Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

0-9

Alborg ... alcohol

Alborg: city, port, and seat of Nordjylland amtskommune (county), northern Jutland, Denmark, on the south side of Limfjorden. It has existed since about AD 1000 and is one of the oldest towns in Denmark. Chartered in 1342, it ...
Albornoz, Gil Alvarez Carrillo de: Spanish cardinal and jurist who paved the way for the papacy's return to Italy from Avignon, France (where the popes lived from about 1309 to 1377).
Albrechtsberger, Johann Georg: Austrian composer, organist, and music theorist who was one of the most learned and skillful contrapuntists of his time. His fame attracted many pupils, including Ludwig van Beethoven.
Albret Family: Gascon family celebrated in French history. The lords (sires) of Albret included warriors, cardinals, and kings of Navarre, reaching the height of their power in the 14th to 16th century. Their name derives from Labrit, a small village on the ...
Albright, Ivan: American painter noted for his meticulously detailed, exaggeratedly realistic depictions of decay and corruption.
Albright, Madeleine: American public official, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, the first woman to hold the cabinet post of U.S. secretary of state.
Albright, Tenley: American figure skater and first American woman to win the world championships (1953) and an Olympic gold medal in figure skating (1956). She was also the first to win the world, North American, and United States titles in a single ...
Albright, W.F.: American biblical archaeologist and Middle Eastern scholar, noted especially for his excavations of biblical sites.
Albright-Knox Art Gallery: museum in Buffalo, New York, U.S., that is noted for its collections of contemporary painting and sculpture, including American and European art of the 1950s, '60s, and '70s. Schools such as Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Op art, and Minimalism are ...
Albula Alps: part of the Rhaetian Alps in eastern Switzerland, lying in Graubunden canton to the north of the resort of Saint Moritz. The mountains extend northeastward from the Splugen Pass (6,932 feet [2,113 m]) to the Fluela Pass (7,818 feet [2,383 ...
album: in ancient Rome, a whitened board on which public notices were inscribed in black. The annals compiled by the pontifex maximus (chief priest), the annual edicts of the praetor, the lists of senators and jurors, the Acta diurna (an account ...
Albumazar: leading astrologer of the Muslim world, who is known primarily for his theory that the world, created when the seven planets were in conjunction in the first degree of Aries, will come to an end at a like conjunction in ...
albumen paper: light-sensitive paper prepared by coating with albumen, or egg white, and a salt (e.g., ammonium chloride) and sensitized by an aftertreatment with a solution of silver nitrate. The process was introduced by the French photographer Louis-Desire Blanquart-Evrard in about 1850 ...
albumin: a type of protein that is soluble in water and in water half saturated with a salt such as ammonium sulfate. Serum albumin is a component of blood serum; alpha-lactalbumin is found in milk. Ovalbumin constitutes about 50 percent of ...
Albuquerque: largest city of New Mexico, U.S., seat (1852) of Bernalillo county, on the Rio Grande opposite a pass between the Sandia and Manzano mountains to the east. It is encircled by Indian pueblos and sections of the Cibola National Forest ...
Albuquerque, Afonso de, the Great: Portuguese soldier, conqueror of Goa (1510) in India and of Melaka (1511) on the Malay Peninsula. His program to gain control of all the main maritime trade routes of the East and to build permanent fortresses with settled populations laid ...
Albury-Wodonga: urban centre comprising twin cities on opposite sides of the Murray River and the New South Wales-Victoria border, Australia. By rail the region is about 398 miles (640 km) southwest of Sydney and nearly 186 miles (299 km) northeast of ...
Alcaeus: Greek lyric poet. His work was highly esteemed in the ancient world. A collection of Alcaeus' surviving poems in 10 books (now lost) was made in the 2nd century BC, and he was a favourite model of the Roman lyric ...
alcaic: classical Greek poetic stanza composed of four lines of varied metrical feet, with five long syllables in the first two lines, four in the third and fourth lines, and an unaccented syllable at the beginning of the first three lines ...
Alcala de Guadaira: town, Sevilla provincia, in the Andalusia comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community"), southwestern Spain. It is just southeast of Sevilla city, on the Guadaira River. The town is popularly known as Alcala de los Panaderos (Alcala ...
Alcala de Henares: city, Madrid provincia and comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community"), central Spain. Known under the Romans as Complutum, the city was destroyed in 1000 and rebuilt in 1038 by the Moors, who called it Al-Qal'ah al-Nahr. ...
Alcala Zamora, Niceto: Spanish statesman, prime minister, and president of the Second Republic (1931-36), whose attempts to moderate the policies of the various factions led eventually to his deposition and exile.
Alcala, Calle de: one of the main thoroughfares of Madrid. It originates at the eastern edge of the Puerta del Sol (the focal point and principal square of the city) and runs northeast approximately 4 mi (6 km) through the Plaza de la ...
alcalde: (from Arabic al-qadi, "judge"), the administrative and judicial head of a town or village in Spain or in areas under Spanish control or influence. The title was applied to local government officials whose functions were various but always included a ...
Alcamenes: sculptor and younger contemporary of Phidias, noted for the delicacy and finish of his works, among which a Hephaestus and an "Aphrodite of the Gardens" are noteworthy. A copy of the head of his "Hermes Propylaeus" at Pergamum has been ...
