Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Saint Mark's Church

(Encyclopedia)Saint Mark's Church, Venice, named after the tutelary saint of Venice. The original Romanesque basilical church, built in the 9th cent. as a shrine for the saint's bones, was destroyed by fire in 967....

Shaffer, Sir Peter

(Encyclopedia)Shaffer, Sir Peter shăfˈər [key], 1926–2016, English playwright, b. Liverpool, grad. Cambridge, 1950. Before turning to the stage he wrote for radio and television and was the author of several m...

horsetail

(Encyclopedia)horsetail, any plant of the genus Equisetum [Lat.,=horse bristle], the single surviving genus of a large group (Equisetophyta) of primitive vascular plants. Like the ferns and club mosses, relatives o...

Guinness, Sir Alec

(Encyclopedia)Guinness, Sir Alec gĭnˈəs [key], 1914–2000, English actor, b. London. After his stage debut in 1934, Guinness performed with John Gielgud's company and at the Old Vic. An actor of enormous versat...

gymnastics

(Encyclopedia)gymnastics, exercises for the balanced development of the body (see also aerobics), or the competitive sport derived from these exercises. Although the ancient Greeks (who invented the building called...

hartebeest

(Encyclopedia)hartebeest härˈtĭbēstˌ [key], large African antelope, Alcelaphus bucelaphus. The hartebeest resembles a horse with horns. It has a very long face and a small hump between the shoulders; its coat ...

Perelman, S. J.

(Encyclopedia)Perelman, S. J. (Sidney Joseph Perelman) pĕrˈəlmən [key], 1904–79, American comic writer, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. He entered the magazine world as a cartoonist for a New York weekly, soon turning from...

lark

(Encyclopedia)lark, common name for members of the large family Alaudidae, perching birds of terrestrial habits, chiefly of the Old World and best-known through the skylark, Alauda arvensis. The horned larks belong...

Klíma, Ivan

(Encyclopedia)Klíma, Ivan ēvänˈ klēmˈə [key], 1931–, Czech author, b. Prague as Ivan Kauders, grad. Charles Univ., Prague (1956). Of Jewish descent, Klíma spent 1941–45 in the Theresienstadt (now Terez�...

Křenek, Ernst

(Encyclopedia)Křenek, Ernst krĕˈnĕk, Czech kerzhĕˈnĕk [key], 1900–1991, Austrian-American composer, b. Vienna. to Czech parents. He studied in Vienna and Berlin, and in the early 1920s he composed chamber ...