1609 résultats pour "introductives"

• Alexander the Great I INTRODUCTION Alexander the Great (356-323 BC), king of Macedonia, conqueror of the Persian Empire, and one of the greatest military geniuses of all times.

• Paul Cézanne I INTRODUCTION Peaches and Pears Peaches and Pears (1888) by Paul Cézanne displays a sense of unity and continuity typical of the artist's many still-life paintings.

  the most transient natural effects as well as their own passing emotional states as the artists stood before nature. Under Pissarro's tutelage, and within a very shorttime during 1872-1873, Cézanne shifted from dark tones to bright hues and began to concentrate on scenes of farmland and rural villages. IV RETURN TO AIX-EN-PROVENCE Mont Sainte-Victoire by CézanneFrench artist Paul Cézanne painted Mont Sainte-Victoire, a mountain near his home in Provence in southern France, onmany occasions. Ov...

• Iliad I INTRODUCTION The Abduction of Helen The Trojan War began with the abduction of Helen, the beautiful wife of the king of Sparta, by the Trojan prince Paris.

  Ajax Defends Greek ShipsThe Greek hero Ajax wields his spear in defense of Greek ships as Trojan warriors try to set the wooden vessels on firewith their torches. This encounter, shown in a late-18th-century illustration, occurs in Book 15 of the Iliad, an epicattributed to Greek poet Homer that recounts events from the Trojan War.Corbis Paris offers to fight a duel with Menelaus to settle the conflict. After an exchange of blows, Paris’s protector, the goddess Aphrodite, intervenes to save him....

• Claude Monet I INTRODUCTION Monet's Gardens at Giverny From 1890 until his death in 1926, Claude Monet lived and painted in the small village of Giverny, near Paris.

  small works, Monet’s quick daubs of fresh colors aptly capture the movement of the water and gaiety of the scene. Despite his father's disapproval, in 1870 Monet married Camille, who had already borne him a son. To escape the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871), during whichGerman troops threatened Paris, the couple went to London, then to Holland. They returned in 1872 and settled in Argenteuil, a sailing center on the Seine Riveroutside Paris. Monet painted numerous vibrant, light-filled views of...

• Introduction sur l'histoire et la diversité des formes théâtrales

  Introduction sur l'histoire et la diversité des formes théâtrales Le théâtre est un art vivant qui nous vient de l’Antiquité. On fait remonter l’origine de la comédie à la Grèce antique, aux cérémonies organisées en faveur du dieu Dionysos. Mais le théâtre peut-il être considéré uniquement comme un rituel ? Il est aussi une mise en espace d’un texte écrit ou oral qui prend forme avec le corps des acteurs. Dans l’Antiquité, le théâtre était joué par des esclaves masqués. En occident, la con...

• Napoleon I I INTRODUCTION Napoleon I (1769-1821), emperor of the French, whose imperial dictatorship ended the French Revolution (1789-1799) while consolidating the reforms it had brought about.

  until after Napoleon’s fall did the common people of Europe, alienated from his governments by war taxes and military conscription, fully appreciate the benefits he hadgiven them. VI NAPOLEON’S DOWNFALL In 1812 Napoleon, whose alliance with Alexander I had disintegrated, launched an invasion of Russia that ended in a disastrous retreat from Moscow. Thereafter allEurope united against him, and although he fought on, and brilliantly, the odds were impossible. In April 1814, his marshals refused...

• House (architecture) I INTRODUCTION Trulli in Alberobello, Italy Alberobello, in the Apulia region of southeastern Italy, is noted for its unusual limestone houses known as trulli (from Greek trullos, dome).

  Fresco in the Villa of the Mysteries, PompeiiThe Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii, Italy (built about 50 bc), featured a large hall with this mural encircling it. The mural ispainted in the Second Style of Roman painting. (Historians of art recognize four periods or styles in Roman wall painting.)The mural in the Villa of the Mysteries is thought to depict the initiation rituals of a mystery religion. For this reason, it hasbeen conjectured that the hall was used for cult rituals.Bridgeman Art Li...

