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...or painted on vases are, until c. 350 bc, the only immediate evidence for the way the Greeks wrote, and their study is normally treated as the province of epigraphy. A find in 1962 at Dervéni (Dhervénion), in Macedonia, of a carbonized roll of papyrus (Archaeological Museum, Thessaloníki, Greece) offers the oldest example of Greek handwriting and the on...

one of the most important early Ottoman historians. The great-grandson of the famous mystic poet of Anatolia, Aşık Paşa, Aşıkpaşazâde also had affiliations with a Muslim mystical order....

one of the most celebrated Ottoman travelers, who journeyed for more than 40 years throughout the territories of the Ottoman Empire and adjacent lands....

any member of a Ṣūfī (Muslim mystic) fraternity, or tariqa. Within the Ṣūfī fraternities, which were first organized in the 12th century, an established leadership and a prescribed discipline obliged the dervish postulant to serve his sheikh, or master, and to establish a rapport with him. The postulant was also expected to learn the ...

German association football (soccer) manager who during his tenure as national coach (1978–84), guided West Germany to 45 wins (including a record 23 straight), 11 losses, and 11 ties; the 1980 European championship title; and the final of the 1982 World Cup, in which the team lost to Italy. After World War II, Derwall played professionally for Oberliga West, Alemania Aachen, and Fortuna D...

German association football (soccer) manager who during his tenure as national coach (1978–84), guided West Germany to 45 wins (including a record 23 straight), 11 losses, and 11 ties; the 1980 European championship title; and the final of the 1982 World Cup, in which the team lost to Italy. After World War II, Derwall played professionally for Oberliga West, Alemania Aachen, and Fortuna D...

(1836–39), organization of settlers from Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) formed to purchase and develop the grazing land of the unsettled Port Phillip District (later the colony of Victoria) of southeastern Australia; its efforts precipitated the large-scale colonization of the area....

river in Tasmania, Australia, rising in Lake St. Clair on the central plateau and flowing 113 miles (182 km) southeast to enter Storm Bay through a 3.5-mile- (5.5-kilometre-) wide estuary. Its major upper-course tributaries, the Jordan, Clyde, Ouse (now draining the Great Lake), and Dee, are extensively developed for hydropower. Hops are grown on irrigated alluvial terraces alon...

river in North Yorkshire, England, that rises on Fylingdales Moor only 6 miles (10 km) inland from the North Sea but flows 57 miles (92 km) through alternating gorges and vales to its junction with the River Ouse. This peculiar course results from the blockage of its former path by an ice sheet. Glacial overflow channels were cut through the tabular hills around Hackness at Langdale and Forge Vall...

lake, administrative county of Cumbria, historic county of Cumberland, England, in the Lake District National Park. It is about 3 miles (5 km) long and from 0.5 to 1.25 miles (0.8 to 2 km) wide, and its maximum depth is 72 feet (22 metres). The River Derwent enters its southern end from Borrowdale, its mountain-girded upper valley, and leave...

district, administrative and historic county of Durham, northeastern England, located in the north-central part of the county about 12 miles (20 km) southwest of the city of Newcastle upon Tyne. Derwentside was a coal-mining area, historically important to Great Britain, encompassing an outlying section of the northeastern Pennines 400 to 1,000 feet (120 to 305 metres) high. Sur...

Russia’s greatest and most original 18th-century poet, whose finest achievements lie in his lyrics and odes....

Since the late 1970s, two types of encryption have emerged. Conventional symmetric encryption requires the same key for both encryption and decryption. A common symmetric encryption system is the Data Encryption Standard (DES), an extremely complex algorithm approved as a standard by the U.S. National Bureau of Standards. Asymmetric encryption, or public-key cryptography, requires a pair of......

nonsteroidal synthethic estrogen used as a drug and formerly used to promote growth of livestock. Unlike natural estrogens, DES remains active following oral administration. It is also administered as vaginal suppositories and by injection. DES breaks down more slowly in the body than do the natural estrogens....

...imbued with a natural and harmonious balance between joy and sadness and that it is in this balance that meaning can be discovered. He advocated the idea in the work that first brought him fame, Des compensations dans les destinées humaines, 3 vol. (1809). In a following work, Système universel, 8 vol. (1809–12), he further developed the same idea and related....

