Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) eccentric, in mechanics, device for changing rotary to back-and-forth motion. A disk is mounted off center on a shaft. One flat, open, circular end of a rod fits around the edge of the disk; the other...

(Encyclopedia) Manley, Norman Washington, 1893–1969, prime minister of Jamaica (1959–62); father of Michael Manley. Of Irish and African descent, he was educated at Oxford and became an internationally known law...

(Encyclopedia) Labrador retriever, breed of large sporting dog whose origins are obscure but whose immediate ancestors were developed in Newfoundland and brought to England in the early 1800s. It stands about 23 in....

(Encyclopedia) MacIntyre, Alasdair C. ălˈəstər măkˈĭntīrˌ [key], 1929–, American philosopher. He teaches at the Univ. of Notre Dame in Indiana. His major contributions have come in ethics. In his highly i...

(Encyclopedia) Abbott and Costello kŏstĕlˈō [key], American comedy team of William Alexander “Bud” Abbott, 1895–1974, b. Asbury Park, N.J., and Lou Costello, 1906–59, b. Pate...

(Encyclopedia) Socialist Revolutionary party, in Russian history, an agrarian party founded by various Populist groups in 1901. Its program, adopted in 1906, called for the overthrow of the autocracy, the establishm...

(Encyclopedia) Ten Commandments or Decalogue [Gr.,=ten words], in the Bible, the summary of divine law given by God to Moses on Mt. Sinai. They have a paramount place in the ethical systems of Judaism, Christianity,...

(Encyclopedia) Tozzi, Federigo fādārēˈgō tôtˈtsē [key], 1883–1920, Italian novelist. He was a follower of Verga and D'Annunzio but, unlike D'Annunzio, became concerned with moral problems. His novels, bitt...

(Encyclopedia) Salmerón y Alonso, Nicolás nēkōläsˈ sälmārōnˈ ē älōnˈsō [key], 1838–1908, Spanish statesman and philosopher. A professor at Oviedo and Madrid universities and a convinced republican, ...

(Encyclopedia) epigram, a short, polished, pithy saying, usually in verse, often with a satiric or paradoxical twist at the end. The term was originally applied by the Greeks to the inscriptions on stones. The epigr...