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Funen: third largest island (area 1,153 square miles [2,985 square km]) of Denmark. It lies between southern Jutland and Zealand (Sjaelland) and is bounded by the Little Belt (strait) to the ...
Funes: city, Navarre provincia and comunidad autonoma ("autonomous community"), northern Spain. It lies along the Arga River. Funes is a centre for sugar-beet cultivation, and there are gypsum quarries in the ...
Fung Yu-lan: outstanding Chinese philosopher of the 20th century.
fungicide: any toxic substance used to kill or inhibit the growth of fungi that either cause economic damage to crop or ornamental plants or endanger the health of domestic animals or ...
fungus: any of about 50,000 species of organisms of the kingdom Fungi, or Mycota-including yeasts, rusts, smuts, mildews, molds, and mushrooms. They are among the most widely distributed organisms on Earth ...
fungus gnat: any member of the insect families Mycetophilidae and Sciaridae (order Diptera), small mosquito-like flies with maggots (larvae) that feed on fungi. In Sciaridae, the dark-winged fungus gnat family, the eyes ...
fungus weevil: any of the approximately 2,400 species of the beetle family Anthribidae (order Coleoptera) usually found on dead twigs or fungi. These insects are between 0.5 and 50 mm (0.02 and ...
Funj Dynasty: line of kings that ruled in the Nilotic Sudan of Eastern Africa in the 16th-19th century. At its greatest extent, Funj authority stretched westward across the southern Gezira region into ...
funk: rhythm-driven musical genre popular in the 1970s and early 1980s that linked soul to later African-American musical styles. Like many words emanating from the African-American oral tradition, funk defies literal ...
Funk & Wagnalls dictionaries: family of English-language dictionaries noted for their emphasis on ease of use and current usage.
Funk, Isaac Kauffman: American publisher who was also a Lutheran minister, religious journalist, Prohibition Party publicist, and spelling reformer.
Funk, Walther: German Nazi and economist who was economics minister of the Third Reich from 1938 and president of the Reichsbank from 1939.
funnel weaver: any of certain members of the spider family Agelenidae (order Araneida). Agelenids are notable for their funnel-shaped webs; they are a common group with many species that are distributed worldwide. ...
funnel-web spider: any species of spider belonging to several genera in the family Dipluridae. The most important genera are Evagrus, Brachythele, and Microhexura in North America; Trechona in South America; and the ...
fur: fine, soft, hairy covering or coat of mammals that has been important to humankind throughout history, chiefly for warmth but also for decorative and other purposes.
Fur: people after whom the westernmost province of The Sudan, Darfur, is named. The Fur inhabit the mountainous area of Jebel Marra, the highest region of The Sudan. The languages spoken ...
fur seal: any of several eared seals of the family Otariidae valued for the quality of their fur.
furan: any of a class of organic compounds of the heterocyclic aromatic series characterized by a ring structure composed of one oxygen atom and four carbon atoms. The simplest member of ...
Furbish, Catharine: American botanist who devoted her lifelong energies to documenting and making drawings of the flora of Maine, enriching both scientific knowledge and numerous botanical collections with her legacy.
Furchgott, Robert F.: American pharmacologist who, along with Louis J. Ignarro and Ferid Murad, was co-awarded the 1998 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery that nitric oxide (NO) acts as ...
Furetiere, Antoine: French novelist, satirist, and lexicographer, remarkable for the variety of his writing.
furlong: old English unit of length, based on the length of an average plowed furrow (hence "furrow-long," or furlong) in the English open- or common-field system. Each furrow ran the length ...
Furman University: private, coeducational institution of higher learning in Greenville, South Carolina, U.S. It has a historical affiliation with the South Carolina Baptist Convention, though formal ties with the church were severed ...
furnace: structure in which useful heat is produced by combustion or other means. Historically, the furnace grew out of the fireplace and stove, following the availability of coal for heating. A ...
Furnariidae: bird family, order Passeriformes, containing about 220 species in nearly 60 genera, limited in distribution to Central and South America. This is one of the most diverse bird groups, with ...
