Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Bakewell, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Bakewell, Robert, 1725–95, English livestock breeder and agriculturist. He successfully bred livestock for meat rather than appearance, developing new breeds, which included the Leicester sheep and ...

Alfonso II, Spanish king of Asturias

(Encyclopedia)Alfonso II (Alfonso the Chaste), 759–842, Spanish king of Asturias (791–842), grandson of Alfonso I. He established his capital at Oviedo, which his father, Fruela I, had founded. Continuing the s...

Frank, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Frank, Robert, 1924–2019, Swiss-American photographer and filmmaker, b. Zürich. He immigrated to the United States in 1947 and became a citizen in 1963. One of the 20th century's most influential p...

Persons, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Persons or Parsons, Robert both: pärˈsənz [key], 1546–1610, English Jesuit missionary. He left a fellowship at Balliol College, Oxford, and went to the Continent to be received (1575) into the Ro...

king snake

(Encyclopedia)king snake, name for a number of species of the genus Lampropeltis, nonvenomous, egg-laying, constricting snakes of North America which show much variation in color and markings. The common king snake...

Hare, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Hare, Robert, 1781–1858, American chemist, b. Philadelphia. He was professor of chemistry (1819–47) at the medical college of the Univ. of Pennsylvania. Hare made important contributions to early ...

King, Rufus

(Encyclopedia)King, Rufus, 1755–1827, American political leader, b. Scarboro, Maine (then a district of Massachusetts). He served briefly in the American Revolution and practiced law in Massachusetts before servi...

King, Stephen

(Encyclopedia)King, Stephen, 1947–, American writer, b. Portland, Maine. Influenced by the 19th-century Gothic tradition, especially the works of Poe, King's fiction reveals the macabre and horrific potential of ...

John I, Spanish king of Castile and León

(Encyclopedia)John I, 1358–90, Spanish king of Castile and León (1379–90), son and successor of Henry II. He tried unsuccessfully to unite the Portuguese and Castilian crowns but was twice defeated by the Port...

Muhammad V, king of Morocco

(Encyclopedia)Muhammad V (Sidi Muhammad ibn Youssef), 1910–61, king of Morocco (1957–61). He succeeded his father, Moulay Youssef, as sultan in 1927. An ardent nationalist, he was deposed and exiled (1953) by t...

Browse by Subject