(Translated by https://www.hiragana.jp/)
Encyclopedia - Britannica Online Encyclopedia
The Wayback Machine - https://web.archive.org/web/20111021100140/http://www.britannica.com/bps/browse/alpha/f/40

"Email" is the e-mail address you used when you registered.

"Password" is case sensitive.

If you need additional assistance, please contact .

Enter the e-mail address you used when enrolling for Britannica Premium Service and we will e-mail your password to you.

A-Z Browse

  • Fink, Eugen (German philosopher)
    Eugen Fink, for several years Husserl’s collaborator, whose essay Die phänomenologische Philosophie Edmund Husserls in der gegenwärtigen Kritik (1933) led to a radicalization of Husserl’s philosophical, transcendental idealism, later turned in another direction, one that approached Heidegger’s position and divorced itself at the same ti...
  • Fink, Katherine L. (American entertainer and writer)
    American entertainer and writer who was best known as the author of the highly popular Eloise books, featuring a comically endearing enfant terrible who bedeviled New York City’s Plaza Hotel....
  • Fink, Kitty (American entertainer and writer)
    American entertainer and writer who was best known as the author of the highly popular Eloise books, featuring a comically endearing enfant terrible who bedeviled New York City’s Plaza Hotel....
  • Fink, Mike (American frontiersman)
    American keelboatman of the Old West, who became the legendary hero of the American tall tale....
  • Fink, Theodore (Australian politician and publisher)
    Australian politician and publisher, noted for his interests in education....
  • Fink truss (civil engineering)
    German-born American railroad engineer and executive who was the first to investigate the economics of railroad operation on a systematic basis. He was also inventor of the Fink truss, used to support bridges and the roofs of buildings....
  • Finke River (river, Australia)
    major but intermittent river of central Australia that rises south of Mount Ziel in the MacDonnell Ranges of south-central Northern Territory. The Finke passes through Glen Helen Gorge and Palm Valley and then meanders generally sout...
  • Finkelstein, Mark Harris (American author)
    Nov. 19, 1922Mount Vernon, N.Y.May 30, 2007Santa Barbara, Calif.American novelist who was the author of the baseball tetralogy that chronicled the adventures of Henry Wiggen, a talented pitcher for the fictional New York Mammoths baseball team; the second novel in the series, Bang the Dr...
  • Finklea, Tula Ellice (American dancer and actress)
    March 8, 1921/22Amarillo, TexasJune 17, 2008Los Angeles, Calif.American dancer and actress who won acclaim for her glamorous looks and sensual, technically flawless dancing in a handful of 1950s movie musicals, notably The Band Wagon (1953) and Silk Stockings (1957), both with...
  • Finklestein, Zorach (American sculptor)
    traditionalist sculptor of simple, figurative subjects who was a leading figure in the early 20th-century revival of direct carving, whereby the sculptor seeks an image directly from the material to be carved, relying on neither the inspiration of models nor the aid of mechanical devices. Zorach’s mature work is monumental in form and makes skillful use of the natural colour, veining, and t...
  • Finland
    country located in northern Europe. Finland is one of the world’s most northern and geographically remote countries and is subject to a severe climate. Nearly two-thirds of Finland is blanketed by thick woodlands, making it the most densely forested country in Europe. Finland also forms a symbolic northern border between western and eastern Europe: dense wilderness and Russia to the east, t...
  • Finland, Bank of (bank, Finland)
    The Bank of Finland (Suomen Pankki), established in 1811 and guaranteed and supervised by the parliament since 1868, is the country’s central bank and a member of the European System of Central Banks. In 2002, the EU’s common currency, the euro, replaced the markka, which had been Finland’s national currency since 1860. Compared with other European countries, Finland has relat...
  • Finland, Church of (national church of Finland)
    national church of Finland, which changed from the Roman Catholic to the Lutheran faith during the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. Christianity was known in Finland as early as the 11th century, and in the 12th century Henry, bishop of Uppsala (Sweden), began organizing the c...
  • Finland, flag of
    ...
  • Finland, Gulf of (gulf, Northern Europe)
    easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea, between Finland (north) and Russia and Estonia (east and south). Covering an area of 11,600 square miles (30,000 square km), the gulf extends for 250 miles (400 km) from east to west but only 12 to 80 miles (19 to 130 km) from north to south. It has a maximum depth of 377 feet (115 m) at its...
  • Finland, history of
    History...
  • Finland, Orthodox Church of
