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  • Walton, Ernest Thomas Sinton (Irish physicist)
    Irish physicist, corecipient, with Sir John Douglas Cockcroft of England, of the 1951 Nobel Prize for Physics for the development of the first nuclear particle accelerator, known as the Cockcroft-Walton generator....
  • Walton, Frederick (British manufacturer)
    In 1860 Frederick Walton of Great Britain patented a process for making linoleum, the first widely used smooth-surfaced floor covering. Plain linoleum, without design, was popular until the mid-1930s, when decorative linoleum was developed. In the 1920s, dark-coloured asphalt sheet and tile materials were developed in the U.S., made from mixtures of asbestos fibre, mineral fillers, and asphalt,......
  • Walton, Izaak (English biographer)
    English biographer and author of The Compleat Angler (1653), a pastoral discourse on the joys and stratagems of fishing that has been one of the most frequently reprinted books in English literature....
  • Walton, John (Irish mathematician)
    ...wrote Berkeley, “need not, methinks, be squeamish about any point in divinity.” A long and fruitful controversy followed. James Jurin, a Cambridge physician and scientist, John Walton of Dublin, and Colin Maclaurin, a Scottish mathematician, took part. Berkeley answered Jurin in his lively satire A Defence of Free-Thinking in Mathematics (1735) and answered......
  • Walton, Sam (American businessman)
    American retail magnate who founded Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., and developed it, by 1990, into the largest retail sales chain in the United States....
  • Walton, Samuel Moore (American businessman)
    American retail magnate who founded Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., and developed it, by 1990, into the largest retail sales chain in the United States....
  • Walton, Sir William (British composer)
    English composer especially known for his orchestral music. His early work made him one of England’s most important composers between the time of Vaughan Williams and that of Benjamin Britten....
  • Walton, Sir William Turner (British composer)
    English composer especially known for his orchestral music. His early work made him one of England’s most important composers between the time of Vaughan Williams and that of Benjamin Britten....
  • Walton, Tony (British production designer and art director)
    ...Steve Tesich for Breaking AwayAdapted Screenplay: Robert Benton for Kramer Vs. KramerCinematography: Vittorio Storaro for Apocalypse NowArt Direction: Philip Rosenberg and Tony Walton for All That JazzOriginal Score: Georges Delerue for A Little RomanceOriginal Song Score and Its Adaptation or Adaptation Score: Ralph Burns for All That JazzOriginal......
  • Walton-le-Dale (neighbourhood, Preston, England, United Kingdom)
    town, industrial suburb of the town of Preston, South Ribble district, administrative and historic county of Lancashire, England. It overlooks the Rivers Darwen and Ribble. Waletune was of Anglo-Saxon origin, and the suffix le Dale was added in Norman times. The parish church of St. Leonard also dates from this period, although only the chancel...
  • Waltonia (biology)
    The articulate-brachiopod shell is typified by Waltonia, which is small (about two centimetres [3/4 inch]) and red in colour, with a smooth or slightly ridged shell. This type of shell is more highly specialized than that of most inarticulate species and is composed of three layers. The outer layer, called periostracum, is made of organic substance and is seldom seen in fossils. A middle......
  • Waltonian Bible (work by Walton)
    One of the most comprehensive and generally considered the finest is the London Polyglot, also called the Londoninesis or Waltonian (1657), compiled by Brian Walton, with the aid of many contemporary scholars; the Waltonian was one of the first English books assembled under public subscription. Its six volumes contain a total of nine languages: Hebrew, Samaritan, Aramaic, Greek, Latin,......
  • Waltrudis, Saint (Christian saint)
    ...as a vehicle route to France. Peopled since prehistoric times, Mons originated as a Roman camp (Castrilocus) in the 3rd century; it grew around an abbey founded (c. 650) by St. Waudru, or Waltrudis, daughter of the Count of Hainaut. During the 9th century, turreted ramparts encircled the small town. Recognized by Charlemagne as the capital of Hainaut (804), it prospered as a......
