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seismology

(Encyclopedia)seismology sīzmŏlˈəjē, sīs– [key], scientific study of earthquakes and related phenomena, including the propagation of waves and shocks on or within the earth by natural or artificially genera...

type

(Encyclopedia)type, for printing, was invented in China (c.1040), using woodblocks. Related devices, such as seals and stamps for making impressions in clay, had been used in ancient times in Babylon and elsewhere....

Walpole, Robert, 1st earl of Orford

(Encyclopedia)Walpole, Robert, 1st earl of Orford, 1676–1745, English statesman. Walpole is usually described as the first prime minister of Great Britain, but he was not a prime minister in the modern sense. A...

Marx, Karl

(Encyclopedia)Marx, Karl, 1818–83, German social philosopher, the chief theorist of modern socialism and communism. In 1847 Marx joined the Communist League and with Engels wrote for it the famous Communist M...

fur trade

(Encyclopedia)fur trade, in American history. Trade in animal skins and pelts had gone on since antiquity, but reached its height in the wilderness of North America from the 17th to the early 19th cent. The demand ...

Bolívar, Simón

(Encyclopedia)Bolívar, Simón sēmōnˈ bōlēˈvär [key], 1783–1830, South American revolutionary who led independence wars in the present nations of Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. ...

Canadian literature, French

(Encyclopedia)Canadian literature, French, the body of literature of the French-speaking population of Canada. Except for the narratives of French explorers (such as Samuel de Champlain and Pierre Esprit Radisson) ...

Wordsworth, William

(Encyclopedia)Wordsworth, William, 1770–1850, English poet, b. Cockermouth, Cumberland. One of the great English poets, he was a leader of the romantic movement in England. Wordsworth's personality and poetry ...

Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr Isayevich

(Encyclopedia)Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr Isayevich əlyĭksänˈdər ēsīˈəvĭch sôlˌzhənētˈsĭn [key], 1918–2008, Russian writer widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential authors of the 20...

investiture

(Encyclopedia)investiture, in feudalism, ceremony by which an overlord transferred a fief to a vassal or by which, in ecclesiastical law, an elected cleric received the pastoral ring and staff (the symbols of spiri...
 

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