county, internal territorial and administrative division in the United Kingdom, United States, and other English-speaking countries. In the United Kingdom the county, or shire, has historically been the principal subdivision of the country for political, administrative, judicial, and cultural

cricket: County and university cricket: …a kind of nursery for county cricket—i.e., matches between the various counties of England. Although the press acclaimed a “champion county” (Sussex) as early as 1827, qualification rules for county cricket were not laid down until 1873, and it was only in 1890 that the format of the county championship…

County Hall, former seat of the London County Council and its successor, the Greater London Council. Since 1997 it has been the site of the London Aquarium. It is located on the south bank of the River Thames, across Westminster Bridge from the Houses of Parliament. In the late 19th century the

almshouse, in the United States, a locally administered public institution that provided housing and health care to people who were of limited financial means and were otherwise disadvantaged. Almshouses radically declined in number in the United States during the mid-20th century, being replaced

Kerry, county in the province of Munster, southwestern Ireland. Kerry is bounded by Counties Limerick and Cork to the east and by the Atlantic Ocean or its inlets to the south, west, and north. Tralee, in the west, is the county town (seat). Composed of sandstone, the principal highlands of Kerry

coup d’état, the sudden, violent overthrow of an existing government by a small group. The chief prerequisite for a coup is control of all or part of the armed forces, the police, and other military elements. Unlike a revolution, which is usually achieved by large numbers of people working for

coup d’état, the sudden, violent overthrow of an existing government by a small group. The chief prerequisite for a coup is control of all or part of the armed forces, the police, and other military elements. Unlike a revolution, which is usually achieved by large numbers of people working for

Curzio Malaparte: …Technique du coup d’état (1931; Coup d’État, the Technique of Revolution; Italian trans., Tecnica del colpo di stato). His early fiction—Avventure di un capitano di Sventura (1927); Sodoma e Gomorra (1931); and Sangue (1937)—also showed a fascist slant.

Stéphane Mallarmé: …ideal world, and in Un Coup de dés jamais n’abolira le hasard, poème (“A Throw of Dice Will Never Abolish the Hazard, Poem”), the work that appeared in 1897, the year before his death, he found consolation in the thought that he had met with some measure of success in…

Peter Paul Rubens: Return to Antwerp: 1616) and Christ on the Cross (also called Le Coup de Lance, 1620). Yet during this same decade Rubens also produced many paintings on secular themes—mythological, historical, and allegorical subjects, hunting scenes, and portraits. Among the finest of his mythological paintings is the Rape of the Daughters…

Jean Louvet: …of the petty bourgeoisie; and Le Coup de semonce (1995; figuratively, “The Shot Across the Bow” or “Warning Shot”), which dramatizes the 1945 Walloon Congress.

W.C. Coup was an American businessman, cofounder and manager of P.T. Barnum’s “Greatest Show on Earth.” Working his way from circus roustabout to manager, Coup, in 1872, persuaded P.T. Barnum to end his retirement and join him in starting the circus that later became “The Greatest Show on Earth.”

W.C. Coup was an American businessman, cofounder and manager of P.T. Barnum’s “Greatest Show on Earth.” Working his way from circus roustabout to manager, Coup, in 1872, persuaded P.T. Barnum to end his retirement and join him in starting the circus that later became “The Greatest Show on Earth.”

coupé, four-wheeled, horse-drawn carriage that was based on the coach but was smaller and lighter in weight. While originally the word coupé described any cut-down coach body, it later became associated with a specific type of truncated coach body that came into general use in western Europe and

coupé, four-wheeled, horse-drawn carriage that was based on the coach but was smaller and lighter in weight. While originally the word coupé described any cut-down coach body, it later became associated with a specific type of truncated coach body that came into general use in western Europe and

loving cup: The French coupe de mariage is a somewhat shallow form of loving cup.

Archibald Scott Couper was a Scottish chemist who, independently of August Kekule, proposed the tetravalency of carbon and the ability of carbon atoms to bond with one another. Couper was a student at the universities of Glasgow and Paris and became an assistant at the University of Edinburgh.