    Eastern Orthodox church, recognized as the second state church of Finland. Most of the Orthodox Finns were originally from Karelia, the southeastern part of Finland that was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, which was Christianized by Russian monks in the 12th century. The Orthodox are now spread throu...
  • Finland Railway Station (railway station, Saint Petersburg, Russia)
    ...an industrial appendage, but by the end of the 20th century most of its industry had been replaced by office and apartment buildings and retail establishments. One of its most famous features is the Finland Railway Station, which faces the Admiralty Side across the Neva. Lenin returned to Russia in April 1917 via this station, and there he made his initial pronouncement of a new course that......
  • Finland, Republic of
    country located in northern Europe. Finland is one of the world’s most northern and geographically remote countries and is subject to a severe climate. Nearly two-thirds of Finland is blanketed by thick woodlands, making it the most densely forested country in Europe. Finland also forms a symbolic northern border between western and eastern Europe: dense wilderness and Russia to the east, t...
  • Finland, Republiken
    country located in northern Europe. Finland is one of the world’s most northern and geographically remote countries and is subject to a severe climate. Nearly two-thirds of Finland is blanketed by thick woodlands, making it the most densely forested country in Europe. Finland also forms a symbolic northern border between western and eastern Europe: dense wilderness and Russia to the east, t...
  • Finland: Year In Review 1993
    The republic of Finland is in northern Europe, on the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland. Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi). Pop. (1993 est.): 5,058,000. Cap.: Helsinki. Monetary unit: Finnish markka, with (Oct. 4, 1993) a free rate of 5.82 markkaa to U.S. $1 (8.82 markkaa = £ 1 sterling). President in 1993, Mauno Koivisto; prime minister, Esko Aho....
  • Finland: Year In Review 1994
    The republic of Finland is in northern Europe, on the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland. Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi). Pop. (1994 est.): 5,083,000. Cap.: Helsinki. Monetary unit: Finnish markka, with (Oct. 7, 1994) a free rate of 4.74 markkaa to U.S. $1 (7.53 markkaa = £ 1 sterling). Presidents in 1994, Mauno Koivisto and, from March 1, Martti Ahtisaari; prime minister, Esko Ah...
  • Finland: Year In Review 1995
    The republic of Finland is in northern Europe, on the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland. Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi). Pop. (1995 est.): 5,101,000. Cap.: Helsinki. Monetary unit: Finnish markka, with (Oct. 6, 1995) a free rate of 4.31 markkaa to U.S. $1 (6.81 markkaa = £ 1 sterling). President in 1995, Martti Ahtisaari; prime ministers, Esko Aho and, from April 13, Paavo Lippon...
  • Finland: Year In Review 1996
    The republic of Finland is situated in northern Europe, on the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland. Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi). Pop. (1996 est.): 5,132,000. Cap.: Helsinki. Monetary unit: Finnish markka, with (Oct. 11, 1996) a free rate of 4.58 markkaa to U.S. $1 (7.21 markkaa = £ 1 sterling). President in 1996, Martti Ahtisaari; prime minister, Paavo Lipponen....
  • Finland: Year In Review 1997
    Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi)...
  • Finland: Year In Review 1998
    Area: 338,145 sq km (130,559 sq mi)...
  • Finland: Year In Review 1999
    In 1999 Finland’s Pres. Martti Ahtisaari made international news by heading talks in Belgrade that resulted in Serbia’s agreeing to pull its armed forces out of Kosovo. (See Biographies.) NATO’s intervention in Yugoslavia was widely endorsed by the countr...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2000
    In February 2000 Tarja Halonen (see Biographies) of the left-wing Social Democratic Party was elected Finland’s first woman president. Although known in her youthful political days as “Red Tarja,” she later served (1995–2000) as an orthodox ...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2001
    Though other countries in the region made plans in 2001 to join NATO, Finland maintained its nonalliance stance but welcomed NATO’s open-door policy and pledged to cooperate closely within NATO’s Partnership for Peace....
  • Finland: Year In Review 2002
    Finland’s historically edgy relationship with Russia again dominated news in 2002. During his July visit to Finland, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov declared that Moscow’s NATO links would not be damaged if the other Baltic states—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—joined NATO, but Russia would ...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2003
