Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Levelers or Levellers, English Puritan sect active at the time of the English civil war. The name was apparently applied to them in 1647, in derision of their beliefs in equality. The leader of the mo...

(Encyclopedia) Haydn, Franz Joseph fränts yōˈzĕf hīˈdən [key], 1732–1809, Austrian composer, one of the greatest masters of classical music. As a boy he sang in the choir at St. Stephen's, Vienna, where he ...

(Encyclopedia) K'ang Yu-wei käng yo͞o-wā [key], 1858–1927, Chinese philosopher and reform movement leader. He was a leading philosopher of the new text school of Confucianism, which regarded Confucius as a utop...

(Encyclopedia) weather balloon, balloon used in the measurement and evaluation of mostly upper atmospheric conditions (see atmosphere). Information may be gathered during the vertical ascent of the balloon through t...

(Encyclopedia) electrocardiography ĭlĕkˌtrōkärdēŏgˈrəfē [key], science of recording and interpreting the electrical activity that precedes and is a measure of the action of heart muscles. Since 1887, when ...

(Encyclopedia) free trade, in modern usage, trade or commerce carried on without such restrictions as import duties, export bounties, domestic production subsidies, trade quotas, or import licenses. The basic argume...

(Encyclopedia) progressivism, in U.S. history, a broadly based reform movement that reached its height early in the 20th cent. In the decades following the Civil War rapid industrialization transformed the United St...

(Encyclopedia) Arndt, Ernst Moritz ĕrnst mōˈrĭts ärnt [key], 1769–1860, German poet and historian. An ardent nationalist and opponent of Napoleon I, he was forced to flee to Sweden and Russia because of his p...

(Encyclopedia) LeWitt, Sol ləwĭtˈ [key], 1928–2007, American artist, b. Hartford, Conn. LeWitt, who came into prominence in the 1960s, termed his work conceptual art, emphasizing that the idea or concept that a...