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Sigismund II

(Encyclopedia)Sigismund II or Sigismund Augustus, 1520–72, king of Poland (1548–72). Crowned in 1530 to assure his succession, he assumed the royal functions at the death of his father, Sigismund I. By the Unio...

Orsini

(Encyclopedia)Orsini ōrsēˈnē [key], powerful Roman family that included three popes and numerous other churchmen, soldiers and statesmen. The eponymous ancestor was one Ursus. Giacinto Orsini, who became Pope C...

Besançon

(Encyclopedia)Besançon bəzäNsôNˈ [key], city, capital of Doubs dept., E France, in Franche-Comté, on ...

Gregory II, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Gregory II, Saint, d. 731, pope (715–31), a Roman; successor of Constantine. When Byzantine Emperor Leo III tried to impose iconoclasm in Italy by an imperial edict, Gregory answered that the empero...

Lothair I

(Encyclopedia)Lothair I lōthârˈ [key], 795–855, emperor of the West (840–55), son and successor of Louis I. In 817 his father crowned him coemperor. He was recrowned (823) at Rome by the pope and issued (824...

Bismarck, Otto von

(Encyclopedia)Bismarck, Otto von bĭzˈmärk, Ger. ôˈtō fən bĭsˈmärk [key], 1815–98, German statesman, known as the Iron Chancellor. The Bismarckian era closed with the death of Emperor Frederick III. A ...

Dresden

(Encyclopedia)Dresden drĕzˈdən [key], city, capital of Saxony, E central Germany, on the Elbe River. It ...

Mustafa

(Encyclopedia)Mustafa or Kara Mustafa mo͝ostäfäˈ [key] [Turk. kara=black], d. 1683, Turkish grand vizier (chief executive officer) under Sultan Muhammad IV of the Ottoman Empire (Turkey). He succeeded his brot...

Eutropius, consul of East Roman Emperor Arcadius

(Encyclopedia)Eutropius, d. 399, consul of East Roman Emperor Arcadius. A eunuch of the palace, he brought about the marriage (395) of Arcadius and Eudoxia and succeeded Rufinus as chief minister. He repelled (398)...

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