Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

pagoda

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Pagoda pagoda pəgōˈdə [key], name given in the East to a variety of buildings of tower form that are usually part of a temple or monastery group and serve as shrines. Those of India (see s...

slide rule

(Encyclopedia)slide rule, instrument for making numerical computations and readings, the results of which may be read easily and quickly after performing simple mechanical manipulations. Multiplication and division...

Mills, Clark

(Encyclopedia)Mills, Clark, 1810–83, American sculptor, b. Onondaga co., N.Y. Self-taught in art, he designed and in 1852 cast in an experimental foundry the statue of General Jackson for Lafayette Square, Washin...

Swinnerton, Frank

(Encyclopedia)Swinnerton, Frank, 1884–1982, English novelist and critic, b. Wood Green, Middlesex. In addition to serving variously as an editor and a drama critic he wrote over 30 novels. For half a century, Swi...

ketch

(Encyclopedia)ketch, fore-and-aft-rigged sailing vessel with a mainmast forward carrying a mainsail and jibs. It has a mizzenmast aft, stepped forward of the rudder post. In the United States, ketch-rigged vessels ...

Fisher, Dorothy Canfield

(Encyclopedia)Fisher, Dorothy Canfield, 1879–1958, American novelist and juvenile writer, b. Lawrence, Kans., grad. Ohio State, 1899, Ph.D. Columbia, 1904. Her novels include The Bent Twig (1915), The Deepening S...

parallelogram

(Encyclopedia)parallelogram, closed plane figure bounded by four line segments, or sides, with opposite pairs of sides parallel and equal in length. The rhombus, rectangle, and square are special types of parallelo...

Brown, Henry Kirke

(Encyclopedia)Brown, Henry Kirke, 1814–86, American sculptor, b. Leyden, Mass. He studied portrait painting with Chester Harding and later turned to sculpture, which he studied in Italy. Returning to America in 1...

Malevich, Casimir

(Encyclopedia)Malevich, Casimir or Kasimir both: käˈsĭmēr mälyāˈvĭch [key], 1878–1935, Russian painter. Moving to Moscow in 1906, he became involved in avant-garde artistic circles. He worked first in a s...

Irving, Edward

(Encyclopedia)Irving, Edward, 1792–1834, Scottish preacher, under whose influence the Catholic Apostolic Church was founded; its members have sometimes been called Irvingites. He was tutor to Jane Welsh, later th...