Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Delhi

(Encyclopedia)Delhi dĕlˈē [key], union territory and city, N central India. The union territory, officia...

Punjab

(Encyclopedia)Punjab pŭnˌjäbˈ [key] [Pers.,=five rivers], historic region in the NW of the Indian subcontinent. Since 1947 it has been separated into an Indian state and a Pakistani province bearing the same na...

Jutland, battle of

(Encyclopedia)Jutland, battle of, only major engagement between the British and German fleets in World War I. They met c.60 mi (100 km) west of the coast of Jutland. On May 31, 1916, a British squadron under Admira...

Cyrus the Great

(Encyclopedia)Cyrus the Great sīˈrəs [key], d. 529 b.c., king of Persia, founder of the greatness of the Achaemenids and of the Persian Empire. According to Herodotus, he was the son of an Iranian noble, the eld...

Biddle, Nicholas, American naval officer

(Encyclopedia)Biddle, Nicholas, 1750–78, American naval officer, b. Philadelphia. Biddle left the British navy in 1773. In the American Revolution he became captain in the patriot navy and daringly raided British...

habeas corpus

(Encyclopedia)habeas corpus hāˈbēəs kôrˈpəs [key] [Lat.,=you should have the body], writ directed by a judge to some person who is detaining another, commanding him to bring the body of the person in his cus...

Madhya Pradesh

(Encyclopedia)Madhya Pradesh mädˈyə präˈdĭsh [key], state (2001 provisional pop. 60,385,118), 119,010 sq mi (308,240 sq km), central India, between the Deccan and the Ganges plain. The capital is Bhopal. One ...

Melaka

(Encyclopedia)Melaka or Malacca both: məlăkˈə [key], state (1991 pop. 504,502), 640 sq mi (1,658 sq km), Malaysia, S Malay Peninsula, on the Strait of Malacca. Formerly one of the Straits Settlements, it was co...

Berlin, Congress of

(Encyclopedia)Berlin, Congress of, 1878, called by the signers of the Treaty of Paris of 1856 (see Paris, Congress of) to reconsider the terms of the Treaty of San Stefano, which Russia had forced on the Ottoman Em...

Spark, Dame Muriel

(Encyclopedia)Spark, Dame Muriel, 1918–2006, Scottish novelist, b. Muriel Sarah Camberg. She lived in Edinburgh, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), London, New York, and Rome, and spent her last years in Tuscany. Spark's t...

Browse by Subject