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The History Channel - Encyclopedia Category: History and Culture > History Date & country: 02/12/2007, UK Words: 25833

Randi, James
(1928) Canadian-born US magician, lecturer, and sceptic. Upset by the claims of Uri Geller to have paranormal powers, he founded the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal...

Randolph, Asa Philip
(1889-1979) US labour and civil-rights leader. Devoting himself to the cause of unionization, especially among African-Americans, he was named a vice president of the American Federation of Labor and...

Randolph, Edmund
(1753-1813) American politician. In 1786 he was elected governor of Virginia. He took part in the Constitutional Convention 1787, and in 1789 George Washington made him first Attorney General of the USA. After...

Randolph, John
(1773-1833) US politician. He was for many years an outspoken member of the House of Representatives, and was in the Senate 1825-27. In 1826 he fought a duel with the politician Henry Clay, but later they...

Randolph, Peyton
(1721-1775) American lawyer and politician. He was King's attorney for Virginia 1748-75. Although fundamentally conservative, he supported the rising tide of colonial protest and was appointed to the first...

Randolph, Thomas
(1605-1635) English dramatist and poet. His earliest printed play is Aristippus or the Jovial Philosopher 1630. Others are The Jealous Lovers 1632, The Muse's Looking-glass, the pastoral comedy Amyntas, both...

Randolph, Vance
(1892-1980) US folklorist whose many volumes of Ozark lore, mostly published in the 1940s and 1950s, include Ozark Folksongs 1946-50 and Pissing in the Snow 1976, and are credited with helping to broaden the...

Ranelagh
Former building in Chelsea, London, England. In the 18th century it was a popular place of entertainment. The wooden structure, built in 1742, resembled the pantheon in Rome, and could accommodate...

Ranganathan, Shivala Ramanrita
(1892-1972) Indian librarian. Originally a university teacher of mathematics, in 1924 Ranganathan was appointed librarian of Madras University, a post he held until 1944. In 1924 he went to University College,...

Rangel, Charles (Bernard)
(1930) US politician. He served in the state assembly (Democrat, Harlem) 1966-70. One of the more outspoken African-American politicians, he went to Congress in 1971 and eventually chaired the Select...

ranger
Government official connected with public parks and forests. Formerly in England a ranger was a sworn officer of the forest appointed by the king to watch the deer and prevent theft. The ranger is...

Rangers
US Army special forces in World War II; specially trained and equipped highly mobile troops, modelled on the British commandos. ...

Rangi
In Maori belief, the sky god, who, with the earth goddess Papa, created the world and its beings. ...

Ranjit Singh
(1780-1839) Indian maharajah. He succeeded his father as a minor Sikh leader in 1792, and created a Sikh army that conquered Kashmir and the Punjab. In alliance with the British, he established himself as...

Ranke, Leopold von
(1795-1886) German historian whose quest for objectivity in history had great impact on the discipline. His attempts to explain `how it really was` dominated both German and outside historical thought until...

Rankin, Ian
(1960) Scottish writer of best-selling crime thrillers featuring Detective Inspector Rebus, including the award-winning Black and Blue (1997). He has published more than 20 Rebus novels, starting with...

Rankin, Jeannette
(1880-1973) US representative. She was the first woman elected to the US House of Representatives (Republican, Montana) in 1917 and became one of only 57 members to vote against US entry into World War I....

Ransom, John Crowe
(1888-1974) US poet and critic. He published his romantic but antirhetorical verse in, for example, Poems About God (1919), Chills and Fever (1924), and Selected Verse (1947). Born in Tennessee, Ransom was a...

Ransome-Kuti, Olunfunmilayo
(1900-1978) Nigerian politician and women's rights activitist. In 1944 she established the Abeokuta Women's Union (later Nigerian Women's Union) and led campaigns against local administration and colonial...

Ransome, Arthur (Michell)
(1884-1967) English writer of adventure stories for children. A journalist, he was correspondent in Russia for the Daily News during World War I and the Russian Revolution. His children's novels feature sailing...

Ranters
English religious sect; one of the many groups that arose during the English Civil War. The Ranters pressed for radical reforms during the Commonwealth period (1649-60). Known for their ecstatic...

Rantoul, Robert
(1805-1852) US lawyer and reformer. As a member of the Massachusetts state legislature and in speeches and articles, he advocated free trade, religious tolerance, public education, collective bargaining, and...

Rantzau, Josias, Comte de Rantzau
(1609-1650) French marshal. He served under the Great Condé, Louis II, and completed the conquest of Flanders, gaining fame at the siege of St Jean-de-Losne. He was so often wounded that he had only one...

