Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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Abenra ... Abington, Fanny

Abenra: city, seat of Sonderjylland amtskommune (county commune), southeastern Jutland, Denmark, at the head of Abenra Fjord. First mentioned in the 12th century when attacked by the Wends, it was granted a charter (1335) and grew from a ...
Abenteuerroman: in German literature, a form of the picaresque novel. The Abenteuerroman is an entertaining story recounting the adventures of the hero, but it often incorporates a serious aspect. An example of the genre is the 17th-century Der Abentheurliche Simplicissimus (Adventurous ...
Abeokuta: town, capital of Ogun state, southwestern Nigeria. It is situated on the east bank of the Ogun River, around a group of rocky outcroppings that rise above the surrounding wooded savanna. It lies on the main railway (1899) from Lagos, ...
Abercrombie & Fitch Co.: former retail sporting goods concern originally based in New York City, famed for its wide range of expensive and often exotic sporting equipment and attire from tennis shoes to elephant guns. For half a century and more the store's apparel, ...
Abercrombie, James: British general in the French and Indian Wars, commander of the British forces in the failed attack on the French at Ticonderoga.
Abercrombie, Lascelles: poet and critic who was associated with Georgian poetry.
Abercrombie, Sir Patrick: British architect and town planner who redesigned London after it was devastated by enemy bombardment in World War II.
Abercromby, Sir Ralph: soldier whose command restored discipline and prestige to the British army after the disastrous campaigns in the Low Countries between 1793 and 1799. He prepared the way for the successful campaign against Napoleon Bonaparte in Egypt.
Aberdare: town ("community"), Rhondda Cynon Taff county borough, historic county of Glamorgan (Morgannwg), Wales, on the River Cynon. The community dates from the Middle Ages. Its Saint John's Church was built about 1189. Aberdare's main growth in the 19th century was ...
Aberdare Range: mountain range, forming a section of the eastern rim of the Great Rift Valley in west-central Kenya, northeast of Naivasha and Gilgil and just south of the Equator. The range has an average elevation of 11,000 feet (3,350 metres) and ...
Aberdeen: city, Grays Harbor county, western Washington, U.S., on the Pacific estuaries of the Chehalis, Wishkah, and Hoquiam rivers (which together form Grays Harbor). With Hoquiam and Cosmopolis, Aberdeen forms a tri-city area. Captain Robert Gray navigated the inlet in the ...
Aberdeen: city, Harford county, northeastern Maryland, U.S., near Chesapeake Bay, 26 miles (42 km) northeast of Baltimore. Settled about 1800, it was named for the city in Scotland. Aberdeen is the principal trading centre for the nearby 113-square-mile (293-square-km) Aberdeen Proving ...
Aberdeen: city, seat (1880) of Brown county, northeastern South Dakota, U.S. It lies in the James River valley about 160 miles (260 km) northeast of Pierre. Established in 1881 as a junction of several railroads, it was named for Aberdeen in ...
Aberdeen: city and historic royal burgh (town) astride the Rivers Dee and Don on Scotland's North Sea coast. Aberdeen is a busy seaport, a centre of Scotland's fishing industry, and the commercial capital of northeastern Scotland. It also is the principal ...
Aberdeen, George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of, Viscount Gordon Of Aberdeen, Viscount Of Formartine, Lord Haddo, Methlick, Tarves, And Kellie: British foreign secretary and prime minister (1852-55) whose government involved Great Britain in the Crimean War against Russia (1853-56).
Aberdeenshire: council area and historic county of eastern Scotland. It projects shoulderlike eastward into the North Sea and encompasses coastal lowlands in the north and east and part of the Grampian Mountains in the west. The council area and the historic ...
Abergavenny: town ("community"), historic and present county of Monmouthshire (Sir Fynwy), Wales, at the confluence of the Rivers Gavenny and Usk. The strategic nature of this site, guarding a main valley corridor between the Black Mountains and the Brecon Beacons into ...
Aberhart, William: the first Social Credit Party premier of Alberta, during and after the Great Depression.
Abernathy, Ralph David: black American pastor and civil-rights leader who was Martin Luther King's chief aide and closest associate during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and '60s.
aberration: in optical systems, such as lenses and curved mirrors, the deviation of light rays through lenses, causing images of objects to be blurred. In an ideal system, every point on the object will focus to a point of zero size ...
aberration, constant of: in astronomy, the maximum amount of the apparent yearly aberrational displacement of a star or other celestial body, resulting from the Earth's orbital motion around the Sun. The value of the constant, about 20.49" of arc, depends on the ratio ...
Abertillery: town, Blaenau Gwent county borough, historic county of Monmouthshire (Sir Fynwy), Wales, in the valley of the River Ebbw. Coal mining was its main economic interest from about 1850 until the last mines closed in the 1980s. Nantyglo, to the ...
Aberystwyth: coastal town, Ceredigion county (historic county of Cardiganshire), Wales, where the River Rheidol flows into Cardigan Bay. Traces of extensive Iron Age earthworks have been found on the hill Pen Dinas, which overlooks the old port and town. The medieval ...
abettor: in law, a person who becomes equally guilty in the crime of another by knowingly and voluntarily aiding the criminal during the act itself. An abettor is one kind of accomplice (q.v.), the other being an accessory, who aids the ...
Abgar legend: in early Christian times, a popular myth that Jesus had an exchange of letters with King Abgar V Ukkama of Osroene, whose capital was Edessa, a Mesopotamian city on the northern fringe of the Syrian plateau. According to the legend, ...
