03-24T21:09:00.000-08:00

Drama in which the tragic protagonists are ordinary middle class or lower class individuals, in contrast to classical and Neoclassical tragedy, in which the protagonists are of kingly or aristocratic rank and their downfall is an affair of state as well as a personal matter. The earliest known examples of domestic tragedy are three anonymous late Elizabethan

Frederick William Ii

2005-03-24T18:33:00.000-08:00

The son of Frederick the Great's brother Augustus William, he became heir presumptive on his father's death in 1758. He was intellectually receptive and devoted to the

Leap Of Faith

2005-03-24T13:37:00.000-08:00

Metaphor used by the 19th-century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard in his Afsluttende uvidenskabelig Efterskrift (1846; Concluding Unscientific Postscript) to describe commitment to an objective uncertainty, specifically to the Christian God. For Kierkegaard, God is totally other than man; between God and man there exists a gulf that faith alone can bridge. Kierkegaard

Arnold, Matthew

2005-03-23T13:44:00.000-08:00

The work that gives Arnold his high place in the history of literature and the history of ideas was all accomplished in the time he could spare from his official duties. His first volume of verse was The Strayed Reveller, and Other Poems. By A. (1849); this was followed (in 1852) by another under the same initial: Empedocles on Etna, and Other Poems. In 1853 appeared the first volume of poems

Campaign Furniture

2005-03-22T23:42:00.000-08:00

Case furniture was usually teak,

Guatemala, Flag Of

2005-03-22T11:34:00.000-08:00

Following brief rule by Mexico (1821–23), the Central American provinces united in a federation, but by 1840 disagreements between Liberals and Conservatives resulted in civil war and the separation of the five countries. Thus Guatemala hoisted a new flag on November 14, 1843, which included the volcanoes found in the coat of arms of Antigua Guatemala, the former capital of Guatemala,

Femur

2005-03-21T17:48:00.000-08:00

Also called thighbone upper bone of the leg or hindleg. The head forms a ball-and-socket joint with the hip (at the acetabulum), being held in place by a ligament (ligamentum teres femoris) within the socket and by strong surrounding ligaments. In humans the neck of the femur connects the shaft and head at a 125° angle, which is efficient for walking. A prominence

Turin, University Of

2005-03-21T14:31:00.000-08:00

Italian Università Degli Studi Di Torino, autonomous coeducational state institution of higher learning in Turin, Italy, that was founded in 1404. Erasmus was a graduate of the school in 1506. The university was reorganized and reestablished in 1713. An Institute of Business and Economics was added in 1906, a veterinary medicine faculty was added in 1934, and faculties of agriculture, pharmacy, and commerce were added in 1935. Among the

Israel, Transportation

2005-03-20T04:32:00.000-08:00

Israel has developed a modern, well-marked highway system, and road transport is more significant to the country's commercial and passenger services than transport by rail. Bus companies provide efficient service within and between all cities and towns, supplemented by private taxis and sheruts—privately owned and operated shuttles—which run on urban and interurban

Canth, Minna

2005-03-19T08:21:00.000-08:00

In 1863 she entered the seminary at Jyväskylä, where she married her teacher, J.F. Canth, in 1865. Widowed in 1879, with seven children, she went into business at Kuopio but still found time to produce literary works that had a powerful

Beirut, American University Of

2005-03-19T05:54:00.000-08:00

Private, nondenominational, coeducational international and intercultural university in Beirut, Lebanon, chartered in 1863 by the state of New York, U.S., as the Syrian Protestant College. Classes started in 1866. Although founded by the American Protestant Mission to Lebanon, the school was set up as an autonomous organization and has no official relationship with any religious

Albert

2005-03-18T20:30:00.000-08:00

Albert's love of the sea developed at an early age, and as a young

Saint Augustine

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

The Spanish

Literature

2005-03-17T22:21:00.000-08:00

The predominant theme of 2001 was literature that chronicled the ordeals of political prisoners in a number of Arab countries. Works defined as “prison literature” were authored by freed political prisoners motivated to speak out by the relative freedom in the past two years in their countries. Writing in French,

Henri, Robert

2005-03-17T17:08:00.000-08:00

Henri studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, from 1884 to 1888, and at both the Académie Julian and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Upon

