Medicine

Developments in modern medical science have made it possible to detect morbid conditions before a person actually feels the effects of the condition. Examples are many: they include certain forms of cancer; high blood pressure; heart and lung disease; various familial and congenital conditions; disorders of metabolism, like diabetes; and acquired immune deficiency

Joyeuse Entrée

Most famous is the charter of liberties, confirmed on Jan. 3, 1356, and called the Joyeuse Entrée, which was presented to the duchy of Brabant (in the Low Countries) by Johanna

Solar

Also spelled  Sollar,   in architecture, private room in a late medieval English manor house, located on the floor above the great hall. The solar served as a kind of parlour to which the owner of the manor house or castle could retire with his family from the chaotic communal living of the hall below. In fact, by the late 14th century the solar was more often called the “retiring room.” Up a flight of

Holiday, Billie

Eleanora Fagan was the daughter of Clarence Holiday, a professional musician who for a time played guitar with the Fletcher Henderson band. She later adopted the name Billie from a favourite movie actress, Billie Dove. In 1928 she moved with her

Russell's Viper

Also called  Daboia, or Tic Polonga  (species Vipera russelli), abundant, highly venomous terrestrial snake of the family Viperidae. It is found from India to Taiwan and Java, most often in open country. It is a major cause of snakebite deaths within its range. The viper grows to a maximum of about 1.5 m (5 feet) and is marked with three rows of reddish brown spots outlined in black and again in white.

Arsacid Dynasty

Also called  Arshakuni  (247 BC–AD 224), ancient Iranian dynasty that founded and ruled the Parthian empire. The progenitors of the dynasty were members of the Parni tribe living east of the Caspian Sea. They entered Parthia (q.v.) shortly after the death of Alexander the Great (323 BC) and gradually gained control over much of Iran and Mesopotamia until, in AD 224, they were overthrown by the Sasanians, an Iranian dynasty founded

Habakkuk, The Book Of

It is difficult to fix the date of the book, but the mention of the Chaldeans as Yahweh's agent (1:6) suggests the period

Arsacid Dynasty

The IRA was created in 1919 as a successor to the Irish Volunteers, a militant Nationalist organization founded in 1913. The IRA's purpose was to use armed force to render British rule in Ireland ineffective and thus

Kamakura

City, Kanagawa Prefecture (ken), Honshu, Japan, on the Pacific Ocean, south of Yokohama. Situated at the western base of the Miura Peninsula, it is enclosed on three sides by hills and has fine sandy beaches to the south. Kamakura was a small fishing village until it was established as a capital of the Minamoto clan in 1180. It then retained its political status as the second capital

Hawk

Any of many small to medium-sized diurnal birds of prey, particularly those in the genus Accipiter, known as the true hawks, and including the goshawks and sparrowhawks. The term hawk is often applied to other birds in the family Accipitridae (such as the kites, buzzards, and harriers) and sometimes is extended to include certain members of the family Falconidae (falcons

Dewas

City, western Madhya Pradesh state, central India. It is located on the Malwa Plateau at the foot of the conical Chamunda Hill, which rises to a Devivasini shrine. Jaina and Hindu temple ruins lie just south of the city, in Nagara. The surrounding area consists chiefly of level plains of the Malwa Plateau, watered by the Narmada, Sipra, and Kali Sindh rivers. Wheat, sorghum, rice, cotton,

Bustamante Y Sirvén, Antonio Sánchez De

In 1884, when he was 19 years

Philby, Kim

While a student at the University of Cambridge, Philby became a Communist and in 1933 a Soviet agent. He worked as a journalist until 1940, when Guy Burgess, a British secret agent who was himself a Soviet double agent, recruited Philby

Motion Picture, Motion-picture design

Under the heading of design, all the elements of a picture's setting may be included—art direction, scenic composition, set design, costume, and makeup. At its simplest and most naturalistic, the camera can choose and frame ordinary people in a real location. At its most elaborate, motion-picture production may involve the expenditure of vast sums to put up gigantic sets

Pacific Mountain System, Soils

In the Pacific mountain system are found all of the 11 orders of soils, of which three are most abundant. Inceptisols dominate in the coastal ranges from the Queen Charlotte Islands south to San Francisco Bay and in the Cascade Range. They have weakly differentiated horizons (layers), are little altered from their parent material, and occur where summers are cool. The

Conti, François-louis De Bourbon, Prince De

Naturally possessed of great ability, he received an excellent education and was distinguished for both the independence of his mind and the popularity of his manners. On this account he was not received with favour by Louis XIV; so in 1683 he assisted the Imperialists in Hungary, and while there he wrote

Switzerland, Relief and drainage

Situated at the hydrographic centre of Europe, Switzerland is the source of many major rivers. The two most important are the Rhône, which flows into the Mediterranean, and the Rhine, which empties into the North Sea. Switzerland's small area contains an unusual diversity of topographic elements, which are divisible into three distinct regions: the Jura