  • waltz (dance)
    (from German walzen, “to revolve”), highly popular ballroom dance evolved from the Ländler in the 18th century. Characterized by a step, slide, and step in 34 time, the waltz, with its turning, embracing couples, at first shocked polite society. It ...
  • Waltz, Kenneth (American author and political scientist)
    In Man, the State, and War (1959), the American international relations theorist Kenneth Waltz applied systems theory to the study of international conflict to develop a view known as structural realism. Waltz argued that the underlying cause of war is an anarchic international system in which there is no recognized authority for resolving conflicts between sovereign states.......
  • Waltzemüller, Martin (German cartographer)
    German cartographer who in 1507 published the first map with the name America for the New World....
  • Waltzing Matilda (song by Paterson)
    Australian poet and journalist noted for his composition of the internationally famous song “Waltzing Matilda.” He achieved great popular success in Australia with The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses (1895), which sold more than 100,000 copies before his death, and Rio Grande’s Last Race and Other Verses (1902), which also went through many editions....
  • Waluguru (people)
    a Bantu-speaking people of the hills, Uluguru Mountains, and coastal plains of east-central Tanzania. The Luguru are reluctant to leave the mountain homeland that they have occupied for at least 300 years, despite the relatively serious population pressure in their area and the employment opportunities in the city and on estates. In the late 20th century the Luguru numbered abou...
  • Walvis Bay (Namibia)
    town and anchorage in west-central Namibia (formerly South West Africa), lying along the Atlantic Ocean. It constituted an exclave of South Africa until 1992....
  • Walvis Ridge (aseismic ridge, Atlantic Ocean)
    The Walvis Ridge and Rio Grande Rise originated from hot spot volcanism now occurring at the islands of Tristan da Cunha 300 kilometres east of the crest of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The Walvis Ridge trends northeast from this location to the African margin. The Rio Grande Rise trends roughly southeast from the South American margin toward the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Both the Walvis Ridge and Rio......
  • Walvisbaai (Namibia)
    town and anchorage in west-central Namibia (formerly South West Africa), lying along the Atlantic Ocean. It constituted an exclave of South Africa until 1992....
  • Walzenmüller, Martin (German cartographer)
    German cartographer who in 1507 published the first map with the name America for the New World....
  • Waman ’Achachi (Inca noble)
    ...Wari), the son of another wife. Capac Huari, however, never became emperor. The claims of his mother and her relatives were suppressed by the supporters of Huayna Capac. This group was led by Huaman Achachi (Waman ’Achachi), the child’s uncle and presumably the brother of the Emperor’s principal wife. A regent named Hualpaya (Walpaya) was appointed from this group to tutor ...
  • Waman Puma de Ayala, Felipe (Andean writer)
    The 17th-century Andean writer Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala (Waman Puma) reported the oral tradition that he had learned from his forebears, who were minor ethnic lords in the Huánuco region. In the century before the Inca conquest people had lived in the “epoch of the soldiers.” During this periodthey began to fight and there was much war and......
  • Wamba (Visigoth king of Spain)
    Toward the end of the 7th century, a critical time in Visigothic history began. The deposition, through deception, of King Wamba (672–680), a capable ruler who tried to reform the military organization, was a portent of future problems. As agitation continued, Wamba’s successors made scapegoats of the Jews, compelling them to accept the Christian religion and threatening them with......
  • Wambaugh, Sarah (American political scientist)
    American political scientist who was recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on the subject of plebiscites....
  • Wampanoag (people)
    Algonquian-speaking North American Indians who formerly occupied parts of what are now the states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, including Martha’s Vineyard and adjacent islands. They were traditionally semisedentary, moving seasonally between fixed sites. Corn (maize) was the staple of their diet, supplemented by fish and game. The tribe comprised several villages, e...
