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

Verlaine, Paul Marie
(1844-1896) French lyric poet. He was acknowledged as the leader of the Symbolist poets (see Symbolism). His volumes of verse, strongly influenced by the poets Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud, include...

Vermeer, Jan
(1632-1675) Dutch painter, active in Delft. He painted quiet, everyday scenes that are characterized by an almost abstract simplicity, subtle colour harmonies, and a remarkable ability to suggest the fall of...

Vermeule, Emily Townsend
(1928-2001) US classicist, art historian, and archaeologist. One of relatively few women full professors at Harvard (1970), she gave the University of California Sather lectures in 1975 and was director of the...

Vermeylen, August
(1872-1945) Flemish writer. He was the critical mentor of the Flemish movement and one of the cofounders of the journal Van Nu en Straks/Today and Tomorrow, advocating a more serious, intellectual, and...

vernacular architecture
The indigenous building tradition of a locality, not designed by trained architects; for example, thatched cottages in England, stone in Scotland, adobe huts in Mexico, and wooden buildings in the...

Verne, Jules
(1828-1905) French author. He wrote tales of adventure that anticipated future scientific developments:Five Weeks in a Balloon (1862), Journey to the Centre of...

Verneuil, Battle of
In the Hundred Years' War, devastating English victory 17 August 1424 over a joint French and Scottish army. The Scots were decimated: they suffered some 7,000 casualties including the 4th Earl of...

Verney, Edmund
(1590-1642) English courtier, knight-marshal to Charles I from 1626. He sat as a member of both the Short and the Long Parliaments and, though sympathizing with the Parliamentary position, remained true to...

Vernon, Edward
(1684-1757) English admiral who captured Portobello from the Spanish in the Caribbean 1739, with a loss of only seven men. ...

Veronica, St
(lived 1st century AD) Woman of Jerusalem who, according to tradition, lent her veil to Jesus to wipe the sweat from his brow on the road to Calvary, whereupon the image of his face was printed upon it. A relic alleged to...

Verrocchio, Andrea del
(c. 1435-1488) Florentine sculptor, painter, and goldsmith. He ran a large workshop in Florence and received commissions from the Medici family. His works include the vigorous equestrian statue of Bartolommeo...

Versailles Council
Allied military coordinating committee in the latter stages of World War I. After the Italian defeat at Caporetto October 1917, the British premier Lloyd George led a movement to set up a supreme...

Versailles, Treaty of
Peace treaty after World War I between the Allies (except the USA and China) and Germany, signed on 28 June 1919. It established the League of Nations, an international organization intended to...

verse
Arrangement of words in a rhythmic pattern, which may depend on the length of syllables (as in Greek or Latin verse), or on stress, as in English. Classical Greek verse depended upon quantity, a...

Verspronck, Jan Cornelisz.
(1597-1662) Dutch portrait painter. He spent his life in Haarlem. He was the pupil of his father and Frans Hals and painted especially portraits of children. ...

Vertue, Robert
(died 1506) English mason, probable architect of Henry VII's palace at Greenwich (subsequently destroyed). He was Henry's master mason and also worked on a new tower at...

Verulamium
Romano-British town near St Albans, Hertfordshire, occupied until about AD 450. Verulamium superseded a nearby Belgic settlement and was first occupied by the Romans in 44-43 BC. The earliest...

Verwey, Albert
(1865-1937) Dutch poet and critic. His early poetry is impressionistic and intensely individual, but his mature work is more contemplative and has been criticized as overintellectual. He was among the founders...

Verwoerd, Hendrik (Frensch)
(1901-1966) South African right-wing Nationalist Party politician, prime minister 1958-66. As minister of native affairs 1950-58, he was the chief promoter of apartheid legislation (segregation by race)....

Vesaas, Tarjei
(1897-1970) Norwegian novelist and poet. The theme of his early work was the harmony of life in tune with nature. After World War II his style became more symbolic and he used visual images to represent inner...

Vesalius, Andreas
(1514-1564) Belgian physician who revolutionized anatomy by performing postmortem dissections and making use of illustrations to teach anatomy. Vesalius upset the authority of Galen, and his book - the first...

Vesey, Denmark
(c. 1767-1822) US African-American resistance leader who planned one of the largest slave rebellions in US history in 1822. His plot, involving as many as 9,000 African Americans in Charleston, South Carolina,...

Vespasian
(9-79) Roman emperor from AD 69. Proclaimed emperor by his soldiers while he was campaigning in Palestine, he reorganized the eastern provinces, and was a capable administrator. He was responsible for the...

vespers
The seventh of the eight canonical hours in the Catholic Church; also, the seventh Roman Catholic office (or non-Eucharistic service) of the day. It is also used by the Anglican Church to refer to...