Mughal Architecture

2005-03-16T10:38:00.000-08:00

Building style that flourished in northern and central India under the patronage of the Mughal emperors from the mid-16th to the late 17th century. The Mughal period marked a striking revival of Islamic architecture in northern India. Under the patronage of the Mughal emperors, Persian, Indian, and various provincial styles were fused to produce works of unusual quality

Ejmiadzin

2005-03-16T08:54:00.000-08:00

Originating in the 7th century BC as the town of Vardkesavan, it was renamed Vagarshapat about AD 140, when the Parthian king Vologases III made it his capital. Upon the conversion of Armenia to Christianity

Iron Age

2005-03-15T14:14:00.000-08:00

Final technological and cultural stage in the Stone–Bronze–Iron-Age sequence. The date of the full Iron Age, in which this metal for the most part replaced bronze in implements and weapons, varied geographically, beginning in the Middle East and southeastern Europe about 1200 BC but in China not until about 600 BC. Although in the Middle East iron had limited use as a scarce and precious

Rambert, Dame Marie

2005-03-14T09:39:00.000-08:00

A student of Émile Jaques-Dalcroze, the originator of eurhythmics, Rambert was invited in 1913 to teach this technique of rhythmic education to members of Sergey Diaghilev's Ballets Russes; through her

Alisar Hüyük

2005-03-14T03:13:00.000-08:00

Site of an ancient Anatolian town southeast of Bogazköy in central Turkey. Thorough and extensive excavations there by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (1927–32) were the first systematic stratigraphic investigations on the Anatolian plateau. In the long succession of strata revealed at Alisar Hüyük—from Chalcolithic (c. 4000–c. 2600 BC) to Phrygian (c. 1200– c. 700 BC)—the only era

Frederick Charles, Prince Of Prussia

2005-03-13T23:01:00.000-08:00

The eldest son of Prince Charles of Prussia and nephew of the future German emperor William I, Frederick Charles was educated from childhood for a military career. He became a colonel in 1852 and a major general in 1854, in which year he married Princess

Stieglitz, Alfred

2005-03-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

American photographer, passionate advocate of photography as an art, and a pioneer exhibitor of modern art in the United States. In 1902 he founded the seminal Photo-Secession Group as a protest against the conventional photography of the time. Stieglitz' own best photographs are the 400-print series of his wife, Georgia O'Keeffe, and his

Pluton

2005-03-12T10:11:00.000-08:00

Body of intrusive igneous rock the size, composition, shape, or exact type of which is in doubt; when such characteristics are known, more limiting terms can be used. Thus, plutons include dikes, laccoliths, batholiths, sills, and other forms of intrusions. Most plutons are thought to be the result of igneous activity in which a magma is involved; the controversial origin

Ibisbill

2005-03-12T01:44:00.000-08:00

(Ibidorhyncha struthersii), Asian bird named for its long, red, down-curved bill (similar to that of an ibis), which it uses to probe for food under stones along streams and ponds. Rather heavyset birds about 40 centimetres (16 inches) long, ibisbills have shorter legs than their familial relatives the avocets and stilts (family Recurvirostridae,

Tyndall, John

2005-03-11T09:07:00.000-08:00

Tyndall was born into a poor Protestant Irish family. After a thorough basic education he worked as a surveyor in Ireland and England (1839–47). When his ambitions turned from engineering to science, Tyndall

Mason, Charlotte

2005-03-10T22:35:00.000-08:00

Mason was born into a wealthy family. She married a prominent physician and socialized with dignitaries and dilettantes.

