Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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dame's rocket ... Dandarah

dame's rocket: (Hesperis matronalis), Eurasian plant of the mustard family (Brassicaceae) that is widely naturalized in North America and Great Britain. A garden ornamental with flowers of violet-like fragrance, dame's rocket reaches about 90 cm (3 feet) in height. It bears narrow, ...
Dameron, Tadd: black American jazz pianist, arranger, composer, and bandleader, especially noted during the bop era for the melodic beauty and warmth of the songs he composed.
Damghan: town, northern Iran. It lies at an elevation of 3,900 feet (1,200 metres), just southeast of the Elburz Mountains on a large, barren gravel plain. It is on the road and railway between Tehran and Meshed. Possibly the oldest mosque ...
Damien, Father: Belgian priest who devoted his life to missionary work among the Hawaiian lepers.
Damiens, Robert-Francois: French fanatic who in 1757 made an unsuccessful attempt on the life of King Louis XV.
Damietta: city, capital of Dumyat muhafazah (governorate), in the Nile River delta, Lower Egypt, on the Mediterranean coast. Damietta, the port of the governorate, is located 8 miles (13 km) from the Mediterranean, on the right (east) bank ...
Damir, Al-: town, northeastern Sudan. It lies on the right (east) bank of the Nile River, about 155 miles (250 km) northeast of Khartoum. Located at an elevation of 1,158 feet (353 metres), it is a local commercial centre for the date-producing ...
Damiri, ad-: Muslim theologian, best known for his encyclopaedia of animals.
Dammam, Al-: city, eastern Saudi Arabia. It lies on the Persian Gulf northwest of Bahrain Island and forms a larger metropolitan and industrial complex with Al-Khubar, Al-Qatif, and Al-Zahran. The discovery of immense oil reserves in the locality in 1938 led to ...
dammar: any of a variety of hard varnish resins obtained from coniferous trees characteristic of Southeast and East Asia, including Shorea species (especially S. wiesneri), several species of the family Dipterocarpaceae, and a few species of Burseraceae. The resin obtained from ...
Dammartin: medieval French countship, whose seat was at Dammartin-en-Goele, northwest of Meaux (in the modern departement of Seine-et-Marne).
Damme: municipality, West Flanders province, northwestern Belgium, on the Brugge-Sluis Canal. Originally on the Zwijn Estuary of the North Sea, it was the North Sea port for Brugge in the 13th and 14th centuries; its maritime law governed the merchants of ...
Damocles: a courtier of Dionysius the Elder of Syracuse, in Sicily, tyrant from 405 to 367 BC. The courtier is known to history through the legend of the "Sword of Damocles."
Damodar River: river in northeastern India, rising with its many tributaries, notably the Bokaro and Konar, in the Chota Nagpur plateau of south-central Bihar state. It follows a generally eastward course for 368 miles (592 km) through West Bengal to join the ...
Damoh: town, central Madhya Pradesh state, central India. An agricultural trade centre, it has industries that include oilseed milling, handloom weaving and dyeing, and the manufacture of bell-metal vessels and pottery. The town has a weekly cattle market. Damoh rose to ...
Damophon: ancient Greek sculptor of Messene, who executed many statues at Messene, Megalopolis, Aegium, and other cities of the Peloponnesus. Soon after 183 BC he repaired Phidias' sculpture of Zeus at Olympia, which had been damaged by an earthquake. Considerable fragments, ...
Dampier: town and port in Roebourne shire, northwestern Western Australia, on Nickol Bay (an inlet of the Indian Ocean). Beginning in 1965, it was built to handle iron ore mined at Mount Tom Price (182 miles [293 km] south) and Paraburdoo ...
Dampier, William: buccaneer who later explored parts of the coasts of Australia, New Guinea, and New Britain for the British Admiralty. A keen observer of natural phenomena, he was, in some respects, a pioneer in scientific exploration.
damping: in physics, restraining of vibratory motion, such as mechanical oscillations, noise, and alternating electric currents, by dissipation of energy. Unless a child keeps pumping a swing, its motion dies down because of damping. Shock absorbers in automobiles and carpet pads ...
damping-off: disease of plant seedlings, caused by such seed- and soil-borne fungi as Rhizoctonia solani, Aphanomyces cochlioides, and species of Pythium, Phytophthora, Botrytis, Fusarium, Cylindrocladium, Diplodia, Phoma, and Alternaria. There are two types of damping-off: preemergence, in which sprouting seeds decay ...
Damrei Mountains: north-south-trending range of high hills, an offshoot of the Kravanh Mountains, southwestern Cambodia. Chuor Phnum Damrei literally translated means "The mountains round which the clouds turn." Extending 70 miles (110 km) north from the Gulf of Thailand, they reach a ...
Damrong Rajanubhab: Thai prince, son of King Mongkut and brother of King Chulalongkorn. He was the founder of modern education and provincial administration and was Thailand's leading intellectual of his generation.
