Spanish dialogue novel, generally considered the first masterpiece of Spanish prose and the greatest and most influential work of the early Renaissance in Spain.
mineral that is a naturally occurring form of strontium sulfate (SrSO4). It resembles barite, barium sulfate, but is much less common. Barium is interchangeable with strontium in the crystal structure; ...
a digestive disorder in which people cannot tolerate gluten, a protein constituent of wheat, barley, malt, and rye flours. The disease is characterized by the passage of foul, pale-coloured stools ...
the state of being unmarried and, therefore, sexually abstinent, usually in association with the role of a religious official or devotee. In its narrow sense, the term is applied only ...
French writer and physician. Celine received his medical degree in 1924 and travelled extensively on medical missions for the League of Nations. In 1928 he opened a practice in a ...
city, central Slovenia, on the Savinja River about 35 miles (56 km) northeast of Ljubljana, Slovenia's capital. Founded as Claudia Celeia by the Roman emperor Claudius in the 1st century ...
in biology, the basic unit of which all living things are composed. As the smallest units retaining the fundamental properties of life, cells are the "atoms" of the living world. ...
in electricity, unit structure used to generate an electrical current by some means other than the motion of a conductor in a magnetic field. A solar cell, for example, consists ...
the maintenance and growth of the cells of multicellular organisms outside the body in specially designed containers and under precise conditions of temperature, humidity, nutrition, and freedom from contamination. In ...
in Classical architecture, the body of a temple (as distinct from the portico) in which the image of the deity is housed. In early Greek and Roman architecture it was ...
room beneath ground level, especially one for storing fruits and vegetables, both raw and canned, on a farm. A typical cellar may be beneath the house or located outdoors, partly ...
small, movable wine cooler and, later, also a deep, metal-lined tray with compartments for holding bottles in a sideboard. The term was first used by 18th-century cabinetmakers. Most movable cellarettes ...
city, Lower Saxony Land (state), north-central Germany, on the Aller River, at the southern edge of the Luneburger Heide (Heath), northeast of Hannover. The old town, Altencelle, was founded about ...
bright white ring surrounding the shadow of the observer's head on a dew-covered lawn with a low solar elevation angle. The low solar angle causes an elongated shadow, so that ...
Florentine sculptor, goldsmith, and writer, one of the most important Mannerist artists and, because of the lively account of himself and his period in his autobiography, one of the most ...
bass musical instrument of the violin group, with four strings, pitched C-G-D-A upward from two octaves below middle C. The cello, about 27.5 inches (70 cm) long (47 inches [119 ...
regenerated cellulose extruded into thin, flat, transparent sheets. Extrusion through a small hole or spinneret produces a fibre, rayon. Highly impermeable to dry gases, grease, and bacteria, cellophane is used ...
the process by which organisms combine oxygen with foodstuff molecules, diverting the chemical energy in these substances into life-sustaining processes and discarding, as waste products, carbon dioxide and water. Organisms ...
the first synthetic plastic material, developed by the American inventor John Wesley Hyatt in the late 1860s from a homogeneous colloidal dispersion of cellulose nitrate and camphor. A tough material, ...
a complex carbohydrate, or polysaccharide, consisting of 3,000 or more glucose units. The basic structural component of plant cell walls, cellulose comprises about 33 percent of all vegetable matter (90 ...
man-made textile fibre produced from the plant substance cellulose, which is obtained from soft woods or the short fibres adhering to cotton seeds (linters) and treated with acetic acid and ...
genus of about 60 species of herbaceous plants, of the amaranth family (Amaranthaceae), native to tropical America and Africa and characterized by alternate leaves and showy flowers in spikes, which ...
an uncommon feldspar mineral, barium aluminosilicate (BaAl2Si2O8), that occurs as hard, light-coloured, glassy masses and crystals in association with manganese deposits in contact zones, as at Jakobsberg, Swed.; Tochigi prefecture, ...
scale based on 0° for the freezing point of water and 100° for the boiling point of water. Invented in 1742 by the Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius, it is sometimes ...
one of the greatest Roman medical writers, author of an encyclopaedia dealing with agriculture, military art, rhetoric, philosophy, law, and medicine, of which only the medical portion has survived. De ...
characteristic New Stone Age tool, a polished stone ax or adz head designed for attachment to a wooden shaft and probably mainly used for felling trees or shaping wood. Great ...
a member of an early Indo-European people who from the 2nd millennium BC to the 1st century BC spread over much of Europe. Their tribes and groups eventually ranged from ...
an area in present north-central Spain occupied from the 3rd century BC onward by tribes of mixed Iberian and Celtic stock. These Celtiberians inhabited the hill country between the sources ...
the early Christian church in the British Isles, founded in the 2nd or 3rd century. Highly ascetic in character, it contributed to the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons in the 7th ...
branch of the Indo-European language family, spoken throughout much of Western Europe in Roman and pre-Roman times and currently known chiefly in the British Isles and in the Brittany peninsula ...
the body of writings composed in Gaelic and the languages derived from it, Scottish Gaelic and Manx, and in Welsh and its sister languages, Breton and Cornish. For writings in ...
