(Translated by https://www.hiragana.jp/)
Encyclopedia - Britannica Online Encyclopedia
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  • Madhya Bharat National Park (national park, India)
    national park in northern Madhya Pradesh state, central India. It has an area of 61 square miles (158 square km). Originally the private game preserve of the rulers of the former princely state of Gwalior, the park was established as Madhya Bharat National Park in 1955. It received its present name in 1959. Located about 70 miles (110 km) south of Gwalior town on the main Bombay–Āgr...
  • Madhya Bharat Pathar (plateau, India)
    plateau comprising the northern part of the Central Highlands, central India. Extending over approximately 22,000 square miles (57,000 square km) and including most of northwestern Madhya Pradesh state and central Rājasthān state, it is bounded by the East Rājasthān Uplands on the west, the Upper Ganges Plain on the north, the Bundelkhand Upland on the east, and the M...
  • Madhya Bharat Plateau (plateau, India)
    plateau comprising the northern part of the Central Highlands, central India. Extending over approximately 22,000 square miles (57,000 square km) and including most of northwestern Madhya Pradesh state and central Rājasthān state, it is bounded by the East Rājasthān Uplands on the west, the Upper Ganges Plain on the north, the Bundelkhand Upland on the east, and the M...
  • Madhya Pradesh (state, India)
    state of India, extending over 114,705 square miles (297,085 square km). As its name implies—madhya means “central” and pradesh means “region” or “state”—it is situated in the heart of India. The state has no coastline and no international frontier. The capital is Bho...
  • Madhyadesh (historical region, India)
    low-lying, alluvial region in northwestern Uttar Pradesh state, northern India. The Rohilkhand is part of the Upper Ganges Plain and has an area of about 10,000 square miles (25,000 square km). It is bounded by the Ganges River on the south and the west and by the frontiers of China and Nepal on the north. The region is referred to as the Madhyadesh in the Hindu epics the Mahābhā...
  • madhyama-pratipada (Buddhism)
    in Buddhism, complement of general and specific ethical practices and philosophical views that are said to facilitate enlightenment by avoiding the extremes of self-gratification on one hand and self-mortification on the other. See Eightfold Path....
  • “Madhyamagama” (Buddhist literature)
    2. Majjhima Nikaya (“Medium [Length] Collection”; Sanskrit Madhyamagama), 152 suttas, some of them attributed to disciples, covering nearly all aspects of Buddhism. Included are texts dealing with monastic life, the excesses of asceticism, the evils of caste, Buddha’s debates with the Jains, and meditation, together with basic doctrinal and ethical......
  • madhyamagrāma (Indian music)
    ...scale the interval ṛi-pa (E- to A) contains 10 śrutis; i.e., one more than the nine of the consonant fourth. Comparably, in the madhyamagrāma scale the interval ṣa-pa (D to A-) contains 12 śrutis, or one fewer than the consonant fifth. These variances involve the consonant......
  • Mādhyamika (Buddhist school)
    (Sanskrit: “Intermediate”), important school in the Mahāyāna (“Great Vehicle”) Buddhist tradition. Its name derives from its having sought a middle position between the realism of the Sarvāstivāda (“Doctrine That All Is Real”) school and the idealism of the Yogācāra (“Mind Only”) school. The most ren...
  • “Mādhyamika Kārikā” (work by Nagarjuna)
    (Sanskrit: “Fundamentals of the Middle Way”), Buddhist text by Nāgārjuna, the exponent of the Mādhyamika (Middle Way) school of Mahāyāna Buddhism. It is a work that combines stringent logic and religious vision in a lucid presentation of the doctrine of ultimate “emptiness.”...
  • “Madhyamika-sastra” (work by Nagarjuna)
    (Sanskrit: “Fundamentals of the Middle Way”), Buddhist text by Nāgārjuna, the exponent of the Mādhyamika (Middle Way) school of Mahāyāna Buddhism. It is a work that combines stringent logic and religious vision in a lucid presentation of the doctrine of ultimate “emptiness.”...
  • Madi (people)
    group of more than 150,000 people who inhabit both banks of the Nile River in northwestern Uganda and in The Sudan. They speak a Central Sudanic language of the Nilo-Saharan language family and are closely related to the Lugbara, their neighbours to the west....
