Madison

Borough (town), Morris county, northeastern New Jersey, U.S. It lies 18 miles (29 km) west of Newark. The borough of Madison includes the communities of Montville, Wood Ridge, and Hopewell Valley. The centre of a greenhouse industry and nicknamed the �Rose City,� it is the site of Drew University (chartered 1868) and the Florham-Madison Campus of Fairleigh Dickinson University. The College

Matsushita Electric Industrial Company, Ltd.

The company was founded in 1918 by Matsushita Konosuke to manufacture and market the electric lamp sockets and plugs he designed. It was incorporated in 1935, when it took its present name, and began expanding rapidly into a number of varied electrical

Mercer, Johnny

Educated in Virginia, Mercer arrived in New York City in the late 1920s and acted in bit parts until his collaboration with Everett Miller on �Out of Breath and Scared to Death of You� was accepted for the revue Garrick

Davenport

In modern usage, a large upholstered settee, but in the 18th century a compact desk having deep drawers on the right side and dummy drawer fronts on the left side. The sloping top of the davenport concealed a fitted well, the front of which protruded beyond the drawers and was supported by a pair of columns on a base, or plinth. The back of the writing area was normally flat

Jaboticaba

Also called �jaboticabeira� any of several trees of the genus Myrciaria, of the myrtle family (Myrtaceae), notably M. cauliflora and M. jaboticaba, native to southeastern Brazil. The trees have been introduced to other warm regions, including western and southern North America. The name is also applied to the edible fruit of these trees. The trees do not differ greatly among the species; they are dome-shaped

Faraj

Faraj's father, Barquq, died in 1399. While he was a child, two guardians, representing the rival

Aldrin, Edwin Eugene, Jr.

A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y. (1951), Aldrin became an air force pilot. He flew 66 combat missions in Korea and later served in West Germany. In 1963 he wrote a dissertation on orbital mechanics to earn his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute

Eleaticism

For a long time Xenophanes of Colophon, a religious thinker and rhapsode of the 6th - 5th century BC, was considered the founder of the Eleatic school and Parmenides' mentor. This ancient claim, however, has been successfully criticized by Reinhardt. It is even possible that, on the contrary, Xenophanes was an older pupil of Parmenides. In any case, his monistic view of a cosmic

Ta'liq Script

In Arabic calligraphy, cursive style of lettering developed in Iran in the 10th century. It is thought to have been the creation of Hasan ibn Husayn 'Ali of Fars, but, because Khwajah 'Abd al-Malik Buk made such vast improvements, the invention is often attributed to him. The rounded forms and exaggerated horizontal strokes that characterize the ta'liq letters were derived primarily

Sogdian Art

Rich body of pre-Muslim Central Asian visual arts that was created between roughly the 5th and 9th centuries and is represented most notably by finds at Pendzhikent and Varakhsha, town principalities in Sogdiana. Many cultural streams united there: the remains of Sasanian culture, of post-Gupta India, and of China of the Sui and T'ang periods. Wall painting and carved wood

Pacific Ocean, Eastern region

The eastern region, which extends southward from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, is relatively narrow and is associated with the American cordilleran system of almost unbroken mountain chains, the coastal ranges of which rise steeply from the western shores of North and South America. The continental shelf, which runs parallel to it, is steep and comparatively narrow.

Briard

French sheepdog breed mentioned in French records of the 12th century and depicted in medieval French tapestries. It is known in France as berger de Brie (sheepdog of Brie) but is found throughout the French provinces. The briard is a lithe, strongly built dog with bushy brows and a long, more-or-less waterproof coat. It stands 56 to 69 cm (22 to 27 inches), weighs about 36 kg (80 pounds), and is

Cabaret

Restaurant that serves liquor and offers a variety of musical entertainment. The cabaret probably originated in France in the 1880s as a small club in which the audience was grouped around a platform. The entertainment at first consisted of a series of amateur acts linked together by a master of ceremonies; its coarse humour was usually directed against the conventions

Nile River

Almost no area within the Nile basin experiences a true equatorial or a true Mediterranean type of climate. While the Nile basin in The Sudan and Egypt is rainless during the northern winter, its southern parts and the highlands of Ethiopia experience heavy rain - more than 60 inches (1,520 millimetres) - during the northern summer. Most of the region falls under the influence

Claes, Ernest

Claes treated several subjects. Animals and children were the subject of such works as Floere het fluwijn (1950; �Floere the Polecat�)