Rao, Raja
(1909-2006) Indian writer. He wrote about Indian independence from the perspective of a village in southern India in Kanthapura (1938) and later, in The Serpent and the Rope (1960), about a young cosmopolitan...

Raoul de Houdenc
(c. 1180-c. 1234) French poet. He was one of the principal followers of Chrétien de Troyes. His main work is a long Arthurian romance, Méraugis de Portlesguez. He also wrote two allegorical poems, Le Songe...

Rapacki Plan
Proposal put to the United Nations 2 October 1957 by Polish foreign minister Adam Rapacki, for a zone closed to the manufacture or deployment of nuclear weapons in Poland, Czechoslovakia, East and...

Rapacki, Adam
(1909-1970) Polish minister for foreign affairs 1956-68, architect of the plan for the demilitarization of Central Europe (`Rapacki plan`). An economist by training, he was a member of the Polish...

rape
In law, sexual intercourse without the consent of the subject. Most cases of rape are of women by men. In Islamic law a rape accusation requires the support of four independent male witnesses. Rape...

Raphael Sanzio
(1483-1520) Painter and architect born in Urbino and eventually settled in Rome. He painted portraits and mythological and religious works, noted for their harmony of colour and composition. He was active in...

Raphael, Frederic
(1931) US-born British writer. His novels and short-story collections include Richard's Things (1976), The Glittering Prizes (1976), Coast to Coast (1999; television screenplay 2003), A Double Life...

Raphael, Max
(1889-1952) German-born art theorist, who emigrated to the USA 1941. Essentially Marxist in approach, his work attempts to outline the manner in which form and content combine. His ideas are most clearly set...

Raphall, Morris Jacob
(1798-1868) Swedish-born US rabbi. In 1849 he came to New York City as rabbi of Congregation B'nai Jeshurun; serving there until 1865, he promoted conservative Judaism in the face of the reform movement. He...

Rapid Deployment Force
Former name (to 1983) of US Central Command, a military strike force. ...

rapid reaction force
Any military unit that is maintained at a high state of readiness to react to an emergency. Specifically, it refers to a corps-sized NATO unit, formed in 1991 to meet threats anywhere in its area...

Rapido River, Battle of
In World War II, costly US assault on German lines in Italy based on the Rapido, a river running southwest through Cassino to meet the Garigliano River; it was a major German defensive obstacle in...

Rapin, Paul de
(1661-1725) French historian. He was a Protestant and, on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, he enlisted in the Dutch army and came to England with William of Orange in 1688, taking part in the Irish...

Rapp, George
(1757-1847) German-born US religious leader. In 1803 he established a communistic settlement in Pennsylvania, called the Harmony Society, with himself as dictator. In 1814 the community migrated to Posey...

rapprochement
Improvement of relations between two formerly antagonistic states, such as the agreement between Britain and France in 1904 which ended decades of colonial rivalry. ...

Rapunzel
Folk tale collected by the Grimm brothers. Rapunzel is named after a plant that her pregnant mother had eaten from the garden of a witch. In return for the plant, the witch demands that the baby be...

Rarotonga Treaty
Agreement that formally declares the South Pacific a nuclear-free zone. The treaty came into effect in December 1986, having been signed by members of the Pacific Islands Forum. China and the USSR...

Rashdun
The `rightly guided ones`, the first four caliphs (heads) of Islam: Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali. ...

Rasmussen, Knud Johan Victor
(1879-1933) Danish Arctic explorer and ethnologist, who travelled extensively in Greenland, Lapland, and Arctic North America. Among the expeditions he took part in were the Mylius-Erichsen expedition to...

Rasmussen, Poul Nyrup
(1943) Danish economist and politician, prime minister 1993-2001. Leader of the Social Democrats from 1992, he succeeded Poul Schluter as prime minister, heading the first majority coalition government...

Raspe, Rudolf Erich
(1737-1794) German scientist, antiquarian, and writer. He was versatile and widely read. He published works on volcanic geology and on Gottfried Leibniz as a mathematician, and wrote an introduction to Thomas...

Rasputin
(1871-1916) Siberian Eastern Orthodox mystic. He acquired influence over the Tsarina Alexandra, wife of Nicholas II, and was able to make political and ecclesiastical appointments. His abuse of power and...

Rassam, Hormuzd
(1826-1910) Turkish Assyriologist. He worked as agent and overseer on excavations at Nineveh 1845-54, initially with the British archaeologist Austen Layard, and discovered the palace of Ashurbanipal. He...

Rastafarianism
Religion originating in the West Indies, based on the ideas of Marcus Garvey, who called on black people to return to Africa and set up a black-governed country there. When Haile Selassie (Ras...

Rastatt, Treaty of
In 1714, agreement signed by Austria and France that supplemented the Treaty of Utrecht and helped to end the War of the Spanish Succession. ...

