Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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Natta, Giulio ... Navarre

Natta, Giulio: Italian chemist who contributed to the development of high polymers useful in the manufacture of films, plastics, fibres, and synthetic rubber. Along with Karl Ziegler of Germany, he was honoured in 1963 with the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the ...
Nattier, Jean-Marc: French Rococo painter noted for his portraits of the ladies of King Louis XV's court in classical mythological attire.
Natufian culture: Mesolithic culture of Palestine and southern Syria dating from about 9000 BC. Mainly hunters, the Natufians supplemented their diet by gathering wild grain; they likely did not cultivate it. They had sickles of flint blades set in straight bone handles ...
natural bridge: naturally created arch formation resembling a bridge. Most natural bridges are erosion features that occur in massive, horizontally bedded sandstone or limestone. Some bridges, such as the Natural Bridge near Lexington, Va., are formed by the collapse of a cavern's ...
Natural Bridge: natural limestone arch, Rockbridge county, western Virginia, U.S., 20 miles (32 km) south of Lexington near the village of Natural Bridge and the northern portion of Jefferson National Forest. The arch, spanning a gorge cut by Cedar Creek, is 215 ...
Natural Bridges National Monument: scenic area in southeastern Utah, U.S., containing three natural sandstone bridges. The bridges were carved by two winding streams that formed on the western slopes of Elk Ridge, a formation of the northwestern Colorado Plateau. Established in 1908, the monument ...
natural childbirth: any of the systems of managing parturition in which the need for anesthesia, sedation, or surgery is largely eliminated by physical and psychological conditioning. Until the early 20th century, the term natural childbirth was thought of as synonymous with normal ...
natural fibre: any hairlike raw material directly obtainable from an animal, vegetable, or mineral source and convertible into nonwoven fabrics such as felt or paper or, after spinning into yarns, into woven cloth. A natural fibre may be further defined as an ...
natural gas: colourless, highly flammable gaseous hydrocarbon consisting primarily of methane and ethane. It is a type of petroleum that commonly occurs in association with crude oil. Natural gas is often found dissolved in oil at the high pressures existing in a ...
Natural History Museum: British natural science museum that has national and international responsibilities for taxonomic and associated research based on its outstanding collection of specimens and its extensive libraries. It is located near the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum in ...
natural law: in philosophy, a system of right or justice held to be common to all humans and derived from nature rather than from the rules of society, or positive law.
natural selection: process that results in the adaptation of an organism to its environment by means of selectively reproducing changes in its genotype, or genetic constitution.
naturalism: in philosophy, a theory that relates scientific method to philosophy by affirming that all beings and events in the universe (whatever their inherent character may be) are natural. Consequently, all knowledge of the universe falls within the pale of scientific ...
naturalism: in literature and the visual arts, late 19th- and early 20th-century movement that was inspired by adaptation of the principles and methods of natural science, especially the Darwinian view of nature, to literature and art. In literature it extended the ...
naturalization: the act of investing an alien with the status of a national in a given state; it may be accomplished as the result of voluntary application, special legislative direction, marriage to a citizen, or parental action. Naturalization may also occur ...
nature reserve: area set aside by a government for the purpose of preserving certain animals, plants, or both. A nature reserve differs from a national park (q.v.) in that the latter protects land and wildlife for public enjoyment, whereas a nature reserve ...
nature worship: system of religion based on the veneration of natural phenomena-for example, celestial objects such as the sun and moon and terrestrial objects such as water and fire.
nature, law of: in logic, a stated regularity in the relations or order of phenomena in the world that holds, under a stipulated set of conditions, either universally or in a stated proportion of instances. For the philosophical law of nature, see natural ...
nature, philosophy of: the discipline that investigates substantive issues regarding the actual features of nature as a reality. The discussion here is divided into two parts: the philosophy of physics and the philosophy of biology.
Natya-sastra: detailed treatise and handbook on dramatic art that deals with all aspects of the classical Sanskrit theatre. It is believed to have been written before the 3rd century by the mythic Brahman sage and priest Bharata.
nauarch: in ancient Greece, an admiral or supreme commander of the navy, used as an official title primarily in Sparta in the late 5th and early 4th centuries BC. The Spartan nauarch could hold office only once, for a period of ...
Naude, Gabriel: French physician and librarian, considered the first important theoretician of modern library organization. His treatise, Advis pour dresser une bibliotheque (1627; Advice on Establishing a Library), was the first important study of library science.
Naugatuck: town (township) and borough, New Haven county, southwestern Connecticut, U.S. It lies along the Naugatuck River just south of Waterbury.
Naughton, Bill: Irish-born British playwright who is best remembered for a series of working-class comedies he wrote in the 1960s, most notably Alfie (1963; filmed 1966), an episodic, unsentimental tale of an egocentric Cockney womanizer.
Naujan Lake: lake on the northeastern coastal plain of Mindoro, Philippines. It is the Philippines' fifth largest lake, with an area of 30 square miles (79 square km). The lake is 8.5 miles (14 km) long and 4 miles (6 km) wide ...
Naukratis: ancient Greek settlement in the Nile River delta, on the Canopic (western) branch of the river. An emporion ("trading station") with exclusive trading rights in Egypt, Naukratis was the centre of cultural relations between Greece and Egypt in the pre-Hellenistic ...
naumachia: in ancient Rome, a mimic sea battle and the specially constructed basin in which such a battle sometimes took place. These entertainments also took place in flooded amphitheatres. The opposing sides were prisoners of war or convicts, who fought until ...
