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Encyclopedia - Britannica Online Encyclopedia
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  • Cairo Trilogy, The (work by Mahfouz)
    ...ancient Egypt, but he had turned to describing modern Egyptian society by the time he began his major work, Al-Thulāthiyyah (1956–57), known as The Cairo Trilogy. Its three novels—Bayn al-qaṣrayn (1956; Palace Walk), Qaṣr al-shawq (1957;...
  • Cairoli, Benedetto (Italian politician)
    politician, leader of the left during the Risorgimento, and three times premier of united Italy....
  • Caiseal (Ireland)
    town and urban district, County Tipperary, southern Ireland, about 30 miles (50 km) east-southeast of Limerick. The town’s landscape is dominated by the 358-foot (109-metre) Rock of Cashel, a limestone outcrop on the summit of which is a group of ruins that includes remains of the town’s defenses, St. Patrick’s Cathedral...
  • Caishen (Chinese deity)
    the popular Chinese god (or gods) of wealth, widely believed to bestow on his devotees the riches carried about by his attendants. During the two-week New Year celebration, incense is burned in Ts’ai Shen’s temple (especially on the fifth day of the first lunar month), and friends joyously exchange the traditional New Year greeting “May you become rich” (“Kung...
  • Caisleán an Bharraigh (Ireland)
    market and county town, County Mayo, Ireland, at the head of Lough (lake) Castlebar. The town was founded early in the 17th century and was incorporated in 1613. It is now an active angling centre and has a small airport and bacon-curing and hat-making factories. Pop. (2006) 10,655....
  • Caisleán Nua, An (Northern Ireland, United Kingdom)
    town, Down district (established 1973), formerly in County Down, eastern Northern Ireland. It lies along Dundrum Bay, at the foot of Slieve Donard (2,789 feet [850 metres]), which is the highest peak in the Mourne Mountains. The town is a popular seaside resort and tourist centre for exploring the adjacent mountains. Nearby Tollymore Forest Park (1,200 acres [486 hectares]) is a...
  • Caisleán Riabhach, An (district, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom)
    district, Northern Ireland, located directly southeast of Belfast, from where it is administered. Formerly astride Down and Antrim counties, Castlereagh was established as a district in 1973. Its rolling lowlands border the districts of Lisburn to the southwest, North Down to the north, Ards to the east, and Down to the south. What is now Castlereagh district was settled in the 14th century by the...
  • caïso (music)
    a type of folk song primarily from Trinidad though sung elsewhere in the southern and eastern Caribbean islands. The subject of a calypso text, usually witty and satiric, is a local and topical event of political and social import, and the tone is one of allusion, mockery, and double entendre....
  • Caisse de la Dette Publique (Egyptian history)
    ...in the last years of Ismāʿīl’s reign. Various expedients to postpone bankruptcy (e.g., the khedive’s sale in 1875 of his Suez Canal shares to Britain) had failed, and in 1876 the Caisse de la Dette Publique (Commission of the Public Debt) was established for the service of the Egyptian debt. Its members were nominated by France, Britain, Austria, and Italy. In...
  • caisson (sea works)
    in engineering, boxlike structure used in construction work underwater or as a foundation. It is usually rectangular or circular in plan and may be tens of metres in diameter....
  • caisson (architectural decoration)
    in architecture, a square or polygonal ornamental sunken panel used in a series as decoration for a ceiling or vault. The sunken panels were sometimes also called caissons, or lacunaria, and a coffered ceiling might be referred to as lacunar....
  • caisson disease
    physiological effects of the formation of gas bubbles in the body because of rapid transition from a high-pressure environment to one of lower pressure. Pilots of unpressurized aircraft, underwater divers, and caisson workers are highly susceptible to the sickness because their activities subject them to pressures different from the normal atmospheric pressure experienced on land....
  • caisson foundation (construction)
    ...wide bases placed directly beneath the load-bearing beams or walls), mat (consisting of slabs, usually of reinforced concrete, which underlie the entire area of a building), or floating types. A floating foundation consists of boxlike rigid structures set at such a depth below ground that the weight of the soil removed to place it equals the weight of the building; thus, once the building is......
