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Zend

(Encyclopedia)Zend zĕnd [key], term formerly used for the language of the Avesta (see Zoroastrianism). ...

Native American languages

(Encyclopedia)Native American languages, languages of the native peoples of the Western Hemisphere and their descendants. A number of the Native American languages that were spoken at the time of the European arriv...

Lysias

(Encyclopedia)Lysias lĭsˈēəs [key], c.459–c.380 b.c., Attic orator; son of Cephalus, a Syracusan. After the capture (404 b.c.) of Athens by the Spartans, the Thirty Tyrants caused the arrest of Lysias and his...

Didache

(Encyclopedia)Didache dĭdˈəkē [key] [Gr.,=teaching], early Christian work written in Greek, called also The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. Dates for its composition suggested by scholars have ranged from a.d....

Alcaeus

(Encyclopedia)Alcaeus ălsēˈəs [key], c.620–c.580 b.c., Greek lyric poet of Lesbos. An aristocrat, he was often embroiled in political battles with the ruling tyrants. He wrote drinking songs, hymns, love song...

Polyglot Bible

(Encyclopedia)Polyglot Bible pŏlˈēglŏt [key], Bible in which different texts, often in different languages, are laid out in parallel columns. Polyglot Bibles serve as tools for textual criticism. Origen's Hexap...

R

(Encyclopedia)R, 18th letter of the alphabet, corresponding to Greek rho. When in Latin alphabets the letters for p and r became similar in appearance, the rho form (P; which at first was used for the r sound) was ...

Pytheas

(Encyclopedia)Pytheas pĭthˈēəs [key], Greek mariner and geographer, fl. late 4th cent. b.c. A native of the Greek colony of Massilia (modern Marseilles), he explored the Atlantic coasts of Spain and France, cir...

paleography

(Encyclopedia)paleography pālēŏgˈrəfē [key] [Gr.,=early writing], term generally meaning all study and interpretation of old ways of recording language. In a narrower sense, it excludes epigraphy (the study o...

Faliscan

(Encyclopedia)Faliscan fəlĭsˈkən [key], extinct language belonging to the Italic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. See Italic languages. ...