Appiah, Kwame Anthony

2005-03-10T18:08:00.000-08:00

Appiah was the son of Joseph Appiah, a Ghanaian-born barrister, and Peggy Cripps, daughter of the British statesman Sir Stafford

Botvinnik, Mikhail Moiseyevich

2005-03-10T01:16:00.000-08:00

At the age of 14, less than two years after he had learned the moves of chess, Botvinnik defeated the then-current world champion, José Raúl Capablanca, in one game of an exhibition in which

Literature

2005-03-09T09:11:00.000-08:00

Three novels were particularly eye-catching to the Chinese literati in 2001. The first was You Fengwei's Zhongguo 1957 (“China 1957”). Written in the first person, the novel told a series of tragic stories about the victims—mostly university students and teachers—of the antirightist campaign of 1957 in which more than 550,000 Chinese were

Utraquist

2005-03-08T20:28:00.000-08:00

Also called Calixtin, or Calixtine, any of the spiritual descendants of Jan Hus who believed that the laity, like the clergy, should receive the Eucharist under the forms of both bread and wine (Latin utraque, “each of two”; calix, “chalice”). Unlike the militant Taborites (also followers of Hus), the Utraquists were moderates and maintained amicable relations with the Roman Catholic Church. As a consequence,

Philanthropinum

2005-03-08T15:33:00.000-08:00

Late 18th-century school (1774–93) founded in Dessau, Germany, by the educator Johann Bernhard Basedow to implement the educational ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Aiming to foster in its students a humanitarian worldview and awareness of the community of interest among all people, it taught rich and poor boys together regardless of religious or class distinctions. The school

Barak, Ehud

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

Barak was born in a kibbutz that had been founded by his father, an emigrant from Lithuania, in 1932. Barak was drafted into the Israel Defense Forces in 1959, thus beginning a distinguished military career (he changed his name at this time). He

San Bernardino

2005-03-07T16:49:00.000-08:00

Central city of the San Bernardino–Riverside–Ontario metropolitan complex, seat (1853) of San Bernardino County, southern California, U.S., at the base of the San Bernardino Mountains. The site, which was named by Spanish missionaries for St. Bernardino of Siena, was sold to Mormons who laid out a town in 1852. It developed as a trade centre chiefly for the surrounding citrus groves

Allophone

2005-03-07T02:45:00.000-08:00

One of the phonetically distinct variants of a phoneme (q.v.). The occurrence of one allophone rather than another is usually determined by its position in the word (initial, final, medial, etc.) or by its phonetic environment. Speakers of a language often have difficulty in hearing the phonetic differences between allophones of the same phoneme, because these differences

Shamanism, The universe

2005-03-06T19:30:00.000-08:00

The classic worldview of shamanism is found among the peoples of northern Asia. In their view the universe is full of heavenly bodies peopled by spiritual beings. Their own world is disk-shaped—saucerlike—with an opening in the middle leading into the Netherworld; the Upper World stands over the Central World, or Earth, this world having a manyfold vault. The Earth,

France, History Of, Industrial production

2005-03-06T16:56:00.000-08:00

After 1740 overall production in France rose annually by about 2 percent, and even more in some sectors. During the later decades of the 18th century, French industrial production grew rapidly, although not on the same scale as in Britain, whose industrial development had begun 60 years before that of the French. Coal mining was a major industry by 1789, its production being nearly

Nebraska, Plant and animal life

2005-03-05T09:33:00.000-08:00

A wide variety of grasses originally covered Nebraska's prairies, and the slopes of the river valleys were well covered with deciduous trees. Cottonwood, elm, and some oak and walnut are found along the bluffs of eastern Nebraska, while conifers grow in the Wild Cat and Pine Ridge highlands and the Niobrara valley. The Nebraska National Forest in west central Nebraska

Kachchh, Rann Of

2005-03-04T15:09:00.000-08:00

Kachchh also spelled Kutch, Cutch , or Kachh saline mudflats, west-central India and southern Pakistan. The Great Rann covers an area of about 7,000 square miles (18,000 square km) and lies almost entirely within Gujarat state, India, along the border with Pakistan. The Little Rann of Kachchh extends northeast from the Gulf of Kachchh and occupies about 2,000 square miles (5,100 square km) in Gujarat state. Originally an extension of the

Powdery Mildew

2005-03-04T14:42:00.000-08:00

A superficial, white or light gray, powdery to

France, History Of, Agricultural patterns

2005-03-04T09:54:00.000-08:00

In its basic organization, French agriculture continued in its age-old patterns. This contrasted starkly with England, where new agricultural techniques as well as major changes in the control of land—convertible husbandry (a progressive form of land use that did away with the wasteful fallowing of land every two or three years) and the enclosure movement (which