• Acting I INTRODUCTION Lee Strasberg American acting teacher Lee Strasberg was best known for his association with the Actors Studio, of which he became the artistic director in 1951.

  truthfully felt those emotions at the moment they expressed them. Finding the true feeling in the proper place and time on stage, however, was a problem that Aristotleaddressed less well. He concluded that acting was an occupation for the gifted or insane. How to cross the artistic boundary beyond feigned emotions and flat imitation obsessed many Greek actors. In 315 BC the tragedian Polus carried the real ashes of his recently deceased son in an urn to stimulate a sense of genuine grief when h...

• Latin American Music I INTRODUCTION Tito Puente Playing the Drums Since the 1950s American drummer Tito Puente has popularized Latin American music, especially the mambo, in the United States.

  Panpipe Music of BoliviaWell before the Spanish conquest, native peoples such as the Quechua and Aymara living in the Andes Mountains inBolivia, Peru, and Ecuador, developed a rich musical tradition. Panpipes (set of tuned pipes), made of ceramic, sugarcane,or bone were paired with shell trumpets, cane flutes, and drums, which accompanied dancers during religious and secularceremonies. Large ensembles of 4 to 20 panpipe players are still the norm, and Spanish influences have since beenintegrated...

• Byzantine Art and Architecture I INTRODUCTION Archangel Michael This depiction of the archangel Michael, in Saint Mark's Cathedral in Venice, Italy, is an example of ancient enamel art.

  This Byzantine ivory relief shows Christ the Pantocrator, or ruler of the world, raising his hand in a gesture of blessing. Itcomes from the cover of a lectionary, or book containing portions of the scriptures, and dates from the second golden ageof Byzantine art, the late 10th century. The relief is in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, England.Bridgeman Art Library, London/New York Mosaics were the favored medium for the interior adornment of Byzantine churches. The small cubes, or tesserae, t...

• Islamic Art and Architecture I INTRODUCTION Córdoba Mosque Courtyard This mosque and courtyard with its repeated horseshoe arches was built between the 8th and 10th centuries in Córdoba, Spain.

  Süleymaniye MosqueThe Süleymaniye Mosque in İstanbul was built in 1550. The architect, Sinan, based his design on Byzantine churches, inparticular the Hagia Sophia. The large central dome above a square opens to smaller spaces vaulted by buttressing half-domes. The four tapering minarets with balconies are characteristic of the architectural style of later Islamic mosques.Gian Berto Vanni/Art Resource, NY The few and relatively simple rituals of the Islamic faith gave rise to a unique religious...

• German Literature I INTRODUCTION German Literature, literature written in the German language from the 8th century to the present, and including the works of German, Austrian, and Swiss authors.

  Till EulenspiegelThe medieval peasant Till Eulenspiegel appears in many German folktales as a trickster who outwits people in positions ofauthority. In this image his first name is spelled Tyll.Keystone Pressedienst GmbH The rise of the middle class in the 14th and 15th centuries and the struggles of the peasants against the nobility culminated in the great 16th-century religiousrevolution known as the Reformation. This movement was reflected in literature, especially by Martin Luther, whose tra...

• Kareem Abdul-Jabbar I INTRODUCTION Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, born in 1947, American professional basketball player, a dominant competitor who holds the record for most points in National Basketball Association (NBA) history.

• Robert Frost I INTRODUCTION Robert Frost Usually set amid the natural beauty of rural New England, the concise, direct poetry of American poet Robert Frost conveys a wide range of emotions.

  Frost's Collected Poems (1930) won him his second Pulitzer Prize. And his next two collections— A Further Range (1936) and A Witness Tree (1942)—also won Pulitzers. He then wrote two plays in blank verse. The first, A Masque of Reason (1945), received lukewarm praise from critics. The second, A Masque of Mercy (1947), which is a modern treatment of Christian biblical figures, was more successful. Frost's final volumes of poetry were Steeple Bush (1947) and In the Clearing (1962). Th...

• Homer I INTRODUCTION Homer According to tradition, the Greek poet Homer is believed to be the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two great epics of ancient Greek literature.

  The Return of OdysseusAfter the Greek warrior Odysseus returns from the Trojan War to his home in Ithaca, he kills the uninvited and unwantedsuitors of his wife, Penelope, who believed him to be dead. Odysseus’s astonishing skill with the bow convinces Penelopethat he is indeed her long-absent husband. This anonymous engraving is of an unknown date.Corbis The Odyssey narrates the return of the Greek hero Odysseus from the Trojan War. The opening scenes depict the disorder that has arisen in Ody...

