Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

230 results found

North German Confederation

(Encyclopedia)North German Confederation, 1867–71, alliance of 22 German states N of the Main River. Dominated by Prussia, it replaced the German Confederation and included the states that had supported Prussia i...

Frederick II, Holy Roman emperor and German king

(Encyclopedia)Frederick II, 1194–1250, Holy Roman emperor (1220–50) and German king (1212–20), king of Sicily (1197–1250), and king of Jerusalem (1229–50), son of Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI and of Consta...

Dada

(Encyclopedia)Dada däˈdäĭzəm [key], international nihilistic movement among European artists and writers that lasted from 1916 to 1922. Born of the widespread disillusionment engendered by World War I, it orig...

kinetic art

(Encyclopedia)kinetic art, term referring to sculptured works that include motion as a significant dimension. The form was pioneered by Marcel Duchamp, Naum Gabo, and Alexander Calder. Kinetic art is either nonmech...

herbal

(Encyclopedia)herbal, early botanical book containing descriptions and illustrations of herbs and plants with their properties, chiefly those qualities that made them useful as medicines or condiments. Most of the ...

Three Emperors' League

(Encyclopedia)Three Emperors' League, informal alliance among Austria-Hungary, Germany, and Russia, announced officially in 1872 on the occasion of the meeting of emperors Francis Joseph, William I, and Alexander I...

Nin, Anaïs

(Encyclopedia)Nin, Anaïs ənīˈĭs nĭn, nēn [key], 1903–77, American writer, b. Paris. The daughter of the Spanish composer Joaquín Nin, she came to the United States as a child. She was a psychoanalytic pat...

Lassalle, Ferdinand

(Encyclopedia)Lassalle, Ferdinand fĕrˈdēnänt läsälˈ [key], 1825–64, German socialist. The son of a Jewish merchant, he studied at the universities of Breslau and Berlin, where he became a philosophical Heg...

Neue Galerie

(Encyclopedia)Neue Galerie [Ger.,=New Gallery], museum in New York City, specializing in early 20th-century fine and decorative art from Germany and Austria; est. 2001. One of the relatively small museum's two gall...

Spoleto

(Encyclopedia)Spoleto spōlĕˈtō [key], city (1991 pop. 37,763), Umbria, central Italy. It is a light industrial and tourist center. An Umbrian and later an Etruscan town, the city flourished after being taken (2...