  • Ma’di (people)
    group of more than 150,000 people who inhabit both banks of the Nile River in northwestern Uganda and in The Sudan. They speak a Central Sudanic language of the Nilo-Saharan language family and are closely related to the Lugbara, their neighbours to the west....
  • Madia (plant)
    any sticky, hairy plant of the genus Madia of the family Asteraceae, consisting of about 18 species. They are native to western North and South America....
  • madia oil plant (plant)
    A few species are grown as garden plants for their yellow or brownish yellow flowers and strong odour. The madia oil plant (M. sativa) is raised in Chile for its oil content....
  • Madia sativa (plant)
    A few species are grown as garden plants for their yellow or brownish yellow flowers and strong odour. The madia oil plant (M. sativa) is raised in Chile for its oil content....
  • Madigan, Cecil Thomas (Australian geologist)
    ...1845 and was called (together with Sturt’s Stony Desert) the Arunta Desert on a chart prepared by T. Griffith Taylor in 1926. After engaging in an aerial survey of the region in 1929, the geologist Cecil Thomas Madigan named it for A.A. Simpson, the then president of the South Australian Branch of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia. Madigan’s crossing of the desert (by ...
  • madīḥ (Arabic literature)
    ...movements that describe the poet’s horse or camel, scenes of desert events, and other aspects of Bedouin life and warfare. The main theme of the qasida (the madīḥ, or panegyric, the poet’s tribute to himself, his tribe, or his patron) is often disguised in these vivid descriptive passages, which are the chief glory...
  • Madikizela, Nkosikazi Nobandle Nomzano (South African leader)
    South African social worker and activist considered by many black South Africans to be the “Mother of the Nation.” She was the second wife of Nelson Mandela, from whom she separated in 1992 after her questionable behaviour and unrestrained militancy alienated fellow antiapartheid activists, including her husband....
  • Madikizela, Nomzamo Winifred (South African leader)
    South African social worker and activist considered by many black South Africans to be the “Mother of the Nation.” She was the second wife of Nelson Mandela, from whom she separated in 1992 after her questionable behaviour and unrestrained militancy alienated fellow antiapartheid activists, including her husband....
  • Madikizela-Mandela, Winnie (South African leader)
    South African social worker and activist considered by many black South Africans to be the “Mother of the Nation.” She was the second wife of Nelson Mandela, from whom she separated in 1992 after her questionable behaviour and unrestrained militancy alienated fellow antiapartheid activists, including her husband....
  • Madilu, Jean Bialu (Congolese musician)
    Congolese musician who was a singer and a composer who reached near legendary status in Africa, notably in duets with Franco Luambo Makiadi, including “Mario” and “Reponse de Mario” in 1985 and “La Vie des hommes” in 1986. Madilu’s career in music began in 1969, but he achieved wide fame as a distinctive vocalist and composer after he was discovered...
  • Madilu System (Congolese musician)
    Congolese musician who was a singer and a composer who reached near legendary status in Africa, notably in duets with Franco Luambo Makiadi, including “Mario” and “Reponse de Mario” in 1985 and “La Vie des hommes” in 1986. Madilu’s career in music began in 1969, but he achieved wide fame as a distinctive vocalist and composer after he was discovered...
  • Maʿdin, al- (Spain)
    town, Ciudad Real provincia (province), in the comunidad autónoma (autonomous community) of Castile-La Mancha, west-central Spain. Almadén is located in one of the world’s richest mercury-producing regions....
  • Madina, Al- (Saudi Arabia)
    city located in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) inland from the Red Sea and 275 miles from Mecca by road. With Mecca, it is one of Islām’s two holiest cities....
  • Madina do Boé (Guinea-Bissau)
    town located on the Corubal River in southeastern Guinea-Bissau. It was the site of the declaration of independence put forth in 1973 by the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (Partido Africano da Independência da Guiné e Cabo Verde; PAIGC). The mayor of Bissau city, Juvencio Gomes, announced at the cou...
  • madīnah (urban centre)
    ...cities retain at least some of their traditional character and charm. During the period of the French protectorate, colonial authorities did not tamper with the traditional urban centres, or medinas (madīnahs), which were usually surrounded by walls. Rather than modifying these traditional centres to accommodate new infrastructure for......
