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Fossano ... Fox Islands

Fossano: town, Cuneo province, Piemonte (Piedmont) region, northern Italy, northeast of Cuneo (city). Fossano is the site of a 14th-century four-sided castle, which belonged to the princes of Acaia; its hospital ...
Fosse Way: major Roman road that traversed Britain from southwest to northeast. It ran from the mouth of the River Axe in Devon by Axminster and Ilchester (Lindinae) to Bath (Aquae Sulis) ...
Fosse, Bob: American theatre and motion-picture choreographer and director of musical plays.
Fossett, Steve: American businessman and adventurer, who set a number of world records, most notably in aviation and sailing. In 2002 he became the first balloonist to circumnavigate the world alone, and ...
Fossey, Dian: American zoologist who became the world's leading authority on the mountain gorilla.
fossil: remnant, impression, or trace of an animal or plant of a past geologic age that has been preserved in the Earth's crust. The complex of data recorded in fossils worldwide, ...
fossil fuel: any of a class of materials of biological origin occurring within the Earth's crust that can be used as a source of energy.
Foster, Abigail Kelley: American feminist, abolitionist, and lecturer who is remembered as an impassioned speaker for radical reform.
Foster, Hannah Webster: American novelist whose single successful novel, though highly sentimental, broke with some of the conventions of its time and type.
Foster, Harold Rudolf: Canadian-born cartoonist and creator of "Prince Valiant," a comic strip notable for its fine drawing and authentic historical detail.
Foster, Jodie: American motion-picture actress who began her career as a tomboyish and mature child actress. Although she has demonstrated a flair for comedy, she is best known for her dramatic portrayals ...
Foster, John W: diplomat and U.S. secretary of state (1892-93) who negotiated an ill-fated treaty for the annexation of Hawaii.
Foster, Rube: American baseball player who gained fame as a pitcher, manager, and owner and as the "father of black baseball" after founding in 1920 the Negro National League (NNL), the first ...
Foster, Sir George Eulas: Canadian statesman who became prominent as minister of trade and commerce in the Sir Robert Laird Borden government (1911-20), which gained increasing recognition for Canada in international affairs. Foster founded ...
Foster, Sir Michael: English physiologist and educator who introduced modern methods of teaching biology and physiology that emphasize laboratory training.
Foster, Sir Norman: prominent British architect known for his sleek, modern buildings made of steel and glass.
Foster, Stephen: American composer whose popular minstrel songs and sentimental ballads achieved for him an honoured place in the music of the United States.
Foster, William Z: American labour agitator and Communist Party leader who ran for the presidency in 1924, 1928, and 1932.
Fothergill, John: physician who was the first to record coronary arteriosclerosis (hardening of the walls of the arteries supplying blood to the heart muscle) in association with a case of angina pectoris.
Fothergilla: genus for about five species of deciduous shrubs of the witch hazel family (Hamamelidaceae) native to the southeastern United States and sometimes planted as ornamentals for their spring flowering and ...
Fotoform: group of photographers in Germany after World War II who, headed by Otto Steinert (a physician who abandoned medicine for photography), reexplored the photographic techniques developed at the Bauhaus, the ...
Foucauld, Charles Eugene, vicomte de: French soldier, explorer, and ascetic who is best known for his life of study and prayer after 1905 in the Sahara Desert.
Foucault pendulum: relatively large mass suspended from a long line mounted so that its perpendicular plane of swing is not confined to a particular direction and, in fact, rotates in relation to ...
Foucault, Jean: French physicist who introduced and helped develop a technique of measuring the absolute velocity of light with extreme accuracy. He provided experimental proof that the Earth rotates on its axis.
Foucault, Michel: French philosopher and historian, one of the most influential and controversial scholars of the post-World War II period.
Fouche, Joseph, Duc D'otrante: French statesman and organizer of the police, whose efficiency and opportunism enabled him to serve every government from 1792 to 1815.
Foucher, Simon: ecclesiastic and critical philosopher of the Cartesian school, the first to publish criticisms of the philosophical theories of Nicolas Malebranche. In Critique de la recherche de la verite (1675; "Critique ...
fouette en tournant: (French: "whipped turning"), spectacular turn in ballet, usually performed in series, during which the dancer turns on one foot while making fast outward and inward thrusts of the working leg ...
