• Khionistra (mountain, Cyprus)

    Cyprus: Relief: The range’s summit, Mount Olympus (also called Mount Troodos), reaches an elevation of 6,401 feet (1,951 metres) and is the island’s highest point.

  • Khíos (island, Greece)

    Chios, island and dímos (municipality), situated 5 miles (8 km) off the western coast of Turkey in the Aegean Sea, North Aegean (Modern Greek: Vóreio Aigaío) periféreia (region), eastern Greece. Of volcanic and limestone origins, it is about 30 miles (50 km) long north-south and from 8 to 15 miles

  • khipu (Incan counting tool)

    quipu, accounting apparatus used by Andean peoples from 2500 bce, especially from the period of the kingdom of Cuzco (established in the 12th century) to the fall of the Inca empire (1532), and consisting of a long textile cord (called a top, or primary, cord) with a varying number of pendant

  • Khirbat al-Mafjar (palace, Middle East)

    Khirbat al-Mafjar, Umayyad desert palace complex located in the Wadi Al-Nuwayʿima, approximately 3 miles (5 km) north of Jericho, in the West Bank. Built in the 8th century, this palace contained a residential unit consisting of a square building with an elaborate entrance, a porticoed courtyard,

  • Khirbat Qumran (ancient site, Middle East)

    Dead Sea Scrolls: Discovery and description: …wilderness from five principal sites: Khirbat Qumrān, Wadi Al-Murabbaʿāt, Naḥal Ḥever (Wadi Khabrah) and Naḥal Ẓeʾelim (Wadi Seiyal), Wadi Daliyeh, and Masada. The first manuscripts, accidentally discovered in 1947 by a shepherd boy in a cave at Khirbat Qumrān on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea, were almost immediately…

  • Khirbet Kerak (ancient site, Palestine)

    Beth Yerah, ancient fortified settlement located at the southern tip of the Sea of Galilee in what is now northern Israel. Beth Yerah was settled in the Early Bronze Age (c. 3100–2300 bce) and was also populated from the Hellenistic to the Arab periods (c. 2nd century bce to 12th century ce).

  • Khirbet Kerak ware (pottery)

    Beth Yerah: …was discovered there and named Khirbet Kerak ware.

  • Khirokitia (Cyprus)

    Cyprus: Earliest periods: …9,000 years ago, was at Khirokitia (near the southern coast), a town of about 2,000 inhabitants who lived in well-built two-story round stone houses. The presence of small quantities of obsidian, a type of volcanic rock not native to the island, is the only sign of the island’s contact with…

  • khirqah (Islam)

    khirqah, (Arabic: “rag”), a woolen robe traditionally bestowed by Sufi (Muslim mystic) masters on those who had newly joined the Sufi path, in recognition of their sincerity and devotion. While most sources agree that the khirqah was a patched piece of cloth, there is no uniform description of the

  • Khitai (people)

    Khitan, any member of a Mongol people that ruled Manchuria and part of North China from the 10th to the early 12th century under the Liao dynasty. See also

  • khitān (Islam)

    khitān, in Islam, circumcision of the male; by extension it may also refer to the circumcision of the female (properly khafḍ). Muslim traditions (Ḥadīth) recognize khitān as a pre-Islamic rite customary among the Arabs and place it in the same category as the trimming of mustaches, the cutting of

  • Khitan (people)

    Khitan, any member of a Mongol people that ruled Manchuria and part of North China from the 10th to the early 12th century under the Liao dynasty. See also

  • Khiuma (island, Estonia)

    Hiiumaa, island of the Muhu archipelago, Estonia. It lies in the Baltic Sea, northwest of the Gulf of Riga. Hiiumaa is the northernmost of the three larger islands forming the archipelago. It is separated from the island of Saaremaa to the south by Soela Strait and from the mainland to the east by

  • Khiva (Uzbekistan)

    Khiva, city, south-central Uzbekistan. It lies west of the Amu Darya (ancient Oxus River) on the Palvan Canal, and it is bounded on the south by the Karakum Desert and on the northeast by the Kyzylkum desert. A notorious slave market was centred there from the 17th to the 19th century. The city is

  • Khiva, khanate of (ancient state, Uzbekistan)

    Chagatai literature: …the somewhat peripheral khanate of Khiva, while the khanate of Bukhara usually patronized writing in Persian. The major literary texts in Chagatai during the 17th century were the historical writing of the Khivan khan Abū al-Ghāzī Bahādur—notably his Shajare-i Tarākime (1659; “Genealogical Tree of the Turkmen”) and Shajare-i Turk (completed…

  • Khiwa (Uzbekistan)

