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

theft
Dishonest appropriation of another's property with the intention of depriving him or her of it permanently. In Britain, under the Theft Act 1968, the maximum penalty is ten years' imprisonment. The...

thegn
Alternative spelling of thane. ...

theism
Belief in the existence of gods, but more specifically in that of a single personal God, at once immanent (active) in the created world and transcendent (separate) from it. ...

theme park
Amusement park devised around a central theme or themes. The first theme park, Disneyland, opened in 1955 in Anaheim, California, and features Walt...

Themis
In Greek mythology, one of the Titans, the daughter of Uranus and Gaia. She was the personification of law and order. ...

Themistocles
(c. 524-c. 460 BC) Athenian admiral and politician. His success in persuading the Athenians to build a navy is credited with saving Greece from Persian conquest. During...

Theobald
French-born archbishop of Canterbury. In 1138 he was nominated archbishop of Canterbury by Stephen. It was probably at his instigation that the pope refused to give his permission to Theobald to...

Theobald, Robert Alfred
(1884-1957) US naval officer, commander of the North Pacific Force (1942-43). He engaged in heated debates with Captain Richmond Kelly Turner at the Naval War College (1936-38) regarding the relative...

theocracy
Political system run by priests, as was once found in Tibet. In practical terms it means a system where religious values determine political decisions. The closest modern examples have been Iran...

Theocritus
(c. 310-c. 250 BC) Greek poet. His Idylls became models for later pastoral poetry. Probably born in Syracuse, he spent much of his life in Alexandria under the Greek dynasty of the Ptolemies. ...

theodicy
In Christian theology, defence of the justice of God and investigation of the problem of evil. It is a subdivision of natural theology. The term was introduced by the German philosopher Gottfried...

Theodora
(c. 508-548) Byzantine empress from 527. She was originally the mistress of Emperor Justinian before marrying him in 525. She earned a reputation for charity, courage, and championing the rights of women. The...

Theodorakis, Mikis
(1925) Greek composer. He has produced a wide variety of musical compositions, including songs, oratorios, chamber music, ballets, and symphonic works. He also produced film scores, most notably for Zorba...

Theodore of Mopsuestia
(c. 350-428) Greek-born Christian bishop, a friend of St John Chrysostom, who converted him to the ascetic life. Ordained in AD 383, he was a great preacher and scholar, and became bishop of Mopsuestia in...

Theodore of Tarsus, St
(c. 602-690) Greek cleric archbishop of Canterbury from 668. He was sent to England on papal authority as archbishop of Canterbury, and called the first national synod at Hertford 673. His plans for diocesan...

Theodore, Ilascaris
(1175-1222) Byzantine Emperor and son-in-law of Alexius III After the Crusaders' conquest of Constantinople (1204), he created a Byzantine Empire in exile in western Asia Minor, based at Nicea (1208),...

Theodoric I
King of the Visigoths 418-51, and son of Alaric I. He succeeded Wallia, and fought the Romans from 425 to 440, defeating them at Toulouse in 439, soon afterwards concluding peace with them. Then,...

Theodoric the Great
(c. 455-526) King of the Ostrogoths 471-526. He led the Ostrogoths from the Danube frontier regions of the Roman Empire to conquer Italy, where he established a peaceful and prosperous kingdom. Although...

Theodorus Studita
(759-826) Byzantine monk and abbot of the Studios monastery. He is famous for his uncompromising opposition to the reintroduction of Iconoclasm by the Emperor Leo V, for which he was exiled 815. He also...

Theodosius II
(401-450) Byzantine emperor from 408 who defeated the Persians in 421 and 441, and from 441 bought off Attila's Huns with tribute. ...

Theognis of Megara
Greek elegiac poet (see elegy). He is said to have been the author of a collection of political verses strongly aristocratic in temper. ...

theogony
In Greek mythology, an account of the origin of the gods, conceived largely in terms of human reproduction. The Greek poet Hesiod wrote a Theogony, which was in effect a genealogy...

theology
Study of God or gods, either by reasoned deduction from the natural world (natural theology) or through divine revelation (revealed theology), as in the scriptures of Christianity,...

Theophanes the Greek
(c. 1330-1405) Byzantine painter. Active in Russia, he influenced painting in Novgorod, where his frescoes in the church of Our Saviour of the Transfiguration are dated to 1378. He also worked in Moscow with...

Théophile
(1590-1626) French writer. He wrote the pastoral tragedy Pyramé et Thisbé, produced 1617, and some sincere and spontaneous love poetry. The contribution of a few licentious poems to the occasional publication...

theory of three worlds
View expounded by Chinese communist leader Deng Xiaoping at the United Nations General Assembly in 1974. He maintained that the two superpowers - the USA and the USSR - were seeking world...

theosophy
Any religious or philosophical system based on intuitive insight into the nature of the divine, but especially that of the Theosophical Society, founded in New York in 1875 by Madame Blavatsky and H...