  • “Caitaani Mutharaba-ini” (work by Ngugi)
    ...domination. Ngugi’s plays in particular were sufficiently outspoken to result in his spending a year in detention. He turned to writing in Kikuyu as well as in English, notably in his novel Devil on the Cross (1982), a scathing satirical fantasy....
  • Caitanya (Hindu mystic)
    Hindu mystic whose mode of worshipping the god Krishna (Kṛṣṇa) with ecstatic song and dance had a profound effect on Vaiṣṇavism in Bengal....
  • Caitanya sect (Hinduism)
    intensely emotional form of Hinduism that has flourished from the 16th century, mainly in Bengal and eastern Orissa, India. It takes its name from the medieval saint Caitanya (Chaitanya; 1485–1533), whose fervent devotion to Lord Krishna (Kṛṣṇa) inspired the movement. For Caitanya the legends of Krishna and his youthful beloved, ...
  • Caithness (historical county, Scotland, United Kingdom)
    historic county in extreme northern Scotland, facing the Atlantic Ocean and the Pentland Firth (which separates it from the Orkney Islands) on the north and the North Sea on the east. It contains Dunnet Head, the northernmost point in Great Britain, which juts into the Atlantic east of Thurso....
  • Caithness, Earl of (Scottish politician)
    Scottish politician, chiefly remembered for his alleged complicity in the Massacre of Glencoe....
  • caitya (Buddhism)
    (Sanskrit: “that which is worthy to be gazed upon,” thus “worshipful”), in Buddhism, a sacred place or object. Originally, caityas were said to be the natural homes of earth spirits and were most often recognized in small stands of trees or even in a single tree. According to Jaina and Buddhist texts from about 200 bc, wandering Indian ascetics oft...
  • caityagṛha (Indian architecture)
    ...were often placed in a circular building with a domical metal and timber roof supported by concentric rows of stone pillars. This type of building, known in ancient India as the caityagṛha, was very popular in Sri Lanka, though it had disappeared at a fairly early period in the country of its origin. A famous example is the vaṭadāgē at......
  • Caius (Roman jurist)
    Roman jurist whose writings became authoritative in the late Roman Empire. The Law of Citations (426), issued by the eastern Roman emperor Theodosius II, named Gaius one of five jurists (the others were Papinian, Ulpian, Modestinus, and Paulus) whose doctrines were to be followed by judges in deciding cases. The Institution...
  • Caius, John (British physician)
    prominent Humanist and physician whose classic account of the English sweating sickness is considered one of the earliest histories of an epidemic....
  • Caius Marcius (fictional character)
    The action of the play follows Caius Marcius (afterward Caius Marcius Coriolanus) through several phases of his career. He is shown as an arrogant young nobleman in peacetime, as a bloodstained and valiant warrior against the city of Corioli, as a modest victor, and as a reluctant candidate for consul. When he refuses to flatter the Roman citizens, for whom he feels contempt, or to show them......
  • Caius, Saint (pope)
    pope from 283 (possibly December 17) to 296. Nothing about him is known with certainty. Supposedly a relative of the Roman emperor Diocletian, he conducted his pontificate at a period of Diocletian’s reign when Christians were tacitly tolerated. Gaius is said, nevertheless, to have carried on his religious work for his last eight years concealed in the catacombs. His epitaph was found in th...
  • Caixa, La (bank, Spain)
    ...the country. Surpluses are put into reserves or are used for local welfare, environmental activities, and cultural and educational projects. The largest of the savings banks is the Barcelona-based La Caja de Ahorros y de Pensiones (the Bank for Pensions and Savings), popularly known as “La Caixa.”...
  • caja de ahorros (Spanish banking)
    Spain has a second distinct set of banks known as cajas de ahorros (savings banks), which account for about half of the country’s total savings deposits and about one-fourth of all bank credit. These not-for-profit institutions originally were provincially or regionally based and were required to invest a certain amount in their home provinces, but no...