Furneaux Group: cluster of islands and rocks in Bass Strait off northeastern Tasmania, southern Australia. The largest are Flinders (about 800 square miles [2,080 square km]), Cape Barren, Clarke, and Chappell. The ...
Furneaux, Tobias: British naval officer and explorer who was first to circumnavigate the globe in both directions.
Furness: region, administrative county of Cumbria, historic county of Lancashire, England. Except for a narrow coastal plain, Furness is predominantly upland, with such eminences as the Old Man of Coniston and ...
Furness, Frank Heyling: U.S. architect, significant for the forceful originality of his buildings and for his influence on Louis H. Sullivan, who was a draftsman in 1873 for the Philadelphia firm of Furness ...
Furness, Horace Howard: American compiler, with his son and others, of variorum editions of 20 of Shakespeare's plays.
Furniss, Harry: British caricaturist and illustrator, best known for his political and social lampoons.
furniture: household equipment, usually made of wood, metal, plastics, marble, glass, fabrics, or related materials and having a variety of different purposes. Furniture ranges widely from the simple pine chest or ...
furniture industry: all the companies and activities involved in the design, manufacture, distribution, and sale of functional and decorative objects of household equipment.
Furnivall, Frederick James: English literary scholar who, partly by his own efforts in textual criticism and partly by founding learned societies, especially the Early English Text Society, was instrumental in initiating a major ...
furo: Japanese-style bath, typically using water heated to 110° F (43.3° C) or hotter. It is claimed that, because the bather may linger in the wooden or metal tub, the furo ...
Furphy, Joseph: Australian author whose novels combine an acute sense of local Australian life and colour with the eclectic philosophy and literary ideas of a self-taught workingman.
Furrer, Jonas: Swiss statesman, president of the Swiss Confederation four times.
Fursey, Saint: monk, visionary, one of the greatest early medieval Irish monastic missioners to the Continent. His celebrated visions had considerable influence on dream literature of the later Middle Ages.
Furstenbund: league founded on July 23, 1785, under the leadership of King Frederick II the Great of Prussia to preserve the status quo among the several German states and curb the ...
Furstenwalde: city, Brandenburg Land (state), eastern Germany, on the Spree River near its junction with the Oder-Spree Canal, east of Berlin. Founded between 1252 and 1258 by the margraves of Brandenburg ...
Furth: city, Bavaria Land (state), south-central Germany. It is situated at the junction of the Pegnitz and Rednitz rivers (which there form the Regnitz), just northwest of Nurnberg. ...
Furtwangen: city, Baden-Wurttemberg Land (state), southwestern Germany, in the upper valley of the Breg River, in the Black Forest (Schwarzwald), northeast of Freiburg im Breisgau. First mentioned in 1179, it was ...
Furtwangler, Adolf: German archaeologist whose catalogs of ancient Greek sculpture, vase painting, and gems brought thousands of art works into historical order.
Furtwangler, Wilhelm: German conductor, one of the great exponents of Romantic music. Known for his passionate, romantic style, he excelled in the works of Beethoven and Wagner.
Furuta Oribe: distinguished figure in the history of the Japanese tea ceremony.
Fury: in Greco-Roman mythology, one of a group of goddesses of vengeance. They were probably personified curses but possibly were originally conceived of as ghosts of the murdered. According to the ...
Fusarium wilt: widespread plant disease caused by many forms of the soil-inhabiting fungus Fusarium oxysporum. Several hundred plant species are susceptible at soil temperatures above 75° F (24° C). Infected plants are ...
Fusaro, Lake of: coastal lagoon in Napoli provincia, Campania regione, southern Italy, west of Naples. The lagoon is separated from the sea on the west by sand dunes. As the ancient Palus Acherusia ...
fuse: in explosives technology, device for firing explosives in blasting operations, in fireworks, and in military projectiles.
fuse: in electrical engineering, a safety device that protects electrical circuits from the effects of excessive currents. A fuse commonly consists of a current-conducting strip or wire of easily fusible metal ...
fusel oil: a mixture of volatile, oily liquids produced in small amounts during alcoholic fermentation. A typical fusel oil contains 60-70 percent of amyl alcohol (q.v.), smaller amounts of n-propyl and isobutyl ...
fuselage: central portion of the body of an airplane, designed to accommodate the crew, passengers, and cargo. It varies greatly in design and size according to the function of the aircraft. ...