• Surrealism I INTRODUCTION Surrealism, artistic and literary movement that explored and celebrated the realm of dreams and the unconscious mind through the creation of visual art, poetry, and motion pictures.

  Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights (about 1505-1510).© 2008 Salvador Dali, Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York./Bridgeman Art Library, London/New York Dreams, according to Freud, were the royal road to studying the unconscious, because it is in dreams that our unconscious, primal desires manifest themselves. Theincongruities in dreams, Freud believed, result from a struggle for dominance of ego and id. In attempting to access the real workings of...

• Art Nouveau I INTRODUCTION Detail of Art Nouveau Decoration This detail of a door decoration from a building constructed in the early 20th century in Milan, Italy, illustrates the stylistic themes associated with art nouveau.

  Wallpaper by William MorrisIn the early 19th century manufacturers began to mass-produce wallpaper, and the quality of designs suffered. WilliamMorris, a British artist who had become interested in the design of household furnishings and items for everyday use,began to create handmade wallpapers that he integrated into the overall design of the home. This artichoke design isbased on stylized plant motifs, a common theme in art nouveau designs.Art Resource, NY Art nouveau in Britain evolved out o...

• Rhythm-and-Blues Music I INTRODUCTION Tina Turner American singer Tina Turner began performing rhythm-and-blues music in a band led by her former husband, Ike Turner, in the 1960s.

  thousands of black Americans migrated from the rural South to Midwest, Northeast, and West Coast cities. In popular music, new styles were created to meet thechanging tastes of this demographic group, leading to the development of the urbane sounds of R&B. The profound sociological changes of the World War II period were accompanied by two significant technological developments: the invention of the electric guitar in thelate 1930s and the discovery of the German-invented tape recorder by the mu...

• Cultural Revolution I INTRODUCTION Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), political campaign in China, launched in 1966 by Chinese Communist Party chairman Mao Zedong to eliminate his political rivals and revolutionize Chinese society.

  1990s attempted to wipe out the legacy of the Cultural Revolution. Even Mao, once glorified as “The Great Helmsman” and the “Red Sun,” was officially criticized for his “leftist mistakes” in the Cultural Revolution, but was still praised forhis leadership in both the war against Japan ( see Sino-Japanese Wars) and the civil war against the Kuomintang. Today, while privately vilified by many Chinese, Mao is at the same time still genuinely admired as a powerful national leader. Contributed By:Rut...

• Mark Twain I INTRODUCTION Mark Twain, pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835-1910), American writer and humorist, whose best work is characterized by broad, often irreverent humor or biting social satire.

  father, who keeps him prisoner in an isolated cabin. The boy escapes and, together with a runaway slave, Jim, sails down the Mississippi on a raft. During their trip,Huck and Jim encounter many unusual characters, including two families involved in a senseless feud and a pair of scoundrels who swindle innocent townspeople. Theirexperiences bring about a strong friendship between the boy and the slave, but their adventures end when Jim is captured and held at the farm of Tom Sawyer’s AuntSally. W...

• Winston Churchill I INTRODUCTION Winston Churchill (1874-1965), British politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom (1940-1945, 1951-1955), widely regarded as the greatest British leader of the 20th century.

  sufficient tools to break the stalemate on the western front and he worked on developing armored fighting vehicles (tanks) to break the deadlock and end theslaughter. As the lines hardened on the western front, Churchill focused on a campaign to force open the Dardanelles Strait, controlled by the Ottoman Empire, to give the Allies adirect route to Russia through the Black Sea. Such a move would bring much-needed supplies to the Russian armies and eliminate the Ottomans from the war. Whenthe nav...

• Holy Roman Empire I INTRODUCTION Holy Roman Empire, political entity of lands in western and central Europe, founded by Charlemagne in AD 800 and dissolved by Emperor Francis II in 1806.

  acquired the imperial title and an area running from the North Sea through Lotharingia (Lorraine) and Burgundy to northern Italy; Louis II received East Francia (theGerman duchies of Saxony, Swabia, and Bavaria). In 870 Lothair’s middle kingdom was divided by the Treaty of Mersen, which gave Lotharingia to East Francia and therest to West Francia. This division created the foundation for today’s states of Germany and France, respectively; however, in the 9th century these were highly fractured d...

