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Selkirk, Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of, Lord Daer And Shortcleuch ... Senegambia

Selkirk, Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of, Lord Daer And Shortcleuch: Scottish philanthropist who in 1812 founded the Red River Settlement (q.v.; Assiniboia) in Canada, which grew to become part of the city of Winnipeg, Man.
Selkirkshire: historic county in southeastern Scotland, occupying a rolling upland region dissected by the valleys of the Ettrick and Yarrow waters (rivers), which merge in the east with the River Tweed. ...
Sella, Quintino: statesman who helped place the new national government on a firm financial footing after the unification of Italy.
Sellers, Peter: versatile English comic actor whose astonishing range of characters earned him international stardom at a time when rigid typecasting was usual.
Selma: city, seat (1865) of Dallas county, central Alabama, U.S. It lies on the Alabama River about 50 miles (80 km) west of Montgomery. The site was first recorded on a ...
Selmi, Francesco: Italian chemist and toxicologist who is considered one of the founders of colloid chemistry.
Selormey, Francis: Ghanaian writer and teacher whose semiautobiographical novel, The Narrow Path: An African Childhood (1966), was hailed as a distinguished addition to African literature.
Selous Game Reserve: huge game reserve, southeastern Tanzania. It is named after Frederick Selous, a naturalist, explorer, and soldier. It covers an area of about 19,300 square miles (50,000 square km) and bestrides ...
Selous, Frederick Courteney: hunter and explorer whose south-central African travels added substantially to knowledge of the country later known as Rhodesia.
Selten, Reinhard: German mathematician who shared the 1994 Nobel Prize for Economics with John F. Nash and John C. Harsanyi for their development of game theory, a branch of mathematics that examines ...
Selvon, Samuel: Caribbean novelist and short-story writer of East Indian descent, known for his vivid evocation of the life of East Indians living in the West Indies and elsewhere. He came to ...
Selye, Hans: endocrinologist known for his studies of the effects of stress on the human body.
Selznick, David O.: American motion-picture producer who earned a reputation for commercially successful films of high artistic quality before and after World War II.
Semang: Negrito people who live mostly in peninsular Malaysia and speak an Austro-Asiatic language. In the late 20th century their population was estimated to be less than 4,000. They are traditional ...
semantics: the philosophical and scientific study of meaning. The term is one of a group of English words formed from the various derivatives of the Greek verb semaino ("to mean" or ...
semaphore: method of visual signaling, usually by means of flags or lights. Before the invention of the telegraph, semaphore signaling from high towers was used to transmit messages between distant points. ...
Semarang: city, kabupaten (regency), and capital, Jawa Tengah (Central Java) provinsi ("province"), Java, Indonesia, on the northern coast. The city, divided into the old and new sections, is just inland from ...
Sembene, Ousmane: Senegalese writer and film director known for his historical and political themes.
Sembrich, Marcella: Polish coloratura known for both her operatic and her concert work.
Semelaic languages: (from Malay orang asli, "aborigines"), subbranch of the Aslian branch of the Mon-Khmer language family, which is itself a part of the Austroasiatic stock. The subbranch consists of three languages ...
Semele: in Greek mythology, a daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, at Thebes, and mother of Dionysus (Bacchus) by Zeus. Semele's liaison with Zeus enraged Zeus's wife, Hera, who, disguised as an ...
semen: fluid that is emitted from the male reproductive tract and that contains sperm cells, which are capable of fertilizing the female eggs. Semen also contains other liquids, known as seminal ...
Semey: city, eastern Kazakstan. It is a port on the Irtysh (Ertis) River where the latter emerges into the West Siberian Plain.
semi-Arianism: a 4th-century Trinitarian heresy in the Christian church. Though it modified the extreme position of Arianism, it still fell short of the church's orthodox teaching that Father, Son, and Holy ...
semi-Pelagianism: in 17th-century theological terminology, the doctrine of an anti-Augustinian movement that flourished from about 429 to about 529 in southern France. The surviving evidences of the original movement are limited, ...
semiconductor: any of a class of crystalline solids intermediate in electrical conductivity between a conductor and an insulator. Semiconductors are employed in the manufacture of various kinds of electronic devices, including ...
semiconductor device: electronic circuit component made from a material that is neither a good conductor nor a good insulator (hence semiconductor). Such devices have found wide applications because of their compactness, reliability, ...
semiconductor memory: any of a class of computer memory devices consisting of one or more integrated circuits. (See computer memory.)
seminal vesicle: either of two elongated saclike glands that secrete their fluid contents into the ejaculatory ducts of some male mammals.
