Jean Le Bel

A soldier and the constant companion of Jean, Count de Beaumont, with whom he went to England and Scotland in 1327, Le Bel wrote his Vrayes Chroniques (�True Chronicles�), recounting the events of the reign of Edward III,

Fern�ndez De Avellaneda, Alonso

Probably the pseudonym of the otherwise unknown author of Segundo tomo del ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (1614; �Second Book of the Ingenious Knight Don Quixote of La Mancha�), a fraudulent sequel to the first volume of Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote (1605). In the 59th chapter of the second volume of Don Quixote (1615), Cervantes mocks the spurious book. Suggestions of the author's

Benavente Y Mart�nez, Jacinto

One of the foremost Spanish dramatists of the 20th century, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1922. He returned drama to reality by way of social criticism: declamatory verse giving way to prose, melodrama to comedy, formula to experience, impulsive action to dialogue and the play of minds. Benavente showed a preoccupation with

Beza, Theodore

After studying law at Orl�ans, Fr. (1535 - 39), Beza established a practice in Paris, where he published Juvenilia (1548), a volume of amorous verse that earned him a reputation as a leading Latin poet. On recovering

Ayrshire

The county has a concave western coastline along the Firth of Clyde

Scorpius

In astrology,

Ben Jelloun, Tahar

Ben Jelloun's first collection of poetry, Hommes sous linceul de silence (1971; �Men Under

Leonardo Pisano

English �Leonardo of Pisa�, original name �Leonardo Fibonacci� medieval Italian mathematician who wrote Liber abaci (1202; �Book of the Abacus�), the first European work on Indian and Arabian mathematics.

Geography, Aerial photography and remote sensing

During the 20th century immense strides have been made in observing features on the Earth's surface, first by the development of aerial photography and later by satellite imagery. Aerial photography was first used extensively during World War I for reconnaissance. A new profession of photographic interpretation evolved in which the identification of both natural

Monongahela River

River formed by the confluence of the Tygart and West Fork rivers in Marion county, W.Va., U.S. It flows 128 miles (206 km) in a northerly direction past Morgantown into Pennsylvania, past Brownsville and Charleroi, joining the Allegheny River at Pittsburgh to become a major headwater of the Ohio River. In its upper reaches the river has a swift current and furnishes hydroelectric

Berbera

Port, northwestern Somalia, on the Gulf of Aden. It lies at the terminus of roads from the towns of Hargeysa and Burko and has an airport. Known during classical times and to Ibn Sa'id (d. 1286) and other early Arab geographers, Berbera was one of the Muslim settlements of the medieval state of Adal. It was sacked by the Portuguese in 1518 and occupied by the sharifs of Mocha in the 17th century,

Allen, Sir Hugh (percy)

Allen was an organ scholar at Christ's College, Cambridge, and later held organist's posts at Ely cathedral (1898 - 1901) and New College, Oxford (1901 - 18). In 1918 he became director of the Royal College of Music, London, and in

Wahat Al-kharijah, Al-

Also spelled �Kharga, or El-kharga, � oasis in the Libyan (Western) Desert, part of Al-Wadi al-Jadid (�New Valley�) muhafazah (governorate), in south-central Egypt. It is situated about 110 miles (180 km) west-southwest of Naj' Hammadi, to which it is linked by railroad. The name Wahat al-Kharijah means �outer oasis.� The oasis consists of two fertile zones, extending about 100 miles (160 km) north-south and from 12 to 50 miles (19 to 80 km) east-west, with an area of more

Simenon, Georges

Simenon began working on a local newspaper at age 16, and at 19 he went to Paris determined to be a successful writer. Typing some 80 pages each day, he wrote, between 1923 and 1933, more than

Alekhine, Alexander

Alekhine was a precocious chess player, becoming a master at age 16 and a grandmaster at age 22. He was playing in a tournament in Mannheim, Germany, when World War I broke out; after

Chanel, Gabrielle

Byname �Coco � French dress designer who ruled over Parisian haute couture for almost six decades. Her elegantly casual designs inspired women of fashion to abandon complicated, uncomfortable clothes and to adopt her now-classic innovations - i.e., jersey dresses and suits, bell-bottom trousers, bobbed hair, trench coats, turtleneck sweaters, costume jewelry,

