Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

0-9

vasectomy ... Vaxjo

vasectomy: severing of the vas deferens in the male reproductive tract to bring about sterility or to prevent infection. The testes in the male produce the sperm cells that fertilize the ovum, or egg, in the process of producing a new ...
Vasiliki ware: elaborately shaped handmade pottery from Vasiliki, eastern Crete, produced in the second phase of the Early Minoan period (c. 3000-c. 2000 BC). The surface of the wares is covered with a red or brown semi-lustrous paint that appears mottled, an ...
Vasily I: in full Vasily Dmitriyevich grand prince of Moscow from 1389 to 1425.
Vasily II: grand prince of Moscow from 1425 to 1462.
Vasily III: grand prince of Moscow from 1505 to 1533. Succeeding his father, Ivan III (ruled Moscow 1462-1505), Vasily completed his father's policy of consolidating the numerous independent Russian principalities into a united Muscovite state by annexing Pskov (1510), Ryazan (1517), and ...
Vasily Shuysky: original name Vasily Ivanovich, Knyaz (Prince) Shuysky, or Shuisky boyar who became tsar (1606-10) during Russia's Time of Troubles.
Vaslui: judet (county), eastern Romania, occupying an area of 2,046 sq mi (5,300 sq km), bounded on the east by Moldova. The terrain consists of rolling hills. The Elan, Barlad, and Tutova rivers drain the county. Vaslui (q.v.) city is the ...
Vaslui: town, seat of Vaslui judet (county), northeastern Romania, on the Barlad River. Near Vaslui, in 1475, Stephen (Stefan) the Great, with 40,000 troops, defeated a Turkish army three times as large. He also built the St John the Baptist church ...
vassa: the Buddhist monastic retreat observed primarily in Buddhist communities in Southeast Asia during the three-month monsoon period each year.
vassal: in feudal society, one invested with a fief in return for services to an overlord. Some vassals did not have fiefs and lived at their lord's court as his household knights. Certain vassals who held their fiefs directly from the ...
Vassar College: private, coeducational institution of higher learning in Poughkeepsie, New York, U.S., one of the Seven Sisters schools. It is a liberal arts college offering undergraduate studies in the arts, languages and literatures, natural and social sciences, psychology, and other areas. ...
Vasteras: city and capital of Vastmanland lan (county), east-central Sweden. It lies at the confluence of the Svart River and Lake Malar, west of Stockholm.
Vasterbotten: lan (county), northern Sweden, extending from the Gulf of Bothnia west to the Norwegian border. Its area comprises the traditional landskap (province) of Vasterbotten and parts of Angermanland and Lappland. The terrain rises from the gulf through a forested upland ...
Vastergotland: landskap (province), southwestern Sweden. It is composed largely of the administrative lan (county) of Vastra Gotaland and of portions of Halland and Orebro counties. Lying between Lakes Vattern and Vanern, it is bounded by the traditional provinces of Varmland on ...
Vasternorrland: lan (county) of northeast Sweden, on the Gulf of Bothnia. Its area takes in most of the two traditional landskap (provinces) of Medelpad and Angermanland. Rising from the low coastal strip is a heavily forested interior plateau that supplies timber ...
Vastitas Borealis: nearly level lowland plain that surrounds the north pole of the planet Mars and extends southward to about latitude 50°. The plain lies 4-5 km (2.5-3 miles) below the planet's mean radius. In some places it is characterized by numerous ...
Vastmanland: lan (county) of central Sweden, extending north of Lake Malar. Its area includes the southwestern part of the traditional landskap (province) of Uppland and the eastern part of Vastmanland. A fertile plain in the southeast rises northward to the edge ...
Vasto: town, Chieti provincia, Abruzzi regione, south-central Italy. It is a beach resort on the Adriatic Sea, with brickmaking, candlemaking, and agricultural-processing industries. The town, the ancient name of which was Histonium, has an archaeological museum. There is a 13th-century castle, ...
Vastra Gotaland: lan (county), southwestern Sweden. It was created in 1998 by the amalgamation of the counties of Alvsborg, Goteborg och Bohus, and Skaraborg. The capital is Goteborg, Sweden's major port and second largest city.
Vasubandhu: Indian Buddhist philosopher and logician, younger brother of the philosopher Asanga. His conversion from the Sarvastivada to the Mahayana Buddhist tradition is attributed to Asanga. Vasubandhu refined classical Indian syllogistic logic by distinguishing the procedure for reaching inferences in formal ...
Vasudeva: in Hindu mythology, the patronymic of Krishna (Krsna), who, according to one tradition, was a son of Vasudeva. The worshipers of Vasudeva, or Krishna, formed one of the earliest theistic devotional movements within Hinduism. When they merged with other groups, ...
vat dye: any of a large class of water-insoluble dyes, such as indigo and the anthraquinone derivatives, that are used particularly on cellulosic fibres. The dye is applied in a soluble, reduced form to impregnate the fibre and then oxidized in the ...
Vatican Apostolic Library: official library of the Vatican, especially notable as one of the world's richest manuscript depositories. The library is the direct heir of the first library of the Roman pontiffs. Very little is known of this library up to the 13th ...
Vatican City: ecclesiastical state, seat of the Roman Catholic church, and an enclave in Rome, situated on the west bank of the Tiber River. Vatican City is the world's smallest fully independent nation-state. Its medieval and Renaissance walls form its boundaries except ...
Vatican Council, First: 20th ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church (1869-70), convoked by Pope Pius IX to deal with contemporary problems. The pope was referring to the rising influence of rationalism, liberalism, and materialism. Preparations for the council were directed by a ...