• Vous expliquerez et apprécierez ce parallèle entre le XVIIe siècle classique et le moyen âge : «Le XVIIe siècle - en ce qu'il a de classique - bien plus que l'introduction à la pensée scientifique, moderne et athée du XVIIIe siècle, est l'épanouissement de la pensée du moyen âge, dont il donne, sous des habits empruntés et dans une langue magnifique, une nouvelle et somptueuse image. Un homme prévenu, qui oublierait tant de poncifs et de jugements consacrés, comment ne serait-il pas fr

• Confucius I INTRODUCTION Confucius (551 or 552-479 BC), Chinese philosopher and educator, one of the most important individuals in Chinese history, and one of the most influential figures in world history.

  From a modern perspective, Confucius’s worldview has certain limitations. He was ignorant of cultural diversity; he accepted the sexism of his society; he shows nointerest in natural science or technology; his political philosophy is undemocratic; and he gives insufficient stress to social change. However, Confucius will no doubtcontinue to inspire people across the world with his vision of social harmony, his insight into human virtue, and his techniques for cultivating ethical individuals. Mi...

• Game Theory I INTRODUCTION Game Theory, mathematical analysis of any situation involving a conflict of interest, with the intent of indicating the optimal choices that, under given conditions, will lead to a desired outcome.

  C Zero-Sum Games A game is said to be a zero-sum game if the total amount of payoffs at the end of the game is zero. Thus, in a zero-sum game the total amount won is exactly equal tothe amount lost. In economic contexts, zero-sum games are equivalent to saying that no production or destruction of goods takes place within the “game economy” inquestion. Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern showed in 1944 that any n-person non-zero-sum game can be reduced to an n + 1 zero-sum game, and that such n...

• Diego Velázquez (artist) I INTRODUCTION Velázquez and Baroque Theatricality Spanish painter Diego Velázquez presents two scenes in The Fable of Arachne (about 1656, Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain), also known as The Spinners.

  search for a position as court painter. In 1623, however, he returned to the capital and, after executing a portrait (1623, Prado) of the king, was named official painterto Philip IV. The portrait was the first among many such sober, direct renditions of the king, the royal family, and members of the court. Indeed, throughout the later1620s, most of Velázquez's efforts were dedicated to portraiture. Mythological subjects would at times occupy his attention, as in Bacchus, also called The Drin...

• Geoffrey Chaucer I INTRODUCTION Geoffrey Chaucer Fourteenth-century English poet and public servant Geoffrey Chaucer wrote verse renowned for its humor, understanding of human character, and innovations in poetic vocabulary and meter.

  Tale of the Wife of BathThe Canterbury Tales by English poet Geoffrey Chaucer contains 22 verse tales and 2 prose tales presumably told bypilgrims to pass the time on their way to visit a shrine in Canterbury, England. An excerpt from the tale of the Wife ofBath is heard here. The wife relates that she has been married and widowed five times but the church has recognized onlyone marriage. You can follow the Middle English text and modern translation as you listen to the audio excerpt.The Wife of...

• le role du juge dans la procedure d'immatriculation et dinscription

  1 les recours possibles 2 contrôle des inscriptions A- annulation B- radiation C- rectification 3 la prénotation par voie judicaire : D- prénotation en vertu d’une ordonnance du président du tribunal de première instance E- prénotation prise en vertu d’une requête introductive d’instance Introduction Le régime de l’immatriculation au Maroc a été institué pas le dahir de 12 aout 1913 et renforcé par d’autres textesse rattachant...

• Vincent van Gogh I INTRODUCTION Church at Auvers by Van Gogh Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh spent the last months of his life in Auvers-sur-Oise, near Paris, under the care of Dr.

  III PARIS Van Gogh's Self-PortraitThe burning eyes of this Self-Portrait are an example of how 19th-century Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh attempted tocapture the human essence and emotions of his subjects. During the last several years of his life, van Gogh created anumber of self-portraits. The expressive brushstrokes and vibrant colors in these paintings are typical of this later style.Bridgeman/Art Resource, NY In 1886 van Gogh went to live with Théo in Paris, where he became familiar with...