  • Caja de Ahorros y de Pensiones, La (bank, Spain)
    ...the country. Surpluses are put into reserves or are used for local welfare, environmental activities, and cultural and educational projects. The largest of the savings banks is the Barcelona-based La Caja de Ahorros y de Pensiones (the Bank for Pensions and Savings), popularly known as “La Caixa.”...
  • Cajamarca (department, Peru)
    The Cajamarca Basin is the site of a pottery style (called cursive) that was entirely independent of known outside influences and that spanned at least the Early Intermediate Period and the Middle Horizon. It has lightly painted running-scroll designs, which vaguely recall writing (whence the name cursive), as well as small animals and faces, in brownish black or red on a cream background,......
  • Cajamarca (Peru)
    city, northern Peru, lying at 9,022 feet (2,750 metres) above sea level on the Cajamarca River. An ancient Inca city, it was the site of the capture, ransom, and execution of the Inca chief Atahuallpa by the conquistador Francisco Pizarro in 1532. The settlement languished until 1802, when it was raised to the status of a city because of its...
  • cajeput oil
    ...a height of 8 metres (25 feet); it has spongy white bark that peels off in thin layers. M. leucadendron, also called river tea tree, is sometimes confused with the former; its leaves provide cajeput oil, used for medicinal purposes in parts of the Orient. The common name swamps paperbark is applied to M. ericifolia, which often grows in clumps, and to M. rhaphiophylla.......
  • cajeput tree (plant)
    Bark varies from the smooth, copper-coloured covering of the gumbo-limbo (Bursera simaruba) to the thick, soft, spongy bark of the punk, or cajeput, tree (Melaleuca leucadendron). Other types of bark include the commercial cork of the cork oak (Quercus suber) and the rugged, fissured outer coat of many other oaks; the flaking, patchy-coloured barks......
  • Cajetan (Catholic theologian)
    one of the major Catholic theologians of the Thomist school....
  • Cajetan of Thiene, Saint (Catholic priest)
    Venetian priest who co-founded the Theatine order and became an important figure of the Catholic Reformation....
  • Cajetanus (Catholic theologian)
    one of the major Catholic theologians of the Thomist school....
  • cajón de tajpeo (instrument)
    ...also play Spanish instruments such as the violin, guitar, and harp. In addition, the Mixtec have adopted certain percussion instruments introduced by African peoples; these include the cajón de tapeo, a wooden box struck with the hands, and a double-headed tension drum. Central Mexicans have maintained strong connections between music and dance since pre-Columbian......
  • Cajophora (plant genus)
    ...hairs that can result in discomfort for days; its oddly formed flowers have five pouchlike yellow petals covering united stamens and distinctive large coloured nectaries. The closely related Caiophora (or Cajophora), with about 65 tropical American species, as withLoasa, mostly grows in rocky slopes of cool Andean areas and also has stinging hairs....
  • Cajori, Florian (American mathematician)
    Swiss-born U.S. educator and mathematician whose works on the history of mathematics were among the most eminent of his time....
  • cajuavé (musical instrument)
    ...Musical bows continue to be played by some native peoples from Mexico and South America. Peoples of the Chaco region in the Southern Cone have a musical bow called the cajuavé, which the player holds between his teeth and strikes with a small stick, using his mouth as a resonator. The cajuavé is......
  • Cajun (American ethnic group)
    descendant of French Canadians whom the British, in the 18th century, drove from the captured French colony of Acadia (now Nova Scotia and adjacent areas) and who settled in the fertile bayou lands of southern Louisiana. The Cajuns today form small, compact, self-contained communities and speak their own patois, a combination of archaic French forms with idioms taken from their English, Spanish, ...
  • Cajun cuisine
    descendant of French Canadians whom the British, in the 18th century, drove from the captured French colony of Acadia (now Nova Scotia and adjacent areas) and who settled in the fertile bayou lands of southern Louisiana. The Cajuns today form small, compact, self-contained communities and speak their own patois, a combination of archaic French forms with idioms taken from their English, Spanish, ...
