Thursday, June 30, 2005

Oersted

Unit of magnetic-field strength, in the centimetre-gram-second system of physical units. Named for the 19th-century Danish physicist Hans Christian Ørsted, it is defined as the intensity of a magnetic field in a vacuum in which a unit magnetic pole (one that repels a similar pole at a distance of one centimetre with a force of one dyne) experiences a mechanical force of

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Selden, John

Called to the bar in 1612, Selden practiced as a conveyancer, rarely appearing in court. His first major book, Titles of Honour (1614), has remained a useful reference. Analecton

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Ghats

Two mountain ranges forming the eastern and western edges, respectively, of the Deccan (q.v.) plateau of peninsular India. In Hindi ghat means “river landing stairs” or “mountain pass” and has been extended in its Anglicized plural form (formerly “ghauts”) to include the mountains themselves. The word refers as well to riverbanks that have been artificially terraced for bathing

Friday, June 03, 2005

P'eng-hu Islands

P'eng-hu also spelled  Penghu , Chinese (Wade-Giles)  P'eng-hu Ch'ün-tao , or  P'eng-hu Lieh-tao conventional  Pescadores  archipelago and hsien (county) of Taiwan, consisting of about 64 small islands, approximately 30 miles (50 km) west of the coast of Taiwan, from which it is separated by the P'eng-hu Channel. Of volcanic origin, many of the islands consist of weathered basalt, and they are surrounded by coral reefs. The islands are low-lying, most rising only about 100–130 feet (30–40 m) above sea level. The highest

Wednesday, June 01, 2005

Biblical Literature, The roles of Deborah, Gideon, and Jephthah

The first notably important judge of the tribal confederacy was Deborah, who was primarily a seer, poet, and interpreter of dreams but still a person endowed with the kind of charisma that identified her as a judge sent from Yahweh. The story of the victory of the Israelites under the charismatic leadership of Deborah and the military leadership of Barak, her commander,