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Umbria

(Encyclopedia)Umbria o͞omˈbrēä [key], region (1991 pop. 811,831), 3,265 sq mi (8,456 sq km), central Italy. Perugia is the capital of the landlocked region, which is divided into the provinces of Perugia and Te...

Lumet, Sidney

(Encyclopedia)Lumet, Sidney lo͞o-mĕtˈ [key], 1924–2011, one of the great American film directors of the 20th cent., b. Philadelphia. A child actor in New York's Yiddish radio and theater and (1935–41) on Bro...

theory

(Encyclopedia)theory, in music, discipline involving the construction of cognitive systems to be used as a tool for comprehending musical compositions. The discipline is subdivided into what can be called speculati...

Roman law

(Encyclopedia)Roman law, the legal system of Rome from the supposed founding of the city in 753 b.c. to the fall of the Byzantine Empire in a.d. 1453; it was later adopted as the basis of modern civil law. Most aut...

Reign of Terror

(Encyclopedia)Reign of Terror, 1793–94, period of the French Revolution characterized by a wave of executions of presumed enemies of the state. Directed by the Committee of Public Safety, the Revolutionary govern...

free energy

(Encyclopedia)free energy or Gibbs free energy, quantity derived from the relationships between heat and work studied in thermodynamics and used as a measure of the relative stability of a physical or chemical syst...

latitude

(Encyclopedia)latitude, angular distance of any point on the surface of the earth north or south of the equator. The equator is latitude 0°, and the North Pole and South Pole are latitudes 90°N and 90°S, respect...

transit

(Encyclopedia)transit, in astronomy, passage of a body across a meridian or passage of a small body across the visible disk of a larger one. (The passage of a large body across a smaller one is called an eclipse or...

Chagall, Marc

(Encyclopedia)Chagall, Marc märk shəgälˈ [key], 1887–1985, Russian painter. In 1907, Chagall left his native Vitebsk for St. Petersburg, where he studied under L. N. Bakst. In Paris (1910) he began to assimil...

Tacitus, Roman historian

(Encyclopedia)Tacitus (Cornelius Tacitus), c.a.d. 55–c.a.d. 117, Roman historian. Little is known for certain of his life. He was a friend of Pliny the Younger and married the daughter of Agricola. In a.d. 97 he ...