Thomas Cooper was an English bishop and author of a famous dictionary. (Read H.L. Mencken’s 1926 Britannica essay on American English.) Educated at the University of Oxford, Cooper became master of Magdalen College school and afterward practiced as a physician in Oxford. In 1565 appeared the first

Costa-Gavras: …camps, and Le Couperet (2005; The Axe), about a frustrated unemployed man who decides to kill the other people competing against him for a job.

François Couperin was a French composer and harpsichordist, the most renowned of the Couperin dynasty of 17th- and 18th-century musicians. He was the nephew of Louis Couperin. Although François Couperin was only 10 years old when his father, Charles Couperin, died, the wardens of the Church of

Louis Couperin: 1631–1708/12) and Charles (1638–79), learned to play respectably on the violin, viol, harpsichord, and organ. Still, they might have remained provincial musicians but for Jacques Champion de Chambonnières, the best harpsichordist in France, who heard one of Louis’s compositions in 1650 and insisted that the young man…

Louis Couperin: …and his two younger brothers, François (c. 1631–1708/12) and Charles (1638–79), learned to play respectably on the violin, viol, harpsichord, and organ. Still, they might have remained provincial musicians but for Jacques Champion de Chambonnières, the best harpsichordist in France, who heard one of Louis’s compositions in 1650 and insisted…

François Couperin was a French composer and harpsichordist, the most renowned of the Couperin dynasty of 17th- and 18th-century musicians. He was the nephew of Louis Couperin. Although François Couperin was only 10 years old when his father, Charles Couperin, died, the wardens of the Church of

Louis Couperin was a French composer, organist, and harpsichordist, the first major member of the Couperin dynasty of musicians of the 17th and 18th centuries. Couperin’s father, a merchant and small landowner in Chaumes-en-Brie, France, was also the organist of the local abbey church, and Louis

Louis Marie Anne Couperus was one of the greatest Dutch novelists of the 1880 literary revival. Couperus grew up in Batavia (now Jakarta) in the Dutch East Indies. After returning to the Netherlands, he settled in Italy. During World War I he returned to The Hague and later traveled through Africa

Coupeville, town, seat (1881) of Island county, northwestern Washington, U.S., on Whidbey Island. One of the oldest towns in the state and originally called the Port of Sea Captains for the retired mariners who settled there, it was renamed for one of them, Captain Thomas Coupe, who staked a claim

Douglas Coupland is a Canadian journalist and novelist best known for his observations on modern-day American culture and for popularizing the term Generation X. Coupland was born on a Canadian military base in Germany. His family relocated to Canada in the mid-1960s, and he grew up in Vancouver.

Douglas Coupland is a Canadian journalist and novelist best known for his observations on modern-day American culture and for popularizing the term Generation X. Coupland was born on a Canadian military base in Germany. His family relocated to Canada in the mid-1960s, and he grew up in Vancouver.

couple, in mechanics, pair of equal parallel forces that are opposite in direction. The only effect of a couple is to produce or prevent the turning of a body. The turning effect, or moment, of a couple is measured by the product of the magnitude of either force and the perpendicular distance

Native American dance: Patterns and body movement: …Austrian influences probably inspired the couple dances of Latin America, for aboriginal dances juxtapose male and female partners only rarely, and never in overt courtship mime.

Suzanne Lilar: Le Couple (1963; Aspects of Love in Western Society), perhaps her best work, is a neoplatonic idealization of love filtered through personal experience; in the same vein she later wrote highly critical essays on Jean-Paul Sartre (À propos de Sartre et de l’amour, 1967; “About Sartre and About…

Jacques Lipchitz: With such transparents as The Couple (1928–29), Lipchitz attempted to express emotion instead of merely addressing formal concerns, as he had in his earlier works.

mechanics: Coupled oscillators: In the section on simple harmonic oscillators, the motion of a single particle held in place by springs was considered. In this section, the motion of a group of particles bound by springs to one another is discussed. The solutions of this seemingly…

mineral: Compositional variation: …such as this are termed coupled substitutions. The plagioclase feldspar series exhibits complete solid solution, in the form of coupled substitutions, between its two end-members, albite (NaAlSi3O8) and anorthite (CaAl2Si2O8). Every atomic substitution of Na+ by Ca2+ is accompanied by the replacement of a

electron tube: Traveling-wave tubes: …cavities have bandwidth limitations, the coupled-cavity TWT also is bandwidth-limited to typically 10 to 20 percent. The helix TWT, however, has no particular bandwidth limitations, and, for all practical purposes, an octave bandwidth (100 percent) is attainable.

