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Asculum

(Encyclopedia)Asculum ăˈskyo͝oləm [key], ancient town, Apulia, SE Italy, 18 mi (29 km) S of Foggia, on a branch of the Appian Way. Here Pyrrhus won a hard-fought battle against the Romans in 279 b.c. Modern Asc...

Assyrian language

(Encyclopedia)Assyrian language, East Semitic dialect that evolved from Akkadian after 1950 b.c. The term Assyrian is sometimes incorrectly used for the Akkadian language as a whole because the first inscriptions i...

arrack

(Encyclopedia)arrack ârˈək [key], strong spirits distilled chiefly in Asia from fermented fruits, grains, or sugarcane. In the 19th cent., Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) became quite noted for palm toddy arrack and in m...

Lanuvium

(Encyclopedia)Lanuvium ləno͞oˈvēəm [key], ancient city of Latium, Italy, c.20 mi (32 km) S of Rome, in the Alban Hills near the Appian Way. It was celebrated for its temple of Juno. The modern village is Lanuv...

Ulster

(Encyclopedia)Ulster, northernmost of the historic provinces of Ireland. Modern Ulster consists of nine counties. Six (Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Derry, and Tyrone) now make up Northern Ireland (see Ireland, ...

Wood, Jethro

(Encyclopedia)Wood, Jethro, 1774–1834, American inventor, b. either in Dartmouth, Mass., or in Washington co., N.Y. In 1814, while a farmer in Cayuga co., N.Y., he patented a cast-iron plow in which he later embo...

Wotton, William

(Encyclopedia)Wotton, William, 1666–1727, English scholar. He is best known for his Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning (1694), a defense of contemporary learning written in response to an essay by Sir W...

Volsinii

(Encyclopedia)Volsinii vŏlsĭnˈēī [key], ancient city of Etruria, Italy, on the site of modern Orvieto. It was a powerful member of the Etruscan League, and the spirit of the league was broken when Romans conqu...

Ageladas

(Encyclopedia)Ageladas ăjˌəlāˈdəs [key], c.540–c.460 b.c., Greek sculptor of the Argive school, famous for his statues of gods and Olympian athletes. Some modern authorities, such as R. Ross Holloway, claim...

Bergmann, Ernst von

(Encyclopedia)Bergmann, Ernst von ĕrnst fən bĕrgˈmän [key], 1836–1907, German surgeon, b. Riga. He became a professor at the Univ. of Berlin in 1882. He contributed to the modern practice of asepsis in surge...