    Following the general elections in March 2003, opposition leader Anneli Jäätteenmäki became prime minister in April, but she resigned in June after confessing that she did not have the confidence of Parliament. Jäätteenmäki had come under intense pressure after it became known that s...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2004
    Finnish Pres. Tarja Halonen spoke on the international stage in September 2004 when she told the United Nations that she thought the U.S.-led military intervention in Iraq was not in line with international law. Speaking to the UN General Assembly shortly after an address by U.S. Pres. George W. Bush, Halonen said that the international community had failed in advance of the Iraq war, “conf...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2005
    A prolonged labour dispute in Finland’s paper industry, which accounted for as much as 20% of the country’s exports, dominated much of 2005. The conflict began when the Finnish Forest Industries Federation announced that it would not join in the comprehensive collective labour agreement reached in late 2004. At the end of March 2005, after months of fruitles...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2006
    In 2006 Finland celebrated the centenary of full political rights for women, a first in world history, and in January Pres. Tarja Halonen, the country’s first woman head of state, was reelected for a second six-year term. Halonen, the Social Democratic Party candidate, gained the most votes in the first round but failed to achieve the 50% majorit...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2007
    The elections to the Finnish parliament in March 2007 resulted in three parties’ proclaiming themselves victorious: the Centre Party remained the largest party, with a 23.1% share (down from 24.7% in 2003); the National Coalition Party (or Conservatives) emerged as the only one of the three big parties to increase its po...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2008
    Eero Heinäluoma, the head of Finland’s Social Democratic Party (SDP), announced in February 2008 that he would not run for the position again in the June convention owing to the party’s unfavourable election results in the 2007 general election. As his replacement, SDP members elected Jutta Urpilainen, a primary-school teacher who was elec...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2009
    The Finnish economy took a further plunge in 2009. The economy was heavily dependent on exports, which had accounted for 44% of GDP in 2008. The value of exported goods alone dropped a historic 35% in the first quarter of 2009 from the same period a year earlier. At the same time, the value of imports, most notably raw materials and other items needed in manufactur...
  • Finland: Year In Review 2010
    In June 2010 Finnish Prime Minister and Centre Party leader Matti Vanhanen stepped down from both posts for reasons he promised to fully disclose only in the distant future. Vanhanen had been implicated in the campaign contributions scandal of 2008–09 that was still reverberating. The party secretary, Jarmo Korhonen, who was at the heart of the scandal,...
  • Finlay, Carlos J. (Cuban physician)
    Cuban epidemiologist who discovered that yellow fever is transmitted from infected to healthy humans by a mosquito. Although he published experimental evidence of this discovery in 1886, his ideas were ignored for 20 years....
  • Finlay, Carlos Juan (Cuban physician)
    Cuban epidemiologist who discovered that yellow fever is transmitted from infected to healthy humans by a mosquito. Although he published experimental evidence of this discovery in 1886, his ideas were ignored for 20 years....
  • Finlay, George (British historian)
    British historian and participant in the War of Greek Independence (1821–32) who is known principally for his histories of Greece and the Byzantine Empire....
  • Finlay River (river, Canada)
    ...only by the Mississippi-Missouri system. The Mackenzie system drains an area of some 697,000 square miles (1,805,200 square km), which is almost as large as Mexico. From the headwaters of the Finlay River, which flows into Williston Lake (the impounded waters of the Peace River) west of the Rocky Mountains, the entire river system runs for 2,635 miles (4,241 km) through the lake-strewn......
  • finless porpoise (mammal)
    The finless porpoise (Neophocaena phocaenoides) is a small, slow-moving inhabitant of coastal waters and rivers along the Indian Ocean and western Pacific Ocean. Black above and white below, it has a rounded head. Unlike other porpoises, it lacks a dorsal fin entirely. The finless porpoise lives alone or in small groups and eats crustaceans, fish, and squid....
  • Finley, Charles Oscar (American businessman)
    American insurance executive and professional baseball club owner who was frequently involved in controversy with the commissioner of baseball, the American League, managers, and players. His Oakland Athletics won three consecutive World Series (1972–74)....