Naumann, Friedrich: political and social theorist, publicist, and reformer who became one of the most influential partisans of German liberalism combined with imperialism.
Naumburg: city, Saxony-Anhalt Land (state), east-central Germany. It lies along the Saale River, near the mouth of the Unstrut River, southwest of Halle. Founded by the margraves of Meissen about the year 1000, Naumburg was granted to the ...
Nauplia: chief town of the nomos (department) of Argolis, in the Peloponnese, Greece, at the head of the Gulf of Argolis. The port, southeast of Argos, sits on the north slope of twin crags; Itche (or Its) Kale (279 feet [85 ...
Nauru: country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of a solitary raised coral island located in southeastern Micronesia, 25 miles (41 kilometres) south of the Equator. The island is about 2,480 miles northeast of Sydney, Australia, and a slightly greater ...
naus: prehistoric grave found in the Balearic Isles. The naus was built of closely fitting blocks of stone in the shape of an overturned boat with a rounded stern and a squared or slightly concave front. A small door in the ...
nausea: (from Greek nausia, "seasickness"), feeling of discomfort in the pit of the stomach that is associated with a revulsion for food and an expectation that vomiting will follow, as it often does. Nausea results from the irritation ...
Nauset: an Algonquian-speaking Indian tribe that occupied most of what is now Cape Cod, in Massachusetts. The Nauset probably came into contact with whites at an early date because of their location, and Samuel de Champlain is known to have encountered ...
nautilus: either of two genera of cephalopod mollusks: the pearly, or chambered, nautilus (Nautilus), to which the name properly applies; and the paper nautilus (Argonauta), a cosmopolitan genus related to the octopus.
Nautilus: any of at least three historic submarines (including the world's first nuclear-powered vessel) and a fourth submarine famous in science fiction.
Nauvoo: city, Hancock county, western Illinois, U.S. It lies along the Mississippi River, about 30 miles (50 km) southwest of Burlington, Iowa. The area was long inhabited by Sauk and Fox Indians before American settlement. Permanent settlement was begun in 1824 ...
Nava'i, 'Ali Shir: Turkish poet and scholar who was the greatest representative of Chagatai Turkish literature (written in an eastern Turkic dialect).
Navadwlp: city, southeastern West Bengal state, northeastern India, at the confluence of the Bhagirathi and Jalangi rivers. The Bhagirathi River has shifted its course, cutting the city off from the rest of the district. Reputedly founded in 1063, the town served ...
Navajo: the most populous of all Indian groups in the United States, with about 170,000 individuals in the late 20th century scattered throughout northwestern New Mexico, Arizona, and southeastern Utah. The Navajo speak an Apachean language, which, like the language of ...
Navajo language: North American Indian language of the Athabascan family, spoken by the Navajo people of Arizona and New Mexico and closely related to Apache. Navajo is a tone language, meaning that pitch helps distinguish words. Nouns are either animate or inanimate. ...
Navajo National Monument: a complex of three prehistoric cliff dwellings near the town of Tonalea in northeastern Arizona, U.S. Located in the Navajo Reservation, the three sites-Betatakin (Navajo: "Ledge House"), Keet Seel ("Broken Pottery"; see ), and Inscription House-are among the best-preserved and ...
Navajo weaving: blankets and rugs made by the Navajo and thought to be some of the most colourful and best-made textiles produced by North American Indians. The Navajo, formerly a seminomadic tribe, settled in the southwestern United States in the 10th and ...
naval ship: the chief instrument by which a nation extends its military power onto the seas. Warships protect the movement over water of military forces to coastal areas where they may be landed and used against enemy forces; warships protect merchant shipping ...
naval stores: products such as tar, pitch, turpentine, pine oil, rosin, and terpenes obtained from the pine and other coniferous trees, and originally used in maintaining wooden sailing ships. Naval stores are produced chiefly by the United States and France, with large ...
naval warfare: the tactics of military operations conducted on, under, or over the sea.
Navan: urban district and county seat of County Meath, Ireland. It lies at the confluence of the Rivers Boyne and Blackwater. The Great Motte, an imposing earthwork 52 feet (16 m) high, is on its western outskirts. The town was walled ...
navaratra: ("nine nights"), in Hinduism, a festival of nine days occurring during the month of Asin, or Asvina (September-October). It usually ends with the dasehra, or dasahara, celebration on the 10th day.
Navarin, Bay of: small, deep, and almost landlocked bay of the Ionian Sea in the nomos (department) of Messenia, in the southwestern Peloponnese (Peloponnisos), Greece. Known also as Pylos (Pilos) Bay after Homeric Pylos, which has been identified farther to the north, the ...
Navarino, Battle of: (Oct. 20, 1827), decisive naval engagement of the War of Greek Independence against Turkey. The battle was fought in the Bay of Navarin in the southwestern Peloponnese, between an Egyptian-Turkish fleet under Tahir Pasha and a combined British-French-Russian fleet under ...
Navarre: comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community") of northern Spain. It is roughly coextensive with the Spanish portion of the historical kingdom of Navarre and encompasses the modern provincia of Navarra. The autonomous community was established by the statute of autonomy of 1982. ...