  • wampum (beads)
    tubular shell beads that have been assembled into strings or woven into belts or embroidered ornaments, formerly used as a medium of exchange by some North American Indians. The terms wampum and wampumpeag were initially adopted by English settlers, who derived them from one of the eastern Algonquian languages; literally translated, wampumpeag means ...
  • Wamyō ruijūshō (Japanese and Chinese dictionary)
    ...revealed his discontent and frustration over his lack of success in official life. He frequently participated in poetry contests. During the Shōhei era (931–938) he compiled the Wamyō ruijūshō, a dictionary of Japanese and Chinese words by categories, which was the first dictionary in Japan. He is also thought to be the author of many other works,......
  • WAN (computer science)
    a computer communications network that spans cities, countries, and the globe, generally using telephone lines and satellite links. The Internet connects multiple WANs; as its name suggests, it is a network of networks. Its success stems from early support by the U.S. Department of Defense, which developed its precursor, ARPANET (see DARPA...
  • Wan Jiabao (Chinese author)
    Chinese playwright who was a pioneer in huaju (“word drama”), a genre influenced by Western theatre rather than traditional Chinese drama (which is usually sung)....
  • Wan-chou (former city, Chongqing, China)
    former city, northeastern Chongqing shi (municipality), central China. It has been a district of Chongqing since the municipality was established in 1997. The district is an important port along the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang), being situated at the western end of the river’s renowned Three Gorges region. Before C...
  • Wan-ch’uan (China)
    city in northwestern Hebei sheng (province), northern China. Kalgan, the name by which the city is most commonly known, is from a Mongolian word meaning “gate in a barrier,” or “frontier.” The city was colloquially known in Chinese as the Dongkou (“Eastern Entry”) into Hebei from Inner Mongolia. It...
  • Wan-dang (Korean calligrapher)
    the best-known Korean calligrapher of the 19th century....
  • Wan-fo Ssu (ancient temple, China)
    ...Nanking the new Indianized style spread to northern China, where it may be seen in the sculpture of the Northern Ch’i dynasty (550–577), and up the Yangtze River to Szechwan, where, at the Wan-fo Temple in Ch’eng-tu, there has been found a hoard of 6th- and 7th-century images, some of which are remarkably close to the Indian Gupta style. This third phase confrontation of Ch...
  • Wan-li (emperor of Ming dynasty)
    reign name (nianhao) of the emperor of China from 1572 to 1620, during the latter portion of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644)....
  • Wan-li Ch’ang-ch’eng (wall, China)
    extensive bulwark erected in ancient China. It is one of the largest building-construction projects ever carried out, running (with all its branches) about 4,500 miles (7,300 km) east to west from Shanhai Pass near the Bo Hai (Gulf of Chihli) to Jiayu Pass (in modern Gansu province). Without its branches and other secondary sections, the wal...
  • Wan-li five-colour ware (Chinese pottery)
    ...emperors. A palette containing underglaze blue in conjunction with green, yellow, aubergine purple, and iron red (the precursor of the later Ch’ing famille verte palette) was known as “Wan-li five-colour” ware (Wan-li wu ts’ai). The red and green Chia-ching decoration was also used, and vast quantities of blue-and-white porcelain were produced for expor...
  • Wan-li wu ts’ai ware (Chinese pottery)
    ...emperors. A palette containing underglaze blue in conjunction with green, yellow, aubergine purple, and iron red (the precursor of the later Ch’ing famille verte palette) was known as “Wan-li five-colour” ware (Wan-li wu ts’ai). The red and green Chia-ching decoration was also used, and vast quantities of blue-and-white porcelain were produced for expor...
  • Wan-sheng Yuan (zoo, Beijing, China)
    zoological garden on the western outskirts of Peking, founded in 1906 by the empress dowager Tz’u-hsi. The zoo is managed by the Peking Office of Parks and Forestry, financed with government funds, and noted for its collection of rare Asian species....