Fougeres: industrial town and tourist centre, northwestern France, in Ille-et-Vilaine departement, Bretagne region, northeast of Rennes. Strikingly situated on a ridge dominating the winding valley of the Nancon River, the town, ...
Foula: one of the Shetland Islands, historic county of Shetland, Scotland, lying in the Atlantic Ocean 16 miles (26 km) southwest of the largest Shetland island, Mainland. Rocky and exposed, Foula ...
foulard: light silk fabric having a distinctive soft finish and a plain or simple twill weave. It is said to come originally from the Far East. In French the word foulard ...
Fould, Achille: influential French statesman during the Second Republic (1848-52) and the Second Empire (1852-70). He combined liberal economic ideas with political flexibility, tempered by a belief in the necessity of repressing ...
Foulis, Robert: Scottish printer whose work had considerable influence on the bookmakers of his time.
Foumban: town, northwestern Cameroon, west-central Africa. It lies 140 miles (225 km) north-northwest of Yaounde. It was the historic capital of the Bamum (Mum) kingdom; a palace there dates from the ...
found poem: a poem consisting of words found in a nonpoetic context (such as a product label) and usually broken into lines that convey a verse rhythm. Both the term and the ...
founding: the process of pouring molten metal into a cavity that has been molded according to a pattern of the desired shape. When the metal solidifies, the result is a casting-a ...
fountain: in landscape architecture, an issue of water controlled or contained primarily for purposes of decoration, especially an artificially produced jet of water or the structure from which it rises.
Fouque, Friedrich Heinrich Karl de La Motte, Baron: German novelist and playwright remembered chiefly as the author of the popular fairy tale Undine (1811).
Fouquet, Jean: preeminent French painter of the 15th century.
Fouquet, Nicolas: French finance minister in the early years of the reign of Louis XIV, the last surintendant (as opposed to controleur general), whose career ended with his conviction for embezzlement.
Fouquier-Tinville, Antoine-Quentin: French Revolutionary lawyer who was public prosecutor of the Revolutionary Tribunal during the Reign of Terror.
Four Freedoms: a formulation of worldwide social and political objectives by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the State of the Union message he delivered to Congress on Jan. 6, 1941. Roosevelt ...
Four Horsemen: name given by the sportswriter Grantland Rice to the backfield of the University of Notre Dame's undefeated gridiron football team of 1924: Harry Stuhldreher (quarterback), Don Miller and Jim Crowley ...
Four Masters of Anhui: group of Chinese artists who were born and worked in Anhui province in the 17th century (Qing dynasty) and who, being somewhat remote from the traditional centres of Chinese painting, ...
Four Masters of the Yuan dynasty: Chinese painters who worked during the Yuan period (1206-1368) and were revered during the Ming dynasty and later periods as major exponents of the tradition of "literati painting" (
Four Noble Truths: the essence of Buddhist religious doctrine, expounded by Gautama Buddha in his first sermon at the deer park near Benares (Varanasi), India, shortly after his having attained Enlightenment. The four ...
Four Seasons, the: American rock-and-roll group that was among the best-selling recording artists of the early and mid-1960s. Best remembered for lead singer Frankie Valli's soaring falsetto, the Four Seasons had a string ...
Four Tops, the: American vocal group that was one of Motown's most popular acts in the 1960s. The members were Renaldo ("Obie") Benson (b. June 14, 1936, Detroit, Michigan, U.S., -d. July 1, ...
Four Wangs: Chinese landscape painters (Wang Shimin, Wang Jian, Wang Hui, Wang Yuanqi) who were members of the group known as the Six Masters of the early Qing period.
four-colour map problem: problem in topology, originally posed in the early 1850s and not solved until 1976, that required finding the minimum number of different colours required to colour a map such that ...
four-eyed fish: either of two species of tropical American river fishes of the genus Anableps (family Anablepidae, order Atheriniformes). Four-eyed fishes are surface dwellers and have eyes adapted for seeing both above ...
four-o'clock: ornamental perennial plant, of the family Nyctaginaceae, native to tropical America. Four-o'clock is a quick-growing species up to one metre (three feet) tall, with oval leaves on short leafstalks. The ...
