Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Ptolemy IV (Ptolemy Philopator) fĭlŏpˈətər [key], king of ancient Egypt (221–205 b.c.), of the Macedonian dynasty, son of Ptolemy III and Berenice of Cyrene. He had his mother, his brother, his...

(Encyclopedia) Haakon IV (Haakon Haakonsson), 1204–63, king of Norway (1217–63), illegitimate son of Haakon III and grandson of Sverre. Secretly reared by the Birkebeiner faction (see Sverre), he was chosen king...

(Encyclopedia) Murad IV, 1612?–1640, Ottoman sultan (1623–40), nephew and successor of Mustafa I. He recovered (1638) Baghdad, which Shah Abbas I of Persia had seized. On his victory he sent an order to murder h...

(Encyclopedia) William of Newburgh, 1136?–1198?, English chronicler, monk of Newburgh, Yorkshire. He wrote the Historia rerum Anglicarum, a history of England from 1066 to 1198. Its chief value lies in the comment...

(Encyclopedia) Frederick III, 1415–93, Holy Roman emperor (1452–93) and German king (1440–93). With his brother Albert VI he inherited the duchies of Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola. He became head of the hous...

(Encyclopedia) William the Lion, 1143–1214, king of Scotland (1165–1214), brother and successor of Malcolm IV. Determined to recover Northumbria (lost to England in 1157), he supported the rebellion (1173–74) ...

(Encyclopedia) Romanus IV (Romanus Diogenes) dīŏjˈənēz [key], d. 1072, Byzantine emperor (1068–71). A Cappadocian general, he succeeded Constantine X by marrying his widow, Eudocia Macrembolitissa. After some...

(Encyclopedia) Stock, Frederick (Friedrich Wilhelm August Stock) stŏk [key], 1872–1942, German-American conductor and composer. He came to the United States in 1895 as a violist in the Chicago Orchestra and becam...

(Encyclopedia) Pius IV, 1499–1565, pope (1559–65), a Milanese named Giovanni Angelo de' Medici; successor of Paul IV. He was probably not related to the great Medici family. His career in Rome began in 1527, and...

(Encyclopedia) Charles William Ferdinand, 1735–1806, duke of Brunswick (1780–1806), Prussian field marshal. He had great success in the Seven Years War (1756–63) and was commander in chief (1792–94) of the A...