...north of Hackensack on the east bank of the Hackensack River. Early Dutch settlers established a plantation-type farm called Vriesendael, which was pillaged by Delaware Indians in 1643. In 1675 David Demarest (or des Marest), a French Huguenot, and his sons received a land grant, which included the former farm area. Two years later they established the first permanent settlement. Their......

minister of finance during the last seven years of the reign (1643–1715) of Louis XIV of France....

city, capital of Iowa, U.S., and seat (1845) of Polk county. The city lies on the Des Moines River at its juncture with the Raccoon River in the south-central part of the state. Situated in the heart of the Corn Belt, it is the focus of Iowa’s most populous metropolitan area, which includes the cities West Des Moines...

morning daily newspaper published in Des Moines, Iowa, one of the most influential regional newspapers in the United States....

river rising in Lake Shetek in southwestern Minnesota, U.S., near Pipestone, and flowing 525 mi (845 km) in a southeasterly direction to join the Mississippi River 2 mi southwest of Keokuk, Iowa. Above Humboldt, Iowa, the river is known as the West Fork. The East Fork and the Raccoon River are its principal tributaries. For a distance of 25 miles (40 km) above its mouth, the river serves as the b...

an ancient territorial division of Ireland approximating the modern counties of Kerry and Cork. Between the 11th and 17th centuries, the name was often used for two quite distinct areas. Gaelic Desmond extended over the modern County Kerry south of the River Maine and over the modern County Cork west and north of the city of Cork; Anglo-Norman Desmond extended over north Kerry from the River Maine...

French storyteller and humanist who attained notoriety as a freethinker....

city, Cook county, northeastern Illinois, U.S. Lying on the Des Plaines River, it is a suburb of Chicago, 17 miles (27 km) northwest of downtown. The area was originally inhabited by Potawatomi, Ottawa, and Ojibwa peoples. Settled in 1835 by Socrates Rand of Massachusetts, for whom the...

river rising in Kenosha county, southeastern Wisconsin, U.S., and flowing south into Illinois through the northwestern suburbs of Chicago to Lyons. It then continues southwest past Lockport and Joliet, where it joins the Kankakee River after a course of 110 miles (177 km). The Illinois River is formed by the confluence of the Des Plaines and Kankakee rivers....

one of the greatest composers of Renaissance Europe....

one of the greatest composers of Renaissance Europe....

...advocated the separation of church and state and the freedoms of conscience, education, and the press. Though he attacked the Gallicanism of the French bishops and the French monarchy in his book Des progrès de la révolution et de la guerre contre l’Église (1829; “On the Progress of the Revolution and the War Against the Church”), this work showe...

...by Marie Uguay, stricken at a young age by cancer. Surrealism remains an important influence in Quebec poetry, particularly in the expression of eroticism, as, for example, in the poetry of Roger Des Roches (Le Coeur complet: poésie et prose, 1974–1982 [2000; “The Complete Heart: Poetry and Prose, 1974–1982”). Homosexual eroticism and the......

...it is commonly used to describe the pall of automotive or industrial origin that lies over many cities, and its composition is variable (see video). The term was probably first used in 1905 by H.A. Des Voeux to describe atmospheric conditions over many British towns. It was popularized in 1911 by Des Voeux’s report to the Manchester Conference of the Smoke Abatement League of Great Brita...

Javanese epic poem written in 1365 by Prapañcā. Considered the most important work of the vernacular literature that developed in the Majapahit era, the poem venerates King Hayam Wuruk (reigned 1350–89) and gives a detailed account of life in his kingdom. It also includes information about King Kertanagara (reigned 1268–92), great-...

In the Northwest the Desaguadero River and its tributaries in the Andes Mountains water the sandy deserts of Mendoza province. The principal tributaries are the Jáchal, Zanjón, San Juan, Mendoza, Tunuyán, and Diamante. In the northern Pampas, Lake Mar Chiquita, the largest lake in Argentina, receives the waters of the Dulce, Primero, and Segundo rivers but has no outlet.......

river and outlet of Lake Nicaragua, issuing from the lake’s southeastern end at San Carlos and flowing along the Nicaragua–Costa Rica border into the Caribbean Sea at San Juan del Norte. It receives the San Carlos and Sarapiquí rivers during its 124-mi (199-km) southeasterly course through tropical forests, and near its mouth it forms three arms, the Juanillo Menor to the nort...