  • Finley, Charlie (American businessman)
    American insurance executive and professional baseball club owner who was frequently involved in controversy with the commissioner of baseball, the American League, managers, and players. His Oakland Athletics won three consecutive World Series (1972–74)....
  • Finley, Martha (American writer)
    prolific and, in her day, immensely popular American writer of children’s books about pious youngsters rewarded for their virtue....
  • Finn (people)
    prolific and, in her day, immensely popular American writer of children’s books about pious youngsters rewarded for their virtue.......
  • Finn (Irish legendary figure)
    legendary Irish hero, leader of the group of warriors known as the Fianna Éireann. See Fenian cycle....
  • Finn, Huck (fictional character)
    one of the enduring characters in American fiction, the protagonist of Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn (1884), who was introduced in Tom Sawyer (1876). Huck, as he is best known, is an uneducated, superstitious boy, the son of the town drunkard....
  • Finn, Huckleberry (fictional character)
    one of the enduring characters in American fiction, the protagonist of Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn (1884), who was introduced in Tom Sawyer (1876). Huck, as he is best known, is an uneducated, superstitious boy, the son of the town drunkard....
  • Finn MacCool (Irish legendary figure)
    legendary Irish hero, leader of the group of warriors known as the Fianna Éireann. See Fenian cycle....
  • Finn MacCumhaill (Irish legendary figure)
    legendary Irish hero, leader of the group of warriors known as the Fianna Éireann. See Fenian cycle....
  • Finn, River (river, Ireland)
    river in County Donegal, Ireland, rising at Lough (lake) Finn and flowing eastward across the county for about 30 miles (48 km) before uniting with the River Mourne at Strabane to form a ribbon of continuous agricultural settlement in the mountain heartland of Donegal. The main settlements along the river are Ballybofey, Stranorlar, and Castlefinn....
  • Finnboga saga ramma (Icelandic literature)
    Prose literature of the 14th century includes several sagas. Among them are the Finnboga saga ramma (“Saga of Finnbogi the Strong”), about a 10th-century hero, and a saga that tells the love story of its hero Víglundr. Sagas about bishops, already a theme in the 13th century, became more numerous, as did lives of foreign saints. A large collection of exempla......
  • Finnbogadóttir, Vigdís (president of Iceland)
    teacher, cultural figure, and politician who served as president of Iceland from 1980 to 1996. She was the first woman in the world to be elected head of state in a national election....
  • finned octopod (cephalopod suborder)
    ...sucker-bearing arms; worldwide; total length 5–540 cm (2 in. to 18 ft); maximum arm spread to about 900 cm (30 ft).Suborder Palaeoctopoda (finned octopod)Cretaceous, some living.Suborder Cirrata (Cirromorpha)Holocene; soft-bodied, deep-webbed...
  • Finnegans Wake (novel by Joyce)
    experimental novel by James Joyce. Extracts of the work appeared as Work in Progress from 1928 to 1937, and it was published in its entirety as Finnegans Wake in 1939....
  • Finney, Albert (British actor)
    English actor noted for his versatility....
  • Finney, Charles Grandison (American evangelist)
    American lawyer, president of Oberlin College, and a central figure in the religious revival movement of the early 19th century; he is sometimes called the first of the professional evangelists....
  • Finney, Jack (American writer)
    ("JACK"), U.S. writer (b. 1911, Milwaukee, Wis.--d. Nov. 14, 1995, Greenbrae, Calif.), was the author of 10 novels as well as short stories and plays, but his fame rested on 2 novels that were especially well known. The Body Snatchers (1955; rep...
  • Finney, Walter Braden (American writer)
    ("JACK"), U.S. writer (b. 1911, Milwaukee, Wis.--d. Nov. 14, 1995, Greenbrae, Calif.), was the author of 10 novels as well as short stories and plays, but his fame rested on 2 novels that were especially well known. The Body Snatchers (1955; rep...
  • Finnic languages
    ...The three remaining groups are the individual languages Mari (formerly Cheremis), Mordvin, and Sami (formerly Lapp). Mari and Mordvin, however, are frequently classified together as the Volga-Finnic group of languages. Also, because the dialects of Sami are almost mutually unintelligible, they are often classified as separate languages. ...
  • Finnic peoples
    descendants of a collection of tribal peoples speaking closely related languages of the Finno-Ugric family who migrated to the area of the eastern Baltic, Finland, and Karelia before ad 400—probably between 100 bc and ad 100, though some authorities place the migration many centuries earlier. The major modern representatives are the Finns and ...
  • Finnis, John Mitchell (British philosopher)
