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automated teller machine
automated teller machine (ATM), device used by bank customers to process account transactions. Typically, a user inserts into the ATM a special plastic card that is encoded with information on a magnetic strip. The strip contains an identification code that is transmitted to the bank's central comp...
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Decapolis
Decapolis [Gr.,=ten cities], confederacy of 10 ancient cities, all E of the Jordan, except Scythopolis. The others were (according to Pliny) Dion, Pella, Gadara, Hippos, Gerasa, Philadelphia, Damascus, Raphana, and Kanatha. The league was constituted after Pompey's campaign (65 BC-62 BC) as a prote...
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folkways
folkways term coined by William Graham Sumner in his treatise Folkways (1906) to denote those group habits that are common to a society or culture and are usually called customs . The word provided a useful contribution to the development of the concept of culture and is still used in its te...
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Valentine, Saint
Valentine, Saint Name traditionally associated with two legendary saints of the 3rd century: Valentine of Rome and Valentine of Interamna (modern Terni). The former was a Roman priest and physician; the latter, the Bishop of Terni. Little is known about either of them. The martyrdom of both is comm...
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custom
custom habitual group pattern of behavior that is transmitted from one generation to another and is not biologically determined. Since societies are perpetually changing, no matter how slowly, all customs are basically impermanent. If short-lived, they are more properly called fashions. Customs for...
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tariff
tariff tax on imported and, more rarely, exported goods. It is also called a customs duty. Tariffs may be distinguished from other taxes in that their predominant purpose is not financial but economic—not to increase a nation's revenue but to protect domestic industries from foreign competiti...
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eunuch
eunuch [Gr.,=keeper of the couch], castrated human male, particularly a chamberlain of a harem in Asia. The custom of employing eunuchs as servants in wealthy or royal households is very ancient; it reached its epitome at the court of Constantinople under the Byzantine emperors, from whom the Ottom...
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Ancren Riwle
Ancren Riwle or Ancrene Wisse [Mid. Eng.,=anchoresses' rule], English tract written c.1200 by an anonymous English churchman for the instruction of three young ladies about to become religious recluses. The work, important as a sample of early Middle English prose, is a charming mixture of real...
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Day of the Dead
Day of the Dead Span. Día de los Muertos, annual festival in Mexico and other parts of Latin America, commonly on November 1st and 2d. Its ancient Mesoamerican roots now augmented by Christian custom, it celebrates the dead with joy and humor rather than mourning, and coincides with All S...
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borough-English
borough-English a custom of inheritance in parts of England whereby land passed typically to the youngest son in preference to his older brothers. Of Anglo-Saxon origin, the custom was abolished by law in 1925. For alternative systems of inheritance in England see gavelkind and primogeniture .
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