Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

322 results found

Arcturus

(Encyclopedia)Arcturus ärkto͝orˈəs [key], brightest star in the constellation Boötes and 4th-brightest star in the entire sky; Bayer designation Alpha Boötis; 1992 position R.A. 14h15.3m, Dec. +19°13′. An ...

San Bernardino Mountains

(Encyclopedia)San Bernardino Mountains, part of the Coast Range, S Calif., extending c.60 mi (100 km) NW and SE through San Bernardino and Riverside counties. Notable peaks are San Bernardino Mt. (10,630 ft/3,240 m...

Buss, Jerry

(Encyclopedia)Buss, Jerry (Gerald Hatten Buss), 1933–2013, American businessman and basketball executive, b. Salt Lake City. He worked in the aerospace industry unt...

Fallingwater

(Encyclopedia)Fallingwater, Bear Run, Pa., house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Fallingwater (1936–39) is an architectural tour de force of Wright's organic philosophy, whereby a building should be completely in...

Paine, Albert Bigelow

(Encyclopedia)Paine, Albert Bigelow, 1861–1937, American author, b. New Bedford, Mass. He is best remembered as the author of the authorized biography of Mark Twain (3 vol., 1912) and as the editor of Twain's let...

Ainu

(Encyclopedia)Ainu īˈno͞o [key], aborigines of Japan who may be descended from a Caucasoid people who once lived in N Asia. More powerful invaders from the Asian mainland gradually forced the Ainu to retreat to ...

Brandenburg, city, Germany

(Encyclopedia)Brandenburg, city, Brandenburg, E Germany, a port on the Havel River. It is an industrial center and rail junction. Manufactures include steel, machiner...

Dupuytren, Guillaume, Baron

(Encyclopedia)Dupuytren, Guillaume, Baron gēyōmˈ bärôNˈ düpüēträNˈ [key], 1777–1835, French surgeon. As professor at the Hôtel Dieu, Paris, from 1812, he was noted as diagnostician, lecturer, and surg...

encaustic

(Encyclopedia)encaustic, painting medium in which the binder for the pigment is wax or wax and resin. Examples of encaustic tomb portraits from Roman Egypt bear witness to the durability of the medium, which is tho...

Faure, Élie

(Encyclopedia)Faure, Élie ālēˈ fōr [key], 1873–1937, French art historian. Trained in medicine, he brought his scientific knowledge to bear in his study of the history of art, relating it to the progress of ...