Pamirs, Animal life

The high tablelands of the eastern Pamirs are the prime breeding area of the mountain goat and the argali (Marco Polo) wild sheep; occasional sightings of blue sheep and urial are reported. Ibex are common where human activity is minimal, and markhor inhabit the lower ranges between the Panj and Vakhsh rivers. Brown bear feed on the abundant marmots, as do wolves. Relatively

Biblical Literature, Greek versions

The first New Testament was done by Maximus of Gallipoli in 1638 (at Geneva?). The British

Ghalib, Mirza Asadullah Khan

Born into an aristocratic family, Ghalib passed his youth in luxury. Subsequently, he was granted a small pension by the British government but had to struggle against penury and hardships. Recognition finally came in 1850, when

West Lancashire

District, administrative and historic county of Lancashire, northwestern England, north of the city of Liverpool. West Lancashire is separated from the Irish Sea by the narrow coastal strip of Sefton except in the north at the mouth of the River Ribble. The district is essentially a low-lying coastal plain, much of it reclaimed marshland, although marshes in the extreme

Wahhab, Muhammad Ibn 'abd Al-

Having completed his formal education in the holy city of Medina, in Arabia, 'Abd al-Wahhab lived abroad for many years. He taught for four years in Basra, Iraq, and in Baghdad he married an affluent woman whose property he inherited

Lur

Also spelled  lure   bronze horn, or trumpet, found in prehistoric Scandinavian excavations. It has a conical bore that extends in length from roughly 5 to 8 feet (1.5 to 2.5 metres) in a bent S-shape (somewhat resembling a mammoth tusk) and ends in an embossed metal disk. The mouthpiece of the lur is permanently affixed. Lurs are usually found in pairs and were probably played ritually.

Gahnite

The mineral zinc aluminum oxide, a member of the spinel (q.v.) series.

Progesterone

Hormone secreted by the female reproductive system that functions mainly to regulate the condition of the inner lining (endometrium) of the uterus. Progesterone is produced by the ovaries, placenta, and adrenal glands; in the ovaries the site of production is the corpus luteum tissue, which begins to form prior to an egg's release and continues to grow into the empty

Frederick

City, seat (1907) of Tillman county, southwestern Oklahoma, U.S. With the opening of the Kiowa-Apache-Comanche reservation to settlement in 1901, the community grew up around a stop on the Blackwell, Enid, and Southwestern Railway. Initially known as Gosnell and renamed in 1902 for the son of railroad magnate J.C. van Blarcom, Frederick developed as a shipping point for locally produced

Ganesan, Sivaji

Ganesan dropped out of school at a young age in order to join a boys' acting troupe. In 1946 he made his mark playing the title role of the Maratha emperor Sivaji (the historical character who gave him his screen name) in C.N. Annadurai's play Sivaji Kanda Indhu Rajyam. When Annadurai formed the Dravida

Margai, Sir Milton (augustus Striery)

The grandson of a paramount chief and the

Rya Rug

Floor covering handmade in Sweden and Finland using techniques resembling those employed in Oriental carpets but having extremely long, recumbent pile and great flexibility. In one Swedish type the nap is produced by Ghiordes knots that include a third warp, the fabric having been made on a cloth loom with open shed. Early examples of rya rugs, which were intended

Malanggan Style

Malanggan carvings take the form of friezes, masks, and sculpture,

Shamanism

The residues of shamanism may be found among peoples who have been converted to religions of a later stage of culture—e.g., Finno-Ugric peoples who became Christians, Turkic peoples in Central Asia and Asia Minor who became Muslim, and Mongols who became Buddhists. Among the Finns, the tietäjä, a figure equivalent to the shaman, also is born with one more tooth than normal.

Pidyon Ha-ben

Plural  Pidyon Ha-bonin, or Pidyon Ha-bens,   Jewish ceremony in which the father redeems his wife's firstborn son by offering to a cohen (a male Jew descended from the first priest, Aaron) the equivalent of five silver shekels (ancient coins). The ceremony, which normally takes place 30 days after the child's birth, dates from Old Testament times, when the firstborn sons of the Israelites were spared from death on the

Seabury, Samuel

Seabury was educated in medicine at Yale University and the University of Edinburgh. After he became a priest in 1753, he served parishes in New Brunswick, New Jersey, in Jamaica, New York, and in Westchester, New York; he also practiced

Arabic Literary Renaissance

After the Napoleonic invasion of Egypt (1798) and the subsequent establishment of an autonomous and Western-minded ruling dynasty there, many Syrian and Lebanese writers sought out the freer environment of Egypt, making it

Paul, Les

Paul designed a solid-body electric guitar in 1941, but, by the time the Les Paul Standard was ready for production by the Gibson Guitar Company in 1952, Leo Fender had already mass-produced the Fender Broadcaster four years earlier, thus beating Paul to popular credit for the invention. Nonetheless, the

Frederic, Harold

Interested at an early age in photography and journalism, Frederic became a reporter and by 1882 was editor of the Albany Evening Journal. In 1884 he went to London as the correspondent for The New York Times. He remained there for the rest

Seti I

In the early years of his reign, Seti led his army northward to restore Egyptian prestige, which had been partly lost during the troubled years of the late 18th dynasty. He battled in northern Palestine