  • Madīnah, Al- (Saudi Arabia)
    city located in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) inland from the Red Sea and 275 miles from Mecca by road. With Mecca, it is one of Islām’s two holiest cities....
  • Madīnah al-Munawwarah, Al- (Saudi Arabia)
    city located in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) inland from the Red Sea and 275 miles from Mecca by road. With Mecca, it is one of Islām’s two holiest cities....
  • Madinah Antakira (Spain)
    city, Málaga provincia (province), in the comunidad autónoma (autonomous community) of Andalusia, southern Spain, northwest of Málaga, at the foot of the Sierra del Torcal. Neolithic dolmens (Menga, Viera, and El Romeral) attest to prehistori...
  • Madīnah ʿĪsā (Bahrain)
    planned community in the state and emirate of Bahrain, north-central Bahrain island, in the Persian Gulf. Conceived and underwritten by the Bahraini government as a residential settlement, it was laid out on an uninhabited site by British town planners in the early 1960s; the first units were occupied in 1968. The town is named for Sheikh ʿĪsā ibn Salmān Āl Khal...
  • Madīnat al-Fayyūm (Egypt)
    capital of Al-Fayyūm muḥāfaẓah (governorate), Egypt. The town is located in the southeastern part of the governorate, on the site of the ancient centre of the region, called Shedet in pharaonic times and Crocodilopolis, later Arsinoe, in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. Its ruins to the northwest of the city date to at least the 12th dynasty (1...
  • Madīnat al-Salām (Iraq)
    city, capital of Iraq and capital of Baghdad governorate, central Iraq. Its location, on the Tigris River about 330 miles (530 km) from the headwaters of the Persian Gulf, is in the heart of ancient Mesopotamia. Baghdad is Iraq’s largest city and one of the most populous urban agglomerations of the Middle East. The city was founded in 762 as the capital of the ʿAbbāsi...
  • Madīnat al-Shaʿb (Yemen)
    town, southern Yemen, former administrative capital of Yemen (Aden). The town is located on the Little Aden Peninsula on the western side of Al-Tawāhī Bay (Aden Harbour), across from Aden city. It was founded in 1959 as Al-Ittiḥād (Arabic: “Unity”) and was at first the capital of the Protectorate of South Arabia under ...
  • Madīnat Habu (archaeological site, Thebes, Egypt)
    the necropolis region of western Thebes in Upper Egypt that is enclosed by the outer walls of the mortuary temple built there by Ramses III (1187–56 bce). This temple, which was also dedicated to the god Amon, was carved with religious scenes and portrayals of Ramses’ wars against the Libyans, ...
  • Madīnat ʿĪsā (Bahrain)
    planned community in the state and emirate of Bahrain, north-central Bahrain island, in the Persian Gulf. Conceived and underwritten by the Bahraini government as a residential settlement, it was laid out on an uninhabited site by British town planners in the early 1960s; the first units were occupied in 1968. The town is named for Sheikh ʿĪsā ibn Salmān Āl Khal...
  • Madīnat Rasūl Allāh (Saudi Arabia)
    city located in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, about 100 miles (160 kilometres) inland from the Red Sea and 275 miles from Mecca by road. With Mecca, it is one of Islām’s two holiest cities....
  • Madioen (regency and city, Indonesia)
    kotamadya (municipality) in East Java (Jawa Timur) propinsi (province), Java, Indonesia. The city lies on the east bank of the Madiun River. The population is mostly Indonesian and Chinese. The city was the scene of a short-lived communist rebellion, the so-called Madiun Affair, in 1948, and it maintains a site at which hundreds of soldiers killed in the Indonesian...
  • Madison (Wisconsin, United States)
    city, capital (1838) of Wisconsin, U.S., and seat (1836) of Dane county. Madison, Wisconsin’s second largest city, lies in the south-central part of the state, centred on an isthmus between Lakes Mendota and Monona (which, with Lakes Waubesa and Kegonsa to the southeast, form the “four lakes” group), about 75 miles (120 km) west of Milwaukee...
