Tuesday, September 28, 2004

Hilarion Of Kiev

A priest, Hilarion became the second archbishop of Kiev, the chief city in Rus at that time. Although Kievan bishops had all previously been appointed by the patriarch of Constantinople, Hilarion was chosen by Prince Yaroslav I the Wise and an assembly

Saturday, September 25, 2004

Photography, Technology Of, Aerial photography

Reconnaissance photographs call for maximum sharpness and detail rendering. Infrared films are often used to bring out details not discernible

Friday, September 24, 2004

Porphyria

Any of a group of diseases characterized by the marked overproduction and excretion of porphyrins or of one or another of their precursors. The porphyrins are reddish constituents of heme, the deep red iron-containing pigment of hemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying protein of the red blood cells. The deposition of porphyrin compounds in body tissues, notably the skin,

Wednesday, September 22, 2004

Antibes

Port town, Alpes-Maritimes département, Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur région, France, on the eastern side of the Garoupe Peninsula across the Baie des Anges (Bay of the Angels) from Nice. Originally Antipolis, a Greek trading post established by Phocaeans from Marseille, it became a Roman town, and from 1384 to 1608 it was a fief of the coast-ruling Grimaldi family. The Grimaldi château,

Sunday, September 19, 2004

Xu Beihong

Xu was first taught art in his childhood by his father, Xu Dazhang, a locally known portrait painter. Xu became an itinerant professional

Saturday, September 18, 2004

Devrient, Karl August

Nephew of the great Romantic actor Ludwig Devrient, he began his career in 1819 in Brunswick. From 1821 to 1835 he acted in Dresden, where he married his first wife, the singer

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Pucallpa

City, capital of Coronel Portillo provincia and Ucayali departamento, eastern Peru. It lies on the Ucayali River in the hot, humid Amazonian rain forest. Although the community dates from the early colonial era (1534), it remained isolated until 1945, when the Lima-Pucallpa highway, 526 miles (846 km) long, was completed. The largest community in Ucayali departamento, Pucallpa can be reached

Tuesday, September 14, 2004

Békésy, Georg Von

As director of the Hungarian Telephone System Research Laboratory (1923–46), Békésy worked on problems

Saturday, September 11, 2004

O Canada

The music, written by Calixa Lavallée (1842–91), a concert pianist and native of Verchères, Que., was commissioned in 1880 on the occasion of a visit to Quebec by Lord Lorne (later Duke of Argyll), then governor-general of Canada, and his wife, Queen Victoria's

Thursday, September 09, 2004

Malayan Emergency

After World War II the Federation of Malaya was formed through the unification of several former British territories, including Sabah and Sarawak. The negotiations included special guarantees of rights for Malays (including the position of sultans) and the establishment

Tuesday, September 07, 2004

Daedalus

(Greek: “Skillfully Wrought”), mythical Greek architect and sculptor, who was said to have built, among other things, the paradigmatic Labyrinth for King Minos of Crete. Daedalus fell out of favour with Minos and was imprisoned; he fashioned wings of wax and feathers for himself and for his son Icarus and escaped to Sicily. Icarus, however, flew too near the Sun, and his wings

Sunday, September 05, 2004

Port Angeles

City, seat (1890) of Clallam county, northwestern Washington, U.S., on Juan de Fuca Strait, linked by ferry to Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, 18 miles (29 km) north across the strait. Located at the base of Ediz Hook (a 3.5-mile- [5.6-km-] long, curving sand bar), the site was visited in 1791 by the Spanish explorer Francisco Eliza, who named the harbour Puerto de Nuestra Señora de los Angeles. Permanently

Saturday, September 04, 2004

Art, African, Lower Congo (Kongo) cultural area

Seated mother-and-child figures are found throughout the lower Congo region. The human figure is used by the peoples of the lower Congo in the decoration of almost every work—from ceremonial objects and domestic utensils to pieces

Wednesday, September 01, 2004

Uvarov, Sergey Semyonovich, Count

Uvarov served as a diplomat (1806–10), head of the St. Petersburg educational district (1811–22), and deputy minister of education (1832) before being named minister of education in 1833. In an important report to the tsar in 1833 he declared