Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Mortimer, Sir Edmund de

(Encyclopedia)Mortimer, Sir Edmund de, 1376–1409, English nobleman; youngest son of Edmund de Mortimer, 3d earl of March. In 1398 when young Edmund, the 5th earl, nephew of Sir Edmund, succeeded to the title whil...

python, in zoology

(Encyclopedia)python pīˈthŏn [key], name for nonvenomous constrictor snakes of the boa family, found in the tropical regions of Africa, Asia, Australia, and the S Pacific islands. Pythons climb and swim expertly...

Coypel

(Encyclopedia)Coypel kwäpĕlˈ [key], family of French painters. Noël Coypel, 1628–1707, director of the Académie de France à Rome and later of the Académie royale de péinture et de sculpture in Paris, was ...

Godefroy

(Encyclopedia)Godefroy gôdfrwäˈ [key], family of French scholars. Denis Godefroy, 1549–1622, was a Calvinist who fled (c.1580) to Geneva and later became a professor of law at Strasbourg and Heidelberg. He com...

Dubois, Guillaume

(Encyclopedia)Dubois, Guillaume gēyōmˈ dübwäˈ [key], 1656–1723, French statesman, cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. A man of humble birth, he was tutor to Philippe II d'Orléans (see under Orléans, fa...

commando

(Encyclopedia)commando, small, elite military raiding and assault unit or soldier. Although the word was coined in the Boer War (1899–1902), the role is as old as battles themselves. In 1940, when the British org...

Tung Chee-hwa

(Encyclopedia)Tung Chee-hwa, 1937–, Hong Kong business and political leader, b. Shanghai. The son of C. Y. Tung, a businessman who left China as the Communists were coming to power, Tung entered the family shippi...

Cumberland, Richard, 1732–1811, English dramatist

(Encyclopedia)Cumberland, Richard, 1732–1811, English dramatist; great-grandson of the 17th-century philosopher Richard Cumberland. His family connections earned him a clerical position with the British board of ...

Kitchener, Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl

(Encyclopedia)Kitchener, Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl kĭchˈənər, kĭchˈnər [key], 1850–1916, British field marshal and statesman. Trained at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich (1868–70), he had a...

Seabury, Samuel, American clergyman

(Encyclopedia)Seabury, Samuel, 1729–96, American clergyman, first bishop of the Episcopal Church, b. Connecticut, grad. Yale, 1748. He studied medicine at the Univ. of Edinburgh, then turned to theology and was o...