  • Madison (county, Ohio, United States)
    city, capital (1838) of Wisconsin, U.S., and seat (1836) of Dane county. Madison, Wisconsin’s second largest city, lies in the south-central part of the state, centred on an isthmus between Lakes Mendota and Monona (which, with Lakes Waubesa and Kegonsa to the southeast, form the “four lakes” group), about 75 miles (120 km) west of Milwaukee...
  • Madison (county, New York, United States)
    county, central New York state, U.S., mostly comprising a rugged upland, bounded by Oneida Lake and Chittenango and Oneida creeks to the north and the Unadilla River to the southeast. Other waterways include the Chenango and Sangerfield rivers and Cazenovia and Tuscarora lakes. Wooded areas feature maple, elm, birch, and beech trees. Public lands include Chittenango Falls State ...
  • Madison (borough, New Jersey, United States)
    borough (town), Morris county, northeastern New Jersey, U.S. It lies 18 miles (29 km) west of Newark. The borough of Madison includes the communities of Montville, Wood Ridge, and Hopewell Valley. The centre of a greenhouse industry and nicknamed the “Rose City,” it is the site of Drew University (chartered 1868) and the Florha...
  • Madison (South Dakota, United States)
    city, seat (1873) of Lake county, southeastern South Dakota, U.S. It lies about 50 miles (80 km) northwest of Sioux Falls. In 1870 settlers William Lee and Charles Walker arrived in the area and named it for Madison, Wisconsin, which was near their previous home. The community was laid out on Lake Madison in 1875 after having been chosen as ...
  • Madison (Indiana, United States)
    city, seat (1811) of Jefferson county, southeastern Indiana, U.S. It lies along the Ohio River (bridged), opposite Milton, Ky. Settled about 1808 and named for President James Madison, it flourished as a river port until overshadowed by Louisville, Ky. (46 miles [74 km] southwestward downstream), and Cincinnati, Ohio (70 miles [113 km] upstream). The town was the southern terminus of the Madison a...
  • Madison (Texas, United States)
    city, seat (1852) of Orange county, southeastern Texas, U.S. It lies at the Louisiana state line. Orange is a deepwater port on the Sabine River, which has been canalized to connect with the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway. It is linked to Beaumont and Port Arthur by the tall Rainbow Bridge (1938), built to allow passage of the...
  • Madison Boulder (erratic, New Hampshire, United States)
    ...Trail crosses Crawford Notch State Park in the northwest. Other public lands include Wentworth, White Lake, and Echo Lake state parks and Pine River and Hemenway state forests. A landmark is the Madison Boulder, one of the largest granite glacial erratics, measuring 83 feet (25 metres) tall and 37 feet (11 metres) wide. The county is largely forested with pine, maple, and birch, except for......
  • Madison, Dolley (American first lady)
    American first lady (1809–17), the wife of James Madison, fourth president of the United States. Raised in the plain style of her Quaker family, she was renowned for her charm, warmth, and ingenuity. Her popularity as manager of the White House made that task a responsibility of every first lady who followed....
  • Madison, Dolly (American first lady)
    American first lady (1809–17), the wife of James Madison, fourth president of the United States. Raised in the plain style of her Quaker family, she was renowned for her charm, warmth, and ingenuity. Her popularity as manager of the White House made that task a responsibility of every first lady who followed....
  • Madison, Guy (American actor)
    (ROBERT OZELL MOSELEY), U.S. film and television actor who starred as television’s Wild Bill Hickok (1951-58) and in some 85 motion pictures, mostly westerns (b. Jan. 19, 1922--d. Feb. 6, 1996)....
  • Madison, Helene (American athlete)
    American swimmer, the outstanding performer in women’s freestyle competition between 1930 and 1932. She won three Olympic gold medals and at her peak held every American freestyle record....
  • Madison Island (island, French Polynesia)
    volcanic island of the northwestern Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia, in the central South Pacific Ocean. Nuku Hiva is the Marquesas’ principal island. It is also widely regarded as the most beautiful of the Marquesas. Its rugged wooded terrain rises to Mount Tekao (3,888 feet [1,185 metres]) and is drained by small streams. There ...
  • Madison, James (president of United States)
    fourth president of the United States (1809–17) and one of the Founding Fathers of his country. At the Constitutional Convention (1787), he influenced the planning and ratification of the U.S. Constitution and collaborated with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay in the publication of the Federalist papers. As a member ...
