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Swedish language

(Encyclopedia)Swedish language, member of the North Germanic, or Scandinavian, group of the Germanic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. It is the official language of Sweden and one of the official...

African literature

(Encyclopedia)African literature, literary works of the African continent. African literature consists of a body of work in different languages and various genres, ranging from oral literature to literature written...

Lewis, Sir George Cornewall

(Encyclopedia)Lewis, Sir George Cornewall, 1806–63, English statesman and man of letters. Entering Parliament as a Liberal in 1847, he served as chancellor of exchequer (1855–58), home secretary (1859–61), an...

Grotefend, Georg Friedrich

(Encyclopedia)Grotefend, Georg Friedrich gāˈôrkh frēˈdrĭkh grōˈtəfĕnt [key], 1775–1853, German archaeologist and philologist. He specialized in Latin and Italian and wrote works on the Umbrian and Oscan...

Schleicher, August

(Encyclopedia)Schleicher, August ouˈgo͝ost shlīˈkhər [key], 1821–68, German philologist. A professor at the universities of Prague and Jena, Schleicher wrote studies of the Lithuanian language (1856–57), t...

Shuswap

(Encyclopedia)Shuswap sho͞oˈswäp [key], Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Salishan branch of the Algonquian-Wakashan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). In the mid-19th cent. the...

Baedeker, Karl

(Encyclopedia)Baedeker, Karl bāˈdĕkər [key], 1801–59, German publisher, founder of the Baedeker guidebooks. His printing establishment was at Koblenz, but his son Fritz, who continued the business, moved it t...

Babel

(Encyclopedia)Babel bāˈbəl [key] [Heb.,=confused], in the Bible, place where Noah's descendants (who spoke one language) tried to build a tower reaching up to heaven to make a name for themselves. For this presu...

Samoyedes

(Encyclopedia)Samoyedes or Samoyeds both: sămˈəyĕdzˌ [key], partly nomadic, partly settled agricultural tribes found in N Siberia and the Taimyr Peninsula, especially in the basin of the Ob and Yenisei rivers....

Tillamook

(Encyclopedia)Tillamook, Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Salishan branch of the Algonquian-Wakashan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). In the early 19th cent. they lived on Tilla...