railroad coupling, device by which a locomotive is connected to a following car and by which succeeding cars in a train are linked. The first couplings were chains with solid buffers to help absorb shock during braking. Later, spring buffers were introduced, with screw couplings that permit two

accordion: Couplers, or “registers,” in some double-action instruments activate extra sets of reeds, one pitched an octave below the main set and another off-tuned from the main set to give a tremulant through “beating” (sound-wave interference). Other registers may include a high-octave set of reeds and…

keyboard instrument: Couplers: …upright pieces of wood called coupler dogs, which reached upward toward the underside of the upper-manual keys. The upper manual was constructed to slide forward and back by about 1 4 inch. When it was pushed into the instrument, the coupler dogs were positioned below the back ends of upper-manual…

American literature: Realism and metafiction: …to Rabbit at Rest [1990]), Couples (1968), and Too Far to Go (1979), a sequence of tales about the quiet disintegration of a civilized marriage, a subject Updike revisited in a retrospective work, Villages (2004). In sharp contrast, Nelson Algren (The Man with the Golden Arm [1949]) and

Jason Bateman: Later life and career: Sarah Marshall (2008), Hancock (2008), Couples Retreat (2009), The Switch (2010), Horrible Bosses (2011), and Bad Words (2013), which he also directed. He has been good friends with American actress Jennifer Aniston since the mid-1990s, and they have appeared together in several movies, including The Break-Up, The

couplet, a pair of end-rhymed lines of verse that are self-contained in grammatical structure and meaning. A couplet may be formal (or closed), in which case each of the two lines is end-stopped, or it may be run-on (or open), with the meaning of the first line continuing to the second (this is

sorosilicate, any member of a group of compounds with structures that have two silicate tetrahedrons (each consisting of a central silicon atom surrounded by four oxygen atoms at the corners of a tetrahedron) linked together. Because one oxygen atom is shared by two tetrahedrons, the chemical

electronic instrument: Early electronic instruments: …first of these was the Coupleux-Givelet synthesizer, which the inventors introduced in 1929 at the Paris Exposition. This instrument used a player-piano-like paper roll to “play” electronic circuits that generated the tone waveforms. Unlike a player piano, however, the Coupleux-Givelet instrument provided for control of pitch, tone colour, and loudness,…

coupling, in machinery, a device that links two rotatable shafts. See hydraulic transmission; shaft

John Robinson Pierce was an American communications engineer, scientist, and father of the communications satellite. Pierce attended the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Pasadena, receiving his Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1936. That year he began working for Bell Telephone

In the bond market, the coupon, also known as the coupon payment, is the interest payment that a bond issuer promises to pay a bondholder regularly until the bond reaches maturity. The coupon rate, or coupon yield, is a bond’s coupon expressed as an annual percentage of the bondholder’s principal.

In the bond market, the coupon, also known as the coupon payment, is the interest payment that a bond issuer promises to pay a bondholder regularly until the bond reaches maturity. The coupon rate, or coupon yield, is a bond’s coupon expressed as an annual percentage of the bondholder’s principal.

David Diop: Diop’s works in Coups de pilon (1956; “Pounding”), his only surviving collection, are angry poems of protest against European cultural values, enumerating the sufferings of his people first under the slave trade and then under the domination of colonial rule and calling for revolution to lead to a…

Courland: …inhabitants, the Latvian tribe of Curonians (Kurs, Cori, Cours; Latvian: Kursi). The duchy of Courland, formed in 1561, included this area as well as Semigallia (Zemgale), a region located east of Courland proper.

Paris: The Louvre: …original square, known as the Cour Carrée (Square Court), two galleries extend westward for about 1,640 feet (500 metres), one along the river and the other along the rue de Rivoli. In 1871, only 19 years after the huge oblong was completed, its western face, the Tuileries Palace (begun 1563),…

procedural law: Criminal courts: The French cour d’assises, which hears serious criminal matters, is composed of three professional judges and nine lay assessors. Such “mixed courts” of professionals and ordinary citizens deliberate together and decide by majority vote, with lawyers and laypersons having one vote each.

