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Dessau, Paul ... Deutsches Worterbuch

Dessau, Paul: German composer and conductor best known for his operas and other vocal works written in collaboration with Bertolt Brecht. Dessau's conducting career included posts in Cologne (1919-23) and Berlin (1925-33). His long collaboration with Brecht began in 1942 in the ...
dessert: the last course of a meal. In the United States dessert is likely to consist of pastry, cake, ice cream, pudding, or fresh or cooked fruit. British meals traditionally end with nuts, fruits, and port or other dessert wine, while ...
Dessoir, Ludwig: German actor whose fame rested on his portrayals of Shakespearean characters.
Destinn, Emmy: Czech soprano noted for the power and vibrant richness of her voice and for her great intelligence and dramatic gifts. She adopted the name of her singing teacher, Maria Loewe-Destinn.
Destouches, Andre Cardinal: French opera composer who brought an original touch to the genres of the day.
Destouches, Philippe Nericault: dramatist who brought to the tradition of French classical comedy influences derived from the English Restoration theatre.
Destour: Tunisian political party, especially active in the 1920s and '30s in arousing Tunisian national consciousness and opposition to the French protectorate.
destroyer: fast naval vessel that has served a variety of functions since the late 19th century. The term destroyer was first used for the 250-ton vessels built in the 1890s to protect battleships from torpedo boats. These torpedo-boat destroyers, as they ...
Destutt de Tracy, Antoine-Louis-Claude, Comte: French philosopher, soldier, and chief Ideologue, so called for the philosophical school of Ideologie, which he founded.
DESY: the largest centre for high-energy particle-physics research in Germany. DESY, founded in 1959, is located in Hamburg and is funded jointly by the German federal government and the city of Hamburg. Its particle-accelerator facilities are an international resource, serving thousands ...
detached retina: eye disorder involving separation of most layers of the retina, the light-sensitive layer of tissue that lines the back and sides of the eye, from the choroid, the pigmented middle layer of the eyeball. As a person ages, small tears ...
Detaille, Edouard: French painter known for his accurate portrayals of battles and military life.
detection: in electronics, the process of rectifying a radio wave and recovering any information superimposed on it; it is essentially the reverse of modulation (q.v.).
detective story: type of popular literature dealing with the step-by-step investigation and solution of a crime, usually murder.
detergent: any of various surface-active agents (surfactants) particularly effective in dislodging foreign matter from soiled surfaces and retaining it in suspension. The term usually denotes a synthetic substance that is not prepared by saponifying fats and oils (as is soap).
determinant: in genetics, the term used in the late 19th century by the German biologist August Weismann to describe the component of hereditary material, or germ plasm, that specifies the characteristics of different cells.
determinant: in linear and multilinear algebra, a value, denoted det A, associated with a square matrix A of n rows and n columns. Designating any element of the matrix by the symbol a_r_c (the subscript r identifies the row and c ...
determinism: in philosophy, theory that all events, including moral choices, are completely determined by previously existing causes that preclude free will and the possibility that humans could have acted otherwise. The theory holds that the universe is utterly rational because complete ...
deterrence: military strategy under which one power uses the threat of reprisal effectively to preclude an attack from an adversary power. With the advent of nuclear weapons, the term deterrence largely has been applied to the basic strategy of the nuclear ...
Detmold: city, North Rhine-Westphalia Land (state), northwestern Germany. It lies on the eastern slope of the Teutoburg Forest (Teutoburger Wald), on the Werre River. The capital, from the 12th century, of the former principality and
Detrez, Conrad: Belgian novelist of political conscience and an energetic, darkly humorous style.
Detroit: city, seat of Wayne county, southeastern Michigan, U.S., on the Detroit River (connecting Lakes Erie and St. Clair), opposite Windsor, Ont., Can. It was founded in 1701 by a French trader, Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, who built a fort ...
Detroit Free Press: daily newspaper, one of the most widely circulated in the United States, published in Detroit, Michigan.
Detroit Institute of Arts: art museum in Detroit, Mich., noted for its collection of American paintings from the 19th century and its Dutch, Flemish, and Italian paintings from the Renaissance through the Baroque periods. The collection of American art is augmented by the Archives ...
Detroit Mercy, University of: private, coeducational institution of higher learning in Detroit, Mich., U.S. It is affiliated with the Jesuits and the Religious Sisters of Mercy of the Roman Catholic church. The university offers undergraduate and graduate degree programs in business, engineering, education, architecture, ...
Detroit River: river forming part of the boundary between Michigan, U.S. (west), and Ontario, Can. (east), and connecting Lake St. Clair (north) with the west end of Lake Erie (south). The river flows southwest and south for 32 miles (51 km) between ...
Detti Falls: waterfall, northeastern Iceland, on the island's second longest river, Jokulsa a Fjollum. The Detti Falls have a vertical drop of 144 feet (44 m). It is the largest Icelandic waterfall in volume and has the greatest hydroelectric-power potential of any ...
Deucalion: in Greek legend, the son of Prometheus (the creator of mankind), king of Phthia in Thessaly, and husband of Pyrrha; he was also the father of Hellen, the mythical ancestor of the Hellenic race.