    ...(assuming that he had a desire to flourish). It was left to other philosophers to develop such a theory. One attempt, Natural Law and Natural Rights (1980), by the legal philosopher John Finnis, was a modern explication of the concept of natural law in terms of a theory of supposedly natural human goods. Although the book was acclaimed by Roman Catholic moral theologians and......
  • Finnish Broadcasting Company (Finnish company)
    The state-run Finnish Broadcasting Company (Yleisradio Oy [YLE]; established 1926) operates a number of nationwide television networks—both public service and commercial—along with several digital channels and offers programming in Swedish. YLE also owns Radio Finland, which broadcasts in Finnish, Swedish, English, and Russian. Jointly owned by Finland, Sweden, and Norway,......
  • Finnish Centre (political party, Finland)
    In June 2010 Finnish Prime Minister and Centre Party leader Matti Vanhanen stepped down from both posts for reasons he promised to fully disclose only in the distant future. Vanhanen had been implicated in the campaign contributions scandal of 2008–09 that was still reverberating. The party secretary, Jarmo Korhonen, who was at the heart of the scandal, failed to win reelection even......
  • Finnish Communist Party (political party, Finland)
    ...in prison camps, bringing the total losses of the war to more than 30,000 lives. A few of the revolutionary leaders, however, managed to escape to Soviet Russia, where a small contingent founded the Finnish Communist Party in Moscow; others continued their flight to the United States and western Europe, some gradually returning to Finland....
  • Finnish language
    member of the Finno-Ugric group of the Uralic language family, spoken in Finland. At the beginning of the 19th century, Finnish had no official status, with Swedish being used in Finnish education, government, and literature. The publication in 1835 of the Kalevala, a national epic poem based on Finnish folklore, arou...
  • Finnish literature
    the oral and written literature produced in Finland in the Finnish, Swedish, and, during the Middle Ages, Latin languages....
  • Finnish National Theatre (theatre, Helsinki, Finland)
    activist in the struggle to enhance Finnish-language institutions, and founder-director of the first stable Finnish-language theatre, the Finnish National Theatre. Bergbom, himself the author of a romantic tragedy, directed the first performance of Aleksis Kivi’s one-act biblical drama Lea (1869), the event cited as the beginning of professional theatre in the Finnish language....
  • Finnish Orthodox Church
    Eastern Orthodox church, recognized as the second state church of Finland. Most of the Orthodox Finns were originally from Karelia, the southeastern part of Finland that was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, which was Christianized by Russian monks in the 12th century. The Orthodox are now spread throu...
  • Finnish spitz (breed of dog)
    breed of dog native to Finland, where a breed standard has existed since 1812. It is nicknamed the “barking bird dog” for its habit of “yodeling,” or barking continuously, to alert the hunter to the location of game birds. The breed continues to be a sporting dog in Finland but elsewhere it fills t...
  • Finniss, Boyle (explorer)
    ...ranching. Tourism and recreational barramundi fishing, centring on the Daly River Settlement, 50 miles (80 km) from the river’s mouth, are the main economic activities. The Daly, explored in 1865 by Boyle Finniss, first governor of a proposed settlement in the territory, and named after Sir Dominick Daly, then governor of South Australia, is navigable for 70 miles (115 km) above its tida...
  • Finnmark (county, Norway)
    (June 3, 1326), the peace treaty ending decades of hostilities between the principality of Novgorod (now in Russia) and Norway. The conflicts took place in what was then generally known as Finnmark (including the present Norwegian province of Finnmark and Russia’s Kola Peninsula). The treaty, rather than delimiting a clear frontier between Norway and Novgorod, created a buffer zone, the......
  • Finnmark Plateau (plateau, Norway)
    ...include the Hardanger Plateau—3,000 feet (900 metres) above sea level—Europe’s largest mountain plateau, covering about 4,600 square miles (11,900 square km) in southern Norway; and the Finnmark Plateau (1,000 feet [300 metres] above sea level), occupying most of Finnmark, the northernmost and largest county of Norway....
  • Finnmarksvidda (plain, Norway)
    swampy plain, northern Norway. Though it has no exact natural boundaries, the plain’s principal section is about 60 miles (100 km) from east to west and 50 miles from north to south. The Finnmarksvidda, made up of ancient crystalline rock, is characterized by numerous small lakes and bogs, with a fe...
  • Finno-Ugric (people)