German scholar known as Der Erzhumanist ("The Archhumanist"). He was also a Latin lyric poet who stimulated interest in Germany in both classical learning and German antiquities.
extinct Indo-European language of the western part of the Iberian Peninsula. Celto-Iberian was written in the Iberic script (borrowed from speakers of the non-Indo-European Iberian language in eastern and southern ...
in general, adhesive substances of all kinds, but, in a narrower sense, the binding materials used in building and civil engineering construction. Cements of this kind are finely ground powders ...
in geology, hardening and welding of clastic sediments (those formed from preexisting rock fragments) by the precipitation of mineral matter in the pore spaces. It is the last stage in ...
in anatomy, thin layer of bonelike material covering the roots and sometimes other parts of the teeth of mammals. Cementum is yellowish and softer than either dentine or enamel. It ...
place set apart for burial or entombment of the dead. Reflecting geography, religious beliefs, social attitudes, and aesthetic and sanitary considerations, cemeteries may be simple or elaborate-built with a grandeur ...
a literary coterie formed around various of the early leaders of the Romantic movement in France, replacing the salon as a place for writers to read and discuss their works. ...
young Roman noblewoman whose condemnation to death by Pope Clement VIII aroused public sympathy and became the subject of poems, dramas, and novels, including The Cenci (1819) by Percy Bysshe ...
French-speaking poet and essayist who created a powerful new poetic style to express a life of action and danger. His poems Paques a New York (1912; "Easter in New York") ...
massif and pass over the French Alps to Italy, Savoie departement, southeastern France, northeast of Briancon and west of the Italian city of Turin. The pass, an invasion route from ...
late Gothic Florentine painter who perpetuated the traditions of Giotto, which he received from his teacher Agnolo Gaddi. He is best known for writing Il libro dell'arte (1437; The Craftsman's ...
form of monasticism based on "life in common" (Greek koinobion), characterized by strict discipline, regular worship, and manual work. St. Pachomius was the author of the first cenobitic rule, which ...
a Celtic people of Cisalpine Gaul (northern Italy) who, during the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, allied with the Romans against other Gallic tribes. After first joining the uprising led ...
(from Greek kenotaphion, "empty tomb"), monument, sometimes in the form of a tomb, to a person who is buried elsewhere. Greek writings indicate that the ancients erected many cenotaphs, including ...
(from Maya dz'onot), natural well or reservoir, common in the Yucatan Peninsula, formed when a limestone surface collapses, exposing water underneath. The major source of water in modern and ancient ...
third of the major eras of the Earth's history, beginning about 66.4 million years ago and extending to the present (see ). It was the interval of time during which ...
in ancient Rome, a magistrate whose original functions of registering citizens and their property were greatly expanded to include supervision of senatorial rolls and moral conduct. Censors also assessed property ...
in traditional East Asia, governmental official charged primarily with the responsibility for scrutinizing and criticizing the conduct of officials and rulers.
the changing or the suppression or prohibition of speech or writing that is condemned as subversive of the common good. It occurs in all manifestations of authority to some degree, ...
an enumeration of people, houses, firms, or other important items in a country or region at a particular time. Used alone, the term usually refers to a population census-the type ...
in Greek mythology, a race of creatures, part horse and part man, dwelling in the mountains of Thessaly and Arcadia. Traditionally they were the offspring of Ixion, king of the ...
any of a population of small bodies, similar to asteroids in size but to comets in composition, that revolve around the Sun in the outer solar system, mainly between the ...
genus of about 500 species of herbaceous plants of the composite family (Asteraceae). Most are native to the Old World and chiefly centred in the Mediterranean region.
town, Ferrara provincia, Emilia-Romagna regione, north-central Italy, on the Reno River, 15 miles (24 km) northwest of Bologna. A chapel was built in the church of Santa Maria del Rosario ...
region of Africa that straddles the Equator and is drained largely by the Congo River system. It includes, according to common definitions, the countries of Congo (Brazzaville), the Central African ...
region of Africa that straddles the Equator and is drained largely by the Congo River system. It comprises, according to common definitions, the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville), the Central ...
landlocked country located in the centre of Africa. The area that is now the Central African Republic has been settled for at least 8,000 years; the earliest inhabitants were the ...
art workshop established in the late 1950s by Frank McEwen, the director of the Rhodesian Art Gallery in Salisbury, Rhodesia (now Harare, Zimbabwe), in order to encourage local African artists. ...
southernmost region of North America, lying between Mexico and South America. (Geologists and physical geographers sometimes extend the northern boundary to the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Mexico.) Within the region ...
member of any of the aboriginal peoples inhabiting Central America (south from Guatemala) and the northern coast of South America, including the northern drainage of the Orinoco River; the West ...