Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Baltic Shield

(Encyclopedia)Baltic Shield, the continental core of Europe, composed of Precambrian crystalline rock, the oldest of Europe. The tectonically stable region was not affected by the Caledonian, Hercynian, and Alpine ...

Stafford, Jean

(Encyclopedia)Stafford, Jean, 1915–79, American writer, b. Covina, Calif., grad. Univ. of Colorado, 1936. Her literary reputation rests primarily on her exquisitely wrought short stories. Both these and her novel...

Taishan

(Encyclopedia)Taishan tī [key], peak, 5,069 ft (1,545 m) high, W Shandong prov., E China. Located in the homeland of Confucius, it is China's most sacred mountain. In ancient times it was believed that Taishan con...

Tanggula Shan

(Encyclopedia)Tanggula Shan täng-lä, däng-lä [key], mountain range, southeast extension of the Karakorum range, in the central Tibetan plateau, on the Tibet-Qinghai border, W China; rises to about 20,000 ft (6,...

Telemark

(Encyclopedia)Telemark tĕˈləmärk [key], county (1995 pop. 163,143), 5,915 sq mi (15,320 sq km), SE Norway, bordering on the Skagerrak in the east. Skien (the capital), Porsgrunn, Kragerø, and Notodden are the ...

Shanhaiguan

(Encyclopedia)Shanhaiguan or Shanhaikwan both: shän-hī-gwän [key] [Chin.,=mountain sea door], city, NE Hebei prov., China, on the Bohai. Strategically situated where the Great Wall meets the sea and on the narro...

Shasta, Mount

(Encyclopedia)Shasta, Mount shăsˈtə [key], volcanic peak, 14,162 ft (4,317 m) high, N Calif., in the Cascade Range. Visited c.1827 by Peter Skene Ogden, a British fur trader and explorer, Mt. Shasta has long bee...

Saigyo

(Encyclopedia)Saigyo säīˈgyō [key], 1118–90, Japanese poet-priest of the late Heian, early medieval period. Born into a warrior clan, Saigyo studied with the most renowned poets of his day, producing relative...

Cardamoms, mountains, Thailand and Cambodia

(Encyclopedia)Cardamoms kärˈdəməmz [key], Thai Banthat, Khmer Kravanh, mountain group extending c.100 mi (160 km) along the Thai-Cambodian border, E of Chanthaburi, SE Thailand. The mountains receive monsoon ra...

solid-state physics

(Encyclopedia)solid-state physics, study of the properties of bulk matter rather than those of the individual particles that compose it. Solid-state physics is concerned with the properties exhibited by atoms and m...