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raisin, in botany and cooking

(Encyclopedia)raisin, dried fruit of certain varieties of grapevines bearing grapes with a high content of sugar and solid flesh. Although the fruit is sometimes artificially dehydrated, it is usually sun-dried. Th...

Rhodesia and Nyasaland, Federation of

(Encyclopedia)Rhodesia and Nyasaland, Federation of, SE Africa, 1953–63, composed of the self-governing British colony of Southern Rhodesia and the British protectorates of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland. The ca...

Rhône, river, Switzerland and France

(Encyclopedia)Rhône, Lat. Rhodanus, river, 505 mi (813 km) long, rising in the Rhône glacier, NE Valais, Switzerland. It flows west through a narrow, flat valley that separates the Bernese Alps from the Pennine A...

riot, rout, and unlawful assembly

(Encyclopedia)riot, rout, and unlawful assembly, in law, varying degrees of concerted disturbance of the peace. At common law, an unlawful assembly is a gathering of at least three persons whose conduct causes obse...

Owl and the Nightingale, The

(Encyclopedia)Owl and the Nightingale, The, Middle English poem written probably by Nicholas de Guildford of Dorsetshire about the beginning of the 13th cent. Written in 2,000 lines of octosyllabic couplets, it des...

vertical takeoff and landing aircraft

(Encyclopedia)vertical takeoff and landing aircraft (VTOL), craft capable of rising and descending vertically from and to the ground, thus requiring no runway. While a balloon or an airship has obvious VTOL capabil...

Vienna, city and province, Austria

(Encyclopedia)Vienna vēĕnˈə [key], Ger. Wien, city and province (1991 pop. 1,539,848), 160 sq mi (414 sq km), capital and largest city of Austria and administrative seat of Lower Austria, NE Austria, on the Dan...

Branford

(Encyclopedia)Branford, town (2020 pop. 28,273), New Haven co., S Conn., on Long Island Sound; settled 1644, inc. as a town 1930. Branford is mainly residential. Tour...

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