    ...Archaeological remains suggest that this second wave of settlers came from or had contact with what was to become Russia and also Scandinavia and central Europe. Peoples of Uralic (specifically Finno-Ugric) stock dominated two settlement areas. Those who entered southwestern Finland across the Gulf of Finland were the ancestors of the Hämäläiset (Tavastians, or......
  • Finno-Ugric languages
    group of languages constituting much the larger of the two branches of a more comprehensive grouping, the Uralic languages. The Finno-Ugric languages are spoken by several million people distributed discontinuously over an area extending from Norway in the west to the Ob River region in Siberia and south ...
  • Finno-Ugric religion
    pre-Christian and pre-Islāmic religious beliefs and practices of the Finno-Ugric peoples, who inhabit regions of northern Scandinavia, Siberia, the Baltic area, and central Europe. In modern times the religion of many of these peoples has been an admixture of agrarian and nomadic primitive beliefs and of Christianity and Islām....
  • Finow Canal (canal, Germany)
    ...Brieskow on the Oder. An extensive system of waterways in this part of Germany was finally established with the opening of the Plauer Canal in 1746, which ran from the Elbe to the Havel. The 25-mile Finow Canal along the Havel to the Liepe, a tributary of the Oder, had been built earlier but fell into decay because of flooding and neglect and was not rebuilt until 1751. In the late 17th and......
  • Finschhafen (Papua New Guinea)
    town and port at the tip of Huon Peninsula, eastern Papua New Guinea, southwestern Pacific Ocean. The three-basin harbour, an inlet of the Solomon Sea, was cha...
  • Finschia novaeseelandiae (Finschia novaeseelandiae)
    The brown creeper (Mohoua novaeseelandiae, or Finschia novaeseelandiae) of New Zealand belongs to the family Pachycephalidae. It is about 13 cm long, with a rather long tail and a tiny bill. Flocks or pairs call constantly in forests of South Island....
  • Finsen, Niels Ryberg (Danish physician)
    Danish physician, founder of modern phototherapy (the treatment of disease by the influence of light), who received the 1903 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for the application of light in the treatment of skin diseases....
  • Finsky Zaliv (gulf, Northern Europe)
    easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea, between Finland (north) and Russia and Estonia (east and south). Covering an area of 11,600 square miles (30,000 square km), the gulf extends for 250 miles (400 km) from east to west but only 12 to 80 miles (19 to 130 km) from north to south. It has a maximum depth of 377 feet (115 m) at its...
  • Finster, Rev. Howard (American artist and preacher)
    American artist and preacher (b. Dec. 2, 1916, Valley Head, Ala.—d. Oct. 22, 2001, Rome, Ga.), with his simple colourful works that combined his evangelistic messages with pop culture icons, became one of the most noted folk artists of the 20th century. He was best known for Paradise Garden in Pennville, Ga., which he concocted from items he retrieved from a dump, and his designs also appea...
  • Finsteraarhorn (mountain, Switzerland)
    highest peak (14,022 feet [4,274 metres]) of the Bernese Alps in south-central Switzerland, it lies between the cantons of Bern and Valais south-southeast of the mountain resort of Grindelwald. First ascended in 1812 by three Swiss guides (though this is disputed, and the first ascent may not have been until 1829), the glacie...
  • Finsterwalder, Ulrich (German engineer)
    During the years after World War II, a German engineer and builder, Ulrich Finsterwalder, developed the cantilever method of construction with prestressed concrete. Finsterwalder’s Bendorf Bridge over the Rhine at Koblenz, Germany, was completed in 1962 with thin piers and a centre span of 202 metres (673 feet). The double cantilevering method saved money through the absence of scaffolding ...
  • finta giardiniera, La (opera by Mozart)
    ...lavish music and set a severe time limit on mass settings, which Mozart objected to but was obliged to observe. At the end of the year he was commissioned to write an opera buffa, La finta giardiniera (“The Feigned Gardener Girl”), for the Munich carnival season, where it was duly successful. It shows Mozart, in his first comic opera since his childhood,......
  • finta semplice, La (opera buffa by Mozart)
    ...spent 15 months. Mozart wrote a one-act German singspiel, Bastien und Bastienne, which was given privately. Greater hopes were attached to his prospect of having an Italian opera buffa, La finta semplice (“The Feigned Simpleton”), done at the court theatre—hopes that were, however, frustrated, much to Leopold’s indignation. But a substantial, festal mas...
  • Fionn (Irish legendary figure)
    legendary Irish hero, leader of the group of warriors known as the Fianna Éireann. See Fenian cycle....
  • Fionn cycle (Irish literature)
    in Irish literature, tales and ballads centring on the deeds of the legendary Finn MacCumhaill (MacCool) and his war band, the Fianna Éireann. An elite volunteer corps of warriors and huntsmen, skilled in poetry, the Fianna flourished under the ...
