Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

ransom

(Encyclopedia)ransom, price of redemption demanded by the captor of a person, vessel, or city. In ancient times cities frequently paid ransom to prevent their plundering by captors. The custom of ransoming was form...

Starr, Ringo

(Encyclopedia) Starr, Ringo (b. Richard Starkey): see Beatles, The. ...

John, king of England

(Encyclopedia)John, 1167–1216, king of England (1199–1216), son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. John, though often cruel and treacherous, was an excellent administrator, much concerned with rendering...

Mans, Le

(Encyclopedia)Mans, Le lə mäN [key], city (1990 pop. 148,465), capital of Sarthe dept., NW France, on the Sarthe River. The historical capital of Maine, it is also an important manufacturing, commercial, educatio...

York, Edmund of Langley, duke of

(Encyclopedia)York, Edmund of Langley, duke of, 1341–1402, fifth son of Edward III of England. He was made (1362) earl of Cambridge, served on expeditions to Spain and France, and married (1372) Isabel, daughter ...

Rumsfeld, Donald Henry

(Encyclopedia)Rumsfeld, Donald Henry, 1932–2021, American government official, b. Chicago, Princeton Univ. (B.A., 1954). After graduating college, Rumsfeld enliste...

Macdonald, Dwight

(Encyclopedia)Macdonald, Dwight, 1906–82, American author and editor, b. New York City. As an associate editor (1928–36) of the business magazine Fortune he acquired a distaste for capitalism, and in 1937 he be...

DeLorean, John Zachary

(Encyclopedia)DeLorean, John Zachary, 1925–2005, American automobile executive and entrepeneur, b. Detroit. Son of a Ford Motor Co. worker, he attended the Lawrence Institute of Technology (B.S. 1948) and later e...

Grisham, John

(Encyclopedia)Grisham, John, 1955–, American novelist and lawyer, b. Jonesboro, Ark., B.S. Mississippi State Univ., 1977, J.D. Univ. of Mississippi School of Law, 1981. He practiced law for nearly a decade and se...

Browse by Subject