Kirchhoff, Gustav Robert

In 1845 Kirchhoff first announced Kirchhoff's

Interlude

In theatre, early form of English dramatic entertainment, sometimes considered to be the transition between medieval morality plays and Tudor dramas. Interludes were performed at court or at �great houses� by professional minstrels or amateurs at intervals between some other entertainment, such as a banquet, or preceding or following a play, or between acts. Although

Aehrenthal, Aloys, Count Lexa Von

Entering the imperial foreign service as attach� in Paris (1877), Aehrenthal subsequently worked at

Mexico, History Of

Diego Vel�zquez, governor of Cuba, laid the foundation for the conquest of Mexico. In 1517 and 1518 Vel�zquez sent out expeditions headed by Francisco Hern�ndez de C�rdoba and Juan de Grijalva that explored the coasts of Yucat�n and the Mexican Gulf. Vel�zquez commissioned Hern�n Cort�s to outfit an expedition to investigate their tales of great wealth in the area. Spending

Ahhiyawa

Also called �Ahhiya� ancient kingdom lying to the west of the Hittite empire. The exact location of Ahhiyawa is not definitely known but may have been western Anatolia or one of the islands in the Aegean Sea. The most commonly held theory is that the people of Ahhiyawa were the Achaeans of Homer, early Mycenaean Greeks. Another theory represents them as ancestors of the Trojans. In any case,

Margaret Of Angoul�me

Daughter of Charles de Valois-Orl�ans, comte d'Angoul�me, and Louise of Savoy, she became the most influential woman in France, with the exception of her mother,

Middle Eastern Religion

Any of the religious beliefs, attitudes, and practices developed in the ancient Middle East (extending geographically from Iran to Egypt and from Anatolia and the Aegean Sea to the Arabian Peninsula and temporally from about 3000 to 330 BC, when Alexander the Great conquered much of the area). They have had an enduring influence on Western civilization. While this article treats

Pole Of Inaccessibility

The term is also used occasionally

Gabrilowitsch, Ossip (salomonovich)

After study with two of the outstanding pianists of his day - Anton Rubinstein in St. Petersburg and Theodor Leschetizky in Vienna - Gabrilowitsch toured widely in Europe and the United States. In 1909 he married Mark Twain's daughter, the singer Clara Clemens,

Chatoyance

The property of some minerals to exhibit a wavy, luminous band with a silky lustre, reminiscent of the eye of a cat, in the centre of a cabochon-cut (polished, with a rounded, unfaceted convex surface) stone. The effect, caused by parallel fibres or by oriented imperfections or inclusions within the stone, is typical of cat's-eye, tigereye, satin spar, and bronzite. The fibres,

Conscription

Modified forms of conscription

Indian Literature

The earliest Indian literature took the form of the canonical Hindu sacred writings, known as the Veda, which were written in Sanskrit. To the Veda

Grijalva River

Spanish �R�o Grijalva, � river in southeastern Mexico. Its headstreams, the largest of which is the Cuilco, rise in the Sierra Madre of Guatemala and the Sierra de Soconusco of Mexico. The Grijalva flows generally northwestward through Chiapas state, where it is known locally as the R�o Grande de Chiapa, or the R�o Chiapa. After leaving a lake created by the Malpaso Dam, it turns northward and

Hawick

Small burgh (town), largest town in the Scottish Borders council area of southeastern Scotland, in the historic county of Roxburghshire. It lies at the confluence of the Rivers Slitrig and Teviot 15 miles (24 km) from the English border. Border skirmishes were frequent in Hawick's history, and in 1570 the town was almost completely burned down. The only building to survive was the

Uinta Mountains

Segment of the south-central Rocky Mountains, extending eastward for more than 100 miles (160 km) from the Wasatch Range across northeastern Utah and slightly into southwestern Wyoming, U.S. Many of the range's summits exceed 13,000 feet (4,000 m), including Kings Peak (13,528 feet [4,123 m]), the highest point in Utah. The mountains are a headstream region for the Provo, Bear, and Duchesne rivers and include