Seminole: city, Seminole county, central Oklahoma, U.S., east-southeast of Oklahoma City. Settled in 1890 as a trading centre for farmers and stockmen, it was known as Tidmore until 1907, when it ...
Seminole: North American Indian tribe speaking a Muskogean language; they are of Creek origin. In the last half of the 18th century, migrants from the lower Creek towns of Georgia moved ...
Seminole Wars: (1817-18, 1835-42, 1855-58), three conflicts between the United States and the Seminole Indians of Florida in the period before the American Civil War, that ultimately resulted in the opening of ...
semiotics: the study of signs and sign-using behaviour. It was defined by one of its founders, the Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, as the study of "the life of signs within ...
semispinalis muscle: any of the deep muscles just to either side of the spine that arise from the transverse processes (side projections) of the lower vertebrae and reach upward across several vertebrae ...
Semitic languages: group of languages spoken in northern Africa and the Middle East that constitutes one of the branches of the Afro-Asiatic (formerly Hamito-Semitic) language family. (The other branches are Egyptian, Berber, ...
Semler, Johann Salomo: German Lutheran theologian who was a major figure in the development of biblical textual criticism during his tenure (1753-91) as professor of theology at the University of Halle.
Semliki River: waterway connecting Lakes Edward and Albert, in the Western Rift Valley. It issues from the northwestern end of Lake Edward in Congo (Kinshasa) and meanders for 143 miles (230 km) ...
Semmelweis, Ignaz Philipp: German-Hungarian physician who discovered the cause of puerperal ("childbed") fever and introduced antisepsis into medical practice.
Semmering: most easterly and lowest (3,232 ft [985 m]) of the great Alpine passes, at the boundary between Bundeslander (federal provinces) Steiermark (Styria) and Niederosterreich (Lower Austria), in east central Austria. ...
Semmes, Raphael: American Confederate naval officer whose daring raids in command of the man-of-war "Alabama" interfered with Union merchant shipping during the middle two years of the American Civil War (1861-65).
Semnan: chief town and county (shahrestan) in Semnan ostan (province), northern Iran; it lies 3,734 ft (1,138 m) above sea level on a large plain at the southern foot of the ...
Semnan,: ostan (province), northern Iran, bounded by the ostans of Khorasan on the east, Esfahan on the south, Markazi (Tehran) on the west, and Mazandaran on the north. It has an ...
semolina: the purified middlings of hard wheat used in making pasta; also, the coarse middlings used for breakfast cereals, puddings, and polenta. See pasta.
Sempach, Battle of: (July 9, 1386), decisive victory won by the Swiss Confederation in its struggle with the Austrian Habsburgs. At Meiersholz, near Sempach, Swiss confederate forces from Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, and Luzern ...
Semper, Gottfried: architect and writer on art who was among the principal practitioners of the Neo-Renaissance style in Germany and Austria.
Sempill, Robert: Scottish poet who first used the metre that became the standard form for the Scottish humorous elegy.
Sempill, Sir James: Scottish poet remembered for his satirical poem A picktooth for the Pope, or the packman's paternoster (1630?), an antipapal dialogue between a peddler and a priest written in rhyming couplets. ...
Semple, Ellen Churchill: American geographer known for promoting the view that the physical environment determines human history and culture, an idea that provoked much controversy until superseded by later antideterministic approaches.
Semyonov, Nikolay Nikolayevich: Soviet physical chemist who shared the 1956 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with Sir Cyril Hinshelwood for research in chemical kinetics. He was the second Soviet citizen (after the emigre writer ...
Sen Rikyu: Japanese tea master who perfected the tea ceremony and raised it to the level of a national art.