...than 25 rivers empty their waters into Titicaca; the largest, the Ramis, draining about two-fifths of the entire Titicaca Basin, enters the northwestern corner of the lake. One small river, the Desaguadero, drains the lake at its southern end. This single outlet empties only 5 percent of the lake’s excess water; the rest is lost by evaporation under the fierce sun and strong winds of the...

English-language Indian novelist and author of children’s books who excelled in evoking character and mood through visual images ranging from the meteorologic to the botanical....

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prime minister of India (1977–79), first leader of sovereign India not to represent the long-ruling Congress Party....

prime minister of India (1977–79), first leader of sovereign India not to represent the long-ruling Congress Party....

French military hero who led forces in the German, Egyptian, and Italian campaigns of the French Revolutionary Wars (from 1792)....

the removal of dissolved salts from seawater and in some cases from the brackish waters of inland seas, highly mineralized groundwaters (e.g., geothermal brines), and municipal waste waters. This process renders such otherwise unusable waters fit for human consumption, irrigation, industrial applications, and various other purposes. Existing desalination technology requir...

the removal of dissolved salts from seawater and in some cases from the brackish waters of inland seas, highly mineralized groundwaters (e.g., geothermal brines), and municipal waste waters. This process renders such otherwise unusable waters fit for human consumption, irrigation, industrial applications, and various other purposes. Existing desalination technology requir...

the removal of dissolved salts from seawater and in some cases from the brackish waters of inland seas, highly mineralized groundwaters (e.g., geothermal brines), and municipal waste waters. This process renders such otherwise unusable waters fit for human consumption, irrigation, industrial applications, and various other purposes. Existing desalination technology requir...

In 1965 Albert DeSalvo, an inmate at a state mental hospital who had a history of burglary dating from the 1950s, confessed to the murders. Although never actually charged with the killings (there was no physical evidence linking him to the murder scenes), DeSalvo was convicted on charges of sexual assault and sentenced to life imprisonment. The case and DeSalvo’s life were portrayed in the...

French mathematician who figures prominently in the history of projective geometry. Desargues’s work was well known by his contemporaries, but half a century after his death he was forgotten. His work was rediscovered at the beginning of the 19th century, and one of his results became known as Desargues’s theorem....

in geometry, mathematical statement discovered by the French mathematician Girard Desargues in 1639 that motivated the development, in the first quarter of the 19th century, of projective geometry by another French mathematician, Jean-Victor Poncelet. The theorem states that if two triangles ABC and A′B′C′, situated in three-dimensional space, are related to...

...poetry (L’Accélérateur d’intensité [1987; “Accelerator of Intensity”]). Other poets have tended to integrate poetry and narrative—for example, Denise Desautels in La Promeneuse et l’oiseau suivi de Journal de la Promeneuse (1980; “The Wanderer and the Bird Followed by Journal of the Wanderer”)...

...(Le Chien [1987; “The Dog”]) and Michel Ouellette (French Town [1994]) won Canada’s Governor General’s Award for drama in French. Poet Patrice Desbiens explored the alienation of the Francophone minority in his bilingual poetry collection L’Homme invisible/The Invisible Man (1981). Novelist and sho...

...a principal focus in French schools, where battalions of healthy young men were trained to avenge the loss of Alsace-Lorraine to the Germans. It was in this heady nationalistic atmosphere that Edmond Desbonnet, a protégé of Triat and proponent of Swedish gymnastics, firmly established a physical culture tradition in the Francophone world. A great teacher and publicist, he......

French poet and woman of letters of the Romantic period....

English soldier, Oliver Cromwell’s brother-in-law, who played a prominent part in Commonwealth politics....

English soldier, Oliver Cromwell’s brother-in-law, who played a prominent part in Commonwealth politics....

(Spanish: “shirtless one”), in Argentine history, during the regime of Juan Perón (ruled 1946–55, 1973–74), any of the impoverished and underprivileged Argentine workers who were Perón’s chief supporters....

(from Latin discantus, “song apart”), countermelody either composed or improvised above a familiar melody. Descant can also refer to an instrument of higher-than-normal pitch, such as a descant recorder. In late medieval music, discantus referred to a particular style of organum featuring one or more countermelodies added to a newly rhythmicized ...

...16th to the 18th century. The viol shares with the Renaissance lute the tuning of its six strings (two fourths, a major third, two fourths) and the gut frets on its neck. It was made in three sizes: treble, tenor, and bass, with the bottom string tuned, respectively, to d, G (or A), and D. To these sizes was later added the violone, a double bass viol often tuned an octave below the bass....