    Khiva, city, south-central Uzbekistan. It lies west of the Amu Darya (ancient Oxus River) on the Palvan Canal, and it is bounded on the south by the Karakum Desert and on the northeast by the Kyzylkum desert. A notorious slave market was centred there from the 17th to the 19th century. The city is

  • Khiyār, Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq ibn Yasār ibn (Arab author)

    Ibn Isḥāq was an Arab biographer of the Prophet Muḥammad whose book, in a recension by Ibn Hishām, is one of the most important sources on the Prophet’s life. Ibn Isḥāq was the grandson of an Arab prisoner captured by Muslim troops in Iraq and brought to Medina, where he was freed after accepting

  • Khizr Khan (Sayyid ruler)

    India: The rise of regional states: …of Sind were held by Khizr Khan Sayyid for Timur (and later for himself). Khizr Khan also took over Delhi and a small area surrounding it after the last of the Tughluqs died in 1413, and he founded the dynasty known as the Sayyid. The Sayyids ruled the territory of…

  • Khizr, the Guide (poem by Iqbal)

    Muhammad Iqbal: Early life and career: …Answer to the Complaint”), and Khizr-e rāh (“Khizr, the Guide”), were published later in 1924 in the Urdu collection Bāng-e darā (“The Call of the Bell”). In those works Iqbal gave intense expression to the anguish of Muslim powerlessness. Khizr (Arabic: Khiḍr), the Qurʾānic prophet who asks the most difficult…

  • Khizr-e rāh (poem by Iqbal)

    Muhammad Iqbal: Early life and career: …Answer to the Complaint”), and Khizr-e rāh (“Khizr, the Guide”), were published later in 1924 in the Urdu collection Bāng-e darā (“The Call of the Bell”). In those works Iqbal gave intense expression to the anguish of Muslim powerlessness. Khizr (Arabic: Khiḍr), the Qurʾānic prophet who asks the most difficult…

  • KHJ (American radio station)

    KHJ, “Boss Radio”: Los Angeles’ KHJ, better known as “Boss Radio” in the mid-1960s, was the most imitated station of its time. After years of “personality” radio—dominated by deejay chatter and replete with long jingles—it ushered in the mainstreaming of Top 40 radio. Its designer, Bill Drake, a…

  • KHJ, “Boss Radio”

    Los Angeles’ KHJ, better known as “Boss Radio” in the mid-1960s, was the most imitated station of its time. After years of “personality” radio—dominated by deejay chatter and replete with long jingles—it ushered in the mainstreaming of Top 40 radio. Its designer, Bill Drake, a Georgia-born deejay,

  • Khlebnikov, Velimir Vladimirovich (Russian poet)

    Velimir Vladimirovich Khlebnikov was a poet who was the founder of Russian Futurism and whose esoteric verses exerted a significant influence on Soviet poetry. Born into a scientific family, Khlebnikov studied both mathematics and linguistics during his university years. At that time he also began

  • Khlebnikov, Viktor Vladimirovich (Russian poet)

    Velimir Vladimirovich Khlebnikov was a poet who was the founder of Russian Futurism and whose esoteric verses exerted a significant influence on Soviet poetry. Born into a scientific family, Khlebnikov studied both mathematics and linguistics during his university years. At that time he also began

  • Khlesl, Melchior (Austrian cardinal)

    Melchior Klesl was an Austrian statesman, bishop of Vienna and later a cardinal, who tried to promote religious toleration during the Counter-Reformation in Austria. Converted from Protestantism by the Jesuits, he became an outstanding preacher and served as bishop of Vienna from the 1590s. Klesl

  • Khlong Phadung Krung Kasem (moat, Bangkok, Thailand)

    Bangkok: History of Bangkok: …and a new city moat, Khlong Phadung Krung Kasem, parallel to the city’s first canal, was dug and fortified; a long canal led from it to the present port area (Khlong Toei), thus allowing small boats to bypass the large bend in the river immediately south of the city. A…

  • Khlysty (Russian sect)

    Grigori Rasputin: …he was introduced to the Khlysty (Flagellants) sect. Rasputin perverted Khlysty beliefs into the doctrine that one was nearest God when feeling “holy passionlessness” and that the best way to reach such a state was through the sexual exhaustion that came after prolonged debauchery. Rasputin did not become a monk.…

  • Khmelnitsky (Ukraine)

    Khmelnytskyy, city, western Ukraine. It lies along the upper Southern (Pivdennyy) Buh River. Originally a Polish military post, it dates from the late 15th century. The fort was seized by Cossacks during the mid-17th century. In 1793 it passed to Russia by the Second Partition of Poland, and in

  • Khmelnitsky, Bogdan (Cossack leader)

