Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Wolf, Markus Johannes

(Encyclopedia)Wolf, Markus Johannes vôlf [key], 1923–2006, East German spymaster. A legendary cold-war espionage chief, he was called “the man without a face” because until 1978 there was no known photograp...

Radek, Karl

(Encyclopedia)Radek, Karl kärl räˈdyĭk [key], 1885–1939?, international Communist leader and journalist, b. Lviv (then in Austrian Poland); his original name was Sobelsohn. Radek participated in the 1905 revo...

Zumthor, Peter

(Encyclopedia)Zumthor, Peter, 1943–, Swiss architect. He apprenticed with his cabinetmaker father as a teenager, and wood is a recurring material in his work, e.g., his small, shingled St. Benedict Chapel, Sumvit...

Savigny, Friedrich Karl von

(Encyclopedia)Savigny, Friedrich Karl von frēˈdrĭkh kärl fən säˈvĭnyē [key], 1779–1861, German jurist and legal historian, a founder of the historical school of jurisprudence. He taught (1810–42) Roman...

Sibelius, Jean Julius Christian

(Encyclopedia)Sibelius, Jean Julius Christian zhän yo͞oˈlyo͝os krĭsˈtyän sĭbāˈlyo͝os [key], 1865–1957, Finnish composer. Sibelius was a highly personal, romantic composer, yet at the same time he repre...

Disraeli, Benjamin, 1st earl of Beaconsfield

(Encyclopedia)Disraeli, Benjamin, 1st earl of Beaconsfield dĭzrāˈlē [key], 1804–81, British statesman and author. He is regarded as the founder of the modern Conservative party. Disraeli succeeded the earl ...

Eastern Question

(Encyclopedia)Eastern Question, term designating the problem of European territory controlled by the decaying Ottoman Empire in the 18th, 19th, and early 20th cent. The Turkish threat to Europe was checked by the H...

Cowell, Henry Dixon

(Encyclopedia)Cowell, Henry Dixon kouˈəl [key], 1897–1965, American composer and pianist, b. Menlo Park, Calif., largely self-educated, studied musicology in Berlin (1931–32). Cowell experimented with new mus...

Hart, Moss

(Encyclopedia)Hart, Moss, 1904–61, American dramatist, b. New York City, studied at Columbia. His first important play, Once in a Lifetime (1930), marked the beginning of a long collaboration with George S. Kaufm...

Mayr, Ernst

(Encyclopedia)Mayr, Ernst ĕrnst mīr [key], 1904–2005, American zoologist and author, b. Kempten, Germany. He began his career in Berlin and emigrated to the United States in 1931, where, until 1953, he was asso...