Thera
Volcanic island in the Aegean, off the south coast of Greece, with the remains of a Bronze Age settlement at Akrotiri. This was buried as a result of a volcanic eruption about 1500 BC, an event that...

Theravada
One of the two major forms of Buddhism, common in Southeast Asia (Sri Lanka, Thailand, Cambodia, and Myanmar); the other is the later Mahayana. Theravada Buddhism, or the Way of the Elders, is...

thermal prospection
An expensive remote-sensing method used in aerial reconnaissance, based on weak variations in temperature which can be found above buried structures whose thermal properties are different from...

Thermidor
11th month of the French Revolutionary calendar, which gave its name to the period after the fall of the Jacobins and the proscription of Robespierre by the National Convention on 9 Thermidor (27...

thermoluminescence
Release, in the form of a light pulse, of stored nuclear energy in a mineral substance when heated to perhaps 500°C/930° F. The energy originates from the radioactive decay of uranium...

Thermopylae, Battle of
Battle between the Greeks under the Spartan king Leonidas and the invading Persians under Xerxes I. They clashed at the narrow mountain pass of Thermopylae, leading from Thessaly to Locrish in...

Theroux, Paul Edward
(1941) US novelist and travel writer. His works include the novels Saint Jack (1973), The Mosquito Coast (1981), Doctor Slaughter (1984), Chicago Loop (1990), Kowloon Tong (1997), Hotel Honolulu (2001),...

Theseus
In Greek mythology, a hero of Attica, who was believed to have united the states of the area under a constitutional government in Athens. He killed the monstrous Minotaur with the aid of Ariadne,...

Thesiger, Wilfred Patrick
(1910-2003) English explorer and writer. His travels and military adventures in Abyssinia (now Ethiopia and Eritrea), North Africa, and Arabia are recounted in a number of books, including Arabian Sands (1959),...

Thesmophoria
Annual Greek festival held in late November in honour of the goddess Demeter. It was a corn festival, and the rotting remains of pigs were mixed with seed corn on an altar to ensure a good crop. ...

Thespis
(lived 6th century BC) Greek poet. He is said to have introduced the first actor into dramatic performances (previously presented by choruses only), hence the word thespian for an actor. He is also said to have invented...

Thessaly
Region of ancient Greece, and a department on mainland Greece, situated on the northwest corner of the Aegean; area 13,904 sq km/5,368 sq mi; population of...

Thetis
In Greek mythology, the most beautiful Nereid (a sea goddess), and mother of Achilles. She dipped the baby in the Styx, rendering him invulnerable except for the heel which she held. In Homer's...

Thibaudet, Albert
(1874-1936) French literary historian. Among his works are La Poésie de Mallarmé/The Poetry of Mallarmé 1912, Flaubert 1922, Physiologie de la critique/The Physiology of Criticism 1930, and Histoire de la...

Thibault, Jacques Anatole François
French writer who wrote as Anatole France. ...

Thierry, Jacques Nicolas Augustin
(1795-1856) French historian of the Romantic school. On leaving school he became secretary to Claude Saint-Simon, at whose suggestion he published his first work, De la reorganisation de la societe...

Thiers, Louis Adolphe
(1797-1877) French politician and historian, first president of the Third Republic 1871-73. He held cabinet posts under Louis Philippe, led the parliamentary opposition to Napoleon III from 1863, and as head...

Thin Man, The
Novel (1932) by the US writer Dashiell Hammett, which introduced the suave-tough-guy style of detective fiction. It was made into a lighthearted film series in 1934-47, starring William Powell...

thin-section analysis
Technique using a sample chip - ground down to a paper thin sheet and mounted on a glass slide - that is utilized in petrological analysis of the mineralogical composition of ceramics, stone...

thing
Assembly of freemen in the Norse lands (Scandinavia) during the medieval period. It could encompass a meeting of the whole nation (Althing) or of a small town or community (Husthing). ...

thing-in-itself
Technical term in the philosophy of Kant, employed to denote the unknowable source of the sensory component of our experience. Later thinkers, including Fichte and Hegel, denied the coherence of...

think tank
Popular name for research foundations, generally private, that gather experts to study policy questions and make recommendations. There are think tanks representing positions across the political...

Third Amendment
See Amendment, Third. ...

third estate
In pre-revolutionary France, the order of society comprising the common people as distinct from members of the first estate (clergy) or the second estate (nobility). All three met collectively as...

