Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) census, periodic official count of the number of persons and their condition and of the resources of a country. In ancient times, among the Jews and Romans, such enumeration was mainly for taxation an...

(Encyclopedia) Peter of Dreux: see Peter I, duke or count of Brittany. ...

(Encyclopedia) Armagnac ärmänyäkˈ [key], region and former county, SW France, in Gascony, roughly coextensive with Gers dept. Auch is the chief town. Armagnac is famous for the brandy bearing the same name. The ...

(Encyclopedia) Artevelde, Jacob van yäˈkôp vän ärˈtəvĕldə [key], c.1290–1345, Flemish statesman, of a wealthy family of Ghent. In 1337 the Flemish cloth industry underwent a severe crisis. The pro-French ...

(Encyclopedia) Alfonso VI, 1643–83, king of Portugal (1656–83), son and successor of John IV. Slightly paralyzed and mentally defective, he led a dissolute youth until he came under the influence of the count of...

(Encyclopedia) John II, 1397–1479, king of Aragón and Sicily (1458–79), king of Navarre (1425–79), count of Barcelona. He succeeded his brother, Alfonso V, in Aragón, Catalonia, and Sicily and became king of...

(Encyclopedia) Reed, Thomas Brackett, 1839–1902, American legislator, b. Portland, Maine. A lawyer, he served in the state assembly (1868–69) and state senate (1870) and became (1870–73) state attorney general...

(Encyclopedia) Hainaut ĕnōˈ [key], Du. Henegouwen, province, 1,437 sq mi (3,722 sq km), S Belgium, border...

(Encyclopedia) Apraksin, Feodor Matveyevich fyôˈdər mətvyāˈəvĭch əpräkˈsyĭn [key], 1671–1728, Russian admiral. He helped Peter I (Peter the Great) create the Russian navy and won several naval battles ...

(Encyclopedia) Schaumburg-Lippe shoumˈbo͝orkh-lĭpˈə [key], former state, N Germany, E of the Weser River. In 1946 it was placed in Lower Saxony. Bückeburg was the capital. It was situated in a fertile agricult...