  • Cakchiquel (people)
    Mayan Indian people of the midwestern highlands of Guatemala, closely related linguistically and culturally to the neighbouring Quiché and Tzutujil. They are agricultural, and their culture and religion are fusions of Spanish and Mayan elements. The sharing of a common language does not provide a basis for ethnic identification among the Cakchiquels; t...
  • Cakchiquel language
    member of the Quiché group of Mayan languages, spoken in central Guatemala. Closely related to and sometimes considered simply a dialect of Cakchiquel is Tzutujil (Zutuhil), spoken in the same region. Both Cakchiquel and Tzutujil have close grammatical and phonological affinities to the Quiché language. In ancient literature, ...
  • cake (food)
    in general, any of a variety of breads, shortened or unshortened, usually shaped by the tin in which it is baked; more specifically, a sweetened bread, often rich or delicate....
  • cake (ground substance)
    ...contains the least amount of impurities and is often of edible quality without refining or further processing. Such oils are known as cold-drawn, cold-pressed, or virgin oils. Pressing the coarse meal while it is heated removes more oil and also greater quantities of nonglyceride impurities such as phospholipids, colour bodies, and unsaponifiable matter. Such oil is more highly coloured than......
  • cake flour (foodstuff)
    ...flour, a starch-free, high-protein, whole wheat flour; all-purpose flour, refined (separated from bran and germ), bleached or unbleached, and suitable for any recipe not requiring a special flour; cake flour, refined and bleached, with very fine texture; self-rising flour, refined and bleached, with added leavening and salt; and enriched flour, refined and bleached, with added nutrients....
  • cake urchin (species of echinoderm)
    any of the echinoid marine invertebrates of the order Clypeastroida (phylum Echinodermata), in which the body is flattened. The surface is covered with short spines (often furlike) and inconspicuous pedicellariae (pincerlike organs). In many species the hollow, slightly elongated test (internal skeleton), which accommodates the water-vascular system, is symmetrically notched on...
  • Cakes and Ale (work by Maugham)
    ...account of a young medical student’s painful progress toward maturity; The Moon and Sixpence (1919), an account of an unconventional artist, suggested by the life of Paul Gauguin; Cakes and Ale (1930), the story of a famous novelist, which is thought to contain caricatures of Thomas Hardy and Hugh Walpole; and The Razor’s Edge (1944), the story of a young Amer...
  • cakewalk (dance)
    couple dance that became a popular stage act for virtuoso dancers as well as a craze in fashionable ballrooms around 1900. Couples formed a square with the men on the inside and, stepping high to a lively tune, strutted around the square. The couples were eliminated one by one by several judges, who considered the elegant bearing of the men, the grace of the women, and the inventiveness of the da...
  • Cakile (plant)
    any of about seven species of plants constituting the genus Cakile, of the mustard family (Brassicaceae), native to seashore regions of North America, Eurasia, western Asia, and Australia, and to central Arabian deserts. C. maritima, a European plant, has waxy, thick, lobed green leaves and pale-lavender flower clusters. Its leaves, 30 to 60 cm (1 to 2 feet) long, rise from a long ta...
  • caking coal
    When many bituminous coals are heated, they soften and form a plastic mass that swells and resolidifies into a porous solid. Coals that exhibit such behaviour are called caking coals. Strongly caking coals, which yield a solid product (coke) with properties suitable for use in a blast furnace, are called coking coals. All coking coals are caking, but not all caking coals are suitable for coke......
  • Çakmak, Fevzi (Turkish statesman)
    Turkish marshal and statesman who played a leading role in the establishment of the Turkish Republic....
  • Cakobau (king of Fiji)
    In Melanesia events transpired differently. In Fiji the missionaries who landed in 1835, accompanied by an envoy from George of Tonga, made no headway with the rising chief Cakobau, who was not converted until 1854, when his fortunes were at a low ebb and he needed Tongan support. Elsewhere in Melanesia, the absence of chiefs meant that missionary work had to be conducted with small groups of......
  • cakra (religion)
    (“wheel”), any of a number of psychic-energy centres of the body, prominent in the occult physiological practices of certain forms of Hinduism and Tantric Buddhism. The chakras are conceived of as focal points where psychic forces and bodily functions merge with and interact with each other. Among the supposed 88,000 chakras in the human body, six major ones locate...