Cour de Cassation, (French: “Court of Cassation,” or “Abrogation”), the highest court of criminal and civil appeal in France, with the power to quash (casser) the decisions of lower courts. The high court considers decisions only from the point of view of whether the lower court has applied the law

France: The judiciary: …from 1963 to 1981, the Court of State Security, which tried felonies and misdemeanours against national security. Very exceptionally, in cases of high treason, a High Court of Justice (Cour de Justice de la République), composed of members of the National Assembly and of senators, is empowered to try the…

France: Governmental reforms: …in 1390, of which the Cour des Aides (board of excise) had provincial divisions set up at Toulouse in 1439 and at Rouen in 1450. A provincial parlement was definitively established at Toulouse in 1443, and there were to be others at Grenoble and Bordeaux. With all these changes, the…

François, marquis de Barbé-Marbois: …appointed first president of the Cour des Comptes (an administrative court handling public accounts of the country) in 1808 and was made a senator and a count in 1813. When Napoleon’s fall became likely, Barbé-Marbois hastily and successfully attached himself to the Bourbons and was made a peer of France…

Céline Dion: Death of husband, health diagnosis, and return to the stage: In 2019 Dion released Courage, her first English-language album in six years. Three years later the singer announced that she had been diagnosed with stiff-person syndrome. The rare neurological disorder was causing spasms that affected her mobility and vocal cords. As she underwent treatment, Dion canceled or postponed various…

Edward Hoagland: Travel and autobiographical writings: His essays are collected in The Courage of Turtles (1971), Walking the Dead Diamond River (1973; a National Book Award finalist in the arts and letters category), The Moose on the Wall: Field Notes from the Vermont Wilderness (1974), Red Wolves and Black Bears (1976), The Edward Hoagland Reader (1979),…

Paul Tillich: Departure from Nazi Germany of Paul Tillich: …his most widely read books, The Courage to Be and Dynamics of Faith, he argued that the deepest concern of humans drives them into confrontation with a reality that transcends their own finite existence. Tillich’s discussion of the human situation in these books shows a profound grasp of the problems…

Matt Damon: Early life and career: …the Persian Gulf War in Courage Under Fire (1996). This portrayal attracted the attention of director Francis Ford Coppola, who cast Damon as a novice lawyer opposite Danny DeVito in The Rainmaker (1997).

Mother Courage, fictional character, the protagonist of the play Mother Courage and Her Children (1941) by Bertolt

Hans Jacob Christoph von Grimmelshausen: … include Die Lanstörtzerin Courage (1669; Courage, the Adventuress)—which inspired Bertolt Brecht’s play Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (1941; Mother Courage and Her Children)—and Das wunderbarliche Vogelnest (1672; “The Magical Bird’s Nest”). One part of the latter, translated as The False Messiah (1964), is about an adventurer whose

Ted Turner: Philanthropist, conservationist, and sportsman: He piloted Courageous to win the America’s Cup in 1977. He also founded and sponsored the Goodwill Games (1986–2001), citing his hope of easing Cold War tensions through friendly athletic competition.

courante, court dance for couples, prominent in the late 16th century and fashionable in aristocratic European ballrooms, especially in France and England, for the next 200 years. It reputedly originated as an Italian folk dance with running steps. As a court dance it was performed with small,

newsletter: …modern newsletters were the “corantos”—single-page collections of news items from foreign journals. They were circulated by the Dutch early in the 17th century, and English and French translations were published in Amsterdam. In the English American colonies, the Boston News-letter—credited also as the first American newspaper—appeared in 1704.

particle accelerator: History: …demonstration in 1952 by Livingston, Ernest D. Courant, and H.S. Snyder of the technique of alternating-gradient focusing (sometimes called strong focusing). Synchrotrons incorporating this principle needed magnets only 1 100 the size that would be required otherwise. All recently constructed synchrotrons make use of alternating-gradient focusing.