Margai, Sir Milton (augustus Striery)

2005-03-03T23:14:00.000-08:00

The grandson of a paramount chief and the

Furniture, Commercial modern

2005-03-02T17:37:00.000-08:00

Most modern furniture designed between 1930 and 1940 was bulky, bulbous, glowingly coloured, glossily finished, and rich with hardware or shiny fabric. It pleased the public but not critics and connoisseurs. Gradually, and more noticeably after 1945, stylistic details filtered down from more progressive design levels to appear as commercial fads, such as sectional seating and

Thailand

2005-03-02T10:25:00.000-08:00

Officially Kingdom of Thailand, formerly (1856–1939) Siam, Thai Prathet, or Prades, Thai (“Thailand”), Rajanajak Thai (“Thai Kingdom”), or Sayam (“Siam”), byname Muang Thai (“Land of the Free”), country located in the centre of mainland Southeast Asia. Its area of 198,115 square miles (513,115 square kilometres) consists of two broad geographic areas: a larger section in the north and a smaller peninsular section in the south. The main body of the country is surrounded by Myanmar (Burma) to the west, Laos to the north and east, Cambodia to the southeast, and the Gulf of Thailand

Palace

2005-03-02T00:51:00.000-08:00

After the Middle Ages the ornate homes of the nobility of all ranks in England, France,

Insurance, Conditions

2005-03-01T21:59:00.000-08:00

Homeowner's policies may include the following conditions: (1) Owners are required to give immediate written notice of loss to the insurer or the insurer's agent. (2) The insured must provide proof of the amount of loss. This suggests that owners should keep accurate records of the items in a building and of their original cost. (3) The insured must cooperate with the insurer

Florencia

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

Capital of Caquetá department, southeastern Colombia, in the eastern slopes of the Andean Cordillera (mountains) Oriental, on the Río Orteguaza, a tributary of the Caquetá. It was founded in 1908 by Capuchin missionaries. Cattle raising and rice cultivation are widespread around Florencia. The city also serves as a trading centre for the densely forested lowlands to

Great Fish River

2005-02-28T17:13:00.000-08:00

Afrikaans Groot-Vis river in the Cape Midlands, Eastern province, southern South Africa. The Great Fish River has a length of 430 miles (692 km) and a drainage area of 11,900 square miles (30,800 square km). Its main northern tributary, the Great Brak River, rises in 7,000-foot- (2,100-metre-) high mountains 30 miles (48 km) south of the Orange River and northeast of Middelburg. The Tarka River, coming from the northeast, and the Baviaans

Nicephorus I, Saint

2005-02-28T16:13:00.000-08:00

Although his conservatively Orthodox

Plum Curculio

2005-02-27T23:06:00.000-08:00

Also called American Plum Weevil (Conotrachelus nenuphar), North American insect pest of the family Curculionidae (order Coleoptera); it does serious damage to a variety of fruit trees. The adult has a dark brown body, about six millimetres ( 1/4 inch) long, with gray and white patches and conspicuous humps on each wing case. It has the typical weevil's snout, strongly down-curved for puncturing the skin of young

Tien Shan, Glaciation

2005-02-27T22:48:00.000-08:00

The total area of the Tien Shan glaciers is some 3,900 square miles, of which approximately four-fifths is in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakstan. Largest among the several glacial areas are the region around Mount Han-t'eng-ko-li and Victory Peak and the O-ha-pu-t'e Mountains. There also are many glaciers in the Kok Shaal-Tau Range, the Akshiyrak Range, the Trans-Ili Alatau Range, and the

Performing Arts, Canada.