  • cakravāla cakravartin (Indian ruler)
    Buddhist and Jaina sources distinguish three types of secular chakravartin: cakravāla cakravartin, a king who rules over all four of the continents posited by ancient Indian cosmography; dvīpa cakravartin, a ruler who governs only one of those continents and is, therefore, less powerful than the first; and pradeśa cakravartin, a monarch who leads......
  • c̣akravartin (Indian ruler)
    the ancient Indian conception of the world ruler, derived from the Sanskrit c̣akra, “wheel,” and vartin, “one who turns.” Thus, a chakravartin may be understood as a ruler “whose chariot wheels roll everywhere,” or “whose movements are unobstructed.”...
  • Čaks, Aleksandrs (Latvian poet)
    Several poets were still influenced or inspired by folk songs, but Aleksandrs Čaks (pseudonym of Aleksandrs Čadarainis) created a new tradition, describing in free verse, with exaggerated images, the atmosphere of the suburbs. His outstanding work was a ballad cycle, Mūžības skartie (1937–39; “Marked by Eternity”), about the Latvian......
  • Čakste, Janis (president of Latvia)
    patriot and president (1922–27) of the Republic of Latvia, who, through political activity in Latvia and Russia and on diplomatic missions to the West, helped spearhead Latvia’s struggle for independence....
  • Cal-Sag Channel (channel, Illinois, United States)
    ...maritime traffic. A second important body of water, Lake Calumet, is located in the industrial southeastern part of the city; it is connected to the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal by the Calumet Sag (Cal-Sag) Channel and to Lake Michigan by the Calumet River....
  • Calabar (Nigeria)
    town and port, capital of Cross River State, southeastern Nigeria. It lies along the Calabar River, 5 miles (8 km) upstream from that river’s entrance into the Cross River estuary. Settled in the early 17th century by the Efik branch of the Ibibio people, the town became a centre for trade between white traders on the coast and natives farther inland. Fish, cassava, banan...
  • Calabar bean (legume)
    ...120 miles [193 km] west) was originally given by 15th-century Portuguese navigators to the African inhabitants of that part of the Gulf of Guinea coast. This region was the main source of the Calabar bean, a poisonous bean that, when ingested, markedly affects the nervous system....
  • Calabar ebony
    D. dendo, native to Angola, is a valuable timber tree with very black and hard heartwood known as black ebony, as billetwood, or as Gabon, Lagos, Calabar, or Niger ebony. Jamaica, American, or green ebony is produced by Brya ebenus, a leguminous tree or shrub; the heartwood is rich dark brown, very heavy, exceedingly hard, and capable of receiving a high polish....
  • Calabar, University of (university, Calabar, Nigeria)
    D. dendo, native to Angola, is a valuable timber tree with very black and hard heartwood known as black ebony, as billetwood, or as Gabon, Lagos, Calabar, or Niger ebony. Jamaica, American, or green ebony is produced by Brya ebenus, a leguminous tree or shrub; the heartwood is rich dark brown, very heavy, exceedingly hard, and capable of receiving a high polish.......
  • Calabaria reinhardtii (snake)
    ...Rica. Usually less than 1 metre long, it is reported to reach nearly 1.5 metres. It seems to be predominantly nocturnal, foraging on the ground for a variety of small vertebrates. The so-called earth, or burrowing, python (Calabaria reinhardtii or Charina reinhardtii) of West Africa appears to be a member of the boa family (Boidae)....
  • calabash gourd
    running or climbing vine, of the gourd family (Cucurbitaceae), native to the Old World tropics but cultivated in warm climates for centuries for its ornamental and useful hard-shelled fruits....
  • calabash tree (tree)
    (Crescentia cujete), tree of the family Bignoniaceae, 6 to 12 metres (20 to 40 feet) tall, that grows in Central and South America, the West Indies, and extreme southern Florida. It is often grown as an ornamental. The calabash tree produces large spherical fruits, up to 50 cm (20 inches) in diameter, the hard shells of which are useful as bowls, cups, and other water containers when hollow...