French mathematician, scientist, and philosopher. Because he was one of the first to abandon scholastic Aristotelianism, because he formulated the first modern version of mind-body dualism, from which stems the mind-body problem, and because he promoted the development of a new science grounded in observation and experiment, he has been call...

In his book Descartes: The Project of Pure Inquiry (1978), Williams gave a compelling description of the ideal of objectivity in science, which he called the “absolute conception” of reality. According to this conception, different human perspectives on and representations of the world are the product of interaction between human beings, as constituents of......

...and the sclera. The cornea is the transparent window of the eye. It contains five distinguishable layers; the epithelium, or outer covering; Bowman’s membrane; the stroma, or supporting structure; Descemet’s membrane; and the endothelium, or inner lining. Up to 90 percent of the thickness of the cornea is made up of the stroma. The epithelium, which is a continuation of the epithe...

...the social contradictions inherent in his position as a member of a wealthy family who sympathized with the working class. His novel Kain no matsuei (1917; Descendants of Cain), dealing with the miserable condition of tenant farmers in Hokkaido, brought his first fame. Nature is the central character’s enemy; his fierce fight against it, ...

...backflow of blood from the aorta into the heart. The aorta emerges from the heart as the ascending aorta, turns to the left and arches over the heart (the aortic arch), and passes downward as the descending aorta. The left and right coronary arteries branch from the ascending aorta to supply the heart muscle. The three main arteries branch from the aortic arch and give rise to further......

The descending colon passes down and in front of the left kidney and the left side of the posterior abdominal wall to the iliac crest (the upper border of the hipbone). The descending colon is more likely than the ascending colon to be surrounded by peritoneum....

...the superior duodenum from the pylorus of the stomach, triggering the release of pancreas-stimulating hormones from glands in the duodenal wall. Ducts from the pancreas and gallbladder enter at the descending duodenum, bringing bicarbonate to neutralize the acid in the gastric secretions, pancreatic enzymes to further digestion, and bile salts to emulsify fat. The mucous lining of the last two....

Many regions of the brain can influence the input arriving at lower levels of the nervous system. This descending inhibition can be selective, with different regions of the brain inhibiting certain inputs to the spinal cord. Some regions reduce mechanoreceptive input, and others reduce noxious and warmth inputs. Descending inhibition can also reduce input from the skin while increasing input......

...are measured. The angle VSN, in degrees of arc, is the longitude of the ascending node, i.e., of the point where the moving planet passes north of the plane of Earth’s orbit. M, the descending node, is where the planet passes from north to south. The sum of the angles subtended at S by the arcs VN and NA is called the longitude of the perihelion. It defines the direction of the......

...of the muscle spindle also can be influenced through other neural pathways that control the general level of excitability of the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord). Activity of the descending reticular formation (a network of cells in the brainstem) may enhance the contraction of the spindle and therefore influence its neural discharges....

...the spinal cord: (1) the dorsal horns, composed of sensory neurons, (2) the lateral horns, well defined in thoracic segments and composed of visceral neurons, and (3) the ventral horns, composed of motor neurons. The white matter forming the ascending and descending spinal tracts is grouped in three paired funiculi, or sectors: the dorsal or posterior funiculi, lying between the dorsal horns;.....

...of which is also dominated by a planet. Scattered at various points throughout the ecliptic are the planets’ degrees of exaltation (high influence), opposite to which are their degrees of dejection (low influence). Various arcs of the zodiac, then, are either primarily or secondarily subject to each planet, whose strength and influence in a geniture (nativity) depend partially on its......

theory in biology postulating that the various types of plants, animals, and other living things on Earth have their origin in other preexisting types and that the distinguishable differences are due to modifications in successive generations. The theory of evolution is one of the fundamental keystones of modern biological theory....

the system of acknowledged social parentage, which varies from society to society, whereby a person may claim kinship ties with another. If no limitation were placed on the recognition of kinship, everybody would be kin to everyone else; but in most societies some limitation is imposed on the perception of common ancestry, so that a person regards many of his associates as not h...

...and strong linear rhythms of the figures in Volterra’s fresco frieze (1541) in the Massimi Palace depicting the story of Fabius Maximus. In that same year he painted his most famous work, the “Descent from the Cross” in the Church of Trinità de’ Monti, Rome. The dynamically posed, monumental figures in this powerful and agitated composition make it one of the ...

