Encyclopædia Britannica Australia -

Encyclopedias since 1768

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yeshiva ... Yokuts

yeshiva: any of numerous Jewish academies of Talmudic learning, whose biblical and legal exegesis and application of Scripture have defined and regulated Jewish religious life for centuries. The early history of the yeshiva as an institution is known only through indirect ...
Yeshiva University: private, coeducational institution of higher learning in New York, New York, U.S. It is a comprehensive research university comprising six undergraduate schools and seven graduate or professional schools at the Main Campus in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, the ...
Yessentuki: city, Stavropol kray (region), southwestern Russia, in the valley of the Podkumok River. It was founded in 1798, developed as a fortress in the 1830s, and became a city in 1917. It is located at mineral springs at the base ...
Yesuj: town, southwestern Iran. The town has a sugar mill and other local industry producing bricks and mosaic tiles, livestock feed, mats and baskets, and carpets and rugs. Roads link it with Dogonbaden, Dehdasht, Shiraj, Nurabad, and Bandar-e Bushehr. There is ...
Yevpatoriya: city, Crimea, southern Ukraine, on the Kalamit Bay on the west coast of the Crimean Peninsula. Founded in the 6th century BC as a Greek colony and later renamed for Mithradates VI Eupator, sixth king of Pontus, the city has ...
Yevreyskaya: autonomous oblast (province) in Khabarovsk kray (region), far eastern Russia, occupying an area of 13,900 sq mi (36,000 sq km) in the basin of the middle Amur River. Most of the oblast consists of level plain, with extensive ...
Yevtushenko, Yevgeny: poet and spokesman for the younger post-Stalin generation of Russian poets, whose internationally publicized demands for greater artistic freedom and for a literature based on aesthetic rather than political standards signalled an easing of Soviet control over artists in the ...
yew: any tree or shrub of the genus Taxus (family Taxaceae), approximately eight species of ornamental evergreens, distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Other trees called yew but not in this genus are the plum-yew (q.v.), Prince Albert yew (see Podocarpaceae), and ...
Yeysk: city, Krasnodar kray (region), southwestern Russia. It was founded as a port in 1848 on the southern side of Taganrog Gulf of the Sea of Azov. Fishing and associated industries (fish canning) are important; other industries include agricultural processing. The ...
Yezhov, Nikolay Ivanovich: Russian Communist Party official who, while chief of the Soviet security police (NKVD) from 1936 to 1938, administered the most severe stage of the great purges, known as Yezhovshchina (or Ezhovshchina).
Yggdrasill: in Norse mythology, the world tree, a giant ash supporting the universe. One of its roots extended into Niflheim, the underworld; another into Jotunheim, land of the giants; and the third into Asgard, home of the gods. At its base ...
YHWH: in Hebrew, the name of God as revealed to Moses. Because of its four letters, it is also known as the Tetragrammaton. See Yahweh.
Yi: ethnic group of Austroasiatic origin living largely in the mountains of southwest China and speaking a Tibeto-Burman language; the term is used by the Chinese to designate what they formerly called the Lolo or Wu-man. The Yi people numbered about ...
Yi Chong: also called T'anum (Korean: "Ocean Hermit") painter who was one of the most popular 16th-century Korean artists.
Yi Dynasty: the last and longest-lived imperial dynasty (1392-1910) of Korea. Founded by General Yi Song-gye, who established the capital at Hanyang (present-day Seoul), the kingdom was named Choson after the state of the same name that had dominated the Korean peninsula ...
Yi In-mun: also called Yu-ch'un (Korean: "Exist Spring") famous Korean landscape painter.
Yi Sang-cha: noted Korean painter famous for the freshness and originality of his style.
Yi Sun-shin: Korean admiral and national hero whose naval victories were instrumental in repelling Japanese invasions of Korea in the 1590s.
yi-dam: in Tibetan Buddhism, a tutelary, or guardian, deity with whom a lama (monk) has a special, secret relationship. The lama first prepares himself by meditation, then selects from among the guardian deities the one that reveals itself as offering the ...
Yiddish language: the language of Ashkenazic Jewry (central and eastern European Jews and their descendants). Written in the Hebrew alphabet, Yiddish became one of the world's most widespread languages, appearing in most countries with a Jewish population by the 19th century. Along ...
Yiddish literature: the body of written works produced in the Yiddish language of Ashkenazic Jewry (central and eastern European Jews and their descendants).
yield point: in mechanical engineering, load at which a solid material that is being stretched begins to flow, or change shape permanently, divided by its original cross-sectional area; or the amount of stress in a solid at the onset of permanent deformation. ...
Yijing: an ancient Chinese text, one of the Five Classics (Wujing) of Confucianism. The main body of the work, traditionally attributed to Wenwang (flourished 12th century BC), contains a discussion of the divinatory system used by the Zhou dynasty wizards. A ...
Yima: in ancient Iranian religion, the first man, the progenitor of the human race, and son of the sun. Yima is the subject of conflicting legends obscurely reflecting different religious currents.
Yin Mountains: range in the Inner Mongolian autonomous ch'u (region), China, comprising the Ta-ch'ing, Wu-la, Hara-narin, Sheyten, and Lang mountains. The Yin Mountains mostly rise to heights of about 6,500 feet (2,000 m). The highest peaks in the southwestern Ta-ch'ing Mountains reach ...
Yin-ch'uan: capital of Hui Autonomous Region of Ningsia, north-central China. The city is located near the western bank of the upper course of the Huang Ho, near the western end of the Great Wall of China in the south-central section of ...