  • Madison River (river, United States)
    river in southwestern Montana and northwestern Wyoming, U.S. The Madison River rises in the northwestern corner of Yellowstone National Park at the junction of the Gibbon and Firehole rivers. It flows west through Hebgen Lake (impounded by a dam) into southwestern Montana, then turns north between the Madison Range (to the east) and the Grav...
  • Madison Square Garden (arena, New York City, New York, United States)
    indoor sports arena in New York City. The original Madison Square Garden (1874) was a converted railroad station at Madison Square; in 1891 a sports arena was built on the site, designed by Stanford White and dedicated chiefly to boxing. In 1925 a new Madison Square Garden was built at Eighth Avenue and 50th Street, with an arena suitable for basketball, hockey, and other sports; it was the site ...
  • Madison Square Theatre (theatre, New York City, New York, United States)
    ...were seeking a means of effecting scene changes that would not require an intermission. In 1879, MacKaye filed a patent for a “double stage,” a feature he subsequently introduced in the Madison Square Theatre in New York City. He built an elevator platform on which one scene might be set while an earlier scene was being played below. The new scene was then merely lowered, with its...
  • Madison University (university, Hamilton, New York, United States)
    private, coeducational institution of higher learning in Hamilton, New York, U.S. The university offers a liberal arts curriculum for undergraduates and several master’s degree programs. Campus facilities include an automated observatory, the Dana Arts Center, and the Longyear Museum of Anthropology. Total enrollment exceeds 2,700....
  • Madison v. Marbury (law case)
    (Feb. 24, 1803), landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision, the first instance in which the high court declared an act of Congress unconstitutional, thus establishing the doctrine of judicial review....
  • Madiun (regency and city, Indonesia)
    kotamadya (municipality) in East Java (Jawa Timur) propinsi (province), Java, Indonesia. The city lies on the east bank of the Madiun River. The population is mostly Indonesian and Chinese. The city was the scene of a short-lived communist rebellion, the so-called Madiun Affair, in 1948, and it maintains a site at which hundreds of soldiers killed in the Indonesian...
  • Madiun Affair (Indonesian history)
    communist rebellion against the Hatta-Sukarno government of Indonesia, which originated in Madiun, a town in eastern Java, in September 1948. The Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) had been declared illegal by the Dutch following uprisings in 1926–27; it was officially reestablished on Oct. 21, 1945, when an independent Indonesia was proclaimed after World War II. The comm...
  • Mädler, Johann Heinrich von (German astronomer)
    German astronomer who (with Wilhelm Beer) published the most complete map of the Moon of the time, Mappa Selenographica, 4 vol. (1834–36). It was the first lunar map to be divided into quadrants, and it remained unsurpassed in its detail until J.F. Julius Schmidt’s map of 1878. The Mappa Selenographica was accompanied in 1837 by a volume providing mic...
  • Madman or Saint (work by Echegaray y Eizaguirre)
    ...but, under the influence of Henrik Ibsen and others, he turned to thesis drama in his later work. He often displayed his thesis by use of a satiric reversal; in O locura o santidad (1877; Madman or Saint), he showed that honesty is condemned as madness by society. In all his plays his manner is melodramatic. Though forgotten now, he achieved tremendous popularity in his day......
  • Madness (British music group)
    ...a significant influence on British pop culture, and so-called 2-Tone groups (whose name derived from both the suits they wore and their often integrated lineups) such as the Specials, Selector, and Madness brought punk and more pop into ska. Madness’s music crossed the Atlantic Ocean and contributed to the success of ska’s third wave of popularity, in the mid-1980s in the United S...
  • madness (law)
    in criminal law, condition of mental disorder or mental defect that relieves a person of criminal responsibility for his conduct. Tests of insanity used in law are not intended to be scientific definitions of mental disorder; rather, they are expected to identify persons whose incapacity is of such character and extent that criminal responsibility should be denied on grounds of social expediency ...
  • madness
    any illness with significant psychological or behavioral manifestations that is associated with either a painful or distressing symptom or an impairment in one or more important areas of functioning....
  • Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason (work by Foucault)
    Many of these critical themes were implicit in Foucault’s early works Madness and Civilization (1961) and The Order of Things (1966). In the former, he attempted to show how the notion of reason in Western philosophy and science had been defined and applied in terms of the beings—the “other”—it was thought to excl...