  • Fionnlagh Ruadh (Scottish bard)
    ...and bard. This is the earliest extensive anthology of heroic Gaelic ballads in either Scotland or Ireland. The Scottish Gaelic poems date from about 1310 to 1520. The bard best represented is Fionnlagh Ruadh, bard to John, chief of clan Gregor (died 1519). There are three poems by Giolla Coluim mac an Ollaimh, a professional poet at the court of the Lord of the Isles and almost certainly......
  • Fioravanti, Alfredo Adolfo (forger)
    ...analysis was made of the black glaze that covered the figure. It was found that the glaze contained as a colouring agent manganese, which never was used for this purpose in ancient times. Finally, Alfredo Adolfo Fioravanti confessed that he was the sole survivor of the three forgers....
  • fiord (sea inlet)
    long narrow arm of the sea, commonly extending far inland, that results from marine inundation of a glaciated valley. Many fjords are astonishingly deep; Sogn Fjord in Norway is 1,308 m (4,290 feet) deep, and Canal Messier in Chile is 1,270 m (4,167 feet). The great depth of these submerged valleys, extending thousands of feet below ...
  • Fiordland crested penguin (bird)
    species of crested penguin (genus Eudyptes, order Sphenisciformes) characterized by a thick stripe of pale yellow feather plumes above each eye (the superciliary stripe) that extends from the bill to the rear of the head. The terminal ends of each of the stripes extend outward near the back of the head. The species is also distinguished by a patch of ba...
  • Fiordland National Park (park, New Zealand)
    scenic natural area in the southernmost part of South Island, New Zealand. Established as a reserve in 1904, it was designated a national park in 1952. It covers an area of some 4,600 square miles (12,000 square km), making it one of the largest national parks in the world. Fiordland, al...
  • Fiordland penguin (bird)
    species of crested penguin (genus Eudyptes, order Sphenisciformes) characterized by a thick stripe of pale yellow feather plumes above each eye (the superciliary stripe) that extends from the bill to the rear of the head. The terminal ends of each of the stripes extend outward near the back of the head. The species is also distinguished by a patch of ba...
  • Fiore, Gioacchino da (Italian theologian)
    Italian mystic, theologian, biblical commentator, philosopher of history, and founder of the monastic order of San Giovanni in Fiore. He developed a philosophy of history according to which history develops in three ages of increasing spirituality: the ages of the Father, the Son, and the ...
  • Fiore, Pasquale (Italian jurist)
    Italian jurist and leading authority on international law....
  • Fiorelli, Giuseppe (Italian archaeologist)
    Italian archaeologist whose systematic excavation at Pompeii helped to preserve much of the ancient city as nearly intact as possible and contributed significantly to modern archaeological methods....
  • All of the media associated with this article appears on the left. Click an item to view it.
  • Mouse over the caption, credit, links or citations to learn more.
  • You can mouse over some images to magnify, or click on them to view full-screen.
  • Click on the Expand button to view this full-screen. Press Escape to return.
  • Click on audio player controls to interact.
JOIN COMMUNITY LOGIN
Join Free Community

Please join our community in order to save your work, create a new document, upload media files, recommend an article or submit changes to our editors.

Log In

"Email" is the e-mail address you used when you registered. "Password" is case sensitive.

If you need additional assistance, please contact customer support.

Enter the e-mail address you used when registering and we will e-mail your password to you. (or click on Cancel to go back).

Save to My Workspace
Share the full text of this article with your friends, associates, or readers by linking to it from your web site or social networking page.

Permalink
Copy Link
Britannica needs you! Become a part of more than two centuries of publishing tradition by contributing to this article. If your submission is accepted by our editors, you'll become a Britannica contributor and your name will appear along with the other people who have contributed to this article. View Submission Guidelines

Have a comment about this page?
Please, contact us. If this is a correction, your suggested change will be reviewed by our editorial staff.

(Please limit to 900 characters) Send

Copy and paste the HTML below to include this widget on your Web page.

Copy Link
The Britannica Store

Share This

Other users can view this at the following URL:
Copy

Create New Project

Done

Rename This Project

Done

Add or Remove from Projects

Add to project:
Add
Remove from Project:
Remove

Copy This Project

Copy

Import Projects

Please enter your user name and password
that you use to sign in to your workspace account on
Britannica Online Academic.