Hilo

City, seat of Hawaii county, northeastern Hawaii Island, Hawaii, U.S. It lies along Hilo Bay and is the island's business centre. The city is surrounded by sugarcane fields and supports a thriving orchid industry. Its deepwater harbour (once a whaling port) is protected by a breakwater and has bulk sugar-loading facilities. Exports also include orchids, anthuriums, macadamia

Cabinda

Also spelled �Kabinda, � northern exclave of Angola, on the west (Atlantic) coast of Africa north of the Congo River estuary. It is bordered by Congo (Brazzaville) to the north and northeast and is separated from Angola by part of Congo (Kinshasa) to the south and southeast. Its coastline extends for 56 miles (90 km) and its greatest width is 70 miles (113 km). With continued offshore oil discoveries, crude oil has

Tooke, Thomas

Tooke was in business throughout most of his adult life, beginning in St. Petersburg at the age of 15 and finally retiring as governor of the Royal Exchange Assurance Corporation in 1852. He often gave evidence before Parliament on economic matters. In 1821 he

Faber, Frederick William

Faber was elected fellow of University College, Oxford, in 1837. Originally a Calvinist, he became a disciple of John Henry Newman (later cardinal) and, in 1843, was appointed rector of Elton, Huntingdonshire. He converted

Spandrel

Also spelled �Spandril, � the roughly triangular area above and on either side of an arch, bounded by a line running horizontally through the apex of the arch, a line rising vertically from the springing of the arch, and the curved extrados, or top of the arch. When arches adjoin, the entire area between their crowns and springing line is a spandrel. If it is filled in, as is ordinarily the case, the

Corax

There is little reliable information about Corax's life or his work, of which nothing survives. He was active at a time when democratic constitutions had replaced tyrannies in Sicily. He specialized in the theory of forensic oratory and is said to have advocated argument

Biblical Literature, The modern period

The modern period is marked by advances in textual criticism and in the study of biblical languages and history, all of which contribute to the interpretation of the Bible. The German theologian J.A. Bengel's (1687 - 1752) edition of the Greek text of the New Testament with critical apparatus (1734), in which he framed the canon that �the more difficult reading is to be preferred,� was followed

Hopak

Also spelled �gopak� Ukrainian folk dance, once for men only but later danced by couples, male soloists, and mixed groups of dancers. In the western Ukraine, as the hopak-kolo, it is danced in a closed circle. The hopak has no fixed pattern of steps. Men competitively improvise steps, high leaps, squatting kicks, and turns; women dance simple steps, sway, clap, or circle. Changes of step do not

Anthropology

The discovery of fossil evidence in Ethiopia supporting the evolutionary divergence of humans and apes roughly 4.5 million to 6 million years ago, long predicted on the basis of molecular evidence, was announced in 1994. Consisting of teeth, jaw fragments, a skull base, and an arm, the fossils were classified as a new species of hominid, Australopithecus ramidus. The bones, which

Race, Galton and Spencer

Hereditarian ideology also flourished in late 19th-century England. Two major writers and proselytizers of the idea of the innate racial superiority of the upper classes were Francis Galton and Herbert Spencer. Galton wrote books with titles such as Hereditary Genius (1869), in which he showed that a disproportionate number of the great men of England - the military leaders,

Niche

Gothic examples of the decorative recess are ubiquitous, including

Bahram I

A son of Shapur I, during his father's reign he governed the province of Atropatene. His succession to his brother Hormizd I strengthened the position of the Zoroastrian clergy and their high priest Karter, and at their insistence Bahram imprisoned Mani, the founder of the antimaterialist, ascetic religion of Manichaeism. Subsequent religious

France, History Of, The conquest of southern Germany

To the east, the Franks extended their domain in southern Germany, bringing Thuringia (c. 531 Chlotar I carried off Radegunda, a niece of the Thuringian king), the part of Alemannia between the Neckar and the upper Danube (after 536), and Bavaria under subjection. The latter was created as a dependent duchy in about 555. The Franks were less successful in northern Germany; in 536 they imposed

Yin Mountains

Wade-Giles and Pinyin �romanization Yin Shan, � range in the Inner Mongolian autonomous ch'� (region), China, comprising the Ta-ch'ing, Wu-la, Hara-narin, Sheyten, and Lang mountains. The Yin Mountains mostly rise to heights of about 6,500 feet (2,000 m). The highest peaks in the southwestern Ta-ch'ing Mountains reach 7,175 feet (2,187 m). The subranges run roughly east to west along the northern bend of the Huang Ho (Yellow River) to the north of the Ordos