Richard Courant was a German-born American mathematician and educator who made significant advances in the calculus of variations. Courant received his secondary education in Germany and Switzerland and his doctorate from the University of Göttingen in 1910 under David Hilbert. For the next four

courante, court dance for couples, prominent in the late 16th century and fashionable in aristocratic European ballrooms, especially in France and England, for the next 200 years. It reputedly originated as an Italian folk dance with running steps. As a court dance it was performed with small,

Courantyne River, river in northern South America, rising in the Akarai Mountains and flowing generally northward for 450 miles (700 km) to the Atlantic Ocean near Nieuw Nickerie, Suriname. It divides Suriname and Guyana. Guyana nationals have free navigation on the river but no fishing rights.

Gustave Courbet: Early life and work: …several unsuccessful attempts, his self-portrait Courbet with a Black Dog, painted in 1842–44, was accepted by the Salon—the only annual public exhibition of art in France, sponsored by the Académie des Beaux-Arts. When in the following years the jury for the Salon thrice rejected his work because of its unconventional…

Gustave Courbet was a French painter and leader of the Realist movement. Courbet rebelled against the Romantic painting of his day, turning to everyday events for his subject matter. His huge shadowed canvases with their solid groups of figures, such as The Painter’s Studio (1854–55), drew sharp

horsemanship: Dressage: …its forelegs drawn in; the courvet, which is a jump forward in the levade position; and the croupade, ballotade, and capriole, a variety of spectacular airs in which the horse jumps and lands again in the same spot.

Courbevoie, northwestern suburb of Paris, Hauts-de-Seine département, Île-de-France région, northern France. The suburb is bordered to the south by avenue du Général-de-Gaulle, a continuation of the Champs-Élysées. Owing partly to its proximity to the Seine, Courbevoie developed as an industrial

Courchevel, winter sports resort, Savoie département, Rhône-Alpes région, southeastern France. It is situated in the commune of Saint-Bon-Tarentaise high on the south side of the Isère Valley, 57 mi (92 km) east-southeast of Chambéry by road. Courchevel and the adjacent resorts of Méribel, Les

John de Courci was an Anglo-Norman conqueror of Ulster, who was a member of a celebrated Norman family of Oxfordshire and Somerset. Sent to Ireland with William FitzAldelm by Henry II in 1176, he immediately led an expedition from Dublin to Ulster and in 1177 seized its capital, Down (now

coureur de bois, French Canadian fur trader of the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Most of the coureurs de bois traded illicitly (i.e., without the license required by the Quebec government). They sold brandy to First Nations peoples, which created difficulties for the nations with whom they

zucchini, (Cucurbita pepo), variety of summer squash in the gourd family (Cucurbitaceae), grown for its edible fruits. Zucchinis are common in home gardens and supermarkets, and the young fruits are cooked as a vegetable. The flowers are also edible and are sometimes fried. Zucchini plants are

Katie Couric is an American broadcast journalist best known as the longtime cohost of NBC’s Today show and as the first solo female anchor of a major network (CBS) evening news program. The daughter of a writer and a journalist, Couric decided to pursue a career in broadcasting after graduating

Katie Couric is an American broadcast journalist best known as the longtime cohost of NBC’s Today show and as the first solo female anchor of a major network (CBS) evening news program. The daughter of a writer and a journalist, Couric decided to pursue a career in broadcasting after graduating

circus: Equestrian acts: One of his acts, “The Courier of St. Petersburg,” is still seen in the circus. In this act a rider straddles two cantering horses while other horses, bearing the flags of those countries that a courier would traverse on a journey from St. Petersburg to England, pass between his…

number game: Courier problems: …get out of the well? These are typified by the movements of bodies at given rates in which some position of these bodies is given and the time required for them to arrive at some other specified position is demanded.

Paul-Louis Courier was a French classical scholar and pamphleteer, remembered for his brilliant style and antimonarchist writings following the Second Restoration of the Bourbons after the defeat of Napoleon (1815). Courier joined the army in 1792 and had a successful career in the artillery,

Benedict Cumberbatch: Doctor Strange and The Grinch: …a Cold War spy in The Courier (2020).

