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Nicholas, Saint

(Encyclopedia)Nicholas, Saint, patron of children and sailors, of Greece, Sicily, and Russia, and of many other places and persons. Little is known of him, but he is traditionally identified as a 4th-century bishop...

Beguines

(Encyclopedia)Beguines bāgēnzˈ [key], religious associations of women in Europe, established in the 12th cent. The members, who took no vows and were not subject to the rules of any order, were usually housed in...

Serlio, Sebastiano

(Encyclopedia)Serlio, Sebastiano sāˌbästyäˈnō sĕrˈlyō [key], 1475–1554, Italian Renaissance architect and theoretician, b. Bologna. He was in Rome from 1514 until the sack in 1527 and worked under Baldas...

Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

(Encyclopedia)Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, founded 1888, one of the world's foremost orchestras. It performs at the Royal Concertbegouw [concert building], Amsterdam, Netherlands, designed by Adolf Leonard van Ge...

Orange, town, France

(Encyclopedia)Orange ôräNzhˈ [key], town (1990 pop. 28,136), Vaucluse dept., SE France. An agricultural market center, the town also produces refined sugar, pâtés, preserves, wool, and shoes. Tourism is also i...

Leicester, Robert Dudley, earl of

(Encyclopedia)Leicester, Robert Dudley, earl of lĕsˈtər [key], 1532?–1588, English courtier and favorite of Queen Elizabeth I. A younger son of John Dudley, duke of Northumberland, he was early brought into th...

creole language

(Encyclopedia)creole language krēōlˈ [key], any language that began as a pidgin but was later adopted as the mother tongue by a people in place of the original mother tongue or tongues. Examples are the Gullah o...

Imitation of Christ, The

(Encyclopedia)Imitation of Christ, The, Christian devotional book, of great popularity. It originated among the Brothers of the Common Life in the Netherlands and was written probably c.1425. Tradition (since c.144...

Frederick III, king of Denmark and Norway

(Encyclopedia)Frederick III, 1609–70, king of Denmark and Norway (1648–70), son and successor of Christian IV. He at first made great concessions to the powerful nobles but later asserted his own power. In 1657...

West Flanders

(Encyclopedia)West Flanders, Du. West-Vlaanderen, Fr. Flandre Occidentale, province (1991 pop. 1,106,829), W Belgium, bordering on the North Sea in the west, on the Netherlands in the northeast, and on France in th...