Fourdrinier machine: device for producing paper, paperboard, and other fibreboards, consisting of a moving endless belt of wire or plastic screen that receives a mixture of pulp and water and allows excess ...
Fourier transform: in mathematics, a particular integral transform. As a transform of an integrable complex-valued function f of one real variable, it is the complex-valued function f ˆ of a real variable ...
Fourier, Charles: French social theorist who advocated a reconstruction of society based on communal associations of producers known as phalanges (phalanxes). His system came to be known as Fourierism.
Fourier, Joseph, Baron: French mathematician, known also as an Egyptologist and administrator, who exerted strong influence on mathematical physics through his Theorie analytique de la chaleur (1822; The Analytical Theory of Heat). He ...
Fourierism: philosophy of social reform developed by the French social theorist Charles Fourier that advocated the transformation of society into self-sufficient, independent "phalanges" (phalanxes). One of several utopian socialist programs to ...
Fourneyron, Benoit: French inventor of the water turbine.
Fournier, Pierre-Simon: French engraver and typefounder particularly noted for decorative typographic ornaments reflecting the Rococo spirit of his day.
Fourteen Points: (Jan. 8, 1918), declaration by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson during World War I outlining his proposals for a postwar peace settlement.
fourteener: a poetic line of 14 syllables; especially, such a line consisting of seven iambic feet. The form is also called a heptameter or septenary. It was used in Greek and ...
Fouta: semidesert region flanking the middle course of the Senegal River and lying north of the Ferlo region, in northern Senegal. The banks of the Senegal River are well-watered and fertile ...
Fouta Djallon: mountainous region of west-central Guinea. Consisting of a series of stepped sandstone plateaus with many picturesque trenches and gorges, the region serves as the watershed for some of western Africa's ...
Fowey: English Channel port, Restormel borough, administrative and historic county of Cornwall, England. Fowey lies on the west bank of the sheltered Fowey estuary. It held a leading position among Cornish ...
fowl: in animal husbandry, birds raised commercially or domestically for meat, eggs, and feathers. Chickens, ducks, turkeys, and geese are of primary commercial importance, while guinea ...
Fowler, H W: English lexicographer and philologist whose works on the use and style of the English language had far-reaching influence. He was a man of moral and intellectual strength whose wit and ...
Fowler, John: English engineer who helped to develop the steam-hauled plow. He began his career in the grain trade but later trained as an engineer. In 1850 he joined Albert Fry in ...
Fowler, Lydia Folger: physician, writer, and reformer, one of the first American women to hold a medical degree and to become a professor of medicine in an American college.
Fowler, Sir John, 1st Baronet: English civil engineer who helped design and build the underground London Metropolitan Railway and was joint designer of the Forth Bridge in Scotland.
Fowler, William A.: American nuclear astrophysicist who, with Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1983 for his role in formulating a widely accepted theory of element generation.
Fowles, John: English novelist, whose allusive and descriptive works combine psychological probings-chiefly of sex and love-with an interest in social and philosophical issues.
fox: any of various members of the dog family (Canidae) resembling small to medium-sized bushy-tailed dogs with long fur, pointed ears, and narrow snouts. In a restricted sense, the name refers ...
Fox: an Algonquian-speaking tribe of North American Indians who called themselves Meshkwakihug, or Mesquakie (Red-Earth People). When they first met Europeans in 1667, they lived in the forest zone of what ...
fox bat: any of numerous tropical Old World bats belonging to the family Pteropodidae (q.v.).
Fox Broadcasting Company: American television broadcasting company founded in 1986 by the media magnate Rupert Murdoch. It is a subsidiary of Fox, Inc., and it is headquartered in Beverly Hills, Calif.
Fox Islands: easternmost group of the Aleutian Islands, southwestern Alaska, U.S. The islands extend about 300 miles (500 km) southwest from the Alaska Peninsula and are part of the extensive Alaska Maritime ...