Vatican Council, Second: 21st ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church (1962-65), announced by Pope John XXIII on Jan. 25, 1959, as a means of spiritual renewal for the church and as an occasion for Christians separated from Rome to join in search ...
Vatican Museums and Galleries: art collections of the popes since the beginning of the 15th century, housed in the papal palaces and other buildings in the Vatican. The Pio-Clementino Museum (Museo Pio-Clementino or Musei di Scultura) was founded in the 18th century by Pope ...
Vatican palace: papal residence in the Vatican north of St. Peter's Basilica. From the 4th century until the Avignonese period (1309-77) the customary residence of the popes was at the Lateran. Pope Symmachus built two episcopal residences in the Vatican, one on ...
Vatnajokull: extensive ice field, southeastern Iceland, covering an area of 3,200 sq mi (8,400 sq km) with an average ice thickness of more than 3,000 ft (900 m). Generally about 5,000 ft above sea level, in the Oraefajokull (Oraefa Glacier) in ...
Vattel, Emmerich de: Swiss jurist who, in Le Droit des gens (1758; "The Law of Nations"), applied a theory of natural law to international relations. His treatise was especially influential in the United States because his principles of liberty and equality coincided with ...
Vattern: English Lake Vatter, lake in south-central Sweden, southeast of Lake Vanern between the administrative lan (counties) of Vastra Gotaland and Ostergotland and north of the traditional landskap (province) of Smaland. With a length of 81 miles (130 km), a breadth ...
Vauban, Sebastien Le Prestre de: French military engineer who revolutionized the art of siege craft and defensive fortifications. He fought in all of France's wars of Louix XIV's reign (1643-1715).
Vaucanson, Jacques de: prolific inventor of robot devices of significance for modern industry.
Vaucheria: genus of yellow-green algae characterized by oil food reserves and multinucleate tubular branches lacking cross walls except in association with reproductive organs or an injury. Asexual reproduction is by motile zoospores and nonmotile aplanospores; sexual reproduction also occurs. The spherical ...
Vaud: canton, southwestern Switzerland, bordering France and the Jura Mountains to the west and Lake Geneva (Lac Leman) to the south. It has an area of 1,243 sq mi (3,219 sq km). In the west it extends a short way along ...
vaudeville: light entertainment popular in the United States from the mid-1890s until the early 1930s that consisted of 10 to 15 individual unrelated acts, featuring magicians, acrobats, comedians, trained animals, jugglers, singers, and dancers. It is the counterpart of the music ...
Vaugelas, Claude Favre, seigneur de, Baron De Perouges: French grammarian and an original member of the Academie Francaise who played a major role in standardizing the French language of literature and of polite society. A courtier, he was a habitue of the salon of the Marquise de Rambouillet, ...
Vaughan Williams, Ralph: English composer of the first half of the 20th century, founder of the nationalist movement in English music.
Vaughan, Henry: Anglo-Welsh poet and mystic remarkable for the range and intensity of his spiritual intuitions.
Vaughan, Sarah: American jazz vocalist and pianist known for her rich voice, with an unusually wide range, and for the inventiveness and virtuosity of her improvisations.
vault: in building construction, a structural member consisting of an arrangement of arches, usually forming a ceiling or roof.
vaulting: gymnastics exercise in which the athlete leaps over a form that was originally intended to mimic a horse. At one time the pommel horse (side horse) was used in the vaulting exercise, with the pommels (handles) removed. Later a cylindrical ...
Vaupes: departamento, southeastern Colombia. It is bounded by Guainia departamento (north), Brazil (east), the Apoporis River (south), and Guaviare departamento (west). Vaupes was administratively created in 1963, and its area was reduced in 1977 when Guaviare was established. It occupies an ...
Vauquelin, Nicolas-Louis: French chemist who discovered the elements chromium (1797) and beryllium (1798).
Vauvenargues, Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de: French moralist and essayist whose belief in the individual's capacity for goodness played a part in the shift of opinion away from the pessimistic view of human nature elaborated by such 17th-century thinkers as Blaise Pascal and the Duke de ...
Vaux, Thomas Vaux, 2nd Baron: one of the early English Tudor poets associated with Sir Thomas Wyat and the Earl of Surrey.
Vaux-le-Vicomte: chateau near Melun, France, designed in 1656 by Louis Le Vau for Nicolas Fouquet, who was finance minister to King Louis XIV. The chateau, finished in 1661, is considered to be one of the masterpieces of French Baroque residential architecture. ...
Vauxhall: neighbourhood in the borough of Lambeth in London, England. It lies on the south bank of the River Thames near Vauxhall Bridge. Public gardens were laid out there about 1661 and were a favourite resort of the metropolis from the ...
Vava'u Group: northernmost major island cluster of Tonga, in the South Pacific. With a total land area of 46 square miles (119 square km), the group comprises two chains, one coral and the other volcanic. To the east lie uplifted coral islands, ...
Vavilov, Nikolay Ivanovich: Soviet plant geneticist whose research into the origins of cultivated plants incurred the animosity of T.D. Lysenko, official spokesman for Soviet biology in his time.
Vaxjo: city and capital of the administrative lan (county) of Kronoberg, southern Sweden, on Vaxjosjon (lake). The city was a medieval trading centre; it was burned several times by the Danes, and most of the present buildings were built after 1843. ...