Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Royal Society, oldest scientific organization in Great Britain and one of the oldest in Europe. It was founded in 1660 by a group of learned men in London who met to promote scientific discussion, par...

(Encyclopedia) Harmony Society, religious society founded by German Separatists under the leadership of George Rapp. The Harmonists (or Rappites) held property in common and subscribed to the austere doctrines of th...

(Encyclopedia) Cincinnati, Society of the [Lat. pl. of Cincinnatus], organization formed (1783) by officers of the Continental Army just before their disbanding after the American Revolution. The organization, with ...

(Encyclopedia) Society Islands, island group (2002 pop. 214,445), South Pacific, a part of French Polynesia. The group comprises the Windward Islands and the Leeward Islands (total land area c.650 sq mi/1,680 sq km)...

(Encyclopedia) Fabian Society, British socialist society. An outgrowth of the Fellowship of the New Life (founded 1883 under the influence of Thomas Davidson), the society was developed the following year by Frank P...

(Encyclopedia) Triad Society, name given to a number of Chinese antidynastic secret societies by 19th-century Western observers. Most of these groups claimed descent from the Heaven and Earth Society (Taendi hui) or...

(Encyclopedia) Amana Church Society əmănˈə [key], corporate name of a group of seven small villages in E central Iowa, clustered around the Iowa River NW of Iowa City; settled 1855 by members of the Ebenezer Soc...

(Encyclopedia) Dunbar, William, 1749–1810, American scientist in the old Southwest, b. near Elgin, Scotland. He came to America in 1771. Commissioned by President Jefferson to investigate the Ouachita and Red Rive...

(Encyclopedia) Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), a Colonial patriotic society in the United States, open to women having one or more ancestors who aided the cause of the Revolution. The society was organiz...

(Encyclopedia) Greek-letter society: see fraternity. ...