  • Wanadi (deity)
    ...religion. In the 20th century, for instance, biblical and Christian themes occupied a large part of the mythology of the Makiritare Indians in the upper Orinoco River region of Venezuela. For them, Wanadi was the Supreme Being of great light and, although one being, he exists in three distinct persons (damodede, “spirit-doubles”). Over the.....
  • Wanaka (New Zealand)
    ...hydroelectric project. The first European to see the lake was Nathaniel Chalmers in 1853. The lake’s name is from the Maori word oanaka, “place of Anaka,” an early Maori chief. Wanaka is separated from Hawea Lake to the east by a narrow ridge of land known as The Neck....
  • Wanaka Lake (lake, New Zealand)
    lake in west-central South Island, New Zealand. The lake occupies 75 square miles (193 square km) of a valley that is dammed by a moraine (glacial debris) and that lies at the eastern foot of the Southern Alps. The lake’s surface is 915 feet (280 m) above sea level. It is probably more than 1,000 feet (300 m) deep. The lake drains a basin of 982 square miles (2,543 square km) and is fed by...
  • Wanamaker, John (American merchant)
    merchant and founder of one of the first American department stores....
  • Wanamaker, Sam (American actor)
    ...the tombs of many well-known individuals, including the poet John Gower and the playwright John Fletcher, and memorials to the engraver Wenzel Hollar, William Shakespeare, and the American actor Sam Wanamaker, the driving force behind building the new Globe Theatre (1997) in Bankside. The original Globe Theatre (1599)—a partial foundation of which was discovered in 1989—and other....
  • wanax (Greek history)
    The Greek mainland in the 14th and 13th centuries was densely populated with towns and villages, and cemeteries confirm the numbers. The state was organized under a king, wanax, with a military leader, rawaketa, and troops with chariot officers attached for patrolling the borders; there also were naval detachments. The people had certain powers and a council. The towns were......
  • Wand, Günter (German conductor)
    German conductor (b. Jan. 7, 1912, Elberfeld, Ger.—d. Feb. 14, 2002, Ulmiz, Switz.), was notable for his rigorous rehearsals and his strong interpretations of the Austro-German Romantic repertory, notably the symphonies of Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, and Schubert. Wand spent most of his career in Cologne, as principal conductor of the Cologne Opera from 1938 until 1944, when the opera hous...
  • Wand of Noble Wood (work by Nzekwu)
    Nzekwu’s first novel, Wand of Noble Wood (1961), portrays in moving terms the futility of a Western pragmatic approach to the problems created by an African’s traditional religious beliefs. To the hero of Blade Among the Boys (1962), traditional practices and beliefs ultimately gain dominance over half-absorbed European and Christian ...
  • Wanda Mountains (mountains, China)
    To the southeast of the Northeast Plain is a series of ranges comprising the Changbai, Zhangguangcai, and Wanda mountains, which in Chinese are collectively known as the Changbai Shan, or “Forever White Mountains”; broken by occasional open valleys, they reach elevations mostly between 1,500 and 3,000 feet (450 and 900 metres). In some parts the scenery is characterized by rugged......
  • wandelaar, De (work by Nijhoff)
    In his first volume, De wandelaar (1916; “The Wanderer”), his negative feelings of isolation and noninvolvement are symbolized in wildly grotesque figures, and the image of the dance of death is prevalent. The only solution to this spiritual frustration is suicide, as enacted in the short verse drama Pierrot aan de lantaarn (1918; “Pierrot at the......
  • wandelende Jood, De (work by Vermeylen)
    ...they all strove for an art that would comprehend all human activity, and in which individual feelings would be given universal significance. In his masterly essays and his symbolic novel De wandelende Jood (1906; “The Wandering Jew”), their leader, August Vermeylen, advocated a rationalism infused with idealism. Prosper van Langendonck, on the other hand,......
