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Buckingham, George Villiers, 2d duke of

(Encyclopedia)Buckingham, George Villiers, 2d duke of, 1628–87, English courtier; son of the 1st duke. Brought up with the royal family and educated at Cambridge, he was a strong royalist in the English civil war...

world soul

(Encyclopedia)world soul, Lat. anima mundi, in philosophy, term denoting a universal spirit or soul that functions as an organizing principle. While many early Greek philosophers saw the world as of one principle, ...

meson

(Encyclopedia)meson mēˈzŏn [key] [Gr.,=middle (i.e., middleweight)], class of elementary particles whose masses are generally between those of the lepton class of lighter particles and those of the baryon class ...

Virginia Military Institute

(Encyclopedia)Virginia Military Institute (VMI), at Lexington; state supported; chartered and opened 1839 as the first state military college in the United States. Although one of the leading U.S. military institut...

condensate

(Encyclopedia)condensate, matter in the form of a gas of atoms, molecules, or elementary particles that have been so chilled that their motion is virtually halted and as a consequence they lose their separate ident...

Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st earl of

(Encyclopedia)Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st earl of, 1621–83, English statesman. In the English civil war he supported the crown until 1644 but then joined the parliamentarians. He was made a member of ...

Citadel, The–The Military College of South Carolina

(Encyclopedia)Citadel, The–The Military College of South Carolina sĭtˈədəl, –dĕlˌ [key], at Charleston; state supported; chartered (1842) as The Citadel, opened 1843. From 1882 to 1910 it was named the So...

excommunication

(Encyclopedia)excommunication, formal expulsion from a religious body, the most grave of all ecclesiastical censures. Where religious and social communities are nearly identical it is attended by social ostracism, ...

Jenkins's Ear, War of

(Encyclopedia)Jenkins's Ear, War of, 1739–41, struggle between England and Spain. It grew out of the commercial rivalry of the two powers and led to involvement in the larger War of the Austrian Succession. The i...

Stafford, Edward, 3d duke of Buckingham

(Encyclopedia)Stafford, Edward, 3d duke of Buckingham, 1478–1521, English nobleman; son of Henry Stafford, 2d duke of Buckingham. The attainder (1483) of his father was reversed on the accession (1485) of Henry V...