Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Albertville, town, France

(Encyclopedia)Albertville älbĕrvēlˈ [key], town, Savoie dept., E France in the Rhone-Alps region, close to the French-Italian border. Located in the Alps on the Arly River just abov...

polka

(Encyclopedia)polka, ballroom dance for couples in 2/4 time. Originated by Bohemian peasants about 1830 from steps of the schottische and other dances, the polka by 1835 reached the drawing rooms of Prague, from wh...

Olean

(Encyclopedia)Olean ōˈlēănˌ [key], city (1990 pop. 16,946), Cattaraugus co., W N.Y., on the Allegheny River near the Pa. line; settled 1804, inc. 1893. The city formerly had an oil-based economy related to nea...

Pérez de Montalván, Juan

(Encyclopedia)Pérez de Montalván, Juan hwän pāˈrāth dā mōntälvänˈ [key], 1602–38, Spanish dramatic poet and novelist. He was the close friend and biographer of Lope de Vega. He wrote 48 plays; among th...

Hidatsa

(Encyclopedia)Hidatsa hēdätˈsä [key], Native North Americans, also known as the Minitari and the Gros Ventre. Their language belongs to the Siouan branch of the Hokan-Siouan linguistic stock (see Native America...

lares

(Encyclopedia)lares lârˈēz [key], in Roman religion, guardian spirits. According to some they were ghosts of the dead, destructive spirits who frequented crossroads and had to be propitiated. Others say that the...

El Cordobés

(Encyclopedia)El Cordobés ĕl kōrdōvāsˈ [key], 1936?–, Spanish bullfighter, b. Manuel Benítez Pérez. The predominant matador of the 1960s, he brought an unorthodox acrobatic and theatrical style to the rin...

Perlman, Selig

(Encyclopedia)Perlman, Selig, 1888–1959, American economist, b. Bialystok, Poland. His parents were active in the Zionist and labor movements of Eastern Europe. Perlman emigrated to the United States in 1918, whe...

Wieland, Heinrich

(Encyclopedia)Wieland, Heinrich, 1877–1957, German chemist, Ph.D. Univ. of Munich, 1901. Wieland was a professor at the Technical Univ. of Munich from 1913 to 1921, the Univ. of Freiburg from 1921 to 1925, and th...

Wenzhou

(Encyclopedia)Wenzhou or Wenchow both: wŭn-jō [key], city (1994 est. pop. 449,700), SE Zhejiang prov., SE China. It is a small deep-sea port on the Ou River 12 mi (19 km) from the East China Sea and a major trade...