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Spalatin, George

(Encyclopedia)Spalatin, George shpäˈlätēn [key], 1484–1545, German Protestant reformer. His original name was Georg Burckhardt; he was called Spalatin after his birthplace, Spalt, near Nuremberg. An early fri...

Coney Island

(Encyclopedia)Coney Island kōˈnē [key], beach resort, amusement center, and neighborhood of S Brooklyn borough of New York City, SE N.Y., on the Atlantic Ocean. The tidal creek that once separated the island fro...

Honorius III

(Encyclopedia)Honorius III, d. 1227, pope (1216–27), a Roman named Cencio Savelli; successor of Innocent III. He was created cardinal in 1197 and was an able administrator of the papal treasury. He authored the o...

Frederick William II

(Encyclopedia)Frederick William II, 1744–97, king of Prussia (1786–97), nephew and successor of Frederick II (Frederick the Great). He had the power but lacked the ability of his distinguished predecessors. He ...

Buck, Linda B.

(Encyclopedia)Buck, Linda B., 1947–, American neurobiologist, b. Seattle, Wash., Ph.D. Univ. of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, 1980. Buck taught at Harvard Medi...

Constance, Holy Roman empress

(Encyclopedia)Constance, 1154–98, Holy Roman empress, wife of Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI; daughter of King Roger II of Sicily. She was named heiress of Sicily by her nephew King William II. On his death, however...

Charles Augustus

(Encyclopedia)Charles Augustus, 1757–1828, duke and, after 1815, grand duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach; friend and patron of Goethe, Schiller, and Herder. Though his duchy was small, he was important in German polit...

Frederick William I

(Encyclopedia)Frederick William I, 1688–1740, king of Prussia (1713–40), son and successor of Frederick I. He continued the administrative reforms and the process of centralization begun by Frederick William, t...

Griffenfeld, Peder Schumacher, Count

(Encyclopedia)Griffenfeld, Peder Schumacher, Count pāˈᵺər sho͞oˈmäkhər, grĭfˈənfĕlt [key], 1635–99, Danish politician. The son of a merchant, he became (1665) secretary to Frederick III. In 1665 Grif...

Kelley, Hall Jackson

(Encyclopedia)Kelley, Hall Jackson, 1790–1874, American propagandist for the settlement of Oregon, b. Northwood, N.H. A schoolmaster in Boston (1818–23) and later a railroad surveyor in Maine, he founded (1829)...