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Renault, Mary

(Encyclopedia)Renault, Mary, pseud. of Mary Challens, 1905–83, English novelist, b. London. After receiving her nursing degree in 1936, she emigrated to South Africa. She was best-known for her historical novels ...

Periander

(Encyclopedia)Periander pĕrˈēănˌdər [key], d. 585 b.c., one of the Seven Wise Men of Greece, tyrant of Corinth. His rule raised his city to a high state of prosperity, and he established friendly relations wi...

Praxiteles

(Encyclopedia)Praxiteles prăksĭtˈəlēz [key], fl. c.370–c.330 b.c., famous Attic sculptor, probably the son of Cephisodotus. His Hermes with the Infant Dionysus, found in the Heraeum, Olympia, in 1877, is the...

Leonov, Aleksei Arkhipovich

(Encyclopedia)Leonov, Aleksei Arkhipovich ŭlˌyĭksyāˈ ärkhˌyĭpôˈvyĭch [key], 1934–2019, Soviet-Russian cosmonaut and military officer. While serving as copilot of Voskhod 2 (Mar. 18–19, 1964), he beca...

glee

(Encyclopedia)glee, in music, an unaccompanied song for three or more solo voices in harmony. The word glee [Anglo-Saxon, gligge or gliw=music] has been associated with vocal music from the time of the medieval gle...

Eretria

(Encyclopedia)Eretria ĕrēˈtrēə [key], ancient city of Greece, in Euboea (now Évvoia), SE of Chalcis (now Khalkís), its rival. In the 7th and 6th cent. b.c., Eretria sent out many colonists to islands and coa...

Anzio

(Encyclopedia)Anzio änˈtsyō [key], Lat. Antium, town, in Latium, central Italy, on the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is a seaside resort with a fishing industry. A Volscian town, it was capture...

Aeacus

(Encyclopedia)Aeacus ēˈəkəs [key], in Greek mythology, son of Zeus and the nymph Aegina. He was the father of Peleus and Telamon. After a plague had nearly wiped out the inhabitants of his land, Zeus rewarded t...

Homeric Hymns

(Encyclopedia)Homeric Hymns hōmĕrˈĭk [key], name applied to a body of 34 hexameter poems falsely attributed to Homer by the ancients. Composed probably between 800 and 300 b.c., they are complimentary verses ad...

Ictinus

(Encyclopedia)Ictinus ĭktīˈnəs [key], fl. 2d half of 5th cent. b.c., one of the greatest architects of Greece. His celebrated work is the Parthenon (447–432 b.c.) upon the acropolis at Athens, which he built ...