  • Madness of George III, The (play by Bennett)
    ...emotional delicacy, and a melancholy consciousness of life’s transience. The result is a drama, simultaneously hilarious and sad, of exceptional distinction. Bennett’s 1991 play, The Madness of George III, took his fascination with England’s past back to the 1780s and in doing so matched the widespread mood of retrospection with which British litera...
  • Madness of Heracles (work by Euripides)
    The title character of Madness of Heracles (c. 416 bc; Greek Hēraklēs mainomenos; Latin Hercules furens) is temporarily driven mad by the goddess Hera and kills his wife and children. Subsequently Heracles recovers his reason and, after recovering from suicidal despair, is taken to spend an honourable retirement at Athens....
  • Madness of King George, The (film by Hytner [1994])
    ...Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary for Pulp FictionAdapted Screenplay: Eric Roth for Forrest GumpCinematography: John Toll for Legends of the FallArt Direction: Ken Adam for The Madness of King GeorgeOriginal Score: Hans Zimmer for The Lion KingOriginal Song: “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” from The Lion King; music by Elton John, lyrics by...
  • Madoc ab Owain Gwynedd (Welsh legendary figure)
    legendary voyager to America, a son (if he existed at all) of Owain Gwynedd (d. 1170), prince of Gwynedd, in North Wales....
  • Madoera (island, Indonesia)
    island, Jawa Timur provinsi (province), Indonesia, off the northeastern coast of Java and separated from the city of Surabaya by a narrow, shallow channel. The island, which covers an area of 2,042 square miles (5,290 square km), has an undulating surface rising to 700 feet (210 metres) in the west and to more than 1,400 feet (430 metres) in the east....
  • Madog ab Owain Gwynedd (Welsh legendary figure)
    legendary voyager to America, a son (if he existed at all) of Owain Gwynedd (d. 1170), prince of Gwynedd, in North Wales....
  • Madog ap Maredudd (ruler of Powys)
    outstanding Welsh poet of the 12th century, court poet to Madog ap Maredudd, prince of Powys (d. 1160), and then to Madog’s enemy Owain Gwynedd, prince of Gwynedd (d. 1170). Cynddelw was also court poet to Owain Cyfeiliog (d. c. 1197) and is thought to be the author of poems traditionally attributed to Owain....
  • Madonie, Le (mountains, Italy)
    mountain range in Palermo provincia, northwest-central Sicily. The range extends for 30 miles (48 km) between the Torto River and the Nebrodi Mountains. Of limestone formation, its highest peaks are Antenna Peak, 6,480 feet (1,975 m), and Carbonara Peak, 6,493 feet (1,979 m). The Madonie is the source of several rivers and is known for its underground drainage system, which provides drinkin...
  • Madonie, Monti (mountains, Italy)
    mountain range in Palermo provincia, northwest-central Sicily. The range extends for 30 miles (48 km) between the Torto River and the Nebrodi Mountains. Of limestone formation, its highest peaks are Antenna Peak, 6,480 feet (1,975 m), and Carbonara Peak, 6,493 feet (1,979 m). The Madonie is the source of several rivers and is known for its underground drainage system, which provides drinkin...
  • Madonna (painting by Munch)
    ...faces melting so completely into each other that neither retains any individual features. An especially powerful image of the surrender, or transcendence, of individuality is Madonna (1894–95), which shows a naked woman with her head thrown back in ecstasy, her eyes closed, and a red halo-like shape above her flowing black hair. This may be understood as the....
  • Madonna (religious art)
    in Christian art, depiction of the Virgin Mary; the term is usually restricted to those representations that are devotional rather than narrative and that show her in a nonhistorical context and emphasize later doctrinal or sentimental significance. The Madonna is accompanied most often by the infant Christ, but there are several important types that show her...
  • Madonna (American singer and actress)
    American singer, songwriter, actress, and entrepreneur whose immense popularity in the 1980s and ’90s allowed her to achieve levels of power and control unprecedented for a woman in the entertainment industry....
