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Daly, Marcus

(Encyclopedia)Daly, Marcus, 1841–1900, American copper magnate, b. Ireland. He went to New York City at 15 and later moved to California, where he worked as a miner. He was employed by the “silver kings,” J. ...

Gay-Lussac, Joseph Louis

(Encyclopedia)Gay-Lussac, Joseph Louis zhôzĕfˈ lwē gā-lüsäkˈ [key], 1778–1850, French chemist and physicist. He was professor in Paris at the Sorbonne, at the Polytechnic School, and at the Jardin des Pla...

Morgenthau, Henry, Jr.

(Encyclopedia)Morgenthau, Henry, Jr., 1891–1967, American cabinet officer, b. New York City; son of Henry Morgenthau. He became interested in agriculture and bought a farm in Dutchess co., N.Y., where he became a...

Astaire, Fred

(Encyclopedia)Astaire, Fred əstârˈ [key], 1899–1987, American dancer, actor, and singer, b. Omaha, Nebr., as Frederick Austerlitz. After 1911 he and his sister Adele (1896–1981), b. Adele Marie Austerlitz, f...

Maori

(Encyclopedia)Maori mäˈōrē [key], people of New Zealand and the Cook Islands, believed to have migrated in early times from other islands of Polynesia. Maori tradition asserts that seven canoes brought their an...

Maimonides

(Encyclopedia)Maimonides mīˈmən [key], 1135–1204, Jewish scholar, physician, and philosopher, the most influential Jewish thinker of the Middle Ages, b. Córdoba, Spain, d. Cairo. He is sometimes called Rambam...

madrigal

(Encyclopedia)madrigal, name for two different forms of Italian music, one related to the poetic madrigal in the 14th cent., the other the most common form of secular vocal music in the 16th cent. The poetic madrig...

lyric

(Encyclopedia)lyric, in ancient Greece, a poem accompanied by a musical instrument, usually a lyre. Although the word is still often used to refer to the songlike quality in poetry, it is more generally used to ref...

Leopardi, Giacomo

(Encyclopedia)Leopardi, Giacomo jäˈkōmō lāōpärˈdē [key], 1798–1837, Italian poet and scholar, considered Italy's outstanding 19th-century poet. An intellectual prodigy, he taught himself Hebrew and ancie...

Price, Reynolds

(Encyclopedia)Price, Reynolds (Edward Reynolds Price), 1933–2011, American writer, b. Macon, N.C., grad. Duke Univ. (A.B., 1955), Oxford (B.Litt., 1958). He began teaching at Duke in 1958 and remained there for m...