Deulino, Truce of: (December 1618), agreement suspending for 14 12 years the hostilities between Poland and Russia that resulted from Polish intervention in Russia during the Time of Troubles (1606-13). In 1609, during the unstable reign (1606-10) of the Russian tsar Vasily Shuysky, ...
deus ex machina: a person or thing that appears or is introduced into a situation suddenly and unexpectedly and provides an artificial or contrived solution to an apparently insoluble difficulty.
deus otiosus: (Latin: "neutral god," or "hidden god"), in the history of religions and philosophy, a high god who has withdrawn from the immediate details of the governing of the world. The god has delegated all work on Earth to ancestors or ...
Deus, Joao de: lyric poet who fashioned a simple, direct, and expressive language that revitalized Portuguese Romantic poetry. He was a major influence on Portuguese literature of the early 20th century.
Deusdedit, Saint: also called Deusdedit I, or Adeodatus I pope from 615 to 618. His pontificate is chiefly noteworthy for an unsuccessful resumption of the Byzantine war against the Lombards in Italy and for a reversal of the policy of popes Gregory ...
deuterium: isotope of hydrogen with atomic weight of approximately 2. Its nucleus, consisting of one proton and one neutron, has double the mass of the nucleus of ordinary hydrogen. Deuterium is a stable atomic species found in natural hydrogen compounds to ...
Deutero-Isaiah: section of the Old Testament Book of Isaiah (chapters 40-55) that is later in origin than the preceding chapters, though not as late as the following chapters. See Isaiah, Book of.
deuterocanonical books: biblical literature accepted in the Roman canon but treated as apocryphal by Jewish and Protestant canons; also, an authentic biblical work added to the canon later. See apocrypha.
Deuteromycetes: artificial assemblage, or form-class, of fungi (kingdom Mycota) in which a true sexual state is uncommon or unknown. Many of these fungi reproduce asexually by spores (conidia or oidia) or by budding. Conidial stages are similar to those in the ...
deuteron: nucleus of deuterium (heavy hydrogen) that consists of one proton and one neutron. Deuterons are formed chiefly by ionizing deuterium (stripping the single electron away from the atom) and are used as projectiles to produce nuclear reactions after accumulating high ...
Deuteronomic Reform: great religious reformation instituted in the reign of King Josiah of Judah (c. 640-609 BC). It was so called because the book of the Law found in the Temple of Jerusalem (c. 622 BC), which was the basis of the ...
Deuteronomist: (D), one of the supposed sources of a portion of the Hebrew canon known as the Pentateuch, in particular, the source of the book of Deuteronomy, as well as of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings. (The other sources are the ...
Deuteronomy: ("Words"), fifth book of the Old Testament, written in the form of a farewell address by Moses to the Israelites before they entered the Promised Land of Canaan. The speeches that constitute this address recall Israel's past, reiterate laws that ...
Deuterostomia: (Greek: "second mouth"), group of animals-including those of the phyla Echinodermata (e.g., starfish, sea urchins), Chordata (e.g., vertebrates), Chaetognatha (e.g., arrowworms), and Brachiopoda (e.g., lamp shells)-classified together on the basis of embryological development. During that process the mouth of the ...
Deutsch, Babette: American poet, critic, translator, and novelist whose volumes of literary criticism, Poetry in Our Time (1952) and Poetry Handbook (1957), were standard English texts in American universities for many years.
Deutsche Bahn AG: the railway system of Germany created in 1994 by the merger of the Deutsche Bundesbahn (German Federal Railway), the state rail system in the former West Germany, with the Deutsche Reichsbahn (German State Railway), the state system in the former ...
Deutsche Bank AG: German banking house founded in 1870 in Berlin and headquartered since 1957 in Frankfurt am Main. One of the world's largest banks, it has a number of foreign offices and has acquired controlling interests in several foreign banks in Europe, ...
Deutsche Bibliothek, Die: the national library of Germany. It was created by the merger (1990) of the Deutsche Bibliothek (founded 1947) in Frankfurt am Main and the Deutsche Bucherei (1912) in Leipzig, which until the reunification of Germany had functioned as the national ...
deutsche Blumen: in pottery, floral decoration consisting of naturalistically painted "German" (i.e., European) flowers appearing individually or in bouquets. Although Viennese potters had produced a type of naturalistic floral decoration about 1730, deutsche Blumen became popular only after they had appeared on ...
Deutscher Werkbund: the first organization of artists influential in its attempts to inspire good design and craftsmanship for mass-produced goods and architecture. The Werkbund, which was founded in Munich in 1907, was composed of artists, artisans, and architects who designed industrial, commercial, ...
Deutsches Museum: museum of science and industry established in Munich in 1903 and opened in 1925. Its pattern of organization and administration became the model for such later foundations as the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.
Deutsches Theater: private dramatic society founded in Berlin in 1883 by the dramatist Adolf L'Arronge in reaction to outmoded theatrical traditions. It presented plays in the ensemble style of the influential Meiningen Company. In 1894 it was affiliated with the Freie Buhne ...
Deutsches Worterbuch: the first German dictionary conceived on scientific lines; initiated by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. The dictionary was designed to give the etymology and history, illustrated by quotations, of all the words in the (New) High German literary language from the ...