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James Bruce
James Bruce 1730-94, Scottish explorer in Africa. He explored Roman ruins in N Africa (1755) from Tunis to Tripoli and visited Crete, Rhodes, and Asia Minor. In 1768 he traveled down the Red Sea as far as the straits of Bab el Mandeb. From Massawa he struck inland for Gondar, then the capital of Et...
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Pramoedya Ananta Toer
Pramoedya Ananta Toer 1925-2006, modern Indonesia's preeminent writer of fiction, b. Blora, Java. The son of a nationalist headmaster, he was a longtime journalist, involved left-wing politics from the 1940s until his death. Pramoedya, who wrote in Bahasa Indonesia, composed his first novel, The F...
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Black Muslims
Black Muslims African-American religious movement in the United States, split since the late 1970s into the American Society of Muslims and the Nation of Islam. The original group was founded (1930) in Detroit by Wali Farad (or W. D. Fard), whom his followers believed to be "Allah in person." W...
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Peyton Randolph
Peyton Randolph
American patriot Peyton Randolph (1721-1775), president of the first Continental Congress, was instrumental in securing independence for the United States of America.
At the time of Peyton Randolph's birth, the future United States of America was an assortment of 13 separate ...
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Myanmar
Myanmar or Burma , officially Union of Myanmar, republic (2005 est. pop. 42,909,000), 261,789 sq mi (678,033 sq km), SE Asia. It is bounded on the west by Bangladesh, India, and the Bay of Bengal; on the north and northeast by China; on the east by Laos and Thailand; and on the south by the Anda...
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human evolution
human evolution theory of the origins of the human species, Homo sapiens. Modern understanding of human origins is derived largely from the findings of paleontology , anthropology , and genetics , and involves the process of natural selection (see Darwinism ). Although gaps in the fossil reco...
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Robert Walker
Robert Walker d. 1658?, English painter, a follower of Van Dyck and favorite portraitist of Oliver Cromwell. His portraits of Cromwell and his family and followers are convincing studies of Puritan temperament. Examples are in the National Portrait Gallery, London, and the Metropolitan Museum.
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Bethabara
Bethabara , place, on the Jordan, traditionally located at a ford just above the Dead Sea, where in the New Testament John was baptizing when Jesus came to him. RSV: Bethany, following some ancient texts.
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cavalier
cavalier , in general, an armed horseman. In the English civil war the supporters of Charles I were called Cavaliers in contradistinction to the Roundheads , the followers of Parliament. The royalists used the designation until it was replaced by Tory .
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Cawdor
Cawdor , village, Highland, NE Scotland, SW of Nairn. Cawdor Castle, the earliest remaining piece dating from 1454, was represented by Shakespeare , following tradition, as the scene of the slaying (1040) of Duncan by Macbeth .
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