Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Burbank, Luther bûrˈbănk [key], 1849–1926, American plant breeder, b. Lancaster, Mass. He experimented with thousands of plant varieties and developed many new ones, including new varieties of pr...

(Encyclopedia) Amadeus VIII ămədēˈəs [key], 1383–1451, count (1391–1416) and duke (from 1416) of Savoy, antipope (1439–49) with the name Felix V. In 1434 he appointed his son regent of Savoy and retired t...

(Encyclopedia) Davidson, Donald Herbert, 1917–2003, American philosopher, b. Springfield, Mass., grad. Harvard (B.A., 1939; Ph.D., 1949). A student of W. V. Quine, Davidson emerged as one of the major figures in p...

(Encyclopedia) Kandinsky, Wassily or Vasily kăndĭnˈskē, Rus. vəsēˈlyē kəndyēnˈskē [key], 1866–1944, Russian abstract painter and theorist. Usually regarded as the originator of abstract art, Kandinsky ...

(Encyclopedia) Hindi hĭnˈdē [key], language belonging to the Indic group of the Indo-Iranian subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. The official language of India, Hindi is the written or literary va...

(Encyclopedia) Norse, another name for the North Germanic, or Scandinavian, group of the Germanic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages (see Germanic languages). The modern Norse languages—Danish, Fae...

(Encyclopedia) Martineau, Harriet märˈtĭnō [key], 1802–76, English author. A journalist rather than a writer of literature, she was an enormously popular author. Her success is the more remarkable since she wa...

(Encyclopedia) Marvell, Andrew märˈvəl [key], 1621–78, one of the English metaphysical poets. Educated at Cambridge, he worked as a clerk, traveled abroad, and returned to serve as tutor to Lord Fairfax's daugh...

(Encyclopedia) Maury, Matthew Fontaine fŏntānˈ môrˈē [key], 1806–73, American hydrographer and naval officer, b. near Fredericksburg, Va. Appointed a midshipman in 1825, he saw varied sea duty until a stagec...

(Encyclopedia) Mayakovsky, Vladimir Vladimirovich vlədyēˈmĭr vlədyēˈmĭrəvĭch mīˌəkôfˈskē [key], 1893–1930, Russian poet and dramatist. Mayakovsky was a leader of the futurist school in 1912, and he...