  • “Wanderbuch” (work by Moltke)
    ...opportunity to begin work on a splendid topographical map of Rome and its vicinity (published in 1852) and to write his “Wanderungen um Rom” (published in his Wanderbuch, 1879; Notes of Travel, 1880). Moreover, when the warship bringing Prince Henry’s body back to Germany reached Gibraltar, Moltke left it and made his own way home across Spain, recording his i...
  • wanderer (larva)
    Harvesters are distinguished by their predatory habits during the larval stage. The squat, hairy larvae of Feniseca tarquinius, known in some areas as wanderers, attack aphids and are generally found on hawthorn and alder trees. It is the only species of harvester found in the United States....
  • Wanderer, The (work by Savage)
    ...the Spanish of Pedro Calderón de la Barca, was produced at Drury Lane. There, in 1723, his Neoclassical tragedy Sir Thomas Overbury was also produced. His most considerable poem, The Wanderer, a discursive work revealing the influence of James Thomson’s The Seasons, appeared in 1729, as did his prose satire on Grub Street, An Author to be Let. In...
  • Wanderer, The (work by Alain-Fournier)
    French writer whose only completed novel, Le Grand Meaulnes (1913; The Wanderer, or The Lost Domain), is a modern classic....
  • Wanderer, The (Old English poem)
    The term elegy is used of Old English poems that lament the loss of worldly goods, glory, or human companionship. The Wanderer is narrated by a man, deprived of lord and kinsmen, whose journeys lead him to the realization that there is stability only in heaven. The Seafarer is similar, but its journey motif more explicitly......
  • wandering albatross (bird)
    The wandering albatross (D. exulans) has a wingspread to more than 340 cm (11 feet), the largest spread among living birds. The adult is essentially like the royal albatross. It nests on islands near the Antarctic Circle and on some islands in the South Atlantic, and in the nonbreeding season it roams the southern oceans north to about 30° S....
  • wandering ecstasy (shamanism)
    ...his obligations either by communicating with the spirits at will or through trance. The latter has two forms: trances of possession, in which the body of the shaman is possessed by the spirit, and wandering trances, in which his soul departs into the realm of spirits. In the former the possessed gets into an intense mental state and shows superhuman strength and knowledge: he quivers, rages,......
  • wandering Jew
    ...(family Commelinaceae), which includes 20 or more erect to trailing, weak-stemmed herbs native to North and South America. Several species are grown as indoor plants in baskets, especially the wandering Jews (T. albiflora and T. fluminensis); among other slight differences, the former is green-leaved and the latter has purplish underleaves. White velvet, or white-gossamer......
  • wandering Jew (legendary character)
    in Christian legend, character doomed to live until the end of the world because he taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion. A reference in John 18:20–22 to an officer who struck Jesus at his arraignment before Annas is sometimes cited as the basis for the legend. The medieval English chronicler Roger of Wendover describes in his Flores historiarum how an arch...
  • Wandering Jew, The (work by Sue)
    ...Mystères de Paris (1842–43; The Mysteries of Paris)—which influenced Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables—and Le Juif errant (1844–45; The Wandering Jew). Published in installments, these long but exciting novels vastly increased the circulation of the newspapers in which they appeared. Both books display Sue’s p...
  • Wandering Souls, Feast of (Chinese Buddhism)
    ...where food was prepared for them. At sundown they were solemnly dismissed to the underworld with the formula: “out, kēres, the Anthesteria is ended.” Buddhist China kept a Feast of Wandering Souls each year, designed to help unfortunate souls suffering in the next world. The Christian All Souls’ Day, on November 2, which follows directly after All Saints...
  • wandering spider
    any member of the family Ctenidae (order Araneida), a small group of large spiders of mainly tropical and subtropical regions, commonly found on foliage and on the ground. The first two legs are armed with strong bristles on the lower side. Cupiennius salei, found in rainforests in Central and South America, has a characteristic banding pattern on its upper legs....
