Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

0-9

Ringerike ... Rishon LeZiyyon

Ringerike: kommune ("commune") and geographic region, Buskerud fylke (county), southeastern Norway, just northwest of Oslo. The region covers a total area of 600 square miles (1,553 square km) adjacent to the northern shore of Tyri Lake and northward to Rands Lake. ...
ringgit: monetary unit of Malaysia. The ringgit, also known as the Malaysian dollar, is divided into 100 sen. The Central Bank of Malaysia (Bank Negara Malaysia) has the exclusive authority to issue banknotes and coins in Malaysia. Coins are issued in ...
Ringgold, Faith: American artist and author who became famous for innovative, quilted narrations that communicate her political beliefs.
Ringkobing: amt (county), Denmark, covering a rectangular area (1,874 square miles [4,853 square km]) that is bounded by the smooth dune and lagoon coast of western Jutland between Nissum Bay in the north and Ringkobing Fjord in the south, and extending ...
Ringling Brothers: family of American circus proprietors who created the Ringling Brothers circus empire in the late 19th century.
Ringo, Johnny: American Western outlaw, a loner, noted for his deadly fast draw.
rings: gymnastics apparatus consisting of two small circles that are suspended by straps from an overhead support and grasped by the gymnast while performing various exercises. They were invented in the early 19th century by the German Friedrich Jahn, known as ...
Ringsaker: town, Hedmark fylke (county), southeastern Norway. It lies along the eastern shore of Mjosa, the largest lake in Norway. Situated along the main road and rail line between Oslo and Trondheim, Ringsaker lies in a rich agricultural and lumbering region. ...
ringtailed cat: carnivorous mammal, a species of cacomistle (q.v.).
Ringuet: French-Canadian novelist whose Trente arpents (1938; Thirty Acres) is considered a classic of Canadian literature.
ringworm: superficial skin lesions caused by a highly specialized group of fungi called dermatophytes that live and multiply on the surface of the skin and feed on keratin, the horny protein constituting the major part of the outermost layer of the ...
Rinzai: one of two major Zen Buddhist sects in Japan; it stresses the abrupt awakening of transcendental wisdom, or enlightenment. Among the methods it practices are shouts (katsu) or blows delivered by the master on the disciple, question-and-answer sessions (mondo), and ...
Rio Branco: city, capital of Acre estado (state), western Brazil. It lies on the west bank of the Acre River, and just north of where the Branco River (Rio Branco) flows into the Acre. A commercial and distribution centre, ...
Rio Branco Law: measure enacted by the Brazilian parliament in 1871 that freed children born of slave parents. The law was passed under the leadership of Jose Maria da Silva Paranhos, Viscount do Rio Branco, premier during 1871-73, and Joaquim Nabuco de Araujo, ...
Rio Claro: city, in the highlands of east-central Sao Paulo estado (state), southeastern Brazil. It is situated at 2,050 feet (625 metres) above sea level along the Corumbatai River. Formerly called Sao Joao Batista da Beira do Ribeirao Claro ...
Rio Cuarto: city, southwestern Cordoba provincia (province), north-central Argentina. It lies along the Cuarto River between the western reaches of the Pampas and the foothills of the Condores Mountains. The city was inaugurated in 1794 under the sponsorship of ...
Rio de Janeiro: estado ("state") of southeastern Brazil, bounded by the states of Espirito Santo (north), Minas Gerais (west), and Sao Paulo (southwest), while to the east lies the Atlantic Ocean. It is named for the city of Rio de Janeiro, the state ...
Rio de Janeiro: city and port of Brazil, capital of the estado (state) of Brazil. It is located on the Atlantic Ocean, in the southeastern part of the tropical zone in South America.
Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden: one of the great tropical botanical gardens and arboretums of the world. It was founded in 1808 by John, prince regent of the United Kingdom of Brazil and Portugal (later King John VI), for introducing and acclimatizing economically beneficial plants ...
Rio de Janeiro, Protocol of: (1942), treaty settling possession of the disputed Oriente region on the border of Peru and Ecuador, arranged by a conference of Western Hemisphere foreign ministers held at Rio de Janeiro. Peruvian forces had occupied the area in 1941, defeating the ...
Rio de la Plata, Viceroyalty of the: the final of the four viceroyalties that Spain created during its colonization of Central and South America. Including the territory now comprising Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Bolivia, the new viceroyalty (established in 1776) controlled an area previously under the administration ...
Rio de Oro: southern region of Western Sahara. It has an area of 71,000 square miles (184,000 square km) and lies between Cape Blanco and latitude 26° N, near Cape Bojador. The climate is very arid, with virtually no rainfall, and there are ...
Rio Gallegos: city, capital of Santa Cruz provincia (province), extreme southern Argentina. It lies on the southern (right) bank of the estuary of the Gallegos River, inland from the Atlantic Ocean, about 40 miles (65 km) north of the ...
Rio Grande: port city, southeastern Rio Grande do Sul estado (state), southern Brazil. The city lies along the Rio Grande (river), which is the outlet to the Atlantic Ocean of the Patos Lagoon. It is built on a low ...
Rio Grande: fifth longest river of North America, and the 20th longest in the world, forming the border between the U.S. state of Texas and Mexico. Rising as a clear, snow-fed mountain stream more than 12,000 feet (3,700 metres) above sea level ...
Rio Grande do Norte: estado ("state") of northeastern Brazil. A primarily agricultural and salt-producing state and one of the smallest of all Brazilian states, it is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the north and east, by the state of Ceara on the west, ...
Rio Grande do Sul: southernmost estado ("state") of Brazil, bordered by the state of Santa Catarina (north), Argentina (west), Uruguay (south), and the Atlantic Ocean (east). The capital of Porto Alegre is the state's main industrial area and port. Rio Grande do Sul is ...
Rio Negro: provincia, south-central Argentina, lying within the region known as Patagonia and extending westward from the Atlantic to the Andes and the border with Neuquen provincia. It is crossed (northwest to southeast) by the Negro River. South of the Negro, most ...
Rio Salado, Battle of: (October 30, 1340), battle fought by the allied Castilian and Portuguese Christian forces against the Muslim Marinids of North Africa in a final attempt by the latter to invade the Iberian Peninsula. The battle, which interrupted a series of disputes ...
Riobamba: city, central Ecuador. It is situated in the central highlands at an elevation of about 9,000 feet (2,700 m) in the basin of the Riobamba River, just south of Mount Chimborazo. The town dates from pre-Inca and Inca times; in ...
Riohacha: capital of La Guajira departamento, northern Colombia. It lies on the Caribbean coast at the mouth of the Rancheria River. Founded in 1545, the settlement became known for its pearl industry. After the depletion of the oyster beds in the ...
Riom: town, Puy-de-Dome departement, Auvergne region, central France. It lies along the Ambene River at the western edge of the fertile Limagne Plain, just north of Clermont-Ferrand. The old town, built around the ancient Church of Saint-Amable, is ringed by the ...
riot: in criminal law, a violent offense against public order involving three or more people. Like an unlawful assembly, a riot involves a gathering of persons for an illegal purpose. In contrast to an unlawful assembly, however, a riot involves violence. ...
Riotinto Mines: copper mines, located near the town of Nerva (formerly Riotinto), in Huelva provincia, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, southwestern Spain, on the Tinto River. Worked since Phoenician and Roman times, the mines (the name of which means "stained river" ...
rip current: narrow jetlike stream of water that flows sporadically seaward for several minutes, in a direction normal or nearly normal to a beach. Such currents are probably the cause of most ocean bathing accidents blamed on undertow. The term riptide is ...
riparian right: doctrine in certain areas that governs the use of surface water and gives all owners of land contiguous to streams, lakes, and ponds equal rights to the water, whether the right is exercised or not. Riparian rights are a form ...
Riperda, Juan Guillermo Riperda, duque de, Baron De Riperda: political adventurer and Spanish minister during the reign of Philip V.
Ripken, Cal, Jr.: American professional baseball player, one of the most durable in professional sports history. In 1995, on September 5 and 6, respectively, Ripken played his 2,130th and 2,131st consecutive games for the American League Baltimore Orioles and thereby tied and broke ...
Ripley, George: journalist and reformer whose life, for half a century, mirrored the main currents of American thought. He was the leading promoter and director of Brook Farm (q.v.), the celebrated utopian community at West Roxbury, Mass., and a spokesman for the ...
Ripley, Robert LeRoy: American cartoonist who was the founder of "Believe It or Not!," a widely popular newspaper cartoon presenting bizarre facts and oddities of all kinds.
Ripley, W Z: American economist and anthropologist whose book The Races of Europe: A Sociological Study (1899) directed the attention of American social scientists to the existence of subdivisions of geographic races. Specifically, Ripley asserted that the European Caucasians can be broadly classified ...
Ripon: cathedral city, Harrogate borough, administrative county of North Yorkshire, historic county of Yorkshire, England. It lies in the upper valley of the River Ure, 27 miles (43 km) north of Leeds. St. Eata, abbot of Melrose, founded a Celtic monastery ...
Ripon: city, Fond du Lac county, east-central Wisconsin, U.S. It lies 20 miles (30 km) west of Fond du Lac and 80 miles (130 km) northwest of Milwaukee. In 1844 the Wisconsin Phalanx, a group of followers of the 19th-century French ...
Ripon, Frederick John Robinson, 1st Earl of, Viscount Goderich Of Nocton: prime minister of Great Britain from August 1827 to January 1828. He received from the radical journalist William Cobbett the sardonic nicknames "Prosperity Robinson" (for his unwarranted optimism on the eve of the 1825 economic crisis) and "Goody Goderich."
Ripon, George Frederick Samuel Robinson, 1st Marquess of, 2nd Earl Of Ripon, Viscount Goderich Of Nocton: British statesman who in more than 50 years of public service occupied important Cabinet posts and served as viceroy of India. A liberal administrator acceptable to the Indians, he was thought to have weakened the British Empire but to have ...
ripple mark: one of a series of small marine, lake, or riverine topographic features, consisting of repeating wavelike forms with symmetrical slopes, sharp peaks, and rounded troughs. Ripple marks are formed in sandy bottoms by oscillation waves, in which only the wave ...
Riquet de Bonrepos, Pierre-Paul, Baron: French public official and self-made engineer who constructed the epochal 150-mile (240-kilometre) Canal du Midi (also called the Languedoc Canal) connecting the Garonne River to the Aude River, thus linking the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The canal has been called ...
Risaralda: departamento, west-central Colombia. It was created in 1966 and extends from the Andean Cordillera Occidental across the Cauca River valley to the Cordillera Central. Agriculture is the predominant economic activity; coffee, sugarcane, beans, corn (maize), bananas, cacao, and tobacco are ...
RISC: information processing using any of a family of microprocessors that are designed to execute computing tasks with the simplest instructions in the shortest amount of time possible. RISC is the opposite of CISC (complex-instruction-set computing).
Rishabhanatha: the first of the 24 Tirthankaras ("Ford-makers," i.e., saviours) of Jainism, a religion of India. His name comes from the series of 14 auspicious dreams that his mother had, in which a bull (rishabha) appeared, before his ...
Rishon LeZiyyon: city, west-central Israel. It lies on the Judaean Plain southeast of Tel Aviv-Yafo. The name (Hebrew: "first to Zion") is derived from a biblical allusion in Isaiah 41:27.