yin-yang: in Eastern thought, the two complementary forces, or principles, that make up all aspects and phenomena of life. Yin is conceived of as earth, female, dark, passive, and absorbing; it is present in even numbers, in valleys and streams, and ...
Ying-k'ou: city and port in Liaoning sheng (province), China. Ying-k'ou is situated near the mouth of the Hun River, some 11 miles (18 km) from the mouth of the Liao River. Ying-k'ou began to develop as a river port in ...
yingqing ware: type of refined, thinly potted Chinese porcelain produced at Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province, and in Hebei province. It was created primarily during the Song dynasty (960-1279), although it is likely that production began in the Tang dynasty (618-907) and continued into ...
Yithion: small port of Laconia, southern Peloponnese, Greece. It lies at the northwestern extremity of the Lakonikos Gulf at the mouth of the Gythius River. The town is connected by a causeway to Marathonisi Island, on which, according to the 2nd-century-AD ...
yizkor: (Hebrew: "may he [i.e., God] remember"), the opening word of memorial prayers recited for the dead by Ashkenazic (German-rite) Jews during synagogue services on Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), on the eighth day of Passover (Pesah), on Shemini Atzeret (the ...
ylang-ylang: (Cananga odorata), South Asian tree of the custard apple family (Annonaceae), in the order Magnoliales. A penetrating but evanescent perfume is distilled from its flowers.
Yobe: state, northeastern Nigeria. It borders the Republic of Niger to the north and the Nigerian states of Borno to the east, Bauchi to the southwest, and Jigawa to the northwest. Yobe state was created in 1991 from the western half ...
Yoccoz, Jean-Christophe: French mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1994 for his work in dynamical systems.
yodel: type of singing in which high falsetto and low chest notes are rapidly alternated; its production is helped by the enunciation of open and closed vowels on the low and high notes of wide intervals. Yodeling is also used as ...
Yodo River: river, central western Honshu, Japan. The Yodo is the sole outlet of Lake Biwa, the country's largest freshwater lake, from which it issues in a southwesterly direction to Osaka Bay, connecting the Kyoto Basin with the Osaka Plain. It was ...
Yoga: (Sanskrit: "Yoking," or "Union"), one of the six orthodox systems (darshans) of Indian philosophy. Its influence has been widespread among many other schools of Indian thought. Its basic text is the Yoga-sutras by Patanjali (c. 2nd century BC?).
Yogacara: ("Doctrine of Consciousness"), an important idealistic school of Mahayana Buddhism. Yogacara attacked both the complete realism of Theravada Buddhism and the provisional practical realism of the Madhyamika school of Mahayana Buddhism. The name of the school is derived from the ...
yogurt: semifluid fermented milk food having a smooth texture and mildly sour flavour because of its lactic acid content. Yogurt may be made from the milk of cows, sheep, goats, or water buffalo. Cow's milk is used in the United States ...
Yogyakarta: kotamadya (municipality) and capital, Yogyakarta daerah istimewa (special district), Java, Indonesia. It lies 18 miles (29 km) inland from the southern Java coast and near Mount Merapi (9,551 feet [2,911 m]).
Yogyakarta: daerah istimewa (special district), south-central Java, Indonesia. It is bounded on the west, north, and east by Jawa Tengah provinsi ("province") and fronts the Indian Ocean on the south. The district includes the city of Yogyakarta.
Yohannes IV: emperor of Ethiopia (1872-89). Like his predecessor, Tewodros II (reigned 1855-68), Yohannes IV was a strong, progressive ruler, but he spent most of his time repelling military threats from Egypt, Italy, and the Mahdists of the Sudan.
Yoho National Park: national park in southeastern British Columbia, Canada. The park occupies 507 square miles (1,313 square km) of the western and central slopes of the Rocky Mountains and is adjacent to two other national parks-Banff to the east and Kootenay to ...
Yojoa, Lake: lake in northwestern Honduras. The nation's largest inland lake, Yojoa has an area of 110 square miles (285 square km). It is volcanic in origin and nestles at an elevation of 2,133 feet (650 m) amid forested mountains. The region ...
yoke: wooden bar or frame used to join draft animals at the heads or necks so that they pull together. In the early Middle East and in Greece and Rome, oxen and onagers were yoked across the horns or necks. Control ...
Yokkaichi: city, Mie ken (prefecture), Honshu, Japan. It lies facing Ise Bay, southwest of Nagoya. The city developed around a castle built in 1470. By the Tokugawa period (1603-1867), it had become an important trade centre, with markets open on the ...
Yokohama: city and port, capital of Kanagawa ken (prefecture), Japan, and part of the Tokyo-Yokohama metropolitan area, which is the largest urban agglomeration in Japan.
Yokomitsu Riichi: Japanese writer who, with Kawabata Yasunari, was one of the mainstays of the New Sensationalist school (Shinkankaku-ha) of Japanese writers, influenced by the avant-garde trends in European literature of the 1920s.
Yokosuka: seaport, Kanagawa ken (prefecture), Honshu, Japan. It lies on the western shore of Tokyo Bay, about 15 miles (24 km) south of Yokohama. Its site on the Miura Peninsula was occupied by a small fishing village until a shipyard was ...
Yokoyama Taikan: Japanese painter who, with his friend Hishida Shunso, contributed to the revitalization of traditional Japanese painting in the modern era.
Yokuts: California Indians speaking a language of Penutian stock who historically inhabited the San Joaquin Valley and the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada south of the Fresno River. The Yokuts were divided into tribes, perhaps as many as 50, each ...