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nursery rhymes

(Encyclopedia)nursery rhymes, verses, generally brief and usually anonymous, for children. The best-known examples are in English and date mostly from the 17th cent. A popular type of rhyme is used in “counting-o...

Acca Larentia

(Encyclopedia)Acca Larentia –tīˈnə [key], in Roman mythology, wife of the shepherd Faustulus and foster mother of Romulus and Remus. Her 12 sons founded the priesthood of the Arval Brothers. According to one l...

Linus, in Greek mythology

(Encyclopedia)Linus, in Greek mythology. 1 Son of Apollo and Psamathe of Argos. He was deserted by his mother on a hillside and devoured by dogs. When Psamathe's father learned what his daughter had done, he had he...

Philips, Ambrose

(Encyclopedia)Philips, Ambrose, 1674–1749, English author. After resigning his fellowship from Cambridge in 1708, he moved to London and became known in the literary Whig coterie of Addison. He is principally rem...

Borden, Lizzie Andrew

(Encyclopedia)Borden, Lizzie Andrew, 1860–1927, American woman accused of killing her father and her step-mother, b. Fall River, Mass. The elder Bordens were hacked to death with an ax on Aug. 4, 1892. Although L...

Strauss, Levi

(Encyclopedia)Strauss, Levi, 1829–1902, American merchant, b. Buttenheim, Germany, as Löb Strauss. He moved with his mother and sisters to New York City in 1847 to join his brothers' wholesale dry-goods company....

Vanderlyn, Pieter

(Encyclopedia)Vanderlyn, Pieter vănˈdərlĭn [key], c.1687–1778, American colonial painter, b. Holland. He reached New York c.1718 and became a portrait painter and land speculator and practiced other trades, ...

Vuillard, Édouard

(Encyclopedia)Vuillard, Édouard ādwärˈ vüēyärˈ [key], 1868–1940, French painter and lithographer; a member of the Nabis. He is known for his scenes of Montmartre and especially for domestic interiors that...

Valadon, Suzanne

(Encyclopedia)Valadon, Suzanne süzänˈ välädôNˈ [key], 1867–1938, French painter. After abandoning successful careers as an acrobat and as artist's model to many of the major impressionists, Valadon, encour...

Thetis

(Encyclopedia)Thetis thēˈtĭs [key], in Greek mythology, a nereid, mother of Achilles. She was loved by both Zeus and Poseidon, but because of a prophecy that her son would be greater than his father, the gods ga...