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Dovrefjell

(Encyclopedia)Dovrefjell dôˈvrəfyĕl [key], mountainous region of S Norway, c.100 mi (160 km) long and 40 mi (60 km) wide, culminating in Snøhetta (7,500 ft/2,286 m high). It is crossed by the Dovre railway and...

Feyjóo y Montenegro, Benito Gerónimo

(Encyclopedia)Feyjóo y Montenegro, Benito Gerónimo bānēˈtō hārōˈnēmō fāēhōˈō ē mōntānāˈgrō [key], 1676–1764, Spanish Benedictine scholar and critic, abbot at Oviedo, Asturias. Feyjóo led in...

Seelye, Laurenus Clark

(Encyclopedia)Seelye, Laurenus Clark, 1837–1924, American educator and Congregational clergyman, b. Bethel, Conn., grad. Union College, 1857, and studied at Andover Theological Seminary and in Germany; brother of...

Hellenistic civilization

(Encyclopedia)Hellenistic civilization. The conquests of Alexander the Great spread Hellenism immediately over the Middle East and far into Asia. After his death in 323 b.c., the influence of Greek civilization con...

Lessing, Doris

(Encyclopedia)Lessing, Doris, 1919–2013, British novelist, b. Kermanshah, Persia (now Iran) as Doris May Tayler. Largely self-educated, she was brought up on a farm in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), and in 194...

Faulkner, William

(Encyclopedia)Faulkner, William, 1897–1962, American novelist, b. New Albany, Miss., one of the great American writers of the 20th cent. Born into an old Southern family named Falkner, he changed the spelling of ...

Sephardim

(Encyclopedia)Sephardim səfärˈdəm [key], one of the two major geographic divisions of the Jewish people, consisting of those Jews whose forebears in the Middle Ages resided in the Iberian Peninsula, as distingu...

Stanislaus II

(Encyclopedia)Stanislaus II, 1732–98, last king of Poland (1764–95). He was born Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski. His mother was a member of the powerful Czartoryski family, which furthered Stanislaus's career....

Wilder, Thornton Niven

(Encyclopedia)Wilder, Thornton Niven, 1897–1975, American playwright and novelist, b. Madison, Wis., grad. Yale (B.A., 1920), Princeton (M.A., 1925). He received most of his early education in China, where his fa...

Thomas, Robert Bailey

(Encyclopedia)Thomas, Robert Bailey, 1766–1846, American journalist, b. Grafton, Mass. He was the founder and long-time editor (1792–1846) of The Farmer's Almanac[k] (later The Old Farmer's Almanac[k]). The wor...