    Bohdan Khmelnytsky was the leader (1648–57) of the Zaporozhian Cossacks who organized a rebellion against Polish rule in Ukraine that ultimately led to the transfer of the Ukrainian lands east of the Dnieper River from Polish to Russian control. Although he had been educated in Poland and had

  • Khmelnitsky, Bogdan (Cossack leader)

    Bohdan Khmelnytsky was the leader (1648–57) of the Zaporozhian Cossacks who organized a rebellion against Polish rule in Ukraine that ultimately led to the transfer of the Ukrainian lands east of the Dnieper River from Polish to Russian control. Although he had been educated in Poland and had

  • Khmelnytsky Insurrection (Ukrainian history)

    Ukraine: The Khmelnytsky insurrection: Tensions stemming from social discontent, religious strife, and Cossack resentment of Polish authority finally coalesced and came to a head in 1648. Beginning with a seemingly typical Cossack revolt, under the leadership of Bohdan Khmelnytsky, Ukraine was quickly engulfed in an unprecedented war…

  • Khmelnytsky, Bohdan (Cossack leader)

    Bohdan Khmelnytsky was the leader (1648–57) of the Zaporozhian Cossacks who organized a rebellion against Polish rule in Ukraine that ultimately led to the transfer of the Ukrainian lands east of the Dnieper River from Polish to Russian control. Although he had been educated in Poland and had

  • Khmelnytsky, Bohdan Zinoviy Mykhaylovych (Cossack leader)

    Bohdan Khmelnytsky was the leader (1648–57) of the Zaporozhian Cossacks who organized a rebellion against Polish rule in Ukraine that ultimately led to the transfer of the Ukrainian lands east of the Dnieper River from Polish to Russian control. Although he had been educated in Poland and had

  • Khmelnytskyy (Ukraine)

    Khmelnytskyy, city, western Ukraine. It lies along the upper Southern (Pivdennyy) Buh River. Originally a Polish military post, it dates from the late 15th century. The fort was seized by Cossacks during the mid-17th century. In 1793 it passed to Russia by the Second Partition of Poland, and in

  • Khmer (people)

    Khmer, any member of an ethnolinguistic group that constitutes most of the population of Cambodia. Smaller numbers of Khmer also live in southeastern Thailand and the Mekong River delta of southern Vietnam. The Khmer language belongs to the Mon-Khmer family, itself a part of the Austroasiatic

  • Khmer empire (historic kingdom)

    Khmer empire, ancient Cambodian state that ruled vast areas of mainland Southeast Asia from about 802 ce to 1431, reaching its peak between the 11th and 13th centuries. Also known as the kingdom of Angkor, it was the successor state of the earlier kingdoms of Funan and Chenla, and it shaped much of

  • Khmer Islam (people)

    Cambodia: Ethnic groups: …early 21st century was the Cham-Malay group. Known in Cambodia as Khmer Islam or Western Cham, the Cham-Malay group also maintained a high degree of ethnic homogeneity and was discriminated against under the regime of Democratic Kampuchea. Receiving only slightly better treatment than the Khmer Islam during that period were…

  • Khmer Issarak (Cambodian history)

    Khmer Issarak, anti-French nationalist movement organized in Cambodia in 1946. It quickly split into factions, and by the time of independence in 1953 all but one of these were incorporated into Prince Norodom Sihanouk’s political structure. The dissident group, under Son Ngoc Thanh, became known

  • Khmer language

    Khmer language, Mon-Khmer language spoken by most of the population of Cambodia, where it is the official language, and by some 1.3 million people in southeastern Thailand, and also by more than a million people in southern Vietnam. The language has been written since the early 7th century using a

  • Khmer literature

    Khmer literature, body of literary works of Khmer peoples of Southeast Asia, mainly Cambodia. The classical literature of Cambodia comprises works composed in verse and recorded between the 16th and mid-19th century; much of it reflects the cultural influence of India. It can be classified

  • Khmer National Party (political party, Cambodia)

    Cambodia: Tensions between the CPP and the opposition: …Funcinpec—as well as with the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP), another opposition party that had won nearly as many seats as Funcinpec in the elections—dragged into 2004, however, and were resolved only by midyear. In October 2004 Sihanouk resigned as king, and his youngest son, Norodom Sihamoni, succeeded him. Sihanouk continued…

  • Khmer People’s National Liberation Front (political party, Cambodia)

    Cambodia: Vietnamese intervention: …National Liberation Front (renamed the Buddhist Liberal Democratic Party in 1992) under the leadership of Son Sann (a former prime minister). Those groups were supported financially by foreign powers, including the United States, who were eager to oppose Vietnam. Thousands of Cambodians continued to enter Thailand in the 1980s, and…

  • Khmer Republic

    Cambodia, country in mainland Southeast Asia. Cambodia is largely a land of plains and great rivers and lies amid important overland and river trade routes linking China to India and Southeast Asia. The influences of many Asian cultures, alongside those of France and the United States, can be seen

