Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

419 results found

Benson, Robert Hugh

(Encyclopedia)Benson, Robert Hugh, 1871–1914, English author and clergyman; 4th son of Archbishop Benson. He was converted to Roman Catholicism in 1903 and ordained the next year. In 1911, as a monsignor, he beca...

Williams, Emlyn

(Encyclopedia)Williams, Emlyn, 1905–87, Welsh actor and dramatist. His best-known plays are Night Must Fall (1935) and The Corn Is Green (1941). His Collected Plays were published in 1961. As an actor he is noted...

Fouquet, Jean

(Encyclopedia)Fouquet or Foucquet, Jean or Jehan all: zhäN fo͞okāˈ [key], c.1420–c.1480, French painter and illuminator. He was summoned to Rome in the 1440s to paint the portrait (now lost) of Pope Eugenius ...

Tenerani, Pietro

(Encyclopedia)Tenerani, Pietro pyĕˈtrō tānāräˈnē [key], c.1789–1869, Italian sculptor. He studied with both Canova and Thorvaldsen. Of his many works on classical and Christian subjects, the best known in...

Suger

(Encyclopedia)Suger süzhĕrˈ [key], 1081–1151, French cleric and statesman, abbot of Saint-Denis from 1122, minister of kings Louis VI and Louis VII. Born into a peasant family and educated at the abbey of Sain...

Romanus I

(Encyclopedia)Romanus I (Romanus Lecapenus), d. 948, Byzantine emperor (920–44). An admiral, he usurped the throne during the minority of his son-in-law, Constantine VII. He defended Constantinople against the Bu...

Antonines

(Encyclopedia)Antonines ănˈtənīnz [key], collective name of certain Roman emperors of the 2d cent., namely Antoninus Pius; his adopted sons, Marcus Aurelius and Verus; and Commodus. ...

Spellman, Francis Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Spellman, Francis Joseph, 1889–1967, American Roman Catholic cardinal, b. Whitman, Mass. Educated at Fordham and the American College at Rome, he was ordained May 14, 1916. He was a parish priest in...

Counter Reformation

(Encyclopedia)Counter Reformation, 16th-century reformation that arose largely in answer to the Protestant Reformation; sometimes called the Catholic Reformation. Although the Roman Catholic reformers shared the Pr...

Prajadhipok

(Encyclopedia)Prajadhipok räˈ mä [key], 1893–1941, king of Siam (1925–35). He was educated in England and France. He succeeded his brother Rama VI, and in 1932 a coup forced him to grant a constitution, whic...