• Vladimir Lenin I INTRODUCTION Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924), Russian revolutionary leader and theorist, who presided over the first government of Soviet Russia and then that of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

  with Japan ( see Russo-Japanese War). A string of military defeats and the strains placed on society by the war made for a tense atmosphere in Saint Petersburg, and by the beginning of 1905 various segments of Russian society, including students and liberal members of the nobility, were calling for political reform. When an unarmedcrowd of workers marched to the city’s Winter Palace on January 9 (or January 22, in the Western, or New Style, calendar) to submit a petition to Emperor Nicholas II,s...

• Children's Literature I INTRODUCTION Kate Greenaway's May Day The delicate skill and graceful simplicity of English artist Kate Greenaway's illustrations delighted children and impressed thinkers, including art critic John Ruskin.

  With the development of vernacular literature, particularly after the invention of printing, more children's books appeared. The publications of the first English printer,William Caxton, included the Book of Curtesye (1477), a collection of rhymes that sets forth rules of conduct for a “goodly chylde.” Eight years later Caxton printed Le Morte d'Arthur (1469-1470; The Death of Arthur ) by English translator and compiler Sir Thomas Malory, which became the basis for later treatments of the A...

• Native American Art I INTRODUCTION Native American Art, the visual works crafted by indigenous people of North America, starting after their arrival on the continent thousands of years ago and continuing until the present.

  artists in the Ohio area cut delicate flat forms from sheets of mica in the shape of birds, human figures, and large hands. They also carved quite natural-looking birdsand animals on stone platform pipes. These figures sat on the pipe’s flat base, or platform, and on some pipes they were part of the pipe bowl. Prominent people ofthese cultures were buried with a wealth of ornaments, such as jewelry of shells and copper, and headdresses elaborated with animal forms. The period of Mississippian cu...

• Peter the Great I INTRODUCTION Peter the Great or Peter I (1672-1725), tsar and, later, emperor of Russia (1682-1725), who is linked with the Westernization of Russia and its rise as a great power.

  V LATER REIGN Before long, however, these and other reform measures had to cede center stage to the prosecution of the Great Northern War (1700-1721) against Sweden. Peter’sjourney west did not result in a great alliance against the Ottomans, but it led to one against Sweden. Russia fought together with Denmark and the union of Polandand Saxony against Sweden to win the Baltic coastline, the 'window into Europe,' and to break Swedish dominance over the northern part of the continent. At the tim...

• Edgar Allan Poe I INTRODUCTION Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), American writer, known as a poet and critic but most famous as the first master of the short-story form (see Short Story), especially the psychological horror tale.

  the deciphering of a code. “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” (1841), “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt” (1842-1843), and “The Purloined Letter” (1844) are regarded aspredecessors of the modern mystery, or detective, story ( see Detective Story). Many of Poe’s tales are distinguished by the author’s unique grotesque inventiveness in addition to his superb plot construction. Poe was unequaled in evoking an all-encompassing mood of horror through the rendering of setting and atmosphere. The opening descri...

• George Frideric Handel I INTRODUCTION Handel's Water Music In addition to his popular operas and oratorios, German-born composer George Frideric Handel wrote music in the 1700s for the church and for royal celebrations.

  During the 1720s and 1730s Handel worked primarily as a composer and producer of operas for the London stage. This extremely productive phase of his career beganwith the opening of the Royal Academy of Music in London in 1719. The Royal Academy was founded with the support of the king and aristocratic subscribers for theproduction of Italian operas. Its directors sent Handel to continental Europe to hire some of the world’s greatest singers. Handel was not the only composer writingoperas for Aca...

• American Music I INTRODUCTION American Music, the folk, popular, and classical music of the United States--created by American-born or American-trained composers, or originating in American culture, or written primarily for American audiences.

  The country's first permanent orchestra was the New York Philharmonic Society, founded in 1842. Among the first symphonic and operatic composers the mostprominent was William Henry Fry, who composed the first opera by an American ( Leonora, 1845). Fry is best remembered, however, for four symphonies written in the 1850s and 1860s. George F. Bristow wrote the first opera on an American theme; his Rip Van Winkle was performed in New York City in 1855. Town bands, a popular form of community mu...

