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Shirley, Sir Anthony

(Encyclopedia)Shirley or Sherley, Sir Anthony, 1565–1636?, English adventurer. He fought in the Netherlands (1586) under the earl of Leicester and in France (1591) under the earl of Essex, who became his patron. ...

hieroglyphic

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Examples of hieroglyphics hieroglyphic hīˌrəglĭfˈĭk, hīˌərə– [key] [Gr.,=priestly carving], type of writing used in ancient Egypt. Similar pictographic styles of Crete, Asia Minor,...

Duras, Marguerite

(Encyclopedia)Duras, Marguerite märgərētˈ düräsˈ [key], 1914–96, French author, b. Gia Dinh, Indochina (now Vietnam). Usually grouped with the exponents of the nouveau roman [new novel] (see French literat...

Copland, Aaron

(Encyclopedia)Copland, Aaron kōpˈlənd [key], 1900–1990, American composer, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. Copland was a pupil of Rubin Goldmark and of Nadia Boulanger, who introduced his work to the United States when she ...

art history

(Encyclopedia)art history, the study of works of art and architecture. In the mid-19th cent., art history was raised to the status of an academic discipline by the Swiss Jacob Burckhardt, who related art to its cul...

Conrad, Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Conrad, Joseph, 1857–1924, English novelist, b. Berdichev, Russia (now Berdychiv, Ukraine), originally named Jósef Teodor Konrad Walecz Korzeniowski. Born of Polish parents, he is considered one of...

Essenes

(Encyclopedia)Essenes ĕsˈēnz [key], members of a small Jewish religious order, originating in the 2d cent. b.c. The chief sources of information about the Essenes are Pliny the Elder, Philo's Quod omnius probus ...

Gunpowder Plot

(Encyclopedia)Gunpowder Plot, conspiracy to blow up the English Parliament and King James I on Nov. 5, 1605, the day set for the king to open Parliament. It was intended to be the beginning of a great uprising of E...

Spark, Dame Muriel

(Encyclopedia)Spark, Dame Muriel, 1918–2006, Scottish novelist, b. Muriel Sarah Camberg. She lived in Edinburgh, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), London, New York, and Rome, and spent her last years in Tuscany. Spark's t...

woman suffrage

(Encyclopedia)woman suffrage, the right of women to vote. Throughout the latter part of the 19th cent. the issue of women's voting rights was an important phase of feminism. On the European mainland, Finland (1...