  • Madonna and Child (religious art)
    ...space in his paintings, and he was above all concerned with his actors as humans carrying out some purposeful human activity. The only extant work by Masaccio that can be clearly dated is the Pisa altarpiece of 1426 (the central panel depicting the Madonna enthroned with Christ Child and angels, now in the National Gallery, London, is the largest surviving section). Although Masaccio......
  • Madonna and Child with Saints (painting by Bellini)
    ...that the medium seems to require. The oil paintings, however, emphasize by their use of light the textures of the objects represented, softening the outlines and creating an elegiac mood. The “Madonna and Child with Saints” of 1488, in Santa Maria dei Frari, Venice, derived its composition from the Florentine sacra conversazione and two earlier altarpieces by Mantegna......
  • Madonna and Child with Saints (altarpiece by Verrocchio)
    The only surviving painting that according to documentary proof should be by Verrocchio, an altarpiece of the Madonna and Child with Saints in the Donato de’ Medici Chapel of the cathedral at Pistoia, was not completed by the master himself. Largely executed by his pupil Lorenzo di Credi, its handling is inconsistent with that of the Baptis...
  • Madonna and Child with SS. Francis and Liberale (painting by Giorgione)
    ...of the 12th-century castle. The town was the birthplace of the painter Zorzi da Castelfranco, called Giorgione. The 18th-century cathedral contains one of Giorgione’s finest works, the “Madonna and Child with SS. Francis and Liberale” (1504), as well as frescoes by Paolo Veronese. The town’s manufactures include textiles and electrical apparatus. Pop. (2006 est.) mun...
  • Madonna and Child with SS. Joseph and Jerome (painting by Solari)
    ...fine portrait, “Man with a Pink [Carnation]” (c. 1492; National Gallery, London), which displays Antonello’s sculptural conception of form. Solari’s earliest dated work is a “Madonna and Child with SS. Joseph and Jerome” (Brera, Milan), with a fine landscape background, executed for the Church of San Pietro Martire at Murano in 1495. The Leonarde...
  • Madonna and Child with the Infant St. John (work by Michelangelo)
    ...While the statue (Madonna and Child) is blocky and immobile, the painting (Holy Family) and one of the reliefs (Madonna and Child with the Infant St. John) are full of motion; they show arms and legs of figures interweaving in actions that imply movement through time. The forms carry symbolic references......
  • Madonna and Child with Two Angels, The (painting by Lippi)
    ...(1437) from Tarquinia Corneto, relies on the Madonna from the Pisa altarpiece, but in his Christ Child Fra Filippo already reveals an earthiness and sweetness unlike anything by Masaccio. “The Madonna and Child with Two Angels” (Uffizi, Florence)—with its urchin-angels, lumpy Christ Child, and elegant Madonna—is perhaps one of his best-known late works; the......
  • Madonna and Martin van Nieuwenhove (work by Memling)
    ...while still in Rogier’s studio. He also imitated Rogier’s compositions in numerous representations of the half-length Madonna with the Child, often including a pendant with the donor’s portrait (the “Madonna and Martin van Nieuwenhove”; Memling-Museum, Brugge). Many devotional diptychs (two-panel paintings) such as this were painted in 15th-century Flanders. T...
  • Madonna and Saints (work by Perugino)
    ...productive and at the artistic summit of his career. Among the finest of his works executed during this time are the Vision of St. Bernard, the Madonna and Saints, the Pietà, and the fresco of the Crucifixion for the Florentine convent of Sta. Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi.......
  • Madonna Benois (work by Leonardo da Vinci)
    In the Benois Madonna (1475–78) Leonardo succeeded in giving a traditional type of picture a new, unusually charming, and expressive mood by showing the child Jesus reaching, in a sweet and tender manner, for the flower in Mary’s hand. In his Portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci (c. 1480) Leonardo opened new paths for portrait...
  • “Madonna dal Collo Lungo” (painting by Parmigianino)
    ...with St. Margaret and Other Saints. In 1531 he returned to Parma, where he remained for the rest of his life, the principal works of this last period being the Madonna of the Long Neck (1534) and the frescoes on the vault preceding the apse of Sta. Maria della Steccata. The latter were to have been only part of a much larger scheme of decoration in......
  • Madonna dei filosofi (work by Gadda)
    ...and Letteratura, while having to tread carefully with the authorities, provided an outlet for new talent. Carlo Emilio Gadda had his first narrative work (La Madonna dei filosofi [1931; “The Philosophers’ Madonna”]) published in Solaria, while the first part of his masterpiece, La cognizione de...