• Christopher Columbus I INTRODUCTION Christopher Columbus (1451-1506), Italian-born Spanish navigator who sailed west across the Atlantic Ocean in search of a route to Asia but achieved fame by making landfall in the Americas instead.

  explorers, adventurers, entrepreneurs, merchants, and any others who saw their fortunes tied to the trade winds and ocean currents. Columbus’s brother Bartholomewworked in Lisbon as a mapmaker, and for a time the brothers worked together as draftsmen and book collectors. Later that year, Columbus set sail on a convoy loadedwith goods to be sold in northern Atlantic ports. In 1478 or 1479 Columbus met and married Felipa Perestrello e Moniz, the daughter of a respected, though relatively poor, nob...

• Wayne Gretzky I INTRODUCTION Wayne Gretzky, born in 1961, Canadian professional ice hockey player, nicknamed The Great One, who is the National Hockey League (NHL) career leader in goals, assists, and points (goals and assists combined).

  and 1991. He was captain of the national team for the 1996 World Cup and made his first Olympic Games appearance as a member of Canada’s ice hockey team duringthe 1998 Winter Games in Nagano, Japan. In 1999, just a few months after his retirement from the NHL, Gretzky was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame. The board of directors of the Hall of Fame waived thenormal three-year waiting period as a way of honoring Gretzky for all his contributions to the sport of hockey. Gretzky remained active...

• Édouard Manet I INTRODUCTION Manet: Tradition and Innovation French impressionist painter Édouard Manet shocked art audiences in Paris with Le déjeuner sur l'herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass; 1863, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), which depicts a nude woman at a woodland picnic.

  Le Déjeuner sur l’herbeLe Déjeuner sur l’herbe (Luncheon on the Grass) by Édouard Manet was painted in 1863. When it was first displayed, therough brushwork and undefined areas of color were as distressing to the public as the nude woman who was neither aclassical goddess nor a symbol in an allegory. Manet claimed that the real subject of the painting was light, and it was thatphilosophy that gave birth to impressionism.Bridgeman Art Library, London/New York After his father died in 1862, Manet...

• Henry VIII I INTRODUCTION Henry VIII (1491-1547), king of England (1509-1547), the image of the Renaissance king as immortalized by German artist Hans Holbein, who painted him hands on hips, legs astride, exuding confidence and power.

  that was completed by 1540. The crown then took possession of all their property, paying small pensions to the approximately 10,000 monks and nuns who weredeprived of their homes. In a reversal of roles, many towns were forced to assist the same people who had once provided charity to the less fortunate. To pay for hiscontinued wars, Henry sold the former monastic lands to nobles and gentry, who thereby gained an interest in the success of Henry’s reformation and becamedependent upon the king. T...

• Canadian Architecture I INTRODUCTION L'Anse aux Meadows In around ad 1000 Norse Vikings sailed from Greenland to North America and set up a village on the tip of what is now the island of Newfoundland's Great Northern Peninsula.

  IglooSome Inuit peoples in the Arctic regions of Canada live in domed houses of snow, or igloos, which provide good insulationand protection from wind. The word igloo comes from the Inuit iglu, meaning “house.”George Holton/Photo Researchers, Inc. Canada’s original inhabitants are known as the First Nations. At the time of European arrival, about 40 nations were scattered across Canada. Many of them lived alongthe coasts, where they could fish. These nations can be classified into five major gro...

• Nuclear Energy I INTRODUCTION Gundremmingen Nuclear Power Plant, Germany The first of three boiling-water nuclear reactors at Germany's Gundremmingen plant began operating in 1966 but was permanently shut down after being decommissioned in 1983.

  such as ¯U is induced by the absorption of a neutron as in producing cesium-140, rubidium-93, three neutrons, and 200 MeV, or 3.2 × 10 -11 J (7.7 × 10 -12 cal). A nuclear fission reaction releases 10 million times as much energy as is released in a typical chemical reaction. See Nuclear Chemistry. III NUCLEAR ENERGY FROM FISSION The two key characteristics of nuclear fission important for the practical release of nuclear energy are both evident in equation (2). First, the energy per fiss...

• Matrix Theory and Linear Algebra I INTRODUCTION Matrix Theory and Linear Algebra, interconnected branches of mathematics that serve as fundamental tools in pure and applied mathematics and are becoming increasingly important in the physical, biological, and social sciences.

  vectors and V is called a vector space of dimension m. Two- and three-dimensional Euclidean spaces are vector spaces when their points are regarded as specified by ordered pairs or triples of real numbers. Matrices may be used to describe linear changes from one vector space into another. Contributed By:James Singer Reviewed By:J. Lennart BerggrenMicrosoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

• William Blake I INTRODUCTION William Blake (1757-1827), English poet, painter, and engraver, who created an unusual form of illustrated verse; his poetry, inspired by mystical vision, is among the most original, lyric, and prophetic in the language.

