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East Haven

(Encyclopedia)East Haven, town (2020 pop. 27,923, New Haven co., S Conn., on Long Island Sound, a residential suburb of New Haven, in a farm area; inc. 1785. Light in...

Smith, James, American political leader

(Encyclopedia)Smith, James, c.1719–1806, political leader in the American Revolution, signer of the Declaration of Independence, b. Ireland. He settled in Pennsylvania in his youth and practiced law at York. He s...

Agrapha of Jesus

(Encyclopedia)Agrapha of Jesus ăgˈrəfə [key] [gr.,=unwritten], sayings attributed to Jesus not found in the canonical Gospels, but found elsewhere in the New Testament, the Apocryphal Gospels, the early Fathers...

Bradshaw, Henry

(Encyclopedia)Bradshaw, Henry, 1831–86, English librarian and antiquarian at Cambridge. He discovered, organized, and made known the university's treasures of manuscripts and incunabula, especially those in Gaeli...

alchemy

(Encyclopedia)alchemy ălˈkəmē [key], ancient art of obscure origin that sought to transform base metals (e.g., lead) into silver and gold; forerunner of the science of chemistry. Some scholars hold that it was ...

Georgian literature

(Encyclopedia)Georgian literature. Early Georgian literature shows the influence of two distinctly different civilizations—medieval Eastern Orthodox Christianity and, later, Persia. The Passion of St. Shushanik, ...

Pseudepigrapha

(Encyclopedia)Pseudepigrapha so͞oˌdĭpĭˈgrəfə [key] [Gr.,=things falsely ascribed], a collection of early Jewish and some Jewish-Christian writings composed between c.200 b.c. and c.a.d. 200, not found in the...

kitsch

(Encyclopedia)kitsch [Ger.,=trash], term most frequently applied since the early 20th cent. to works considered pretentious and tasteless. Exploitative commercial objects such as Mona Lisa scarves and abominable pl...

Sackville

(Encyclopedia)Sackville, town (1991 pop. 5,494), SE N.B., Canada, near the head of Chignecto Bay, an arm of the Bay of Fundy. The early French Acadian settlers diked and reclaimed the nearby Tantramar marshes, crea...

Semeru

(Encyclopedia)Semeru səmĕrˈo͞o [key], volcanic peak, 12,060 ft (3,676 m) high, E Java, Indonesia. Formerly called Mt. Mahameru, it is the island's highest point. The mountain has experienced frequent eruptions ...