Vespucci, Amerigo
(1454-1512) Florentine merchant. The Americas were named after him as a result of the widespread circulation of his accounts of his explorations. His accounts of the voyage from 1499 to 1501 include...

Vesta
In Roman mythology, the goddess of the hearth, equivalent with the Greek Hestia. In Rome, the sacred flame in her shrine at the Forum represented the spirit of the community, and was kept constantly...

Vestal Virgin
One of the six priestesses of the Roman goddess Vesta, who served in her temple in Rome. Their lives were dedicated to the goddess and they kept the sacred flame burning...

Vestal, Albert (Henry)
(1875-1932) US Republican representative. A prosecuting attorney before going to the US House of Representatives (Indiana; 1917-32), he chaired the Committee on Weights and Measures, also serving as majority...

Vestdijk, Simon
(1898-1971) Dutch writer and critic. His 38 novels, 10 collections of short stories, 28 books of essays, and 22 volumes of poetry are the products of a skilful writing technique and a penetrating intellect. ...

vestiarian controversy
16th-century dispute over the use of clerical vestments. The Puritans opposed clergy wearing the surplice which they felt had overtones of a Catholic priesthood, and the issue was hotly contested...

Veterans Day
In the USA, the name adopted in 1954 for Armistice Day and from 1971 observed by most states on 11 November. The equivalent in the UK and Canada is Remembrance Sunday. ...

Veterans' Affairs, Department of
US government department created by Congress in 1989, succeeding the Veterans Administration. The government's second-largest department, it is responsible for a nationwide system of health-care...

veto
Exercise by a sovereign, branch of legislature, or other political power, of the right to prevent the enactment or operation of a law, or the taking of some course of action. In the UK the sovereign...

Veuster, Joseph de
(1840-1889) Belgian missionary, known as Father Damien. He entered the order of the Fathers of the Sacred Heart at Louvain, went to Hawaii, and from 1873 was resident priest in the leper settlement at Molokai....

Via Appia
Latin form of Appian Way, the ancient Roman road. ...

Via Flaminia
Latin Flaminian Way. ...

Vian, Philip Louis
(1894-1968) British admiral of the fleet in World War II. In 1940 he was the hero of the Altmark incident, and in 1941 commanded the destroyers that chased the Bismarck. KBE 1942. ...

Viau, Théophile de
(1590-1626) French playwright and poet who courted controversy. In 1623, he was condemned to be burned at the stake for his part in the publication of scurrilous verse, but the sentence was commuted to one of...

Viaud, (Louis Marie) Julien
Real name of French novelist Pierre Loti. ...

vicar
Church of England priest, originally one who acted as deputy to a rector, but now also a parish priest. In the USA, a vicar is in charge of a chapel of the Episcopal Church. ...

Vicente (or Vincente), Gil
(c. 1465-1536) Portuguese dramatist, who wrote also in Spanish. Over 40 of his works survive, including moralities, farces, romantic comedies, and allegorical spectacles devised for the Portuguese court. ...

viceroy
Chief official representing a sovereign in a colony, dominion, or province, as in many Spanish and Portuguese American colonies and as in the British administration of India. ...

Vichy
Health resort and spa town in Allier département, central France, situated on the River Allier 320 km/200 mi southeast of Paris; population (1990) 60,000. From 1940 to 1944, during World War II, it...

Vichy government
In World War II, the right-wing government of unoccupied France after the country's defeat by the Germans in June 1940, named after the spa town of Vichy, France, where the national assembly was...

Vickers
British engineering company, prominent in the manufacture of munitions. In addition to naval and land artillery, the company gave its name to the `Vickers gun`, a modified form of the Maxim...

Vickrey, William S
(1914-1996) Canadian-born US economist. A Quaker and conscientious objector during World War II, Vickrey spent his alternative service designing a new inheritance tax for Puerto Rico, which he later submitted...

Vicksburg, Battle of
In the American Civil War, Union victory over Confederate forces May-July 1863, at Vicksburg, Mississippi, 380 km/235 mi north of New Orleans. Vicksburg was a well-fortified communications hub...

Victor Emmanuel I
(1759-1824) King of Sardinia-Piedmont, 1802-21. After a long struggle to liberate his possessions from French control, he headed an extremely reactionary regime that suppressed all liberal calls for reform....

Victor Emmanuel II
(1820-1878) First king of united Italy from 1861. He became king of Sardinia on the abdication of his father Charles Albert 1849. In 1855 he allied Sardinia with France and the UK in the Crimean War. In 1859 in...

Victor Emmanuel III
(1869-1947) King of Italy from the assassination of his father, Umberto I, in 1900. He acquiesced in the Fascist regime of Mussolini from 1922 and, after the dictator's fall in 1943, relinquished power to his...

