Bulgarian revolutionary who conducted subversive activities in Romania before joining the Russian Bolshevik Party and becoming a leading political figure in Soviet Russia.
in Hindu mythology, a type of demon or goblin. Rakshasas have the power to change their shape at will and appear as animals, as monsters, or in the case of ...
Japanese lead-glazed earthenware, originally invented expressly for the tea ceremony in 16th-century Kyoto. Quite distinct from wares that preceded it, raku represents an attempt to arrive at a new kind ...
city, capital of North Carolina, and seat (1771) of Wake county, central North Carolina, U.S. It lies roughly 25 miles (40 km) southeast of both Chapel Hill and Durham, the ...
English adventurer and writer, a favourite of Queen Elizabeth I, who knighted him in 1585. Accused of treason by Elizabeth's successor, James I, he was imprisoned in the Tower of ...
automobile competition over a specified public route with a driver and navigator attempting to keep to a predetermined schedule between checkpoints. The course is generally unknown to contestants until the ...
former French political party formed by Jacques Chirac in 1976 that presumed to be heir to the traditions of Charles de Gaulle. It was the direct successor to the Gaullist ...
former American manufacturer of cereals, packaged foods, pet food, and livestock feed. A merger with Nestle in December 2001 created Nestle Purina PetCare Company.
appurtenance fixed to the front end of a fighting vessel and designed to damage enemy ships when struck by it. It was possibly first developed by the Egyptians as early ...
town, central Palestine, adjacent to the town of Al-Birah (east) and north of Jerusalem. Ram Allah (Arabic: "Height of God") has since the Six-Day War of 1967 been under Israeli ...
member of a group of dissenters within Sikhism, a religion of India. The Ram Raiyas are descendants of Ram Rai, the eldest son of Guru Har Rai (1630-61), who was ...
one of the most widely worshipped Hindu deities, the embodiment of chivalry and virtue. Although there are three Ramas mentioned in Indian tradition (Parasurama, Balarama, and Ramacandra), the name is ...
also called Phraphutthaloetla Naphalai the second ruler (1809-24) of the present Chakkri dynasty, under whose rule relations were reopened with the West and Siam began a forward policy on the ...
also called Phranangklao king of Siam (1824-51) who made Siam's first tentative accommodations with the West, and under whom the country's boundaries reached their maximum extent.
in Islam, the holy month of fasting, the ninth month of the Muslim year, in which "the Qur'an was sent down as a guidance for the people" (Qur'an 2:185).
Hindu religious leader, founder of the school of religious thought that became the Ramakrishna order, and the best-known Hindu saint of the 19th century.
religious society that carries out extensive educational and philanthropic work in India and is also the foremost exponent in Western countries of a modern version of Advaita Vedanta-a school of ...
change in the wavelength of light that occurs when a light beam is deflected by molecules. The phenomenon is named for Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, who discovered it in 1928. ...
Indian physicist whose work was influential in the growth of science in India. He was the recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930 for the discovery that when ...
Hindu philosopher and yogi called "Great Master," "Bhagavan" (the Lord), and "the Sage of Arunachala," whose position on monism (the identity of the individual soul and the creator of souls) ...
also called Ramanand, or Ramadatta North Indian Brahman, fifth in succession in the lineage of the philosopher-mystic Ramanuja and founder of the bhakti (devotional) cult of Rama, the incarnation of ...
town, Ramanathapuram district, Tamil Nadu state, southeastern India. A former capital of the Maravan rajas, it produces textiles and jewelry and has two colleges affiliated with Madurai-Kamaraj University. Its name ...
South Indian Brahman theologian and philosopher, the single most influential thinker of devotional Hinduism. After a long pilgrimage, Ramanuja settled in Srirangam, where he organized temple worship and founded centres ...
fossil primate genus dating from the Middle and Late Miocene epochs (about 16.6 to 5.3 million years ago). For a time in the 1960s and '70s Ramapithecus was thought to ...
city, west-central Israel, on the Plain of Sharon just east of Tel Aviv-Yafo. Founded in 1921, it is the largest satellite city in the Tel Aviv-Yafo metropolitan area, with fine ...
