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Bernard of Clairvaux, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Bernard of Clairvaux, Saint klrvōˈ [key], 1090?–1153, French churchman, mystic, Doctor of the Church. Born of noble family, in 1112 he entered the Cistercian abbey of Cîteaux, taking along 4 or 5...

Tweed, William Marcy

(Encyclopedia)Tweed, William Marcy, 1823–78, American politician and Tammany leader, b. New York City. A bookkeeper, he became (1848) a volunteer fireman and as a result acquired influence in his ward. He was an ...

Nabokov, Vladimir

(Encyclopedia)Nabokov, Vladimir vlädēˈmĭr näbôˈkŏf [key], 1899–1977, Russian-American author, b. St. Petersburg, Russia. He emigrated to England after the Russian Revolution of 1917 and graduated from Cam...

Shevchenko, Taras Hryhorovych

(Encyclopedia)Shevchenko, Taras, 1814–1861, Ukrainian poet, writer, and artist, b. Ukraine, studied at the St. Petersburg Academy of Art. The premier Ukrainian poet...

African National Congress

(Encyclopedia)African National Congress (ANC), the oldest black (now multiracial) political organization in South Africa; founded in 1912. Prominent in its opposition to apartheid, the organization began as a nonvi...

Wilde, Oscar

(Encyclopedia)Wilde, Oscar (Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde), 1854–1900, Irish author and wit, b. Dublin. He is most famous for his sophisticated, brilliantly witty plays, which were the first since the come...

Zuma, Jacob Gedleyihlekisa

(Encyclopedia)Zuma, Jacob Gedleyihlekisa, 1942–, South African political leader, b. Indkandla, Natal (now KwaZulu-Natal) prov. Zuma received no formal schooling and joined the African National Congress (ANC) when...

Moravia

(Encyclopedia)Moravia mərāˈvēə, mō– [key], Czech Morava, Ger. Mähren, region in the E Czech Republic. The region is bordered on the W by Bohemia, on the E by the Little and White Carpathian Mts., which div...

Slavic languages

(Encyclopedia)Slavic languages, also called Slavonic languages, a subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. Because the Slavic group of languages seems to be closer to the Baltic group than to any other, ...

Home Rule

(Encyclopedia)Home Rule, in Irish and English history, political slogan adopted by Irish nationalists in the 19th cent. to describe their objective of self-government for Ireland. Escalating violence between Prot...

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