The other major system that Polynesians used to organize descent groups is known as the descent line. Descent line organization appears to be the result of a breakdown in genealogical ties between the lower levels of a ramage organization. The descent line in Samoa, for example, consists of a group of people tracing descent in the male line from a common mythical ancestor. This group was known......

...unrelieved by any hope of salvation through human effort or divine compassion. The dead were, in fact, among the most dreaded beings in early Mesopotamian demonology. In a myth called “The Descent of Ishtar to the Underworld,” the fertility goddess decides to visit kur-nu-gi-a (“the land of no return”), where the dead “live in darkness, eat clay, and......

...unrelieved by any hope of salvation through human effort or divine compassion. The dead were, in fact, among the most dreaded beings in early Mesopotamian demonology. In a myth called “The Descent of Ishtar to the Underworld,” the fertility goddess decides to visit kur-nu-gi-a (“the land of no return”), where the dead “live in darkness, eat clay, and......

...observations) that some animals are notably more complicated than others, in ways that probably include differences in behaviour and intelligence. It was, however, the publication of Darwin’s Descent of Man (1871) that stimulated scientific interest in the question of mental continuity between man and other animals. Darwin’s young colleague, George Romanes, compiled a syste...

poet prominent in the development of Romanticism....

poet prominent in the development of Romanticism....

poet and author of L’Art de dictier (1392), the first treatise on French versification....

French political figure who was an important parliamentary leader during the Third Republic and served as its 10th president (Feb. 17 to Sept. 20, 1920)....

...in his portraits. Friedrich Hagenauer, active in Munich and in Augsburg (1527–32), produced more than 230 medals. In Nürnberg, Matthes Gebel (active 1525–54) and his follower Joachim Deschler (active 1540–69) were the principal medalists. Ludwig Neufahrer worked mainly in Nürnberg and the Austrian Habsburg domains, employed by Ferdinand I from 1545. The Italia...

vanadate mineral containing lead, copper, and zinc that usually forms brownish red to blackish brown crusts of intergrown crystals or rounded fibrous masses; its physical appearance is varied, however, and specimens have been found in shades from orange-red to black and various greens. The chemical formula for descloizite is (Zn,Cu)PbVO4(OH). Descloizite forms a solid-solution series w...

French writer and translator who was a respected member of the literary establishment but gained her greatest fame in 1994 when it was confirmed that she was the author, under the pseudonym Pauline Réage, of the sensational erotic best-seller Histoire d’O, published in 1954 and later translated into at least 20 languages (b. Sept. 23, 1907, Rochefort, France--d. April 30, 1998...

...Muntaner’s account of the Grand Catalan Company’s expedition to the Morea in southern Greece and of James II’s conquest of Sardinia were distinguished by skill of narration and quality of language. Bernat Desclot’s chronicle deals with the reign of Peter I the Great; though the account of Peter IV the Ceremonious is ascribed to Bernat Desclot, it was planned and revi...

a synonym for lai, a medieval Provençal lyric in which the stanzas are nonuniform. The term also refers to a poem in medieval Provençal literature with stanzas in different languages. Derived from Old French and Old Provençal, the word literally means “a quarrel” or “discord.”...

After studying medicine, Varenius was attracted to geography by his acquaintance with geographers. In 1649 he published Descriptio Regni Japoniae (“Description of the Kingdom of Japan”), which in addition to describing Japan included a Latin translation of an account of Siam (Thailand), possibly by the Dutch navigator Willem Corneliszoon Schouten, and excerpts from the Arab......

...at an early stage another category that was quite different in focus and yet reflected a very vigorous aspect of the Arabic poetic tradition from the outset: description (waṣf). Analysts of the earliest poetry chose to devote particular attention to the ways in which poets depicted animals and other aspects of nature and often indulged in complex......

...subject of considerable philosophical controversy. One widely accepted account, however—substantially that presented in Principia Mathematica and known as Russell’s theory of descriptions, after Bertrand Russell—holds that “The ϕ is ψぷさい” is to be understood as meaning that exactly one thing is ϕ and that thing is also ...