  • calabazilla (plant)
    (Cucurbita foetidissima), perennial prostrate vine of the gourd family (Cucurbitaceae), native to southwestern North America. A calabazilla has triangular, long-stalked, finely toothed leaves, yellow flowers about 6.3 to 10.2 cm (2.5 to 4 inches) wide, and inedible, orange-shaped, predominantly green fruits with yellow stripes and markings. Although an unattractive plant with a fetid odour,...
  • Calabozo (Venezuela)
    city, Guárico estado (state), central Venezuela. It lies along the Guárico River, 110 miles (180 km) south-southwest of Caracas, on a piedmont plain between the mountains and the Llanos (plains). Founded in 1695 by Capuchin missionaries, it lacked permanence until a Spanish settlement took hold in 1727. Because of the remote location, colonial convicts alleg...
  • Calabresi, Guido (American legal scholar)
    Very different was the theory of general deterrence principally argued by the U.S. legal scholar and judge Guido Calabresi in The Cost of Accidents (1970). In Calabresi’s words, general deterrence involves decidingwhat the accident costs of activities are and letting the market determine the degree to which, and the ways in which, activities are desired....
  • Calabria (region, Italy)
    regione, southern Italy, composed of the province of Catanzaro, Cosenza, Crotone, Reggio di Calabria, and Vibo Valentia. Sometimes referred to as the “toe” of the Italian “boot,” Calabria is a peninsula of irregular shape, jutting out in a northeast-southwest direction from the main body of Italy and separating the Tyrrhenian and Ionian ...
  • Calabrian Apennines (mountain range, Italy)
    ...elevation (8,130 feet) at Mount Vettore; the Abruzzi Apennines, 9,554 feet at Mount Corno; the Campanian Apennines, 7,352 feet at Mount Meta; the Lucanian Apennines, 7,438 feet at Mount Pollino; the Calabrian Apennines, 6,414 feet at Mount Alto; and, finally, the Sicilian Range, 10,902 feet at Mount Etna. The ranges in Puglia (the “boot heel” of the peninsula) and southeastern Sic...
  • Calabrian expedition of 1844 (Italian history)
    In the early 1840s, renewed Mazzinian attempts at armed rebellion were ruthlessly suppressed. Among these was the Calabrian expedition of 1844, organized by the Venetian Bandiera brothers and seven of their companions, who were captured and executed by the Bourbon regime. These violent acts of suppression increased the esteem that governments and the general public felt for the moderate......
  • Calabrian Stage (paleontology)
    a name given by many geologists to the rock layer whose base defines the beginning of the Pleistocene Epoch, approximately 1.8 million years ago. As defined in 1985, the global stratotype section and point (GSSP) for its lower boundary is the base of clay stones in a sequence of marine strata about 4 km (2.5 miles) south of Crotone on the Marchesato Peninsula ...
  • Calabro Apennines (mountain range, Italy)
    ...elevation (8,130 feet) at Mount Vettore; the Abruzzi Apennines, 9,554 feet at Mount Corno; the Campanian Apennines, 7,352 feet at Mount Meta; the Lucanian Apennines, 7,438 feet at Mount Pollino; the Calabrian Apennines, 6,414 feet at Mount Alto; and, finally, the Sicilian Range, 10,902 feet at Mount Etna. The ranges in Puglia (the “boot heel” of the peninsula) and southeastern Sic...
  • Caladium (plant genus)
    ...and a succession of flowerlike leaves (spathes), usually white. Species of Anthurium, many of which, such as the flamingo flower, have colourful spathes, do best in humid conditions. Caladium’s tropical American tuberous herbs produce fragile-looking but colourful foliage; they keep surprisingly well if protected from chills and wintry drafts....
  • Calagurris (Spain)
    town, in the provincia (province) and comunidad autónoma (autonomous community) of La Rioja, northern Spain, on the south bank of the Cidacos River near its confluence with the Ebro, southeast of Logroño city. Known as Calagurris to its original Celtiberian inhabitant...
