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penguin

(Encyclopedia)penguin, originally the common name for the now extinct great auk of the N Atlantic and now used (since the 19th cent.) for the unrelated, generally antarctic diving birds of the Southern Hemisphere. ...

duck

(Encyclopedia)duck, common name for wild and domestic waterfowl of the family Anatidae, which also includes geese and swans. It is hunted and bred for its meat, eggs, and feathers. Strictly speaking, duck refers to...

pigeon

(Encyclopedia)pigeon, common name for members of the large family Columbidae, land birds, cosmopolitan in temperate and tropical regions, characterized by stout bodies, short necks, small heads, and thick, heavy pl...

Feininger, Lyonel

(Encyclopedia)Feininger, Lyonel fīˈnĭngər [key], 1871–1956, American painter and illustrator, b. New York City. Feininger studied painting in Berlin, Hamburg, and Paris. He was an illustrator and caricaturist...

white-eye

(Encyclopedia)white-eye, common name for warblerlike, arboreal birds, including 85 species in the family Zosteropidae, and for certain species of ducks. The members of Zosteropidae, with the exception of a few spec...

ratite

(Encyclopedia)ratite rătˈīt [key], common and general term for a variety of flightless birds characterized by a flat, raftlike sternum rather than the keeled sternum, designed to support flight muscles, typical ...

flycatcher

(Encyclopedia)flycatcher, common name for various members of the Old World family Muscicapidae, insectivorous songbirds including the kingbirds, phoebes, and pewees. Flycatchers vary in color from drab to brilliant...

embroidery

(Encyclopedia)embroidery, ornamental needlework applied to all varieties of fabrics and worked with many sorts of thread—linen, cotton, wool, silk, gold, and even hair. Decorative objects, such as shells, feather...

Quetzalcoatl

(Encyclopedia)Quetzalcoatl kĕtˌsälkôätˈəl [key] [Nahuatl,=feathered serpent], ancient deity and legendary ruler of the Toltec in Mexico. The name is also that of a Toltec ruler, who is credited with the disc...

Updike, John

(Encyclopedia)Updike, John, 1932–2009, American author, one of the nation's most distinguished 20th-century men of letters, b. Shillington, Pa., grad. Harvard, 1954. In his many novels and stories, written in a w...
 

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