Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Gallup

(Encyclopedia)Gallup, town (2020 pop. 21,899), alt. 6,515 ft (1,986 m), seat of McKinley co., NW N.Mex., on the Puerco River near the Ariz. line; inc. 1891. It is a r...

Naipaul, V. S.

(Encyclopedia)Naipaul, V. S. (Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul) nīpôlˈ [key], 1932–2018, English writer, b. Chaguanas, Trinidad; grad. University College, Oxford, 1953. Naipul, whose family descended from Ind...

yam

(Encyclopedia)yam, common name for some members of the Dioscoreaceae, a family of tropical and subtropical climbing herbs or shrubs with starchy rhizomes often cultivated for food. The largest genus, Dioscorea, is ...

button

(Encyclopedia)button, knoblike appendage used on wearing apparel either for ornament or for fastening. Although buttons were sometimes used as fasteners by Greeks and Romans, they were more often merely ornamental ...

Latter-day Saints, Church of Jesus Christ of

(Encyclopedia)Latter-day Saints, Church of Jesus Christ of, name of the church founded (1830) at Fayette, N.Y., by Joseph Smith. The headquarters are in Salt Lake City, Utah. Its members, now numbering about 5.7 mi...

Spanish language

(Encyclopedia)CEE Spanish language, member of the Romance group of the Italic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages (see Romance languages). The official language of Spain and 19 Latin American nati...

mammoth

(Encyclopedia)mammoth, name for several large prehistoric relatives (genus Mammuthus) of modern elephants which ranged over Eurasia and North America in the Pleistocene epoch. The shoulder height of the Siberian, o...

soap plant

(Encyclopedia)soap plant, any of various plants having cleansing properties. A few are of commercial importance, but most soap plants are used locally, as in early times, for toilet and laundry purposes. The soapba...

Native American Church

(Encyclopedia)Native American Church, Native American religious group whose beliefs blend fundamentalist Christian elements with pan–Native American moral principles. The movement began among the Kiowa about 1890...

Zapotec

(Encyclopedia)Zapotec zäˈpətĕk, säˈ– [key], indigenous people of Mexico, primarily in S Oaxaca and on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Little is known of the origin of the Zapotec. Unlike most native peoples of ...