  • Calah (ancient city, Iraq)
    ancient Assyrian city situated south of Mosul in northern Iraq. The city was first excavated by A.H. Layard during 1845–51 and afterward principally by M.E.L. (later Sir Max) Mallowan (1949–58)....
  • Calahorra (Spain)
    town, in the provincia (province) and comunidad autónoma (autonomous community) of La Rioja, northern Spain, on the south bank of the Cidacos River near its confluence with the Ebro, southeast of Logroño city. Known as Calagurris to its original Celtiberian inhabitant...
  • Calais (Maine, United States)
    city, Washington county, eastern Maine, U.S., on the St. Croix River (there spanned by an international bridge to St. Stephen, New Brunswick, Canada), 98 miles (158 km) east-northeast of Bangor. The river is noted for its tidal surges, which can vary by 28 feet (9 metres). Settlers were attracted to the area in 1779 by the abundance of natur...
  • Calais (France)
    industrial seaport on the Strait of Dover, Pas-de-Calais département, Nord-Pas-de-Calais région, northern France, 21 miles (34 km) by sea from Dover (the shortest crossing from England). On an island, now bordered by canals and harbour basins, Calais originated as a fishing village. It was ...
  • Calais (Greek mythology)
    in Greek mythology, the winged twin sons of Boreas and Oreithyia. On their arrival with the Argonauts at Salmydessus in Thrace, they liberated their sister Cleopatra, who had been thrown into prison by her husband, Phineus, the king of the country. According to Apollonius of Rhodes (Argonautica, Book II), they delivered Phineus from the Harpies. They were slain by Hera...
  • Calais, Pas de (international waterway, Europe)
    a narrow water passage separating England (northwest) from France (southeast) and connecting the English Channel (southwest) with the North Sea (northeast). The strait is 18 to 25 mi (30 to 40 km) wide, and the depth ranges from 120 to 180 ft (35 to 55 m). Until the comparatively recent geologic past (c. 5000 bc), the strait was an exposed river valley, thus making England an ...
  • Calais, Treaty of (England-France [1360])
    ...Paris. After this unsuccessful campaign he was glad to conclude preliminaries of peace at Brittany (May 8, 1360). This treaty, less onerous to France than that of London, took its final form in the Treaty of Calais, ratified by both kings (October 1360). By it, Edward renounced his claim to the French crown in return for the whole of Aquitaine, a rich area in southwestern France....
  • Calaisian Substage (paleontology)
    ...Transition”). In The Netherlands the barrier beaches re-formed close to the present coastline, and widespread tidal flats developed to the interior. These are known as the Calais Beds (or Calaisian) from the definition in Flanders by Dubois. In the protected inner margins, the peat continued to accumulate during and after the “Atlantic” time....
  • Calama (Algeria)
    town, northeastern Algeria. It lies on the right bank of the Wadi el-Rabate just above its confluence with the Wadi Seybouse. Originally settled as pre-Roman Calama, it became a proconsular province and the bishopric of St. Possidius, biographer and student of St. Augustine. Among the town’s Roman ruins are baths and a theatre, and 5 miles (8 km) west, at el-Announa, are ...
  • Calama (Chile)
    city, northern Chile, on the Río Loa in an extremely arid region. It lies on the western slope of the Andes at an altitude of 7,435 feet (2,266 metres) and is linked to Antofagasta, 125 miles (200 km) southwest, by aqueduct. The oasis city is a service centre for the Chuquicamata copper mine and an agricultural marketing centre. The Smithsonian Institution (U.S.) operates...
  • Calamagrostis (plant)
    ...and stiff, smooth stems. Other plants of the family Poaceae known as reeds are giant reed (Arundo donax), sea reed (Ammophila arenaria), reed canary grass (Phalaris), and reedgrass, or bluejoint (Calamagrostis). Bur reed (Sparganium) and reed mace (Typha) are plants of other families....
  • calamancos (American decorative arts)
    Thrifty colonial women would have recycled precious fabric scraps to make and repair garments and bedding. However, the earliest surviving American quilts tend to be wholecloth calamancos, in which the glazed wool top, often of imported fabric, was layered with wool batting and a home-woven linen or linsey-woolsey back, then closely quilted in plumes and other decorative motifs. In following......