Sen, Amartya: Indian economist who was awarded the 1998 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for his contributions to welfare economics and social choice and for his interest in the problems of society's ...
Sen, Mrinal: Indian filmmaker who used a range of aesthetic styles to explore the social and political realities of his homeland.
Sena: town, central Mozambique, on the Zambezi River. A river port and railway junction, it has an economy based on sugarcane cultivation and processing. Sena Sugar Estates Ltd., a formerly British-owned ...
Sena Dynasty: Indian dynasty ruling in Bengal in the 11th and 12th centuries. Their ancestors came from the south and established themselves as chieftains in southwestern Bengal early in the 11th century. ...
Senac, Jean: French-language poet active in the cause of national literature in Algeria.
Senanayake, D S: first prime minister of Ceylon (1947-52) when the country became independent of Great Britain.
Senancour, Etienne Pivert de: French author of Obermann (1804), one of several early 19th-century novels that describe the sufferings of a sensitive and tormented hero. Rediscovered some 30 years after it first appeared, the ...
Senate: one of the two houses of the legislature of the United States, established in 1789 under the Constitution. Each state elects two senators for six-year terms, the terms of about ...
Senate: in ancient Rome, the governing and advisory council that proved to be the most permanent element in the Roman constitution.
Sendai: city and capital, Miyagi Prefecture (ken), northern Honshu, Japan, between the Nanakita-gawa (Nanakita River) and the Hirose-gawa. Sendai was architecturally designed by a feudal lord to be the headquarters of ...
Sendai: city, Kagoshima ken (prefecture), southwestern Kyushu, Japan, on the lower Sendai River. A communications centre since early historic times, it was a small castle town and naval port during the ...
Sendak, Maurice: American artist best known for his illustrated children's books.
Sender, Ramon Jose: Spanish novelist, essayist, and educator whose works deal with Spanish history and social issues.
Sendic, Raul: Uruguayan rebel leader, founder of the leftist Tupamaro National Liberation Front (1963), a guerrilla movement that waged a relentless battle against the police and the army from 1967 to 1972.
Senebier, Jean: Swiss botanist and naturalist who demonstrated that green plants consume carbon dioxide and release oxygen under the influence of light.
Seneca: tribe of North American Indians of the Iroquoian linguistic group who lived in what is now western New York state and eastern Ohio. They were the largest and one of ...
Seneca: county, central New York state, U.S., lying between Cayuga Lake to the east and Seneca Lake to the west, the latter the largest and deepest of the Finger Lakes. Lowlands ...
Seneca Falls: village and town (township), Seneca county, west-central New York, U.S. The village lies in the Finger Lakes district on the Seneca River (connecting Seneca and Cayuga lakes), once the site ...
Seneca Falls Convention: assembly held on July 19-20, 1848, at Seneca Falls, New York, that launched the woman suffrage movement in the United States. Seneca Falls was the home of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, ...
Seneca, Lucius Annaeus: Roman philosopher, statesman, orator, and tragedian. He was Rome's leading intellectual figure in the mid-1st century AD and was virtual ruler with his friends of the Roman world between 54 ...
Seneca, Lucius Annaeus: author of a Latin work on declamation, a form of rhetorical exercise. Only about half of his book, Oratorum sententiae divisiones colores, survives; a 4th-century epitome preserves some of the ...
Senecan tragedy: body of nine closet dramas (i.e., plays intended to be read rather than performed), written in blank verse by the Roman Stoic philosopher Seneca in the 1st century AD. Rediscovered ...
Senefelder, Alois: German inventor of lithography.
Senegal: country of sub-Saharan West Africa. Located at the westernmost point of the continent and served by multiple air and maritime travel routes, Senegal is known as the "Gateway to Africa." ...
Senegal River: river of West Africa, with a length of 1,020 miles (1,641 kilometres). Its drainage basin encompasses some 174,000 square miles (450,000 square kilometres). Two of the river's three headstreams rise ...
Senegambia: limited confederation (1982-89) of the sovereign countries of Senegal and The Gambia. The two countries reached a merger agreement in November 1981, and the Senegambia confederation came into being three ...