2005-02-27T09:13:00.000-08:00

Unusually, one of the most highly profiled North American films of the year was a documentary, Michael Moore's devastating study of American gun culture, Bowling for Columbine. With Ararat, Atom Egoyan investigated the Turkish genocide of the Armenians in 1915 through the eyes of a filmmaker (played by Charles Aznavour) researching a film. In Spider, David Cronenberg abandoned

Graveyard School

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

Genre of 18th-century British poetry that focused on death and bereavement. The graveyard school consisted largely of imitations of Robert Blair's popular long poem of morbid appeal, The Grave (1743), and of Edward Young's celebrated blank-verse dramatic rhapsody Night Thoughts (1742–45). These poems express the sorrow and pain of bereavement, evoke the horror of death's physical

Sinai, Mount

2005-02-24T13:51:00.000-08:00

Also called Mountain Of Moses, or Mount Hareh, Hebrew Har Sinai, Arabic Jabal Musa, granitic peak of the south-central Sinai Peninsula, Janub Sina' (South Sinai) muhafazah (governorate), Egypt. Mount Sinai is renowned as the principal site of divine revelation in Jewish history, where God is purported to have appeared to Moses and given him the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20; Deuteronomy 5). According to Jewish tradition, not only the decalogue but also the entire corpus

Adamic, Louis

2005-02-24T13:03:00.000-08:00

Adamic immigrated to the United States from Yugoslavia at age 14 and was naturalized in 1918. He wrote about what he called the failure of the American melting pot in Laughing

Jackson, Thomas Jonathan

2005-02-24T10:09:00.000-08:00

Byname Stonewall Jackson Confederate general in the American Civil War, one of its most skillful tacticians, who gained his sobriquet “Stonewall” by his stand at the First Battle of Bull Run (called First Manassas by the South) in 1861.

Maccabees

2005-02-23T13:49:00.000-08:00

Also spelled Machabees priestly family of Jews who organized a successful rebellion against the Seleucid ruler Antiochus IV and reconsecrated the defiled Temple of Jerusalem.

Amazonstone

2005-02-23T00:34:00.000-08:00

Also called Amazonite, a gemstone variety of green microcline (q.v.), a feldspar mineral. Frequently confused with jade, amazonstone varies in colour from yellow-green to blue-green and may also exhibit fine white streaks; it is usually opaque and therefore is cut en cabochon (with a rounded and convex polished surface). Although its name is derived from the Amazon River, no deposits have been

Resende

2005-02-22T22:50:00.000-08:00

City, western Rio de Janeiro estado (“state”), eastern Brazil, on the Paraíba do Sul River, opposite Agulhas Negras, at 1,296 feet (395 m) above sea level. Dairying, meat and coffee processing, and talc pulverizing are the principal economic activities. A marble quarry is located nearby, as is a military school. Resende, on the Presidente Dutra Highway between the cities of Rio de Janeiro

Gabrovo

2005-02-22T06:56:00.000-08:00

Town, north-central Bulgaria. It is situated on both banks of the Yantra River, at the foot of the Shipka Pass in the Balkan Mountains. A major industrial centre, Gabrovo has a high in-migration population from the surrounding area. Called the “Bulgarian Manchester,” the town has a large textile industry—clothes, leather goods, and accessories. Other manufactures are machine

Tunisia, Transportation

2005-02-21T05:53:00.000-08:00

The network of roads and railways is sufficiently dense so that all cities of any importance are linked with the interior. Tunisia is connected by both road and rail to Algeria and Morocco but only by road to Libya (Tripoli), and to Egypt (Cairo), since the railway ends at Qabis. Work is underway to modernize and extend the railway network. The principal port is Tunis-Halq

Cohort Analysis

2005-02-21T05:51:00.000-08:00

Method used in studies to describe an aggregate of individuals having in common a significant event in their life histories, such as year of birth (birth cohort) or year of marriage (marriage cohort). The concept of cohort is useful because occurrence rates of various forms of behaviour are often influenced by the length of time elapsed since the event defining the

Taft, Robert A.

2005-02-20T10:43:00.000-08:00

The son of William Howard Taft, 27th president of the

Dzungarian Basin

2005-02-20T01:21:00.000-08:00

The basin is located between the Mongolian Altai Mountains, on the Sino-Mongolian border, to the north, and the P'o-lo-k'o-nu and O-ha-pu-t'e mountains to the south; the latter run east and west immediately to the north of the Tien Shan (“Celestial Mountains”). To the east and southeast, respectively, the basin is

Ménière Disease

2005-02-19T13:39:00.000-08:00

Recurrent and generally progressive group of symptoms that include loss of hearing, ringing in the ears, dizziness, and a sense of fullness or pressure in the ears. Ménière disease usually only affects one ear. The disease causes episodic attacks that seldom last longer than 24 hours and are accompanied by vertigo, nausea, and vomiting. The apparent immediate cause