  Your spring & your day are wasted in play,And your winter and night in disguise. Both series of poems take on deeper resonances when read in conjunction. Innocence and Experience, “the two contrary states of the human soul,” are contrasted insuch companion pieces as “The Lamb” and “The Tyger.” Blake’s subsequent poetry develops the implication that true innocence is impossible without experience,transformed by the creative force of the human imagination. III BLAKE AS ARTIST The LambThe Lamb...

• Albert Einstein I INTRODUCTION Albert Einstein (1879-1955), German-born American physicist and Nobel laureate, best known as the creator of the special and general theories of relativity and for his bold hypothesis concerning the particle nature of light.

  On the basis of the general theory of relativity, Einstein accounted for the previously unexplained variations in the orbital motion of the planets and predicted thebending of starlight in the vicinity of a massive body such as the sun. The confirmation of this latter phenomenon during an eclipse of the sun in 1919 became a mediaevent, and Einstein’s fame spread worldwide. For the rest of his life Einstein devoted considerable time to generalizing his theory even more. His last effort, the unifi...

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart I INTRODUCTION Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, an 18th-century Austrian classical composer and one of the most famous musicians of all time, came from a family of musicians that included his father and sister.

  The opera, Mitridati, rè di Ponto (Mithridates, King of Pontus), was produced in 1770 in Milan under Mozart’s direction with success. Also that year the pope made Mozart a knight of the Order of the Golden Spur. A Salzburg and Germany From 1775 to 1780 Mozart was based mainly in Salzburg working for the archbishop Hieronymous von Colloredo. Although dissatisfied with the low pay and limitedopportunities his employment offered, Mozart composed many works during this period, including his first...

• Metalwork I INTRODUCTION Metalwork, in the fine arts, objects of artistic, decorative, and utilitarian value made of one or more kinds of metal--from precious to base--fashioned by either casting, hammering, or joining or a combination of these techniques.

  Early Bronze DiskThis disk with the head of Acheloos, an Etruscan river god, was made of bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, sometime inthe early 5th century bc. It comes from the necropolis of Monte Quaglieri in Tarquinia. Alloys are made by smelting twodifferent metals together.Scala/Art Resource, NY Knowledge of smelting ultimately led to knowledge of mixing different ores together in the smelting process to produce simple alloys. This followed an intermediateperiod, about 3000 BC, when comp...

• Latin American Architecture I INTRODUCTION Oldest Cathedral in the Western Hemisphere The oldest cathedral in the Western hemisphere is the Cathedral of Santa Maria la Menor, constructed between 1512 and 1541 in Santo Domingo, now the capitol of the Dominican Republic.

  Colonial FortressThe imposing fortress of San Felipe de Barajas, in the foreground, was built in the mid-17th century to defend the colonialport settlement of Cartagena. Modern day Cartagena, Colombia, can be seen in the background.Dave G. Houser/Post-Houserstock/Corbis The use of architecture and urban planning as tools of European conquest is a recurrent theme in Latin American history. King Philip II of Spain ordered town plannersto use a grid or checkerboard plan for the layout of new towns...

• Mesopotamian Art and Architecture I INTRODUCTION Mesopotamian Art and Architecture, the arts and buildings of the ancient Middle Eastern civilizations that developed in the area (now Iraq) between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers from prehistory to the 6th century BC.

  arts. III EARLY DYNASTIC PERIOD Figures from Tell AsmarCreated around 2700 bc, these stone figures are from the city of Tell Asmar in what today is Iraq. From the Temple ofAbu, the statuettes stood in watchful prayer with the wide, staring eyes often found in Sumerian sculpture. The figuresare in the Iraq Museum, Baghdād, Iraq.Art Resource, NY The first historical epoch of Sumerian dominance lasted from about 3000 BC until about 2340 BC. While earlier architectural traditions continued, a ne...

• Nicolaus Copernicus I INTRODUCTION Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), Polish astronomer, best known for his astronomical theory that the sun is at rest near the center of the universe, and that the earth, spinning on its axis once daily, revolves annually around the sun.