Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

gun control

(Encyclopedia)gun control, government limitation of the purchase and ownership of firearms. The availability of guns is controlled by nations and localities throughout the world. In the United States the “right o...

Nuzi

(Encyclopedia)Nuzi no͞oˈzē [key], site near Kirkuk, N Iraq. Thousands of clay tablets unearthed there bear inscriptions said to have been made by the Horims (or Horites) of the Bible. The tablets, which are in A...

Ripon, Frederick John Robinson, 1st earl of

(Encyclopedia)Ripon, Frederick John Robinson, 1st earl of rĭpˈən [key], 1782–1859, British statesman, better known as Viscount Goderich. Entering Parliament as a Tory in 1806, he sponsored the unpopular corn l...

Licinius, Roman plebian gens

(Encyclopedia)Licinius līsĭnˈēəs [key], Roman plebeian gens, of which several men were noteworthy. Caius Licinius Calvus Stolo, fl. 375 b.c., was tribune of the people with Lucius Sextius. Roman historians att...

Magnus I

(Encyclopedia)Magnus I (Magnus the Good), 1024–47, king of Norway (1035–47) and Denmark (1042–47), son of Olaf II. He was recalled from exile in 1035 by the former opponents of Olaf when they rebelled against...

International Fund for Agricultural Development

(Encyclopedia)International Fund for Agricultural Development(IFAD), specialized agency of the United Nations with headquarters in Rome, Italy. IFAD grew out of the 1974 World Food Conference; it was established in...

United Nations Industrial Development Organization

(Encyclopedia)United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), specialized agency of the United Nations. Headquartered in Vienna, it was organized in 1966 and made a specialized UN agency in 1985. UNIDO'...

environmentalism

(Encyclopedia)environmentalism, movement to protect the quality and continuity of life through conservation of natural resources, prevention of pollution, and control of land use. The philosophical foundations for ...

Hardwicke, Philip Yorke, 1st earl of

(Encyclopedia)Hardwicke, Philip Yorke, 1st earl of, 1690–1764, English jurist. As lord chancellor (1737–56) he did much to systematize the laws of equity and established the principle that equity must follow it...

homosexuality

(Encyclopedia)homosexuality, a term created by 19th cent. theorists to describe a sexual and emotional interest in members of one's own sex. Today a person is often said to have a homosexual or a heterosexual orien...