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Charles IV, king of Spain

(Encyclopedia)Charles IV, 1748–1819, king of Spain (1788–1808), second son of Charles III, whom he succeeded in place of his imbecile older brother. Unlike his father, Charles IV was an ineffective ruler and in...

Prado, Museo Nacional del

(Encyclopedia)Prado, Museo Nacional del präˈdō, Span. präˈᵺō [key], Spanish national museum of painting and sculpture, in Madrid, one of the finest in Europe. Situated on the Paseo del Prado, it was begun b...

Prescott, William Hickling

(Encyclopedia)Prescott, William Hickling, 1796–1859, American historian, b. Salem, Mass. He entered his father's law office, but was compelled by a serious eye injury to abandon law. He received medical attention...

pi

(Encyclopedia)pi, in mathematics, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. The symbol for pi is π. The ratio is the same for all circles and is approximately 3.1416. It is of great importance in...

Tierra del Fuego

(Encyclopedia)Tierra del Fuego tyĕˈrä dĕl fwāˈgō [key], [Span.,=land of fire], archipelago, 28,476 sq mi (73,753 sq km), off S South America, separated from the mainland by the Strait of Magellan. It consist...

Pamplona

(Encyclopedia)Pamplona pämplōˈnä [key], city (1990 pop. 183,525), capital of Navarre, N Spain, on the Arga River. An older spelling is Pampeluna. It is an important communications, agricultural, and industrial ...

Blanc, Louis

(Encyclopedia)Blanc, Louis lwē bläN [key], 1811–82, French socialist politician and journalist and historian. In his noted Organisation du travail (1840, tr. Organization of Work, 1911), he outlined his ideal o...

Moors

(Encyclopedia)Moors, nomadic people of the northern shores of Africa, originally the inhabitants of Mauretania. They were chiefly of Berber and Arab stock. In the 8th cent. the Moors were converted to Islam and bec...

Aragón

(Encyclopedia)Aragón ârˈəgŏn, Span. ärägōnˈ [key], autonomous community, 18,425 sq mi (47,720 sq km), and former kingdom, NE Spain, bordered on the N by France. The city of Z...

Orléans, French royal family

(Encyclopedia)Orléans ôrlāäNˈ [key], family name of two branches of the French royal line. The house of Valois-Orléans was founded by Louis, duc d'Orléans (see separate article), whose assassination (1407) c...