Rastell, John
(c. 1475-1536) English printer and author. Initially a lawyer, he practised with success at the Bar, before establishing a printing business c. 1514. His chief work is The Pastyme of People, the Chronycles of...

rate of interest
Total interest paid divided by the sum borrowed or saved expressed as a percentage over a period of time, usually one year. ...

rate of return
The income from an investment expressed as a percentage of the cost of that investment. ...

rate of turnover
The speed or rate at which a business organization sells its products from its stocks. It is calculated by the formula: value of sales...

rate support grant
In the UK 1967-90, an amount of money made available annually by central government to supplement rates as a source of income for local government; replaced by a revenue support...

rates
In the UK, a local government tax levied on industrial and commercial property (business rates) and, until the introduction of the community charge (see poll tax) 1989-90, also on residential...

rath
Fortified Irish farmstead or ring fort with an earthen ring wall. They are the most commonly found field monument in Ireland, with over 30,000 known sites. Most were built in the early Christian...

Ratha Yatra
Hindu festival in celebration of Krishna as `Jagannath in State`, an incarnation of the god Vishnu. It is held in Puri, Orissa, for two weeks in June/July. Murtis (images) of Jagannath, his...

Rathbone, Eleanor Florence
(1872-1946) English feminist and social reformer. She made an extensive study of the position of widows under the poor law, and became the leading British advocate for family allowances, her campaign result ...

Rathenau, Walther
(1867-1922) German politician. He was a leading industrialist and was appointed economic director during World War I, developing a system of economic planning in combination with capitalism. After the war he...

Rathje, William L(aurens)
(1945) US anthropologist who is credited with coining the term `garbology`, the study of a society by the examination of its refuse. He also discovered that refuse decomposes much more slowly in modern...

rationalism
In architecture, an Italian movement of the 1920s which grew out of a reaction to the extremes of Futurism. It was led by Gruppo 7, a loose association of young Italian architects, headed by...

rationalism
In theology, the belief that human reason rather than divine revelation is the correct means of ascertaining truth and regulating behaviour. In philosophy, rationalism takes the view that...

rationing
Restricted allowance of provisions or other supplies in time of war or shortage. Food rationing was introduced in Germany and Britain during World War I. During World War II food rationing,...

Rattigan, Terence Mervyn
(1911-1977) English dramatist. His play Ross (1960) was based on the character of T E Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia). Rattigan's work ranges from the comedy French Without Tears (1936) to the psychological...

Ratzinger, Josef Alois
(1927) German priest, pope from 2005 under the name Benedict XVI. ...

Rau, Johannes
(1931-2006) German socialist politician, president 1999-2004. The son of a Protestant pastor, he was state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia (1978-98). In January 1987 he stood for chancellor of West...

Rauschenberg, Robert
(1925) US pop artist. He has created happenings and multimedia works, called `combined painting`, such as Monogram (1959; Moderna Museet, Stockholm), a stuffed goat daubed with paint and wearing a car...

Rauschenbusch, Walter
(1861-1918) US religious leader. His experience as pastor of an impoverished German immigrant parish in New York City turned him to the Social Gospel movement, of which he became a leader. In 1897 he left...

Rava Russka, Battle of
In World War I, series of battles September 1914 between Austrian and Russian forces along a line from Tomasov (now Tomaszow Lubelski, Poland) via Grodek (now Gorodok, Ukraine) to Rava Russka (now...

Ravaillac, François
(1578-1610) French political assassin. An extremist supporter of the Catholic League, he killed Henry IV of France 1610, and was himself put to death. ...

Ravana
In the Hindu epic Ramayana, demon king of Lanka (Sri Lanka) who abducted Sita, the wife of Rama. ...

Raven-Hill, Leonard
(1867-1942) English painter and illustrator. He became widely known through his drawings for Punch, beginning 1896, and in 1910 was made the magazine's political cartoonist. He also illustrated books, notably...

Raven, Simon (Arthur Noël)
(1927-2001) English novelist and playwright, perhaps best known for the ten-volume series of novels Alms for Oblivion (1964-76) depicting post-war life from 1945 to 1973. Other works include The Feathers...

Raven, The
US poem, written 1845 by Edgar Allan Poe, about a bereaved poet haunted by a raven that sonorously warns Nevermore. ...

Rawle, William
(1759-1836) US lawyer who served as US attorney for Pennsylvania 1791-1800. He was a member of the Maryland Society against slavery 1792-1836 and its president from 1818. He was a trustee...

Rawlings, Jerry (John)
(1947) Ghanaian politician, president 1981-2001. He first took power in a bloodless coup in 1979, and, having returned power to a civilian government, staged another coup in 1981. He then remained in...