Abha: city, southwestern Saudi Arabia. It is situated on a plain at the western edge of Mount al-Hijaz and is surrounded by hills. The valley of the Wadi Abha near the city is filled with gardens, fields, and streams. The city ...
Abhayagiri: important ancient Theravada Buddhist monastic centre (vihara) built by King Vattagamani Abhaya (29-17 BC) on the northern side of Anuradhapura, the capital of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) at that time. Its importance lay, in part, in the fact that religious and ...
abhibhvayatana: in Buddhist philosophy, one of the preparatory stages of meditation, in which the senses are completely restrained. In Buddhist canons, abhibhvayatana is divided into eight substages during which man comes to realize that physical forms in the external world are ...
Abhidhamma Pitaka: the third-and historically the latest-of the three "baskets," or collections of texts, that together compose the Pali canon of Theravada Buddhism, the form predominant in Southeast Asia and Sri Lanka (Ceylon). The other two collections are Sutta ("Discourse"; Sanskrit
Abhidhammattha-sangaha: a highly popular primer, or digest, of the Abhidhamma corpus (the scholastic section of the canon) of the Theravada tradition. The Abhidhammattha-sangaha was composed in India or in Myanmar (Burma), the chief centre for Abhidhamma studies. Written in Pali by ...
Abhidhammavatara: the earliest effort at systematizing, in the form of a manual, the doctrines dealt with in the Abhidhamma (scholastic) section of the Theravada Buddhist canon. The Abhidhammavatara was written in Pali, apparently in the 5th century, by the poet and ...
Abhidharmakosha: encyclopaedic compendium of Abhidharma (scholasticism).
abhijna: in Buddhist philosophy, miraculous power obtained especially through meditation and wisdom. Usually five kinds of abhijna are enumerated: the ability (1) to travel any distance or take on any form at will, (2) to see everything, (3) ...
Abhinavagupta: philosopher, ascetic and aesthetician, and outstanding representative of the "recognition" (pratyabhijna) school of Kashmiri Saivite monism. This school conceived of the god Siva (the manifestation of ultimate reality), the individual soul, and the universe as essentially one; pratyabhijna refers to ...
Abhisamayalambkaraloka: important contribution to exegetical literature on the Prajnaparamita- ("Perfection of Wisdom") sutras of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and one of the texts most often studied in Tibetan monasteries.
abhiseka: ("sprinkling"), in esoteric Buddhism, a purificatory or initiatory rite in which a candidate is sprinkled with water or other liquid, signifying a change in status.
Abia: state, east-central Nigeria. Abia was administratively created in 1991 from the eastern half of former Imo state. It is bordered by the states of Enugu to the north, Cross River and Akwa Ibom to the east, Rivers to the south, ...
Abiathar: in the Old Testament, son of Ahimelech, priest of Nob. He was the sole survivor of a massacre carried out by Doeg. Fleeing to David, he remained with him throughout his wanderings and his reign. He was loyal through the ...
Abid al-Bukhari: army of Saharan blacks organized in Morocco by the 'Alawi ruler Isma'il (reigned 1672-1727). Earlier rulers had recruited black slaves (Arabic: 'abid) into their armies, and these men or their descendants eventually formed the core of Isma'il's guard.
Abidjan: chief port, capital (de facto; legislative), and largest city of Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast). It lies along the Ebrie Lagoon, which is separated from the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic by the Vridi Plage sandbar. A village in 1898, ...
abietic acid: the most abundant of several closely related organic acids that constitute most of rosin, the solid portion of the oleoresin of coniferous trees. Commercial abietic acid is usually a glassy or partly crystalline, yellowish solid that melts at temperatures as ...
Abigail: in the Old Testament, the wife of Nabal of southern Judah, on whose death she became one of the first wives of David (1 Samuel 25) and the mother of his son Chileab. The name Abigail was also borne by ...
Abijah: ("Yahweh Is My Father"), any of nine different persons mentioned in the Bible, of whom the most noteworthy are the following: (1) The son and successor of Rehoboam, king of Judah (II Chronicles 12:16, 13), who reigned about two years ...
Abildgaard, Nicolai Abraham: the most renowned Danish painter of the late 18th century and one of the early Neoclassicists.
Abilene: city, seat (1883) of Taylor county (and partly in Jones county), west-central Texas, U.S. It lies on low, rolling plains 153 miles (246 km) west of Fort Worth. Founded in 1881 as the new railhead (built by the Texas and ...
Abilene: city, seat (1861) of Dickinson county, east-central Kansas, U.S. The city lies along the Smoky Hill River.
Abingdon: town, seat (1778) of Washington county, southwestern Virginia, U.S. It lies in the Blue Ridge highlands of the Appalachian Mountains, near the border with Tennessee, 15 miles (24 km) northeast of Bristol. Originally called "Wolf Hills" by frontiersman Daniel Boone ...
Abingdon: town ("parish"), Vale of White Horse district, administrative county of Oxfordshire, historic county of Berkshire, England. It lies south of Oxford at the confluence of the Rivers Thames and Ock.
Abington: town (township), Plymouth county, eastern Massachusetts, U.S. It lies 19 miles (31 km) southeast of Boston and 4 miles (6 km) east of Brockton. Ames Nowell State Park is nearby (to the west). Known as Manamooskeagin ("Land of Many Beavers") ...
Abington: urban township, Montgomery county, southeastern Pennsylvania, U.S. Abington is a northern suburb of Philadelphia, encompassing the communities of Ardsley, Glenside, McKinley, Noble, North Glenside, and Roslyn.
Abington, Fanny: English actress admired both for her craft and for her leadership in fashion.