Third Reich
Germany during the years of Adolf Hitler's dictatorship after 1933. Hitler and the Nazis wanted to place their government into the history of Germany for both historical precedent and legitimacy....

Third World
Former term used to describe countries of the developing world, now considered derogatory. The classifications First (western industrialized free-market), Second (eastern Communist bloc), and...

Thirkell, Angela Margaret
(1891-1961) English novelist. She wrote more than 30 novels set in `Barsetshire`, dealing with the descendants of characters from Anthony Trollope's `Barsetshire` novels, including Coronation Summer...

Thirlwall, Connop
(1797-1875) English historian and bishop of St David's. Born in London, educated at the Charterhouse and Trinity College, Cambridge, his principal work is a History of Greece 1935-44. ...

Thirteen Colonies
Original North American colonies that signed the Declaration of Independence from Britain in 1776. After the Continental Army (the first regular US fighting force, organized in 1775 to supplement...

Thirteenth Amendment
See Amendment, Thirteenth. ...

Thirty Tyrants
Aristocratic body which usurped the government of Athens 404-403 BC. They were expelled by the democratic party led by Thrasybulus. ...

Thirty Years' War
Major war 1618-48 in central Europe. Beginning as a German conflict between Protestants and Catholics, it was gradually transformed into a struggle to determine whether the ruling Austrian...

Thirty-Nine Articles
Set of articles of faith defining the doctrine of the Anglican Church; see under Anglican communion. ...

Thisbe
Legendary Babylonian lover of Pyramus; see Pyramus and Thisbe. ...

Thistle, Order of the
Scottish order of knighthood. ...

Thistlewood, Arthur
(1770-1820) English Radical. A follower of the pamphleteer Thomas Spence (1750-1814), he was active in the Radical movement and was executed as the chief leader of the Cato Street Conspiracy to murder...

Thoma, Wilhelm Ritter von
German general in World War II. He commanded a Panzer Regiment in Poland 1939, then joined the Mobile Troops Office in General Headquarters. He led the 6th and then 20th Panzer Divisions in the...

Thomas de Cantelupe, St
(c. 1218-1282) English saint and bishop. He was appointed lord chancellor in 1265 and was consecrated bishop of Hereford in 1275. At the Council of Reading in 1279, he became involved in a dispute with Archbishop...

Thomas of Celano
(1190-1260) Italian Franciscan monk and poet. According to an uncertain Tradition, he wrote the words of the long 13th-century hymn or sequence `Dies irae, dies illa`, which forms the Sequence in the...

Thomas the Rhymer
Alternative name of the Scottish poet and seer Thomas of Erceldoune. ...

Thomas the Tank Engine
Best-known character in the `Railway series` of books for young children by Rev W V Awdry (1911-1997). The series features a number of train characters who converse through their funnels and...

Thomas, (Philip) Edward
(1878-1917) English poet and prose writer. His essays and his poems (including `Adlestrop`) were quiet, stern, melancholy evocations of rural life. Poems was published in October 1917 after his death in...

Thomas, (Thomas) George
(1909-1997) Welsh Labour politician who became Speaker of the House of Commons in 1976. He was elected Labour MP for Cardiff Central in 1945 and for Cardiff West in 1950. From 1951 to 1964 he was a member of...

Thomas, Augustus
(1857-1934) US playwright. Praised for his use of distinctly American material, his first popular success was Alabama (1891), based on a family conflict in the wake of the Civil War. He wrote or adapted over 65...

Thomas, Bertram Sydney
(1892-1950) British explorer and orientalist. In the winter of 1930-31 he crossed the Rub' al Khal?, the great desert of southern Arabia, with a camel caravan; a great feat of endurance. In 1927-28 he...

Thomas, Clarence
(1948) US Supreme Court associate justice from 1991. He was nominated by President George H W Bush, but was only narrowly confirmed, by 52 votes to 48, by the Senate in what was the narrowest margin for...

Thomas, Cyrus
(1825-1910) US entomologist and ethnologist. As state entomologist he wrote a report on Illinois insects (1877-82). Appointed archaeology chief of the Bureau of American Ethnology (1882), he directed a major...

Thomas, Dylan Marlais
(1914-1953) Welsh poet. His poems, characterized by complex imagery and a strong musicality, include the celebration of his 30th birthday `Poem in October` and the evocation of his youth `Fern Hill`...

Thomas, George Henry
(1816-1870) US general. At the outbreak of the Civil War he joined the Union volunteers. In 1862 he gained the victory at the Battle of Mill Springs, and distinguished himself at Perryville, Murfreesboro, and...