Damrosch, Walter Johannes: Prussian-born American orchestral conductor and composer whose activities spanned more than half a century of American musical life.
damsel bug: any predacious aphid- and caterpillar-eating bug of the family Nabidae (order Heteroptera). Damsel bugs are generally divided into two types. One is about 8 mm (0.3 inch) long and yellow-brown in colour with well-developed wings; the second is larger, shiny ...
damselfish: any of about 250 species of small, primarily tropical marine fishes of the family Pomacentridae (order Perciformes) found in the Atlantic and Indo-Pacific oceans. Damselfishes are deep-bodied and usually have forked tails. They resemble the related cichlids, and, like them, ...
damselfly: any of a group of predatory, aerial insects closely related to and often collectively called dragonflies (suborder Anisoptera). Like dragonflies, they are found mainly near shallow, freshwater habitats and are graceful fliers with slender bodies and long, filmy, net-veined wings. ...
Damu: in Mesopotamian religion, Sumerian deity, city god of Girsu, east of Ur in the southern orchards region. Damu, son of Enki, was a vegetation god, especially of the vernal flowing of the sap of trees and plants. His name means ...
Dan: one of the 12 tribes of Israel that in biblical times comprised the people of Israel who later became the Jewish people. The tribe was named after the first of two sons born to Jacob (also called Israel) and Bilhah, ...
Dan: an ethnolinguistic grouping of people inhabiting the mountainous west-central Cote d'Ivoire and adjacent areas of Liberia. The Dan belong to the Southern branch of the Mande linguistic subgroup of the Niger-Congo language family. They originated somewhere to the west or ...
Dan Patch: (foaled 1896), American harness racehorse (Standardbred), a nearly legendary horse in his time, who established in 1905 a world pacing record of 1:55 14 that endured for 33 years. (In 1906 he paced a mile in 1:55 flat-Billy Direct's record-breaking ...
Dan Takuma: manager of the giant Mitsui zaibatsu, the greatest of the family-owned combines in pre-World War II Japan. A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an important member of Japan's business elite, Dan was assassinated by right-wing nationalists who ...
Dana, Charles A.: American journalist who became a national figure as editor of the New York Sun.
Dana, James D: American geologist, mineralogist, and naturalist who, in explorations of the South Pacific, the U.S. Northwest, Europe, and elsewhere, made important studies of mountain building, volcanic activity, sea life, and the origin and structure of continents and ocean basins.
Dana, Richard Henry: American lawyer and author of the popular autobiographical narrative Two Years Before the Mast.
Danane: town, western Cote d'Ivoire. It lies along the Boan River, a tributary of the Nuon (Nipoue, Cestos) River, and at the intersection of roads from Liberia, Guinea, and the Ivoirian town of Man. It is the chief trade centre (rice, ...
Danao: city, eastern Cebu island, Philippines, about 17 miles (27 km) northeast of Cebu City. It was founded in 1844 and is a port on the Camotes Sea for nearby coalfields. It is also a service centre for the coastal agricultural ...
Danapur: town, northern Bihar state, northeastern India, on the Ganges River. It is a major road and rail junction and agricultural trade centre. Industries include printing, oilseed milling, and metalworks. There is a college affiliated with Magadh University and an army ...
Danaus: in Greek legend, son of Belus, king of Egypt, and twin brother of Aegyptus. Driven out of Egypt by his brother, he fled with his 50 daughters (the Danaids) to Argos, where he became king. Soon thereafter the 50 sons ...
Danbury: city, coextensive with the town (township) of Danbury, Fairfield county, southwestern Connecticut, U.S. It lies along the Still River in the foothills of the Berkshire Hills. Settled in 1685, it was named in 1687 for Danbury, England, and was incorporated ...
Danbury Hatters' Case: U.S. Supreme Court case in which unions were held to be subject to the antitrust laws. In 1902 the United Hatters of North America, having failed to organize the firm of D.E. Loewe in Danbury, Conn., called for a nationwide ...
dance: the movement of the body in a rhythmic way, usually to music and within a given space, for the purpose of expressing an idea or emotion, releasing energy, or simply taking delight in the movement itself.
dance fly: any insect of the family Empididae (order Diptera), named for their movements while in flight. Dance flies are small with a proportionately large thorax and a long tapering abdomen, which in males usually bears conspicuous genitalia at the posterior end.
dance notation: the recording of dance movement through the use of written symbols.
dance suite: musical arrangement consisting of related dance movements. See suite.
dance, African: performing art deeply woven into the social fabric of Africa and generally involving aspects of music and theatre as well as rhythmic bodily movement. See also music, African, and mask.
Dance, George, the Younger: British architect who was responsible for extensive urban redevelopment in London. He was a founding member of Great Britain's Royal Academy of Arts.
dance, Western: history of Western dance from ancient times to the present and including the development of ballet, the waltz, and various types of modern dance.
dancehall music: style of Jamaican popular music that had its genesis in the political turbulence of the late 1970s and became Jamaica's dominant music in the 1980s and '90s. Central to dancehall is the deejay, who raps, or "toasts," over a prerecorded ...
Dancourt, Florent Carton: actor and playwright who created the French comedy of manners and was one of the most popular of French dramatists before the Revolution.
Dandakaranya: physical region in east-central India. Extending over an area of about 35,600 square miles (92,300 square km), it includes the Abujhmar Hills in the west and borders the Eastern Ghats in the east. The Dandakaranya includes parts of Madhya Pradesh, ...
Dandarah: agricultural town on the west bank of the Nile, in Qina muhafazah (governorate), Upper Egypt. The modern town is built on the ancient site of Ta-ynt-netert (She of the Divine Pillar), or Tentyra. It was the capital ...