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Klimt, Gustav

(Encyclopedia)Klimt, Gustav go͝osˈtäf klĭmt [key], 1862–1918, Austrian painter. He cofounded the Vienna Secession group, an alliance against 19th-century eclecticism in art, and in 1897 became its first presi...

Kiefer, Anselm

(Encyclopedia)Kiefer, Anselm kēˈfər [key], 1945–, German painter. One of the major figures of neoexpressionism, he studied (1970) with Joseph Beuys, who heavily influenced his work. His large paintings of the ...

calumet, peace pipe

(Encyclopedia)calumet [Fr.,=reed], name given by the French to the peace pipe used by the indigenous people of North America for smoking tobacco; it consisted of a long, feathered stem, with or without a pipe bowl....

tympanum

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Tympanum (west pediment, temple of Aphaia at Aegina) tympanum tĭmˈpənəm [key]. In architecture, the triangular space of a pediment, or low-pitched gable, above a portico, door, or window. ...

Merchants of the Staple

(Encyclopedia)Merchants of the Staple or Merchant Staplers, English trading company that controlled the export of English raw wool. The first wool staple (i.e., a place designated by royal ordinance as a special ce...

Madurai

(Encyclopedia)Madurai mədo͝orīˈ [key], city (1991 pop. 1,085,914), Tamil Nadu state, S India, on the Vaigai River. It is known as the “city of festivals and temples” and is the second largest city in Tamil ...

button

(Encyclopedia)button, knoblike appendage used on wearing apparel either for ornament or for fastening. Although buttons were sometimes used as fasteners by Greeks and Romans, they were more often merely ornamental ...

Sewall, Samuel

(Encyclopedia)Sewall, Samuel syo͞oˈəl [key], 1652–1730, American colonial jurist, b. England. He was taken as a child to Newbury, Mass., and was graduated from Harvard in 1671. He became a minister but gave up...

Channing, Edward

(Encyclopedia)Channing, Edward, 1856–1931, American historian, b. Dorchester, Mass.; son of William Ellery Channing (1818–1901). He was a prominent teacher at Harvard from 1883 until his retirement in 1929, hol...

Farabi, al-

(Encyclopedia)Farabi, al- äl-färäˈbē [key], d. 950, Islamic philosopher. He studied in Baghdad and later flourished in Aleppo as a sufi mystic (see Sufism). He died in Damascus. Al-Farabi was the author of an ...