Bruhn, Erik

2005-02-19T11:09:00.000-08:00

Bruhn entered the training school for the Royal Danish Ballet in 1937, joined the company in 1947, and was promoted to soloist in 1949. To enrich his repertory, he took a leave of absence (1949–58) to dance with

Charles

2005-02-19T05:57:00.000-08:00

The son of Duke Philip III the Good of Burgundy, Charles was brought up in the French manner as a friend of the French dauphin, afterward Louis XI of France, who spent five years in Burgundy before his accession. Although he had shown no hostility toward France before taking over the government of Burgundy during his father's last illness, he thereupon gave rein to an

Cálabozo

2005-02-19T03:16:00.000-08:00

City, Guárico estado (“state”), central Venezuela. It lies along the Guárico River, 110 miles (180 km) south-southwest of Caracas, on a piedmont plain between the mountains and the Llanos (plains). Founded in 1695, Cálabozo was formerly an administrative centre. It gained prominence in the 1950s as the headquarters of the Guárico River Reclamation Project, which is concerned with irrigation,

Actinomycete

2005-02-17T14:10:00.000-08:00

Any member of a heterogeneous group of gram-positive, generally anaerobic bacteria noted for a filamentous and branching growth pattern that results, in most forms, in an extensive colony, or mycelium. The mycelium in some species may break apart to form rod- or coccoid-shaped forms. Many genera also form spores; the sporangia, or spore cases, may be found on aerial hyphae,

Himyar

2005-02-16T21:28:00.000-08:00

The Himyarites were concentrated in the area known as Dhu Raydan on the coast of present-day Yemen (San'a'); they were probably aided in the overthrow of their Sabaean kinsmen by the discovery of a sea route from Egypt

Clark, Abraham

2005-02-16T17:33:00.000-08:00

Benefiting little from formal education, Clark became a surveyor and managed transfers of property. He had a gift for politics and served in many public offices in New Jersey. He championed the cause of the colonies and in 1776 was elected to the Continental Congress,

Winterhalter, Franz Xaver

2005-02-16T00:38:00.000-08:00

Trained in Freiburg im Breisgau and Munich, Germany, Winterhalter entered court circles when in 1828 he became drawing master to Sophie, later grand duchess of Baden, at Karlsruhe. After 1834 he went to Paris and quickly became fashionable, at first under

Arabic Alphabet

2005-02-15T15:13:00.000-08:00

Second most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world (the Latin alphabet is the most widespread). Originally developed for writing the Arabic language and carried across much of the Eastern Hemisphere by the spread of Islam, the Arabic script has been adapted to such diverse languages as Persian, Turkish, Spanish, and Swahili. Although it probably developed

Lepidopteran, Environmental hazards

2005-02-15T11:51:00.000-08:00

As primary consumers of green plant material, the Lepidoptera are enormously important in food chains, not only because of the very large number of species in the order and the diversity of their food habits, but also because of the abundance of individuals. In most land environments they, in turn, are eaten by a host of other animals: predators, parasites, and scavengers.

Mecca, Plant and animal life

2005-02-15T08:14:00.000-08:00

Plant and animal life are scarce and consist of species that can withstand the high degree of aridity and heat. Natural vegetation is sparse, and includes tamarisks and various types of acacia. Wild animals include wild cats, wolves, hyenas, foxes, mongooses, and kangaroo rats (jerboas).