Alcamo: town, Trapani provincia, northwestern Sicily, Italy, 23 miles (37 km) west-southwest of Palermo. The name comes from that of the nearby Saracen fortress, Alqamah, on Mount Bonifato. The present town was founded by the emperor Frederick II ...
Alcan Aluminium Limited: Canadian multinational company incorporated in 1928 (as Aluminium Limited) and now the largest Canadian industrial enterprise, operating in more than 100 countries. It has mining and refining operations for bauxite; smelting plants for aluminum; hydroelectric plants; fabricating plants for a ...
Alcantara: town, Caceres provincia, in the Extremadura comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community"), western Spain, on a rock above the southern bank of the Tagus (Tajo) River just east of the Portuguese frontier. The walled town was ...
Alcantara, Order of: major military and religious order in Spain. It was founded in 1156 or 1166 by Don Suero Fernandez Barrientos and was recognized in 1177 by Pope Alexander III in a special papal bull. Its purpose was to defend Christian Spain ...
Alcaraz carpet: floor covering handwoven in 15th- and 16th-century Spain at Alcaraz in Murcia. These carpets use the Spanish knot on one warp. A number of 15th-century examples imitate contemporary Turkish types but differ in border details and colouring.
Alcatraz Island: rocky island in San Francisco Bay, California, U.S. The island occupies an area of 22 acres (9 hectares) and is located 1.5 miles (2 km) offshore.
alcazar: any of a class of fortified structures built in the 14th and 15th centuries in Spain. (The term is derived from the Arabic word al-qasr, meaning "castle," or "fortress.") As the Spanish efforts to drive out the ...
Alcazar de San Juan: town, Ciudad Real provincia, in the comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community") of Castile-La Mancha, central Spain. It lies on the high Meseta Central at 2,135 feet (650 m) above sea level. Known to the Romans as Alces, the town was renamed ...
alchemy: a form of speculative thought that, among other aims, tried to transform base metals such as lead or copper into silver or gold and to discover a cure for disease and a way of extending life.
Alchevsk: city, Luhansk oblast (province), eastern Ukraine. It lies along the railway from Luhansk to Debaltsevo. Alchevsk was founded in 1895 with the establishment of the Donetsko-Yuryevsky ironworks. The plant has developed into a large, integrated ironworks and steelworks, which was ...
Alchian, Armen A.: American economist whose teachings countered some of the popular economic theories of the late 20th century, such as those regarding labour costs or the implications of property ownership.
Alcibiades: brilliant but unscrupulous Athenian politician and military commander who provoked the sharp political antagonisms at Athens that were the main causes of Athens' defeat by Sparta in the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC).
Alcidae: bird family, order Charadriiformes, which includes the birds known as auk, auklet, dovekie, guillemot, murre, murrelet, and puffin (qq.v.).
Alcidamas: prominent Sophist and rhetorician who taught in Athens. He was a pupil of Gorgias and a rival of Isocrates. His only extant work, Peri sophiston ("Concerning Sophists"), stresses the superiority of extempore (though prepared) speeches over written ones. The oration ...
Alcinous: in Greek mythology, king of the Phaeacians (on the legendary island of Scheria), son of Nausithous, and grandson of the god Poseidon. In the Odyssey he entertained Odysseus, who had been cast by a storm on the shore of the ...
Alciphron: rhetorician who wrote a collection of fictitious letters, a form of literature popular in his day. More than 100 of the letters have survived. The background of them all is the Athens of the 4th century BC, and the imaginary ...
alclad: laminated metal produced in sheets composed of a Duralumin (q.v.) core and outer layers of aluminum.
Alcmaeon: Greek philosopher and physiologist of the academy at Croton (now Crotone, southern Italy), the first person recorded to have practiced dissection of human bodies for research purposes. He may also have been the first to attempt vivisection. Alcmaeon inferred that ...
Alcmaeon: in Greek legend, the son of the seer Amphiaraus and his wife Eriphyle. When Amphiaraus set out with the expedition of the Seven Against Thebes, which he knew would be fatal to him, he commanded his sons to avenge his ...
Alcmaeonid Family: a powerful Athenian family, claiming descent from the legendary Alcmaeon, that was important in 5th- and 6th-century-BC politics. During the archonship of one of its members, Megacles (632? BC), a certain Cylon failed in an attempt to make himself tyrant, ...
Alcman: Greek poet, the first known writer of Dorian choral lyrics.
Alcoa: city, Blount county, eastern Tennessee, U.S., about 15 miles (25 km) south of Knoxville and adjacent to Maryville. The city is a gateway to Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which lies to the southeast. It was founded in 1913 by ...
Alcobaca: town and concelho (township), Leiria distrito ("district"), west-central Portugal. It lies at the confluence of the Alcoa and Baca rivers, just south-southwest of the city of Leiria. Alcobaca is notable for its Cistercian monastery (Mosteiro de Santa Maria), founded in ...
Alcock, John: architect, bishop, and statesman who founded Jesus College, Cambridge, and who was regarded as one of the most eminent pre-Reformation English divines.
Alcock, Sir John William: aviator who, with his fellow British aviator Arthur Brown, made the first nonstop transatlantic flight.
alcohol: any of a class of organic compounds characterized by one or more hydroxyl (OH) groups attached to a carbon atom of an alkyl group (hydrocarbon chain). Alcohols may be considered as derivatives of water (H₂O) in which one of the ...