Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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Erdos, Paul ... Eritrea

Erdos, Paul: Hungarian "freelance" mathematician (known for his work in number theory and combinatorics) and legendary eccentric who was arguably the most prolific mathematician of the 20th century, in terms of both the number of problems he solved and the number of ...
Erdrich, Louise: author of Native American ethnicity whose principal subject is the Chippewa Indians in the northern Midwest.
Erebuni: ancient Urartian palace-fortress probably built by King Argishti I in the first quarter of the 8th century BC; it was located on the hill of Arin Berd, near modern Yerevan in Armenia. Excavations at Erebuni have centred on the palace ...
Erech: ancient Mesopotamian city located northwest of Ur (Tall Al-Muqayyar) in southeastern Iraq. The site has been excavated from 1928 onward by the German Oriental Society and the German Archeological Institute. Erech was one of the greatest cities of Sumer and ...
Erechim: city, northern Rio Grande do Sul estado ("state"), Brazil. The city lies in the Uruguay River basin. It was founded in 1909 as Boa Vista do Erechim and was called Jose Bonifacio from 1939 to 1944. The hinterland of Erechim ...
Erechtheum: Ionic temple of Athena, built during 421-405 BC on the Acropolis at Athens, famous largely for its complexity and for the exquisite perfection of its details. The temple's Ionic capitals are the most beautiful that Greece produced, and its distinctive ...
Erechtheus: legendary king and probably also a divinity of Athens. According to the Iliad, he was born from the corn land and raised by the goddess Athena, who established him in her temple at Athens. In later times only a great ...
erection: enlargement, hardening, and elevation of the male reproductive organ, the penis. Internally, the penis has three long masses of cylindrical tissue, known as erectile tissue, that are bound together by fibrous tissue. The two identical areas running along the sides ...
erector spinae: a deep muscle of the back; it arises from a tendon attached to the crest along the centre of the sacrum (the part of the backbone at the level of the pelvis, formed of five vertebrae fused together). When it ...
Eregli: town, northern Turkey, on the Black Sea coast. The town was founded about 560 BC as Heraclea Pontica by a colony of Megarians who soon subjected the native Mariandynians and extended their control over most of the coast. In 74 ...
Eregli: town, south-central Turkey. It stands near the foot of the central Taurus Mountains on the northern approach to the Cilician Gates, a major pass. A frontier fortification of the Byzantine Empire, then known as Heraclea Cybistra, the town lay in ...
Ereshkigal: in Mesopotamian religion, goddess in the Sumero-Akkadian pantheon who was Lady of the Great Place (i.e., the abode of the dead) and in texts of the 3rd millennium BC wife of the god Ninazu (elsewhere accounted her son); in later ...
Eretna Dynasty: dynasty that succeeded the Mongol Il-Khanid rulers in central Anatolia and ruled there from c. 1343 to 1380.
Eretria: ancient Greek coastal town of the island of Euboea. Jointly with its neighbour Chalcis, it founded Cumae in Italy (c. 750 BC), the first of the Greek colonies in the west; it then established colonies of its own in Chalcidice ...
Erewash: borough (district), administrative and historic county of Derbyshire, England. Its eastern boundary is the River Erewash, from which the borough takes its name. It is bounded on the south by the Rivers Trent and Derwent, and to the west it ...
Erfurt: city, capital of Thuringia Land (state), central Germany. It is located in the Thuringian Basin, on the Gera River, 200 miles (320 km) southwest of Berlin. It was first mentioned in 724 as Erpesfurt, the site of ...
Erfurt Union Parliament: (March 20-April 29, 1850), conference called by Prussia to form a union of German states headed jointly by Prussia and Austria. Opposed by Austria, the plan failed to win the adherence of the other large German states and had to ...
Erfurth, Hugo: German photographer noted mainly for his portraits of artists, intellectuals, and celebrities of the 1920s.
erg: unit of energy or work in the centimetre-gram-second system of physical units used in physics; to lift a pound weight one foot requires 1.356 × 10⁷ ergs. It equals the work done by a force of one dyne acting through ...
erg: in a desert region, area of large accumulation of sand, generally in the bottom of a huge basin in which a former river piled up alluvium. Ergs are areas of actively shifting dunes, "fossilized" dunes, or extensive sand sheets. The ...
ergosterol: ₂, a white crystalline organic solid of the molecular formula C₂₈H₄₄O belonging to the steroid family. It is found only in plants (e.g., yeasts and fungi) and is chemically related to cholesterol. Ergosterol is converted by ultraviolet irradiation into ergocalciferol, ...
ergot: fungal disease of cereal grasses, especially rye, caused by the ascomycete fungus Claviceps purpurea. In an ear of rye infected with ergot, a sweet, yellowish mucus is exuded for a time, followed by a loss of starch as the ear ...
Erh Lake: lake in western Yunnan province, China. It lies in a deep basin at the eastern foot of the snow-covered Tien-ts'ang range between the upper waters of the Yangtze River, there called the Chin-sha River, and the Mekong River. Erh Lake ...
erh-hu: Chinese vertical fiddle, consisting of two strings, commonly tuned a fifth apart, which are stretched over a wooden drum resonator. A vertical post with no fingerboard goes through the resonator, and the bow is moved between the strings. Bowing is ...
Erh-lien-hao-t'e: city, Inner Mongolia autonomous ch'u (region), China, in the Gobi (desert) near the border with Mongolia. Erh-lien-hao-t'e is located on the Trans-Mongolian railway. The town was elevated to city status in 1966 following the transfer of railroad wheel-change operations (necessary ...