The Courier-Journal, morning daily newspaper published in Louisville, Kentucky, long recognized as one of the outstanding regional newspapers of the United States. It was founded in 1868 by a merger of the Louisville Courier and the Louisville Journal brought about by Henry Watterson, The

limpkin, (species Aramus guarauna), large swamp bird of the American tropics, sole member of the family Aramidae (order Gruiformes). The bird is about 70 cm (28 inches) long and is coloured brown with white spots. The limpkin’s most distinctive characteristics are its loud, prolonged, wailing cry

Courland, region on the Baltic seacoast, located south of the Western Dvina River and named after its inhabitants, the Latvian tribe of Curonians (Kurs, Cori, Cours; Latvian: Kursi). The duchy of Courland, formed in 1561, included this area as well as Semigallia (Zemgale), a region located east of

Curonian Lagoon, gulf of the Baltic Sea at the mouth of the Neman River, in Lithuania and Russia. The lagoon, with an area of 625 square miles (1,619 square km), is separated from the Baltic Sea by a narrow, dune-covered sandspit, the Curonian Spit (Lithuanian: Kuršiu Nerija; Russian: Kurskaya

André F. Cournand was a French-American physician and physiologist who in 1956 shared the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Dickinson W. Richards and Werner Forssmann for discoveries concerning heart catheterization and circulatory changes. His medical studies interrupted by World War I,

André F. Cournand was a French-American physician and physiologist who in 1956 shared the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Dickinson W. Richards and Werner Forssmann for discoveries concerning heart catheterization and circulatory changes. His medical studies interrupted by World War I,

Antoine-Augustin Cournot was a French economist and mathematician. Cournot was the first economist who, with competent knowledge of both subjects, endeavoured to apply mathematics to the treatment of economics. His main work in economics is Recherches sur les principes mathématiques de la théorie

cuckoo roller, (Leptosomus discolor), little-known bird of Madagascar and the neighbouring Comoros, named for its superficial resemblance to cuckoos but usually deemed the sole member of the family Leptosomatidae (sometimes treated as a subfamily of the Coraciidae [rollers]). It is about 43 cm (17

cannonball tree, (Couroupita guianensis), tall, soft-wooded tree, of the family Lecythidaceae, native to northeastern South America and notable for its large, spherical woody fruit, which resembles a rusty cannonball. The tree is also cultivated in the southern regions of North America. The leaves

André Courrèges was a dress designer who first made a reputation in the Parisian fashion world of the 1960s for futuristic, youth-oriented styles. Courrèges wished to be an artist, but his father directed him into engineering, at which he was successful. In 1948 he joined the staff of the couturier

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: …first book, Courrier sud (1929; Southern Mail), his new man of the skies, airmail pilot Jacques Bernis, dies in the desert of Rio de Oro. His second novel, Vol de nuit (1931; Night Flight), was dedicated to the glory of the first airline pilots and their mystical exaltation as they…

Courrières mining disaster, underground explosion and fire that took place in a French mine on March 10, 1906. The mining disaster, one of Europe’s worst, killed 1,099 people; hundreds more were injured. The mine, owned by the Courrières mining company, was located near the Pas-de-Calais hills in

Camille Jordan: …and researches on analysis in Cours d’analyse de l’École Polytechnique, 3 vol. (1882; “Analysis Course from the École Polytechnique”). In the third edition (1909–15) of this notable work, which contained a good deal more of Jordan’s own work than did the first, he treated the theory of functions from the…

Jacques-François Blondel: …and plans in the monumental Cours d’architecture (1771–77; “Architecture Course”); the 12-volume work was completed (and its 6 volumes of plates combined into 3 volumes) by the French architect, writer, and engraver Pierre Patte.

Vilfredo Pareto: Pareto’s first work, Cours d’économie politique (1896–97), included his famous but much-criticized law of income distribution, a complicated mathematical formulation in which Pareto attempted to prove that the distribution of incomes and wealth in society is not random and that a consistent pattern appears throughout history, in all…

Luigi Cherubini: …several treatises, including the celebrated Cours de contrepoint et de fugue (1835; “Course in Counterpoint and Fugue”), which is far more conservative musically than Cherubini’s actual music.

Ferdinand de Saussure: …Cours de linguistique générale (1916; Course in General Linguistics), a reconstruction of his lectures on the basis of notes by students carefully prepared by his junior colleagues Charles Bally and Albert Séchehaye. The publication of his work is considered the starting point of 20th-century structural linguistics.

Auguste Comte: Life: …philosophy in a work entitled Cours de philosophie positive (1830–42; “Course of Positive Philosophy”; Eng. trans. The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte).