Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

0-9

ulexite ... Ulyanovsk

ulexite: borate mineral that consists of hydrated sodium and calcium borate (NaCaB₅O₉·8H₂O). Individual crystals are colourless and have a vitreous lustre, whereas the more common nodular, rounded, or lenslike crystal aggregates (often resembling cotton balls) are white and have a silky ...
Ulfilas: Gothic Wulfila Christian bishop and missionary who evangelized the Goths, reputedly created the Gothic alphabet, and wrote the earliest translation of the Bible into a Germanic language. Although his life cannot be reconstructed with certainty, fragments have come from 4th- ...
Ulhasnagar: city, northwestern Maharashtra state, western India. It lies northeast of Mumbai (Bombay). Part of the Thana industrial area, it specializes in the manufacture of chemicals and silk and nylon textiles. Ulhasnagar became important in 1947 as a refugee camp for ...
uli figure: wooden statue of a type carved in the villages of northern and central New Ireland, Papua New Guinea, that represents an ancestral or mythological personage in the secret uli rites. Only after a series of 13 festivals, held over a ...
Ulithi: coral atoll in the Federated States of Micronesia, in the western Pacific Ocean. Its islets have a total land area of 1.75 square miles (4.5 square km).
Ull: in Norse mythology, the god of snowshoes, hunting, the bow, and the shield; he was a handsome stepson of the thunder god Thor. Ull possessed warrior-like attributes and was called upon for aid in individual combat. He resided at Ydalir ...
Ulladulla: town, southeastern New South Wales, southeastern Australia. It lies 40 miles (65 km) south of Jervis Bay. The town was established in the 1820s as an anchorage for ships importing cedarwood to Sydney (108 miles [174 km] northeast), and its ...
Ullathorne, William Bernard: Roman Catholic missionary to Australia and first bishop of Birmingham, Eng. He was influential in securing the final abolition (1857) of the British system of transporting convicts to Australia.
Ullmann, Liv: Norwegian actress known for her natural beauty and intelligent, complex performances. Her name is closely linked to that of Swedish director Ingmar Bergman, with whom she worked in several films.
Ullswater: lake, in the administrative county of Cumbria, on the border between the historic counties of Cumberland and Westmorland in the Lake District of England. It is the Lake District's second largest lake, about 7.5 miles (12 km) long and 0.5 ...
Ullung Island: volcanic island, North Kyongsang do (province), South Korea. It lies in the East Sea (Sea of Japan), 75 miles (120 km) off the northeastern coast of South Korea, and has an area of 28 square miles (73 ...
Ulm: city, Baden-Wurttemberg Land (state), southwestern Germany. It lies on the left bank of the Danube River at its junction with the Iller and the Blau, opposite the Bavarian town of Neu Ulm. It was first mentioned as ...
Ulm, Battle of: (Sept. 25-Oct. 20, 1805), major strategic triumph of Napoleon, conducted by his Grand Army of about 210,000 men against an Austrian Army of about 72,000 under the command of Baron Karl Mack von Leiberich.
Ulmaceae: the elm family of the nettle order (Urticales), with 15 genera of trees and shrubs, distributed primarily throughout temperate regions. Members of the family have watery sap, and its leaves alternate along the stem. The leaves usually have toothed edges ...
Ulmanis, Karlis: a leader in the fight for Latvian independence in the early decades of the 20th century. He was the first head of the Latvian Republic in 1918 and again in 1936-40 and was premier in 1918, 1919-21, 1925-26, 1931-32, and ...
ulna: inner of two bones of the forearm (when viewed with the palm facing forward), present in all land vertebrates.
Ulothrix: genus of filamentous green algae found in marine and fresh waters; it survives best at low temperatures and thrives during winter and spring months. Each cell contains a distinct nucleus, a central vacuole, and a large, thin chloroplast with at ...
Ulpian: Roman jurist and imperial official whose writings supplied one-third of the total content of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I's monumental Digest, or Pandects (completed 533). He was a subordinate to Papinian when that older jurist was praetorian prefect (chief adviser ...
Ulrich: duke of Wurttemberg (1498-1519, 1534-50), a prominent figure in the German religious Reformation.
Ulrich von Hutten: Franconian knight and Humanist, famed as a German patriot, satirist, and supporter of Luther's cause. His restless, adventurous life, reflecting the turbulent Reformation period, was occupied with public and private quarrels, pursued with both pen and sword.
Ulrich, Saint: Ulrich also spelled Ulric bishop and patron saint of Augsburg, the first person known to have been canonized by a pope.
Ulrika Eleonora: Swedish queen whose short reign (1718-20) led to Sweden's Age of Freedom-a 52-year decline of absolutism in favour of parliamentary government.
Ulsan: city, Kyongsang-namdo (South Kyongsang Province), southeastern South Korea. At the eastern end of T'aebaek-sanmaek (mountains), facing the Sea of Japan (East Sea), on Ulsan-man (bay), it is 45 mi (72 km) north-northeast of Pusan. It is the heart of the ...
Ulster: county, southeastern New York state, U.S., bordered by the Hudson River to the east and the Catskill Mountains to the northwest. The varied terrain is drained by the Wallkill and Neversink (west and east branches) rivers; lakes include Ashokan Reservoir. ...
Ulster: one of the ancient provinces of Ireland, and subsequently the northernmost of Ireland's four traditional provinces (the others being Leinster, Munster, and Connaught [Connacht]). Because of the Ulster cycle of Irish literature, which recounts the exploits of Cu Chulainn and ...
Ulster cycle: in ancient Irish literature, a group of legends and tales dealing with the heroic age of the Ulaids, a people of northeast Ireland from whom the modern name Ulster derives. The stories, set in the 1st century BC, were recorded ...
Ulster Defence Association: loyalist organization founded in Northern Ireland in 1971 to coordinate the efforts of local Protestant vigilante groups in the sectarian conflict in the province.
Ulster Unionist Party: oldest and traditionally most successful Unionist party in Northern Ireland and the party of government in the province from 1921 to 1972. The UUP was a branch of the British Conservative Party until 1986. Its leader from 1995 to 2005 ...
Ulster Volunteer Force: illegal Protestant paramilitary organization founded in Northern Ireland in 1966. Its name was taken from a Protestant force organized in 1912 to fight against Irish Home Rule. Augustus (Gusty) Spence was the group's best-known leader. The UVF was affiliated with ...
Ulster, Hugh de Lacy, earl of: one of the most powerful Anglo-Norman lords in Ulster (in Ireland) in the first half of the 13th century.
Ulster, Richard de Burgh, 2nd earl of: one of the most powerful Irish nobles of the late 13th and early 14th centuries, a member of a historic Anglo-Irish family, the Burghs, and son of Walter de Burgh (c. 1230-71), the 1st earl of Ulster (of the second ...
ultima Thule: in literature, the furthest possible place in the world. Thule was the northernmost part of the habitable ancient world. (See Thule culture.) References to ultima Thule in modern literature appear in works by Edgar Allan Poe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and ...
ultimobranchial gland: in biology, any of the small bodies in the pharynx that develop behind the fifth pair of gill pouches in the vertebrate embryo. In mammals the ultimobranchial tissue has become incorporated into the thyroid gland. Ultimobranchial glands produce the hormone ...
Ultisol: one of the 12 soil orders in the U.S. Soil Taxonomy. Ultisols are reddish, clay-rich, acidic soils that support a mixed forest vegetation prior to cultivation. They are naturally suitable for forestry, can be made agriculturally productive with the application ...
ultra: the extreme right wing of the royalist movement in France during the Second Restoration (1815-30). The ultras represented the interests of the large landowners, the aristocracy, clericalists, and former emigres. They were opposed to the egalitarian and secularizing principles of ...
Ultra: Allied intelligence project that, in tapping the very highest level of communications among the German armed forces, as well as (after 1941) those of the Japanese armed forces, contributed to the Allied victory in World War II.
Ultraism: movement in Spanish and Spanish American poetry after World War I, characterized by a tendency to use free verse, complicated metrical innovations, and daring imagery and symbolism instead of traditional form and content. Influenced by the emphasis on form of ...
ultramarine: pigment in the gem lapis lazuli, used by painters as early as the European Middle Ages. Ore containing the colour was ground, and the powdered lapis lazuli was separated from the other mineral matter. The pigment was first produced artificially ...
ultramicroscope: microscope arrangement used to study colloidal-size particles that are too small to be visible in an ordinary light microscope. The particles, usually suspended in a liquid, are illuminated with a strong light beam perpendicular to the optical axis of the ...
Ultramontanism: (from Medieval Latin ultramontanus, "beyond the mountains"), in Roman Catholicism, a strong emphasis on papal authority and on centralization of the church. The word identified those northern European members of the church who regularly looked southward beyond the Alps (that ...
ultrasonics: vibrations of frequencies greater than the upper limit of the audible range for humans-that is, greater than about 20 kilohertz. The term sonic is applied to ultrasound waves of very high amplitudes. Hypersound, sometimes called praetersound or microsound, is sound ...
ultrasound: in medicine, the use of high-frequency sound (ultrasonic) waves to produce images of structures within the human body. Ultrasonic waves are sound waves that are above the range of sound audible to humans. The ultrasonic waves are produced by the ...
ultraviolet astronomy: study of the ultraviolet spectra of astronomical objects. It has yielded much important information about chemical abundances and processes in interstellar matter, the Sun, and certain other stellar objects, such as white dwarfs.
ultraviolet radiation: that portion of the electromagnetic spectrum extending from the violet, or short-wavelength, end of the visible light range to the X-ray region. Ultraviolet (UV) radiation is undetectable by the human eye, although, when it falls on certain materials, it may ...
Ulua River: river in northwestern Honduras. Its headstreams rise deep in the central highlands, draining much of northwestern Honduras. The Ulua proper, about 150 miles (240 km) long, is formed by the union of the Jicatuyo and Otoro rivers, northwest of Santa ...
Ulugh Beg: grandson of the Asian conqueror Timur (Tamerlane) and one whose primary interest was in the arts and intellectual matters. Under his brief rule the Timurid dynasty of Iran reached its cultural peak.
Ulundi: town, northern KwaZulu-Natal province, South Africa. It lies on the north bank of the White Mfolozi (Umfolozi) River. The site was chosen by Cetshwayo for his new capital when he became king of the Zulu in 1873. He called it ...
Ulvang, Vegard: Norwegian Nordic skier known both for his successful racing career and for his many adventurous trips throughout the world; he skied across Greenland and climbed some of the highest mountain peaks in the world, including Mont Blanc, Mt. McKinley, and ...
Ulverstone: town, northern Tasmania, Australia. It lies near the mouth of the River Leven on Bass Strait. Surveyed by 1855 and named after Ulverston, Eng., in the English Lake District, it was proclaimed a town in 1888 and was made a ...
Ulyanovsk: oblast (province), western Russia. The oblast lies athwart the middle Volga River, which is there transformed into a broad lake by the downstream Samara dam. The larger western part lies on the Volga Upland, which is dissected by river valleys ...
Ulyanovsk: city and administrative centre of Ulyanovsk oblast (province), western Russia. It lies along the Volga River at its confluence with the Sviyaga. Founded in 1648, it was a key fortress on the Sinbirsk defensive line; in 1924 it was renamed ...