Thomas, Isaiah
(1749-1831) US printer and publisher. The foremost 18th-century American publisher, Thomas published over 400 titles, including the most important literary works of the time. He published the first...

Thomas, James Henry
(1874-1949) Welsh Labour politician. He was made secretary of state for the colonies in the first Labour government in 1924. As an engine-driver he was elected to the Swindon town council, and in 1904 became...

Thomas, Jesse Burgess
(1777-1853) US Democrat senator. Appointed a federal judge in the new Illinois Territory (1809-18), he then became one of the new state's first two senators (1818-29). He proposed...

Thomas, John Parnell
(1895-1970) US representative. A member of the US House of Representatives (1937-49), he joined the conservative Dies Committee in 1939 and chaired the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee...

Thomas, Lorenzo
(1804-1875) US soldier. He was adjutant general of the Federal Army (1861-63) before being assigned to recruit and organize freed slaves for Union service (1863-65). Reappointed adjutant general (1868), he...

Thomas, Lowell Jackson
(1892-1981) US journalist, a radio commentator for the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) 1930-76. Travelling to all World War II theatres of combat and to remote areas of the world, he became one of the...

Thomas, Norman Mattoon
(1884-1968) US political leader, six times Socialist candidate for president 1928-48. One of the founders of the American Civil Liberties Union in 1920, he also served as a director of the League for...

Thomas, Ronald Stuart
(1913-2000) Welsh poet. His verse contrasts traditional Welsh values with encroaching `English` sterility. His poems, including The Stones of the Field (1946), Song at the Year's Turning (1955), and...

Thomas, St
(died AD 53) In the New Testament, one of the 12 Apostles, said to have preached in southern India, hence the ancient churches there were referred to as the `Christians of St Thomas`. He is not...

Thomas, William I(saac)
(1863-1947) US sociologist. An empiricist, he helped to make sociology a scientific discipline; he also pioneered the study of social psychology. His most important books were Source Book for Social Origins...

Thomasius, Christian
(1655-1728) German jurist and lecturer in law. He began to lecture on law in Leipzig in 1684. In 1687 he took the daring step of lecturing in German instead of Latin, and in the following year sided with the...

Thomism
In philosophy, the method and approach of Thomas Aquinas. Neo-Thomists apply this philosophical method to contemporary problems. It is a form of scholasticism. ...

Thompson, `Big Bill`
(1869-1944) US mayor. He was elected mayor for two terms 1916-24; he then dropped out of politics because his financial backer was indicted for fraud and race riots marred his term. He managed to get himself...

Thompson, Alice
Original name of the English writer Alice Meynell. ...

Thompson, Clara (Mabel)
(1893-1958) US psychoanalyst. She published some original work on women and sexuality, her best-known book being Psychoanalysis: Evolution and Development (1950). In a famous schism in the American...

Thompson, David
(1770-1857) Canadian explorer and surveyor who mapped extensive areas of western Canada, including the Columbia River, for the Hudson's Bay Company 1789-1811. ...

Thompson, Dorothy
(1894-1961) US journalist. A foreign correspondent in Vienna and Berlin during the 1920s, she later wrote a syndicated column (1936-57) and espoused vehemently anti-Nazi views prior to World War II. Her...

Thompson, Edith
(died 1923) English murderess. She was tried in 1922, with her accomplice Frederick Bywaters, for stabbing her husband. The trial at the Old Bailey caused a sensation; the couple were found guilty, and in spite...

Thompson, Edward Herbert
(1856-1935) US explorer. Appointed consul to Yucatán, Mexico, 1885, he was inspired by early Spanish writings and native legends to explore the ruined cities of the ancient Maya. His excavations focused in...

Thompson, Flora Jane
(1876-1947) English novelist. Her trilogy Lark Rise to Candleford (1945) describes Victorian rural life. Born in Juniper Hill, Oxfordshire, which was...

Thompson, Francis
(1859-1907) English poet. In Sister Songs 1895 and New Poems 1897 Thompson, who was a Roman Catholic, expressed a mystic view of life. ...

Thompson, Homer (Armstrong)
(1906-2000) US archaeologist of Canadian origin. An expert on the history and monuments of Athens, his Guide to the Athenian Agora (1976) was admired by both scholars and those without specialist knowledge. He...

Thompson, Hunter S(tockton)
(1939-2005) US writer and journalist. A proponent of the New Journalism school of reporting, which made the writer an essential component of the story, Thompson mythologized himself as the outrageous `Doctor...

Thompson, J(ames) Walter
(1847-1928) US advertising executive. He virtually created modern advertising, transforming it into a primary sales tool by persuading magazines and major clients (Eastman Kodak, Prudential Insurance) of its...