Columbia Encyclopedia

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Merovingian art and architecture

(Encyclopedia)Merovingian art and architecture mĕrˌəvĭnˈjēən [key]. This period is named for Merovech, the founder of the first Germanic-Frankish dynasty (c.a.d. 500–a.d. 751). The Merovingian period was m...

Monroe

(Encyclopedia)Monroe. 1 Industrial city (1990 pop. 54,909), seat of Ouachita parish, SE La., on the Ouachita River; founded c.1785, inc. as a city 1900. The center of the great Monroe Natural Gas Field (discovered ...

Mainland

(Encyclopedia)Mainland. 1 Island (1991 pop. 14,150), 178 sq mi (461 sq km), N Scotland. The largest of the Orkney Islands, it is also called Pomona. Kirkwall, the seat of the Orkney Islands council area, is on the ...

Rosetta

(Encyclopedia)Rosetta räshēdˈ [key], city (1986 pop. 51,789), N Egypt, in the Nile River delta. The city once dominated the region's rice market; rice milling and fish processing are the main industries of moder...

Saint Helens, Mount

(Encyclopedia)Saint Helens, Mount, volcanic peak, 8,363 ft (2,549 m; 9,677 ft/2,950 m before its 1980 eruption) high, SW Wash., historically the most active volcano in the Cascade Range. Dormant since 1857, Mt. St....

Reading, cities, United States

(Encyclopedia)Reading. rĕdˈĭng [key] 1 Town (1990 pop. 22,539), Middlesex co., NE Mass., a suburb of Boston; settled 1639, set off from Lynn and inc. 1644. Printing is the major industry. A 17th-century tavern i...

thick-knee

(Encyclopedia)thick-knee, common name for terrestrial, Old World birds in the family Burhinidae. The name derives from the bird's thickened tarsal joints. Thick-knees are shy, solitary birds. They are rapid runners...

Copán

(Encyclopedia)Copán kōpänˈ [key], ruined city of the Maya, W Honduras, in a small river valley of the same name. Copán is noted for its fine sculptured stele and majestic architecture. The ruins were the site ...

Cro-Magnon man

(Encyclopedia)Cro-Magnon man krō-măgˈnən, –mănˈyən [key], an early Homo sapiens (the species to which modern humans belong) that lived about 40,000 years ago. Skeletal remains and associated artifacts of t...

Gobi

(Encyclopedia)Gobi gōˈbē [key], Mandarin Yintai shamo, great stony desert of N central Asia, c.500,000 sq mi (1,295,000 sq km), extending c.1,000 mi (1,610 km) from east to west across SE Mongolia and N China fr...