  • wandering tattler (bird)
    ...danger. Broadly, tattlers are birds of the subfamily Tringinae of the family Scolopacidae. Examples are the redshank, greenshank, willet, and yellowlegs. More narrowly, the name is given to the wandering tattler (Heteroscelus incanus) and the Polynesian, or gray-rumped, tattler (H. brevipes). Both closely resemble the yellowlegs but are short-legged and have barred underparts......
  • Wanderings of Oisin, and Other Poems, The (work by Yeats)
    ...young man, and his pride required him to rely on his own taste and his sense of artistic style. He was not boastful, but spiritual arrogance came easily to him. His early poems, collected in The Wanderings of Oisin, and Other Poems (1889), are the work of an aesthete, often beautiful but always rarefied, a soul’s cry for release from circumstance....
  • Wandern, Das (song by Schubert)
    ...a neutral setting that avoids detailed text illustration. Prosody and syntax must follow a regular pattern in each stanza if the result is to be satisfactory. Thus in Franz Schubert’s “Das Wandern” (“Wandering) from the cycle Die schöne Müllerin (The Miller’s Beautiful Daughter), the accompaniment suggests the continual flow of the ...
  • Wanderone, Rudolf Walter, Jr. (American billiards player)
    (RUDOLF WALTER WANDERONE, JR.), U.S. billiards player (b. Jan. 19, 1913?, New York, N.Y.--d. Jan. 18, 1996, Nashville, Tenn.), popularized American billiards in the late 20th century as the prototypical smooth-talking pool hustler. His larger-than-life personality matched his corpulent frame (1.78 m and as heavy as 136 kg [5 ft 10 in; 300 lb]) and his penchant for telling tall tales about himself....
  • wanderoo (primate)
    Liontail macaques, or wanderoos (M. silenus), are black with gray ruffs and tufted tails; an endangered species, they are found only in a small area of southern India. Closely related to liontails are the pigtail macaques (M. nemestrina), which carry their short tails curved over their backs. Inhabiting rainforests of Southeast Asia,......
  • Wandiwāsh, Battle of (Indian history)
    (Jan. 22, 1760), in the history of India, a confrontation between the French, under the Count de Lally, and the British, under Sir Eyre Coote. It was the decisive battle in the Anglo-French struggle in southern India during the Seven Years’ War (1756–63)....
  • wandjina style (painting)
    type of depiction in Australian cave paintings of figures that represent mythological beings associated with the creation of the world. Called wandjina figures, the images are believed by modern Aborigines to have been painted by the Wondjinas, prehistoric inhabitants of the Kimberley region in northwest Australia, the only area where cave paintings in the wandjina style have been fo...
  • “Wandlung, Die” (play by Toller)
    ...bring about a socialist utopia. The Expressionist stage became a vehicle to effect a transformation of consciousness in the audience. Die Wandlung (1919; Transfiguration), a play by Ernst Toller, depicts this kind of transformation in a young man who turns his horrific war experience into a new awareness of the brotherhood of man; his play......
  • “Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido” (work by Jung)
    ...ended. At this stage Jung differed with Freud largely over the latter’s insistence on the sexual bases of neurosis. A serious disagreement came in 1912, with the publication of Jung’s Wandlungen und Symbole der Libido (Psychology of the Unconscious, 1916), which ran counter to many of Freud’s ideas. Although Jung had been elected president of the International...
  • Wandsbecker Bothe, Der (German journal)
    German poet, most notable for Der Mond ist aufgegangen (“The Moon Has Risen”) and editor of the journal Der Wandsbecker Bothe....
  • Wandsbek (district, Hamburg, Germany)
    Having absorbed Altona, Harburg, and Wandsbek in 1937, Hamburg has become Germany’s major industrial city. All processing and manufacturing industries are represented there. Hamburg treats most of the country’s copper supplies, and the Norddeutsche Affinerie, on Veddel, is Europe’s second largest copperworks. The chemical, steel, and shipbuilding industries are also important,...