  • Calamander (wood)
    ...branches and oblong leaves. D. montana of India yields a yellowish gray, soft but durable wood. D. quaesita is the tree from which is obtained the wood known in Sri Lanka as Calamander. Its closeness of grain, great hardness, and fine hazel-brown colour, mottled and striped with black, render it valuable for veneering and furniture making....
  • Calamanian stink badger (mammal)
    Stink badgers consist of two species, the Malayan stink badger (Mydaus javanensis), also called the skunk badger or teledu, and the Palawan, or Calamanian, stink badger (M. marchei). The Malayan stink badger is an island dweller of Southeast Asia that usually lives in mountainous areas. It is brown to black with white on the head and......
  • Calamian Group (island, Philippines)
    islands lying between Mindoro and Palawan, west-central Philippines. The group comprises Busuanga, Culion, and Coron islands and about 95 lesser coral isles and islets. The main islands are quite hilly and are densely settled, with relatively stable populations engaged in subsistence agriculture and fishing. The principal settlement is Coron...
  • calamine (mineral)
    either of two zinc minerals. The name has been dropped in favour of the species names hemimorphite (hydrous zinc silicate) and smithsonite (zinc carbonate)....
  • calamine brass (alloy)
    alloy of copper with zinc, produced by heating fragments of copper with charcoal and a zinc ore, calamine or smithsonite, in a closed crucible to red heat (about 1,300° C, or 2,400° F). The ore is reduced to a zinc vapour that diffuses into the copper. Apparently invented in Asia Minor, this method of brass manufacture was common from the 1st millennium bc. In Roman ti...
  • calamistrum (anatomy)
    ...pair having been either lost or reduced to a nonfunctional cone (colulus) or flat plate (cribellum), through which open thousands of minute spigots. Spiders with a cribellum also have a comb (calamistrum) on the metatarsus of the fourth leg. The black widow is one such comb-footed spider (family Theridiidae). The calamistrum combs the silk that flows from the cribellum, producing a......
  • Calamitaceae (plant family)
    ...1 metre (3 feet) tall, with small, wedge-shape leaves; 2 families: Sphenophyllaceae and Cheirostrobaceae.Order EquisetalesTwo families: Calamitaceae, extinct tree horsetails; and Equisetaceae, herbaceous living horsetails and fossil allies with needlelike leaves in whorls along the stem; 15 extant species in the genus......
  • Calamites (fossil plant genus)
    genus of tree-sized, spore-bearing plants that lived during the Carboniferous and Permian periods (about 360 to 250 million years ago). Calamites had a well-defined node-internode architecture similar to modern horsetails, and its branches and ...
  • calamity (event)
    January 1, Indonesia. An Adam SkyConnection Airlines Boeing 737 flying from Java island to Sulawesi with 102 people aboard disappears from radar screens; Indonesia initially reports that the plane’s wreckage and some survivors have been found but the next day denies the report, and weeks later flotsam and jetsam from the plane begin to surface on the ocean....
  • Calamity Jane (American frontierswoman)
    legendary American frontierswoman whose name was often linked with that of Wild Bill Hickok. The facts of her life are confused by her own inventions and by the successive stories and legends that accumulated in later years....
  • Calamoichthys calabaricus (fish)
    eellike African fish related to the bichir....
  • Calamonastes (bird genus)
    ...their tails cocked up. The name also denotes certain birds of the family Maluridae that are found in Australia and New Zealand. Among the sylviid wren-warblers are those of the African genus Calamonastes (sometimes included in Camaroptera), in which the tail is rather long and the underparts are barred. An example is the barred wren-warbler (C. fasciolatus) of......
  • Calamonastes fasciolatus (bird)
    ...sylviid wren-warblers are those of the African genus Calamonastes (sometimes included in Camaroptera), in which the tail is rather long and the underparts are barred. An example is the barred wren-warbler (C. fasciolatus) of south-central Africa, which sews its nest like a tailorbird....

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