Erhard, Ludwig: economist and statesman who, as economics minister (1949-63), was the chief architect of West Germany's post-World War II economic recovery. He served as German chancellor from 1963-66.
Ericales: order of dicotyledonous flowering plants, a division of the subclass Dilleniidae. Mostly shrubs and small trees that are found throughout the world, the order includes such ornamentals as the azaleas and rhododendrons as well as such food plants as blueberries ...
Erice: town, Trapani provincia, northwestern Sicily, Italy; it lies at 2,464 feet (751 m) above sea level on the top of Monte San Giuliano (also called Monte Erice), just northeast of Trapani city. The town originated as a settlement of the ...
Ericsson, John: Swedish-born American naval engineer and inventor who built the first armoured turret warship and developed the screw propeller.
Eridu: ancient Sumerian city south of modern Ur (Tall al-Muqayyar), Iraq. Eridu was revered as the oldest city in Sumer according to the king lists, and its patron god was Enki (Ea), "lord of the sweet waters that flow under the ...
Eridu Genesis: in Mesopotamian religious literature, ancient Sumerian epic primarily concerned with the creation of the world, the building of cities, and the flood. According to the epic, after the universe was created out of the primeval sea and the gods were ...
Erie: county, extreme western New York state, U.S., bounded to the south by Cattaraugus Creek, to the west by Lake Erie, to the northwest by the Niagara River, and to the north by Tonawanda Creek, which is incorporated into the New ...
Erie: Iroquoian-speaking North American Indians who inhabited most of what is now northern Ohio, parts of northwestern Pennsylvania, and western New York; they were often referred to as the Cat Nation. Little is known of their social or political organization, but ...
Erie: city, seat (1803) of Erie county, northwestern Pennsylvania, U.S. It lies on the southeastern shore of Lake Erie, where a 6-mile (10-km) peninsula encloses a fine natural harbour; the city is a major lake port. Named for the Erie Indians, ...
Erie: county, extreme northwestern Pennsylvania, U.S., bordered by Lake Erie to the northwest, New York state to the northeast, and Ohio to the southwest. It consists of low hills that rise toward the southeast. The principal waterways are Conneaut, Elk, and ...
Erie Canal: 363 mile (584 km) historic waterway of the United States, connecting the Great Lakeswith New York City via the Hudson Riverat Albany. Taking advantage of the Mohawk River gap in the Appalachian mountains the Erie Canal was the first canal ...
Erie Railroad Company: U.S. railroad running between New York City, Buffalo, and Chicago, through the southern counties of New York state and skirting Lake Erie. It was incorporated in 1832 as the New York and Erie Railroad Company, to build from Piermont, N.Y., ...
Erie, Lake: fourth largest of the five Great Lakes of North America. It forms the boundary between Canada (Ontario) to the north and the United States (Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York) to the west, south, and east. The major axis of ...
Erigena, John Scotus: theologian, translator, and commentator on several earlier authors in works centring on the integration of Greek and Neoplatonist philosophy with Christian belief.
Erigone: in Greek mythology, daughter of Icarius, the hero of the Attic deme (township) of Icaria. Her father, who had been taught by the god Dionysus to make wine, gave some to several shepherds, who became intoxicated. Their companions, thinking they ...
Erik I: king of Norway (c. 930-935) and later king of Northumberland (948, 952-954). On the death of his father, Harald I Fairhair, first king of united Norway, Erik attempted to make himself sole king of Norway, defeating and slaying two of ...
Erik The Red: founder of the first European settlement on Greenland (c. 986) and the father of Leif Eriksson, one of the first Europeans to reach North America.
Erik V: king of Denmark (1259-86) whose reign saw the expansion of the power of the great nobles and prelates, formalized by the royal charter of 1282, and the restoration of Danish sovereignty in Schleswig (southern Jutland).
Erik VI: king of Denmark (1286-1319) under whom the conflict between church and monarchy, which had first arisen during the rule of his grandfather Christopher I, reached its peak and was tenuously resolved. Erik's attempts to renew Danish conquests along the southern ...
Erik VII: king of the united realms of Denmark, Norway (as Erik III), and Sweden (as Erik XIII) from 1397 to 1439; his autocratic rule and foreign wars eventually lost him the throne in all three of his dominions.
Erik XIV: king of Sweden (1560-68) who expanded the powers of the monarchy and pursued an aggressive foreign policy that led to the Seven Years' War of the North (1563-70) against Denmark.
Erikson, Erik H.: German-born American psychoanalyst whose writings on social psychology, individual identity, and the interactions of psychology with history, politics, and culture influenced professional approaches to psychosocial problems and attracted much popular interest.
Eriocaulales: the pipewort order of monocotyledonous flowering plants (i.e., those characterized by one seed leaf), consisting of one family, Eriocaulaceae, with 13 genera of small, tufted herbs with grasslike leaves that grow in aquatic and marshy habitats, mostly in tropical and ...
erionite: hydrated sodium-potassium-calcium aluminosilicate mineral in the zeolite family, one of the most abundant zeolites present in sedimentary rocks. Its chemical composition is approximately represented by the formula (Na₂,K₂,Ca)₄.₅Al₉Si₂₇O₇₂·27H₂O. It forms woolly, fibrous crystals that have an internal molecular structure similar ...
Eris: in Greco-Roman mythology, the personification of strife, daughter of Nyx, and sister and companion of Ares, or the Roman Mars. Eris is best known for her part in starting the Trojan War. When she alone of the gods was not ...
Eritrea: country of the Horn of Africa, located on the Red Sea. Its 600 miles (1,000 kilometres) of coastline extend from Cape Kasar, in the north, to the Strait of Mandeb, separating the Red Sea from the Gulf of Aden in ...