  • Wandsworth (borough, London, United Kingdom)
    inner borough of London, lying west of Lambeth and stretching for 5 miles (8 km) along the south bank of the River Thames. Wandsworth was established in 1965 by merging the former metropolitan borough of Battersea with approximately two-thirds of what then constituted Wandsworth (the remainder of which w...
  • Wandsworth Prison (prison, Wandsworth, London, United Kingdom)
    ...that took place annually from 1747 to 1796 in the Garratt Lane district of Wandsworth inspired the 18th-century satirical playwright Samuel Foote to write The Mayor of Garratt. Wandsworth Prison (1851; originally named the Surrey House of Correction) held Oscar Wilde in 1895 and was the scene of a sensational escape in 1965 by the train robber Ronald Biggs. Notable among......
  • Waner, Lloyd (American athlete)
    ...who played much of their career together. Their nicknames did not refer to their size but to their batting: Big Poison, who batted and threw left-handed, hit more long balls (doubles and triples); Little Poison, who batted left-handed and threw right-handed, was known for the number of singles he hit....
  • Waner, Lloyd James (American athlete)
    ...who played much of their career together. Their nicknames did not refer to their size but to their batting: Big Poison, who batted and threw left-handed, hit more long balls (doubles and triples); Little Poison, who batted left-handed and threw right-handed, was known for the number of singles he hit....
  • Waner, Paul (American athlete)
    American professional baseball outfielders, brothers who played much of their career together. Their nicknames did not refer to their size but to their batting: Big Poison, who batted and threw left-handed, hit more long balls (doubles and triples); Little Poison, who batted left-handed and threw right-handed, was known for the number of singles he hit....
  • Waner, Paul and Lloyd (American athletes)
    American professional baseball outfielders, brothers who played much of their career together. Their nicknames did not refer to their size but to their batting: Big Poison, who batted and threw left-handed, hit more long balls (doubles and triples); Little Poison, who batted left-handed and threw right-handed, was known for the number of singles he hit....
  • Waner, Paul Glee (American athlete)
    American professional baseball outfielders, brothers who played much of their career together. Their nicknames did not refer to their size but to their batting: Big Poison, who batted and threw left-handed, hit more long balls (doubles and triples); Little Poison, who batted left-handed and threw right-handed, was known for the number of singles he hit....
  • Wang (empress of Tang dynasty)
    ...in Chinese history. Wuhou had been a low-ranking concubine of Taizong. She was taken into Gaozong’s palace and, after a series of complex intrigues, managed in 655 to have the legitimate empress, Wang, deposed and herself appointed in her place. The struggle between the two was not simply a palace intrigue. Empress Wang, who was of noble descent, had the backing of the old northwestern.....
  • wang (Chinese title)
    ...with Toghril, Temüjin seized the opportunity of continuing the clan feud and took the Tatars in the rear. The Jin emperor rewarded Toghril with the Chinese title of wang, or prince, and gave Temüjin an even less exalted one. And, indeed, for the next few years the Jin had nothing to fear from Temüjin. He was fully occupied in building u...
  • Wang, An (American electrical engineer and executive)
    Chinese-born American executive and electronics engineer who founded Wang Laboratories....
  • Wang An-shih (Chinese author and political reformer)
    Chinese poet and prose writer, best known as a governmental reformer who implemented his unconventional idealism through the “New Laws,” or “New Policies,” of 1069–76. The academic controversy sparked by his reforms continued for centuries....
  • Wang Anshi (Chinese author and political reformer)
    Chinese poet and prose writer, best known as a governmental reformer who implemented his unconventional idealism through the “New Laws,” or “New Policies,” of 1069–76. The academic controversy sparked by his reforms continued for centuries....
