Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) shooting, firing with rifle, shotgun, pistol, or revolver at stationary or moving targets. The term shooting is also used in Great Britain to mean small-game hunting. In the 19th cent. the sport of ri...

(Encyclopedia) Poland, partitions of. The basic causes leading to the three successive partitions (1772, 1793, 1795) that eliminated Poland from the map were the decay and the internal disunity of Poland and the eme...

(Encyclopedia) Burns, Robert, 1759–96, Scottish poet. Burns's art is at its best in songs such as “Flow Gently, Sweet Afton,” “My Heart's in the Highlands,” and “John Anderson My Jo.” Two collections...

(Encyclopedia) oratorio ôrətôrˈēō [key], musical composition employing chorus, orchestra, and soloists and usually, but not necessarily, a setting of a sacred libretto without stage action or scenery. The imme...

(Encyclopedia) SETI sĕtˈē [key] [Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence], name given to a series of independent programs to detect radio signals from civilizations beyond the solar system. Modern SETI efforts c...

(Encyclopedia) Edward II, 1284–1327, king of England (1307–27), son of Edward I and Eleanor of Castile, called Edward of Carnarvon for his birthplace in Wales. When trouble threatened with the new king of Fran...

(Encyclopedia) Great Awakening, series of religious revivals that swept over the American colonies about the middle of the 18th cent. It resulted in doctrinal changes and influenced social and political thought. In ...

(Encyclopedia) Bellini jōvänˈnē [key], c.1430–1516, who was first active in Padua where he worked with his father and brother. Also influenced by Mantegna, who became his brother-in-law in 1454, Giovanni paint...

(Encyclopedia) Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von yōˈhän vôlfˈgäng fən göˈtə [key], 1749–1832, German poet, dramatist, novelist, and scientist, b. Frankfurt. One of the great masters of world literature, his ge...

(Encyclopedia) lithography lĭthŏgˈrəfē [key], type of planographic or surface printing. It is distinguished from letterpress (relief) printing and from intaglio printing (in which the design is cut or etched in...