Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Aetius, Roman general

(Encyclopedia)Aetius, c.396–454, Roman general. At first unfriendly to Valentinian III, he later made his peace with Valentinian's mother, Galla Placidia, and was given a command in Gaul. An ambitious general, he...

pear

(Encyclopedia)pear, name for a fruit tree of the genus Pyrus of the family Rosaceae (rose family) and for its fruit, a pome. The common pear (P. communis) is one of the earliest cultivated of fruit trees, both in i...

Nicaragua, Lake

(Encyclopedia)Nicaragua, Lake, 3,089 sq mi (8,001 sq km), c.100 mi (160 km) long and up to 45 mi (72 km) wide, SW Nicaragua; the largest lake of Central America. It is drained into the Caribbean Sea by the San Juan...

Nimeiri, Muhammed Jaafar al-

(Encyclopedia)Nimeiri or Nimeiry, Muhammed Jaafar al- mo͞ohämˈmäd jäfärˈ äl-nĭmārˈē [key], 1930–, Sudanese army officer and politician. Early active in the Sudanese nationalist movement, he was tempor...

Liu Shaoqi

(Encyclopedia)Liu Shaoqi or Liu Shao-ch'i both: lyo͞o shou-chē [key], 1898?–1969, Chinese Communist political leader. Liu joined (1920) a Comintern organization in Shanghai, where he studied Russian. While in M...

Nanchang

(Encyclopedia)Nanchang nänˈchängˈ [key], city (1994 est. pop. 1,168,700), capital of Jiangxi prov., China, on the Gan River, near the southern end of Poyang Lake. A major transportation center, it has a port, r...

Malema, Julius Sello

(Encyclopedia)Malema, Julius Sello, 1981–, South African political leader. Involved in the African National Congress (ANC) from a young age, he rose quickly in its influential Youth League, becoming a regional ch...

Kocharian, Robert Sedraki

(Encyclopedia)Kocharian or Kocharyan, Robert Sedraki, 1954–, Armenian political leader. He served (1972–74) in the Soviet army and worked as a mechanical engineer (1977–81) before graduating (1982) from the Y...

Raisi, Ebrahim

(Encyclopedia) Raisi, Ebrahim , 1960- , Iranian cleric and political leader, b. Mashhad, as Ebrahim Raisol-Sadati. Raisi’s educational history is unclear, with both...

Terre Haute

(Encyclopedia)Terre Haute tĕrˈə hōt, tĕrˈē hŭt [key], city (1990 pop. 51,483), seat of Vigo co., W Ind., on the Wabash River; inc. 1816. The commercial and trade center of a farm and coal-mining region, its...