France, History Of, Demographic changes

Rates of demographic growth varied greatly from place to place: in Brittany, where typhoid fever was endemic, population figures peaked in 1700. In Quercy they grew by 70 percent between 1700 and 1786. But, regardless of local variations, France as a whole counted two million more peasants in 1790 than during the reign of Louis XIV. Better preventive medicine, a decline in infant mortality,

Arts, Central Asian, Kushan

The Kushans replaced the Greeks in Bactria about 130 BC. They are thought to have been of Yüeh-chih stock with a strong admixture of Hephthalites, Saka, and Tocharian. One branch of this group migrated to the Tarim Basin and founded a short-lived empire, while the other, under the name of Kushan, gained control of Central Asia. Capturing a section of the great trade route leading

Andean Peoples

Since 1532, under European rule, extractive activities, such as silver, tin, and copper mining, for foreign markets have been favoured to the point to which Andean agriculture and the ecologic wisdom in handling productively the extremely high altitudes have been gradually devalued and mostly forgotten. The population of the Central Andes is both less dense and less

Rio Branco

City, capital of Acre estado (“state”), western Brazil. It lies on the west bank of the Acre River, and just north where the Branco River (Rio Branco) flows into the Acre. A commercial and distribution centre, Rio Branco exports rubber, metals, medicinal plants, Brazil nuts, and timber. Petroleum and alcohol fuels are processed there. The Federal University of Acre (1971) is located

Fable, Parable, And Allegory, Fable

E. Chambry, Fables (1927), in Greek and French; S.A. Handford, Fables of Aesop (1956); B. Pares, Krylov's Fables (1926); Marianne Moore, Fables of La Fontaine (1954). For commentary on fables, see P. Clarac, La Fontaine, l'homme et l'oeuvre (1947); B.E. Perry, Aesopica (1952).

Saudi Arabia

The coastal parts of the territory that was to become Saudi Arabia participated in the broad trends of Arabian Peninsula history in the Islamic period—the rise of Islam in western Arabia in the 7th century,

Adams, Gerry

Gerry Adams, Before the Dawn (1996), is an autobiography, and he discusses his goals in Free Ireland: Towards a Lasting Peace, rev. ed. (1995).

La Galissonnière, Roland-michel Barrin, Marquis De

La Galissonnière was the son of a naval lieutenant-general and studied at the College of Beauvais in Paris. He became a midshipman in the French navy in 1710 and, in the following year, made the first of a number of voyages on the Heros carrying supplies to Canada. Some 26 years later he commanded