...(site of Minneapolis, Minn.). Hennepin was rescued by the French voyageur Daniel Greysolon, Sieur Dulhut, in July 1680. Returning to France in 1682, he wrote a full account of his exploits, Description de la Louisiane (1683), later revised as Nouvelle découverte d’un très grand pays situé dans l’Amérique (1697; “New Discovery of a V...

...was the culmination of 18th-century interest in the East. The expedition was accompanied by a team of scholars who recorded the ancient and contemporary country, issuing in 1809–28 the Description de l’Égypte, the most comprehensive study to be made before the decipherment of the hieroglyphic script. The renowned Rosetta Stone, which bears a decree of Ptolemy V...

...In either case, the total and irreversible loss of these functions dramatically alters the ontological status of the subject. Descartes specifically considered the example of death. In “La Description du corps humain” (1664) he wrote that “although movements cease in the body when it is dead and the soul departs, one cannot deduce from these facts that the soul produced......

...senses and God, being immaterial, cannot be sensed? His answer is to distinguish between knowing something by being acquainted with it through sensation and knowing something through a description. Knowledge by description is possible using concepts formed on the basis of sensation. Thus, all knowledge of God depends upon the description that he is “the thing than which a greater cannot....

...Il libro del cortegiano (1528; The Book of Courtesy, 1561). Further elaborations by English authorities—e.g., Richard Brathwaite’s The English Gentleman and Description of a Good Wife—arrived in colonial America with passengers of the “Mayflower.” These British imports were soon followed by such indigenous products as the man...

...a collection of shorter pieces, Beim Bau der chinesischen Mauer (The Great Wall of China), in 1931. Such early works by Kafka as Description of a Struggle (begun about 1904) and Meditation, though their style is more concretely imaged and their structure more incoherent than that of the later......

Greek traveler and geographer whose Periegesis Hellados (Description of Greece) is an invaluable guide to ancient ruins....

...saw North America again. His writings include detailed descriptions of Virginia and New England, books on seamanship, and a history of English colonization. Among his books are A Description of New England (1616), a counterpart to his Map of Virginia with a Description of the Country (1612); The Generall Historie of......

After studying medicine, Varenius was attracted to geography by his acquaintance with geographers. In 1649 he published Descriptio Regni Japoniae (“Description of the Kingdom of Japan”), which in addition to describing Japan included a Latin translation of an account of Siam (Thailand), possibly by the Dutch navigator Willem Corneliszoon Schouten, and excerpts from the Arab......

His contributions to this powerful mathematical invention are contained in two treatises: Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio (Description of the Marvelous Canon of Logarithms), which was published in 1614, and Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Constructio (Construction of the Marvelous Canon of Logarithms), which was published two years after his death. In......

...Manuscripts of these are in the National Library of Scotland and other libraries. Other maps and charts prepared by Adair also exist in manuscript. In 1703 he published the first part of his Description of the Sea-coast and Islands of Scotland, With Large and Exact Maps, for the Use of Seamen. The second part was never printed. Judging from his scrupulous delineations, Adair’s sea...

...then stands for the single value of a that makes αあるふぁ true. An expression of the form “the so-and-so” is called a definite description; and (ιいおたx), known as a description operator, can be thought of as forming a name of an individual out of a proposition form. (ιいおたx) is analogous to a quantifier in that, when prefixed to a wff αあるふぁ, it binds......

The power of Frege’s logic to dispel philosophical problems was immediately recognized. Consider, for instance, the hoary problem of “non-being.” In the novel Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll, the messenger says he passed nobody on the road, and he is met with the observation, “Nobody walks slower than you.” To this the messenger replies,.....

The primary purpose of descriptive bibliography is to organize detailed information culled from a mass of materials in a systematic way so that others can have access to useful information. In the earliest bibliographies, the organizing principle was simply that of compiling all the works of a given writer into a list created either by the works’ author (autobibliography) or by an author...

...ordering, librarianship has developed an extensive set of attributes in terms of which it describes each item in the collection. The rules for assigning these attributes are called cataloging rules. Descriptive cataloging is the extraction of bibliographic elements (author names, title, publisher, date of publication, etc.) from each item; the assignment of subject categories or headings to suc...

the empirical (observational) study of the moral beliefs and practices of different peoples and cultures in various places and times. It aims not only to elaborate such beliefs and practices but also to understand them insofar as they are causally conditioned by social, economic, and geographic circumstances. Comparative ethics, in contrast to normative ethics, is thus the proper subject matter of...