Hindu religious leader known for the highly personal and poetic manner in which he taught what he styled "Practical Vedanta," using common experiences to illustrate the divine nature of man. ...
a twopenny sheet issued twice weekly in London by the publisher John Payne between 1750 and 1752, each issue containing a single anonymous essay; 208 such periodical essays appeared, all ...
breed of sheep, developed from selections of a few hundred of the best Merino sheep of Spain in 1786 and 1799 by the French government at its national sheepfold at ...
town, Yvelines departement, Paris region, northern France, just southwest of Versailles. Flanked by its famous chateau and surrounded by an extensive forest, it is a favoured tourist spot for Parisians. ...
(Nephelium lappaceum), tree of the soapberry family (Sapindaceae). It is native to Malaysia, where it is commonly cultivated for its tasty fruit, also called rambutan. The bright-red, oval fruit, about ...
("Sacred Lake of the Acts of Rama"), version, written in a dialect of Hindi, of the Sanskrit epic poem the Ramayana, one of the masterpieces of medieval Hindu literature and ...
capital of Al-Anbar muhafazah (governorate), central Iraq. It lies on the Euphrates River just northwest of Lake Al-Habbaniyah. Ancient settlements existed in the vicinity, but Al-Ramadi was ...
French composer of the late Baroque period, best known today for his harpsichord music but in his lifetime also famous as a musical theorist and a composer of operas.
city and centre of a rayon (sector), Moscow oblast (province), western Russia. It lies southeast of the city of Moscow. In the 1820s Ramenskoye became the site of one of ...
funerary temple of Ramses II (1279-13 BC), erected on the west bank of the Nile River at Thebes in Upper Egypt. The temple, famous for its 57-foot (17-metre) seated statue ...
island, southeastern Tamil Nadu state, southeastern India. It forms part of Adams Bridge, a series of coral reef islands connecting India and Sri Lanka. The island contains a temple that ...
any of several fibre-yielding plants of the genus Boehmeria, belonging to the nettle family (Urticaceae), and their fibre, one of the bast fibre (q.v.) group. Boehmeria nivea, native to China, ...
(May 23, 1706), victory won by Allied (Anglo-Dutch) forces led by the Duke of Marlborough over the French during the War of the Spanish Succession. The victory led to the ...
first king of Aragon, who reigned from 1035. He was the illegitimate son of King Sancho III of Navarre. During his father's lifetime he governed this territory and was made ...
king of Aragon from 1134 to 1137. He was the third son of Sancho V Ramirez. His elder brother, Alfonso I the Battler, left no issue and bequeathed his kingdom ...
king of Leon and Asturias in Christian Spain from 931 to 951. The second son of King Ordono II, he became king on the abdication of his elder brother, Alfonso ...
air-breathing jet engine that operates with no major moving parts. It relies on the craft's forward motion to draw in air and on a specially shaped intake passage to compress ...
third king of Sukhothai in what is now north-central Thailand, who made his young and struggling kingdom into the first major Tai state in 13th-century Southeast Asia.
city in Israel, on the coastal plain southeast of Tel Aviv-Yafo. Ramla is the only city founded by the Arabs in Palestine. It was established in 716 by the caliph ...
building material made by compacting certain soils, used by many civilizations. The most durable of the earth-building forms, rammed earth may be used for making building blocks or for constructing ...
city, capital of Valcea judet (county), south-central Romania, on the Olt River. Documented as a town in the late 14th century, it was a local market town during the Middle ...
American engineer who made notable contributions to electronics and was chief scientist (1954-58) of the U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program.
count of Barcelona during whose reign (1097-1131) independent Catalonia reached the summit of its historical greatness, spreading its ships over the western Mediterranean and acquiring new lands from the southern ...
Spanish histologist who (with Camillo Golgi) received the 1906 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for establishing the neuron, or nerve cell, as the basic unit of nervous structure. This ...
American band that influenced the rise of punk rock on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. The original members were Joey Ramone (byname of Jeffrey Hyman; b. May 19, 1951, ...
military leader and politician who was president of the Philippines from 1992 to 1998. He was generally regarded as one of the most effective presidents in that nation's history.
East Timorese political activist who, along with Bishop Carlos F.X. Belo, received the 1996 Nobel Prize for Peace for their efforts to bring peace and independence to East Timor, a ...
French flutist who brought the flute to new prominence as a concert instrument and demonstrated the appropriateness of the flute as a solo instrument adaptable to a wide range of ...
any member of the genus Phyteuma, of the bellflower family (Campanulaceae), consisting of about 40 species of perennial plants with long, clustered, hornlike buds and flowers. The genus is native ...