  • Wang Banshan (Chinese author and political reformer)
    Chinese poet and prose writer, best known as a governmental reformer who implemented his unconventional idealism through the “New Laws,” or “New Policies,” of 1069–76. The academic controversy sparked by his reforms continued for centuries....
  • Wang Bi (Chinese philosopher)
    one of the most brilliant and precocious Chinese philosophers of his day....
  • Wang Burapha (section of Bangkok, Thailand)
    ...and Europeans. Despite their small size, the foreign communities tend to live in certain areas. The Chinese concentrate in the commercial area of Sam Peng, Indians gather around mosques in the Wang Burapha section, and the Western and Japanese communities reside in the affluent, modern eastern section of the city....
  • Wang Chao-chün (fictional character)
    ...another contemporary, wrote 14 plays, of which the most celebrated is Han-kung ch’iu (“Sorrow of the Han Court”). It deals with the tragedy of a Han dynasty court lady, Wang Chao-chün, who, through the intrigue of a vicious portrait painter, was picked by mistake to be sent away to Central Asia as a chieftain’s consort. Like the Romance of the Wester...
  • Wang Chao-ming (Chinese revolutionary)
    associate of the revolutionary Nationalist leader Sun Yat-sen, rival of Chiang Kai-shek (Jiang Jieshi) for control of the Nationalist government in the late 1920s and early ’30s, and finally head of the regime established in 1940 to govern the Japanese-conquered territory in China....
  • Wang Chen (Chinese eunuch)
    Chinese eunuch who monopolized power during the first reign of the Ming emperor Yingzong (reigned as Zhengtong; 1435–49)....
  • Wang Chen (Chinese politician)
    Chinese politician and military leader (b. 1908, Liuyang [Liu-yang] county, Hunan province, China--d. March 12, 1993, Guangzhou [Canton], Guangdong [Kwangtung], China), was an uncompromising hard-liner who used his position as vice president (1988-93) of China to promote Maoism. He supported Deng Xiaoping (Teng Hsiao-p’ing) in the military suppression of the student-led 1989 Tiananmen (T...
  • Wang Chieh (Chinese printmaker)
    ...by the Egyptians in the 6th or 7th century; but the earliest printed image with an authenticated date is a scroll of the Diamond Sūtra (one of the discourses of the Buddha) printed by Wang Chieh in ad 868, which was found in a cave in eastern Turkestan....
  • Wang Ch’ing-jen (Chinese author)
    The teachings of the religious sects forbade the mutilation of the dead human body; hence traditional anatomy rests on no sure scientific foundation. One of the most important writers on anatomy, Wang Ch’ing-jen, gained his knowledge from the inspection of dog-torn children who had died in a plague epidemic in ad 1798. Traditional Chinese anatomy is based on the cosmic system,...
  • Wang Ching-wei (Chinese revolutionary)
    associate of the revolutionary Nationalist leader Sun Yat-sen, rival of Chiang Kai-shek (Jiang Jieshi) for control of the Nationalist government in the late 1920s and early ’30s, and finally head of the regime established in 1940 to govern the Japanese-conquered territory in China....
  • Wang Chong (Chinese philosopher)
    one of the most original and independent Chinese thinkers of the Han period (206 bce–220 ce)....
  • Wang Ch’ung (Chinese philosopher)
    one of the most original and independent Chinese thinkers of the Han period (206 bce–220 ce)....
  • Wang Daohan (Chinese politician)
    Chinese politician (b. March 27, 1915, Jiashan, Anhui province, China—d. Dec. 24, 2005, Shanghai, China), served as vice-mayor (1980–81) and mayor (1981–85) of Shanghai. He continued to be an adviser to the Shanghai government after he was succeeded as mayor by Jiang Zemin, who later served as president of China. Named president of the mainland-based Association for Relations ...
  • Wang Dexin (Chinese dramatist)
    leading dramatist of the Yuan dynasty (1206–1368), which saw the flowering of Chinese drama....
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