Victor III
(0000-1087) Pope, 1086-87. He became abbot of the Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino in central Italy in 1058, and under him the abbey reached the height...

Victoria
(1819-1901) Queen of the UK from 1837, when she succeeded her uncle William IV, and Empress of India from 1877. In 1840 she married Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Her relations with her prime...

Victoria and Albert Museum
Museum of decorative arts in South Kensington, London, England, founded in 1852. It houses prints, paintings, and temporary exhibitions, as well as one of the largest collections of decorative arts...

Victoria Cross
British decoration for conspicuous bravery in wartime, instituted by Queen Victoria in 1856. It is bronze, with a 4 cm/1.5 in diameter, and has a crimson ribbon. Victoria Crosses are struck from the...

Victorian
Style of architecture, furnituremaking, and decorative art covering the reign of Queen Victoria, from 1837 to 1901. The era was influenced by significant industrial and urban development, and the...

Victorian
Period of mid- and late- 19th century in England, covering the reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1901. This period was one of significant industrial and urban development in Britain, and also...

Victorian Order, Royal
One of the fraternities carrying with it the rank of knight; see knighthood. ...

Victory
British battleship, the flagship of Admiral Nelson at Trafalgar. Weighing 2,198 tonnes/2,164 tons, it was launched in 1765; it is now in dry dock in Portsmouth harbour, England. ...

Vidal, Gore
(1925) US writer and critic. Much of his fiction deals satirically with history and politics and includes the novels Myra Breckinridge (1968), Burr (1973), Empire (1987), The Smithsonian Institution...

Videla, Gabriel Goncález
(1898-1980) Chilean president 1946-52. He was a political reformist and outlawed the Communist Party in Chile in 1948, despite having communist members in his cabinet 1946-1948 and sided with the USA in the...

Videla, Jorge Rafael
(1925) Argentine military leader and president 1976-81. He was the main architect of the `dirty war` against left-wing elements 1976-83. In 1975 Videla was appointed commander-in-chief of the...

video art
Type of modern art created by visual artists using video and television equipment; it is a medium rather than a style. The equipment (medium) can be used in any of various ways, for example in...

Vidocq, François Eugène
(1775-1857) French criminal who became a spy for the Paris police 1809, and rose to become chief of the detective department. ...

Viebig, Clara
(1860-1952) German novelist. She wrote about the influence of the bleak landscape of the Eifel region of the Rhineland, near Luxembourg, on the people who live there, in such novels as Kinder der Eifel 1897,...

Vien, Joseph-Marie
(1716-1809) French painter. He was court painter to Louis XVI, and represents the antiquarian taste in art stimulated by the discoveries at Pompeii and Herculaneum and by the writings of the German art...

Vienna Circle
Group of philosophers in Vienna, Austria, in the 1920s and 1930s, who advocated logical positivism. The group, which was highly influential, centred on Moritz Schlick, professor of philosophy at the...

Vienna, Battle of
Turkish defeat by a Christian army 12 September 1683. The Ottoman Turks had launched a fresh invasion of the West, and Mustapha Pasha was besieging Vienna with...

Vienna, Battle of
During the Ottoman Wars, unsuccessful siege of Vienna in September-October 1529 by the Turks, commanded by Suleiman the Magnificent. Vienna marked...

Vienna, Congress of
International conference held from 1814 to 1815 which agreed the settlement of Europe after the Napoleonic Wars. National representatives included the Austrian foreign minister Metternich, Alexander...

Viereck, George Sylvester
(1884-1962) US writer and propagandist, of German origin. A published poet (1904), he became a writer and editor with German language publications, defending Germany at the outbreak of World War I. Known for...

Vietcong
In the Vietnam War (1954-75), the members of the communist National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam, founded in 1960, who conducted a guerrilla campaign against South Vietnamese and US...

Vietminh
The Vietnam Independence League, founded 1941 to oppose the Japanese occupation of Indochina and later directed against the French colonial power. The Vietminh were instrumental in achieving...

Vietnam
Country in Southeast Asia, on the South China Sea, bounded north by China and west by Cambodia and Laos. Government Vietnam is a one-party socialist state. The dominating force in Vietnam is the...

Vietnam War
War from 1954 to 1975 between communist North Vietnam and US-backed South Vietnam, in which North Vietnam aimed to conquer South Vietnam and unite the country as a communist state. North Vietnam...

Vietnam War protests
Demonstrations, marches, and acts of civil disobedience in protest to US involvement in the Vietnam War (1954-75), beginning around 1965. Anti-war sentiment arose from the question of the...

Vietnamese
Inhabitants of Vietnam; people of Vietnamese culture or descent. The Vietnamese comprise approximately 90% of the population. Most Vietnamese live in the fertile valleys of the Red and Mekong...