Rawlings, Marjorie Kinnan
(1896-1953) US novelist. The Yearling 1938, a tale of a boy and his pet fawn, became a minor classic and was awarded a Pulitzer Prize; other novels about the Florida backwoods and its inhabitants are South Moon...

Rawlinson, George
(1812-1902) English historian and classical scholar. His most outstanding work is a translation 1858-60, with his brother Henry Creswicke Rawlinson and Gardner Wilkinson, of the Greek historian Herodotus. He...

Rawlinson, Henry Creswicke
(1810-1895) English orientalist and political agent in Baghdad in the Ottoman Empire from 1844. He deciphered the Babylonian cuneiform and Old Persian scripts of Darius I's trilingual inscription at Behistun,...

Rawlinson, Henry Seymour
(1864-1925) British soldier in World War I. Commanding the 4th Army, he was responsible for the main attack on the Somme 1916 and played a decisive part in stemming the German Spring Offensive and then the...

Rawls, John
(1921) US philosopher. In A Theory of Justice 1971, he revived the concept of the social contract and its enforcement by civil disobedience. He argued that if we did not know which position we were to...

Rawmuddin
In Islam, the Day of Judgement. ...

Ray, Dixie Lee
(1914-1994) US politician and biologist. The first woman on the Atomic Energy Commission, as chair 1973-75 she championed nuclear power plant construction. As an independent governor of Washington 1977-81,...

Ray, James Earl
(1928) US assassin believed to have shot and killed Martin Luther King, Jr, in 1968. In 1969 he was sentenced to 99 years in prison. Although few doubted he had fired the fatal shot, many questioned...

Ray, Robert D
(1928) US politician. As governor of Iowa 1969-83, he funded state university construction, established an environmental agency, and reformed the state's judicial system. As governor of a major...

Rayburn, Samuel Taliaferro
(1882-1961) US Democratic politican. Elected to Congress in 1912, he supported President Roosevelt's New Deal programme of 1933, and was elected majority leader in 1937 and Speaker of...

Raymond, Alex(ander Gillespie)
(1909-1956) US cartoonist who was the creator of the science fiction newspaper comic strip `Flash Gordon` 1934, the action-adventure strip `Jungle Jim` 1934, and `Rip Kirby` 1946, the popular...

Raymond, Henry Jarvis
(1820-1869) US journalist and Republican politician. He cofounded the New York Times 1851. Active in the formation of the Republican Party, he was speaker of the state assembly 1862, named Republican national...

Raymond, Walter
(1852-1931) English writer. His life on Exmoor, southwestern England, is described in The Book of Simple Delights 1906, which shows his powers as a rural essayist and portraitist. Other works include The Book...

Raymund of Fitero, St
(died 1163) Spanish saint. A Cistercian, he founded Fitero Abbey in Spanish Navarre. When the city of Calatrava was in danger from the Moors he founded the military order of Calatrava for its defence. Under him...

Rayner, Claire Berenice
(1931) English writer, broadcaster, and journalist. With a background in nursing and midwifery, she became the medical correspondent for Woman's Own magazine (as Ruth Martin 1966-75, and as Claire Rayner...

Razak, Tun Abdul
(1922-1976) Malaysian politician and civil servant. In 1970, Razak was appointed as Malaysia's second prime minister after independence, but he died prematurely from cancer six years l ...

razor
Sharpened metallic blade used to remove facial or body hair. Razors were known in the Bronze Age. The safety razor was patented by William Henson in 1847; a disposable version was produced by King...

Re
Alternative form of Ra, the Egyptian sun god. ...

reactionary
Pejorative term applied to those people who are seen as resistant to change and progress. ...

Read, Opie Percival
(1852-1939) US writer. His humorous novels expressed a whimsical philosophy and were very popular. They include A Kentucky Colonel 1889, A Tennessee Judge 1893, and The Jucklins 1895. ...

Reade, Charles
(1814-1884) English novelist and dramatist. He wrote crusading novels about social issues, such as It Is Never Too Late to Mend 1856 and Hard Cash 1863, exposing respectively the prison system and the private...

reader-response theory
Literary theory which sees the reader as an active participant in establishing the meaning of a text. ...

Reader's Digest
Magazine founded in 1922 in the USA to publish condensed articles and books, usually uplifting and conservative, along with in-house features. It has editions in many languages and until the...

ready-made
In the visual arts, an object chosen at random by the artist, as opposed to being selected for any presumed aesthetic merit, and presented as a work of art. The concept was first launched by Marcel...

Reagan doctrine
US foreign policy which, during the presidency of Ronald Reagan 1981-89, stressed the potential threat of the USSR. It also provided economic and military support for anticommunist, authoritarian...