Fuseli, Henry: Swiss-born painter whose works are among the most exotic, original, and sensual pieces of his time.
fusion reactor: a device that produces electrical power from the energy released in a nuclear fusion reaction.
fusion reactor: a device to produce electrical power from the energy released in a nuclear fusion reaction.
Fussen: city, Bavaria Land (state), extreme southern Germany. It lies along the Lech River, at the east foot of the Allgau Alps, near the Austrian border. The site ...
Fust, Johann: early German printer, financial backer of Johann Gutenberg (the inventor of printing in Europe), and founder, with Peter Schoeffer, of the first commercially successful printing firm.
Fustat ware: in Islamic ceramics, style of pottery originating from al-Fustat (now part of Cairo), where, however, many deposits of imported ware have also been found. Its characteristic qualities are poorish white ...
Fustat, Al-: capital of the Muslim province of Egypt during the Umayyad and 'Abbasid caliphates and under succeeding dynasties, until captured by the Fatimid general Jawhar in 969. Founded in 641 by ...
Fustel de Coulanges, Numa Denis: French historian, the originator of the scientific approach to the study of history in France.
fustian: fabric originally made by weaving two sets of cotton wefts, or fillings, on a linen warp, popular during the European Middle Ages. The word has come to denote a class ...
fustic: either of two natural dyes. Old fustic, or yellowwood, is derived from the heartwood of dyer's mulberry, a large, tropical American tree (Chlorophora tinctoria, or Maclura tinctoria) of the mulberry ...
Fusulina: genus of extinct fusulinid foraminiferans (protozoans with a shell) found as fossils in marine rocks of Late Carboniferous age (286 to 320 million years old). Fusulina, an excellent index fossil ...
Fusulinella: genus of extinct fusulinid foraminiferans (protozoans with a shell) found as fossils in Late Carboniferous marine rocks (those formed between 320 and 286 million years ago). Because of its narrow ...
fusulinid: any of a large group of extinct foraminiferans (single-celled organisms related to the modern amoebas but having complex shells that are easily preserved as fossils). The fusulinids first appeared late ...
Futabatei Shimei: Japanese novelist and translator of Russian literature; his Ukigumo (1887-89; "The Drifting Clouds," translated, with a study of his life and career, by M. Ryan as Japan's First Modern Novel: ...
futures: commercial contract calling for the purchase or sale of specified quantities of a commodity at specified future dates. The origin of futures contracts was in trade in agricultural commodities, and ...
Futurism: early 20th-century artistic movement that centred in Italy and emphasized the dynamism, speed, energy, and power of the machine and the vitality, change, and restlessness of modern life in general. ...
futurology: in the social sciences, the study of current trends in order to forecast future developments. While the speculative and descriptive aspects of futurology are traceable to the traditions of utopian ...
Fux, Johann Joseph: Austrian composer known for his theoretical work on counterpoint, Gradus ad Parnassum.
Fuxing: in Chinese mythology, star god of happiness, one of the three stellar divinities known collectively as Fulushou. He is one of many Chinese gods who bestow happiness on their worshipers. ...
Fuzuli, Mehmed bin Suleyman: Turkish poet and the most outstanding figure in the classical school of Turkish literature.
fuzzy logic: in mathematics, a form of logic based on the concept of a fuzzy set. Membership in fuzzy sets is expressed in degrees of truth-i.e., as a continuum of values ranging ...
Fw 190: fighter aircraft of Nazi Germany, second in importance only to the Bf 109 (or Me 109) in that nation's air force during World War II. The Fw 190 was a ...
Fyffe, Will: Scottish actor, music-hall entertainer, and pantomimist, one of the most popular character comedians of British stage and screen.
Fylde: borough (district), administrative and historic county of Lancashire, England. It lies on the north bank of the estuary of the River Ribble at the Irish Sea, just east of the ...