English soldier and navigator who devised daring and farseeing projects of overseas colonization. Although he was brilliant and creative, his poor leadership was responsible for his failure to establish the first permanent English colony in North America. He succeeded, however, ...
English Romantic painter and illustrator of literary classics, especially remembered for his woodcut illustrations for the works of Shakespeare (1859-60) and Scott. He preferred medieval chivalric subjects, and such pictures as "Sir Lancelot du Lake" (1887) earned him the epithet ...
American molecular biologist who was awarded a share (with Paul Berg and Frederick Sanger) of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1980 for his development of a method for determining the sequence of nucleotide links in the chainlike molecules of ...
husband and wife who developed the method of time-and-motion study as applied to the work habits of industrial employees to increase their efficiency and hence their output.
metallurgist who, with his better-known cousin Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, devised in 1876-77 a process (thereafter widely used in Europe) of manufacturing in Bessemer converters a kind of low-phosphorus steel known as Thomas steel. In the Thomas-Gilchrist process the lining used ...
British historian of the 6th century. A monk, he founded a monastery in Brittany known after him as St. Gildas de Rhuys. His De excidio et conquestu Britanniae ("The Overthrow and Conquest of Britain"), one of the few sources for ...
period of gross materialism and blatant political corruption in U.S. history during the 1870s that gave rise to important novels of social and political criticism. The period takes its name from the earliest of these, The Gilded Age (1873), written ...
the art of decorating the whole or parts of wood, metal, plaster, glass, or other objects with gold in leaf or powder form. The term also embraces the application of silver, palladium, aluminum, and copper alloys.
area of ancient Palestine east of the Jordan River, corresponding to modern northwestern Jordan. The region is bounded in the north by the Yarmuk River and in the southwest by what were known in ancient times as the "plains of ...
the best known of all ancient Mesopotamian heroes. Numerous tales in the Akkadian language have been told about Gilgamesh, and the whole collection has been described as an odyssey-the odyssey of a king who did not want to die.
town in the Northern Areas of the Pakistani-administered sector of the Kashmir region, in the northern Indian subcontinent. It is situated in the Karakoram Range in a narrow valley on the Gilgit River at its confluence with the Hunza River ...
in biology, type of respiratory organ found in many aquatic animals, including a number of worms, nearly all mollusks and crustaceans, some insect larvae, all fishes, and a few amphibians. The gill consists of branched or feathery tissue richly supplied ...
in measurement, unit of volume in the British Imperial and United States Customary systems. It is used almost exclusively for the measurement of liquids. Although its capacity has varied with time and location, in the United States it is defined ...
British sculptor, engraver, typographic designer, and writer, especially known for his elegantly styled lettering and typefaces and the precise linear simplicity of his bas-reliefs.
American architect important for introducing a severe, geometric style of architecture in California and for his pioneering work in developing new construction technology.
Scottish astronomer known for his measurements of solar and stellar parallax, showing the distances of the Sun and other stars from Earth, and for his early use of photography in mapping the heavens. To determine the parallaxes, he perfected the ...
American religious leader who guided her order in dramatically expanding higher education for women by founding numerous institutions throughout the United States.
Scottish Presbyterian minister who assisted in founding the Relief Church (Oct. 22, 1761), a Presbyterian group advocating the right of a congregation to approve its minister.
town, seat (1911) of Campbell county, northeastern Wyoming, U.S., midway between the Black Hills (east) and the Bighorn Mountains (west). It developed after the arrival in 1891 of the Burlington and Missouri River railroads and was named for Edward Gillette, ...
American playwright and actor noted for his portrayal of the title role in Sherlock Holmes, which he adapted for the stage from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories.
English writer of essays, short stories, screenplays, and novels. Her fiction is noted for its sensitive, sometimes wry look at the challenges and complexities of modern life in England and the United States.
town and port, unitary authority of Medway, geographic and historic county of Kent, southeastern England, on the River Medway. Gillingham is one of the three Medway towns. Before the establishment of the royal dockyard at nearby Chatham, a portion of ...
French painter, engraver, and theatrical designer best known as the master of the great painter Antoine Watteau. Gillot directed scenery and costume design for both opera and theatre. An accomplished draftsman and a man of keen intelligence, he was in ...
English caricaturist chiefly remembered for lively political cartoons directed against George III of England and Napoleon I. Often scurrilous and violent in his criticism, he brought a highly dramatic sense of situation and analogy to cartooning.
any of several scented flowering plants, especially the carnation, or clove pink (Dianthus caryophyllus), stock (Matthiola incana), and wallflower (Cheiranthus cheiri). The gillyflower of Chaucer, Spenser, and Shakespeare was the carnation. Other plants that utilize the word gillyflower are dame's ...
American pharmacologist who shared the 1994 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with American biochemist Martin Rodbell for their separate research in discovering molecules called G proteins, which are intermediaries in the multistep pathway cells use to react to an ...
popular American writer and publisher, much of whose work reflected her conviction of the importance of the family as a foundation for societal harmony.