Aerospace Industry, General works

2005-02-14T09:51:00.000-08:00

Roger E. Bilstein, Flight in America: From the Wrights to the Astronauts, rev. ed. (1994), is a general treatise on the development of aviation and spaceflight for the layperson, and his The American Aerospace Industry: From Workshop to Global Enterprise (1996) provides an account of the development of the American aerospace industry. The best source for historical aerospace data is Charles Harvard Gibbs-Smith, The Aeroplane: An Historical Survey of Its Origins and Development (1960). An excellent source on the development of the American aircraft industry to the 1940s is Grover Loening, Takeoff Into Greatness (1968). Charles D. Bright, The Jet Makers: The Aerospace Industry from 1945 to 1972 (1978), details the aerospace industry in the United States after World War II. T.A. Heppenheimer, Turbulent Skies: The History of Commercial Aviation (1995), traces the ascent of the airline business from the biplane era to modern jetliners, and Countdown: A History of Space Flight (1997) includes excellent coverage on the development of the space industry. Bill Gunston, World Encyclopedia of Aircraft Manufacturers (1993), provides a brief listing of the world's aircraft manufacturers from the pioneers to the early 1990s. Daniel Todd and Jamie Simpson, The World Aircraft Industry (1986), discusses the state of the aerospace industry by country and technology and provides statistical data in the appendix.

Biblical Literature, The canon at Qumran.

2005-02-13T02:44:00.000-08:00

In the collection of manuscripts from the Judaean Desert—discovered from the 1940s on—there are no lists of canonical works and no codices (manuscript volumes), only individual scrolls. For these reasons nothing can be known with certainty about the contents and sequence of the canon of the Qumran sectarians. Since fragments of all the books of the Hebrew Bible (except

Andragoras

2005-02-12T18:57:00.000-08:00

Seleucid satrap (governor) of Parthia during the mid-3rd century. He apparently defied Seleucid imperial authority, which was weakly established in his area, and issued coins on which his image bore the royal diadem. After ruling only a few years, he was defeated and killed by Parni tribesmen from the Caspian steppes led by Arsaces, who later set up an independent kingdom

Turishcheva, Lyudmila Ivanovna

2005-02-12T10:42:00.000-08:00

Turishcheva graduated from the Rostov Pedagogical Institute in 1974. At the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, she won a gold medal as a team member in the combined exercises, as she also did at the 1972 Games in Munich and the 1976 Games in Montreal. She won a gold medal for individual

Cambridge Platonists

2005-02-12T10:41:00.000-08:00

Group of 17th-century English philosophic and religious thinkers who hoped to reconcile Christian ethics with Renaissance humanism, religion with the new science, and faith with rationality. Their leader was Benjamin Whichcote, who expounded in his sermons the Christian humanism that united the group. His principal disciples at the University of Cambridge were

Scandinavian Literature, The development of the Icelandic drama

2005-02-11T13:04:00.000-08:00

Icelandic drama really started to develop through Jóhann Sigurjónsson, whose first success was Fjalla-Eyvindur (1911; Eyvind of the Hills), followed by Galdra-Loftur (1915; “Loftur the Sorcerer”); both plays were based on powerful folktales. Gudmundur Kamban's Hadda-Padda (1914) was highly praised by Georg Brandes, and he remained important in Scandinavian drama for the next quarter

Vörösmarty, Mihály

2005-02-11T08:20:00.000-08:00

Born into an impoverished noble family, Vörösmarty soon had to provide for himself. From the age

Insurance, Special riders

2005-02-11T07:41:00.000-08:00

The insured may, at a nominal charge, attach to the contract a waiver-of-premium rider under which premium payments will be waived in the event of total and permanent disability before the age of 60. Under the disability income rider, should the insured become totally and permanently disabled, a monthly income will be paid. Under the double indemnity rider, if death occurs

Trier

2005-02-10T06:29:00.000-08:00

French Trèves, Latin Augusta Treverorum, city, Rhineland-Palatinate Land (state), southwestern Germany, on the right bank of the Mosel (Moselle) River, surrounded by the foothills of the Eifel, Hunsrück, and Mosel mountains, just east of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg frontier. A shrine of the Treveri, a Germanic tribe, existed at the site (c. 400 BC). The Roman town was founded by the emperor Augustus about 15 BC. The city's strategic

Pacific Islands, Agriculture and natural resources

2005-02-09T23:35:00.000-08:00

Coconut products, including copra, from which oil is extracted, form the principal export from most islands. Agricultural production depends as much on native family enterprise as it does on plantation systems, which predominate in the larger islands. Perishable fruits, such as pineapples, bananas, and citrus fruits, require markets close at hand unless they are

Nahant

2005-02-09T02:12:00.000-08:00

Initially settled by fishermen and livestock herders in the mid-17th century, Nahant