Vigarny, Felipe
(c. 1475-1542) Burgundian sculptor who, from 1498, worked in Spain. He employed a style full of Italianate motifs and styling. An early patron was cardinal Ximénes de Cisneros, of whom he carved an alabaster...

Vigdís Finnbogadóttir
(1930) President of Iceland 1980-96. She was first elected president in 1980, the first woman ever to be democratically elected president of a republic, and was re-elected in 1984 and 1988. In 1996 she...

vigilante
In US history, originally a member of a `vigilance committee`, a self-appointed group to maintain public order in the absence of organized authority, especially...

Vigilius
(died 555) Pope, 537-555, who ascended the papal throne after plotting with Theodora, wife of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I, to depose his predecessor St Silverius. Vigilius played a leading role in the...

Vignola, Giacomo Barozzi da
(1507-1573) Italian architect, the leading architect in Rome after the death of Michelangelo. He is largely remembered for his architectural textbook Regole delle cinque ordini/On the Five Orders (1562). He...

Vigny, Alfred Victor, comte de
(1797-1863) French Romantic writer. His works, pervaded by an air of melancholy Stoicism, include the historical novel Cinq-Mars 1826, the play Chatterton 1835, and poetry, for example, Les...

Vijayanagar
The capital of the last extensive Hindu empire in India between the 14th and 17th centuries, situated on the River Tungabhadra, southern India. The empire attained its peak under the warrior Krishna...

Viking
The inhabitants of Scandinavia in the period 800-1100. They traded with, and raided, much of Europe, and often settled there. In their narrow, shallow-draught, highly manoeuvrable longships, the...

Viking art
Sculpture and design of the Vikings, dating from the 8th to 11th century. Viking artists are known for woodcarving and finely wrought personal ornaments in gold and silver, and for an intricate...

Vilar, Jean
(1912-1971) French actor, manager, and director. He became director of the Théâtre National Populaire in 1951, whose aim was to win a mass audience for serious theatre, but resigned in 1963 as a protest...

vilayet
Administrative division of the Ottoman Empire under a law of 1864, with each vilayet, or province, controlled by a vali; some were subdivided into sanjaks. The vilayet system was an attempt by the...

Villa, Pancho (Francisco)
(1877-1923) Mexican revolutionary. The Mexican Revolution of 1911 made him famous as a military commander. In a fierce struggle for control of the revolution, he and Emiliano Zapata were defeated in 1915 by...

village, medieval
In the Middle Ages, a typical English village would consist of a few dozen people living in a cluster of huts around a village green. The parish ...

Villani, Giovanni
(c. 1280-1348) Italian historian. His Cronica universale 1559 begins with biblical times and continues until 1348; it also gives a valuable account of the early history of Florence. It was continued by his brother...

Villard, Henry
(1835-1900) German-born US journalist and financier. He covered the American Civil War 1861-65 for the New York Herald and Tribune. An astute investor, he was president of the Edison General Electric Co....

Villeda Morales, Ramón
(1908-1971) Honduran centrist Liberal Party politician, president 1957-63. He launched a centre-left reform programme, involving agrarian reform, a progressive land tax, a new labour code, modernization of...

Villehardouin, Geoffroy de
(c. 1160-c. 1213) French historian. He was the first to write in the French language. He was a leader of the Fourth Crusade, of which his Conquest of Constantinople (c. 1209) is an account. ...

villein
A peasant who, under the feudal system of land tenure that prevailed in Europe in the Middle Ages, gave dues and services to a lord in exchange for land. Villeins were not slaves, and were named as...

Villena, Enrique de
(1384-1434) Spanish translator, astrologer, and cook. He was friends with Iñigo Santillana and his colourful life would be dramatized by Lope de Vega. On Santillana's request, he produced the first complete...

Villiers, Alan John
(1903-1982) Australian sailor and travel writer. With the four-master Pamir he twice won the grain race from South Australia to England. In 1957 he captained the Mayflower II, a replica...

Villon, François
(1431-c. 1465) French poet. He used satiric humour, pathos, and irony in works like Petit Testament or Louis (1456) and Grand Testament (1461) ( ...

Vimiero, Battle of
In the Peninsular War, French defeat by the Duke of Wellington 21 August 1808 near Vimiero, a Portuguese village 50 km/31 mi northwest of Lisbon. Wellington wanted to pursue the defeated French, but...

Vimy Ridge
Hill in northern France, taken in World War I by Canadian troops during the battle of Arras, April 1917, at the cost of 11,285 lives. It is a spur of the ridge of Notre Dame de Lorette, 8 km/5 mi...

Vinaya-pitaka
Buddhist scripture; the first and oldest part of the Tripitaka, the canon of the Buddha's teachings. The Vinaya-pitaka covers the rules that should govern monks and nuns in the running of...