  • Madonna del Sasso (church, Locarno, Switzerland)
    ...the Pretorio, or law court, in which the Pact of Locarno, an attempt to guarantee the peace in western Europe, was initiated in 1925; and several old churches, including the pilgrimage church of Madonna del Sasso (founded 1480, extended 1616). It is a noted health and tourist resort with a warm Mediterranean climate and numerous hotels and other tourist facilities. There are machinery and......
  • “Madonna della Misericordia” (work by Piero della Francesca)
    Back in Sansepolcro by 1442, Piero was elected to the town council. Three years later the Confraternita della Misericordia commissioned a polyptych from him. The Misericordia Altarpiece shows Piero’s indebtedness to the Florentines Donatello and Masaccio, his fondness for geometric form, and the slowness and deliberation with which he habitually worked—for the Misericordia altarpiece...
  • “Madonna della Stella” (work by Angelico)
    ...delicacy of execution and the vibrant luminosity that seem to spiritualize the figures in Angelico’s paintings. These qualities are notably apparent in two small altarpieces, Madonna of the Star and The Annunciation....
  • “Madonna della Vittoria” (altarpiece by Mantegna)
    Notwithstanding ill health and advanced age, Mantegna worked intensively during the remaining years of his life. In 1495 Francesco ordered the Madonna of the Victory (1496) to commemorate his supposed victory at the Battle of Fornovo. In the last years of his life, Mantegna painted the Parnassus (1497), a picture celebrating the marriage......
  • Madonna dell’Orto (church, Venice, Italy)
    Tintoretto’s works for the Madonna dell’Orto, which occupied him for approximately a decade, also give an idea of the evolution of the idiomatic elements of his art; the Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple (1552) was, according to Vasari, “a highly finished work, and the best executed and most successful painting that there is in the place...
  • “Madonna di Loreto” (work by Caravaggio)
    ...are among the monumental works he produced at this time. Some of these paintings, done at the high point of Caravaggio’s artistic maturity, provoked violent reaction. The Madonna with Pilgrims, or Madonna di Loreto (1603–06), for the Church of San Agostino, was a scandal because of the “dirty feet and torn, filthy......
  • Madonna di San Biago (church, Montepulciano, Italy)
    Antonio da Sangallo the Elder (1455–1535), a military architect in his younger years, is best known for the major work of his life, the pilgrimage church of the Madonna di San Biago at Montepulciano, a tiny but important cultural centre of Tuscany. An ideal central-plan church (i.e., one symmetrical about a central point) of the High Renaissance, it also is a Greek-cross plan built.....
  • Madonna Enthroned with Four Saints (work by Lotto)
    ...in their nervous, crowded compositions and pale colouring. His numerous portraits of this period are among his most incisively descriptive of the sitter’s character; and the Madonna Enthroned with Four Saints (c. 1540) shows Lotto at the height of his narrative power....
  • Madonna in a Rose Garden (altarpiece by Schongauer)
    According to contemporary sources, Schongauer was a prolific painter whose panels were sought in many countries. Few paintings by his hand survive. Among these, the “Madonna in a Rose Garden” (1473), altarpiece of the Church of Saint-Martin in Colmar, ranks first in importance. This work combines monumentality with tenderness, approaching the manner of the great Flemish painter......
  • Madonna in Glory (work by Gaddi)
    ...in 1337, Gaddi became the leader of Giotto’s school in Florence. Between 1347 and 1353 he painted a polyptych for San Giovanni Fuorcivitas at Pistoia, and in 1355 he executed a signed and dated “Madonna in Glory” (Uffizi, Florence) for San Lucchese at Poggibonsi. In 1366 he is mentioned in documents for the final time....
  • Madonna lily (plant)
    ...bulbs, usually narrow leaves, and solitary or clustered flowers. The flowers consist of six petallike segments, which may form the shape of a trumpet, with a more or less elongated tube, as in the Madonna lily (Lilium candidum) and Easter lily (L. longiflorum). Alternatively, the segments may be reflexed (curved back) to form a turban shape, as in the Turk’s cap lily (L....

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