  • Khmer Rouge (political group, Cambodia)

    Khmer Rouge, radical communist movement that ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 after winning power through a guerrilla war. It was purportedly set up in 1967 as the armed wing of the Communist Party of Kampuchea. The Khmer Rouge government under Pol Pot was responsible for the Cambodian genocide

  • Khmer Rouge Tribunal (Cambodian history)

    Khmer Rouge: …of Cambodia (commonly called the Khmer Rouge Tribunal) was established in 2006 as a joint operation between the United Nations and the government of Cambodia. The first indictments were handed down in 2007, and the first trial—against Kaing Guek Eav (better known as Duch), the former commander of a notorious…

  • Khmer Serei (political organization, Cambodia)

    Cambodia: World War II and its aftermath: …formed a dissident movement, the Khmer Serei (“Free Khmer”), that opposed both Sihanouk and the French.

  • Khmer, Kingdom of (historic kingdom)

    Khmer empire, ancient Cambodian state that ruled vast areas of mainland Southeast Asia from about 802 ce to 1431, reaching its peak between the 11th and 13th centuries. Also known as the kingdom of Angkor, it was the successor state of the earlier kingdoms of Funan and Chenla, and it shaped much of

  • Khmers Rouges (political group, Cambodia)

    Khmer Rouge, radical communist movement that ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 after winning power through a guerrilla war. It was purportedly set up in 1967 as the armed wing of the Communist Party of Kampuchea. The Khmer Rouge government under Pol Pot was responsible for the Cambodian genocide

  • Khmu language

    Khmuic languages: Khmu is the most prominent of the languages, having more than 500,000 speakers, most of whom are spread across northern Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, and China. Smaller numbers live in Myanmar (Burma) and in Western countries. Other Khmuic languages include Khang, Phong (also called Kaniang, Piat,…

  • Khmuic languages

    Khmuic languages, group of Mon-Khmer languages (Austroasiatic stock) spoken primarily in Laos in areas scattered around Louangphrabang and extending into parts of Thailand and northern Vietnam. Khmu is the most prominent of the languages, having more than 500,000 speakers, most of whom are spread

  • Khmunu (ancient city, Egypt)

    Hermopolis Magna, ancient town of Upper Egypt, located on the Nile River south of Al-Minyā in Al-Minyā muḥāfaẓah (governorate). It was known as Khmunu (“City of the Eight”) and was the capital of the Hare nome (province), the 15th nome of Upper Egypt. The great deity worshiped there was Thoth, god

  • Khnemu (Egyptian god)

    Khnum, ancient Egyptian god of fertility, associated with water and with procreation. Khnum was worshipped from the 1st dynasty (c. 2925–2775 bce) into the early centuries ce. He was represented as a ram with horizontal twisting horns or as a man with a ram’s head. Khnum was believed to have

  • Khnopff, Fernand (Belgian artist and writer)

    Fernand Khnopff was a Belgian painter, draftsman, photographer, sculptor, and writer associated with Symbolism and known best for his paintings that blend precise realism with an ethereal dreamlike atmosphere. Khnopff came from an affluent family and was one of three siblings. When he was a child,

  • Khnopff, Fernand-Edmond-Jean-Marie (Belgian artist and writer)

    Fernand Khnopff was a Belgian painter, draftsman, photographer, sculptor, and writer associated with Symbolism and known best for his paintings that blend precise realism with an ethereal dreamlike atmosphere. Khnopff came from an affluent family and was one of three siblings. When he was a child,

  • Khnum (Egyptian god)

    Khnum, ancient Egyptian god of fertility, associated with water and with procreation. Khnum was worshipped from the 1st dynasty (c. 2925–2775 bce) into the early centuries ce. He was represented as a ram with horizontal twisting horns or as a man with a ram’s head. Khnum was believed to have

  • kho-kho (Indian sport)

    kho-kho, traditional Indian sport, a form of tag, that is one of the oldest forms of outdoor sport, dating back to prehistoric India. The kho-kho playing field—which can be placed on any suitable indoor or outdoor surface—is a rectangle 29 metres (32 yards) long and 16 metres (17 yards) wide with a

  • Khobar (Saudi Arabia)

    Khobar, oasis and port city, Al-Sharqiyyah minṭaqah (province) and region, eastern Saudi Arabia, situated on the Persian Gulf south of Dammam. The city is a commercial and industrial center lying in a valley on the main road to Jordan. Khobar has good water wells and fertile soil, producing an

  • Khobar Towers bombing of 1996 (terrorist attack, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia)

    Khobar Towers bombing of 1996, terrorist attack on a U.S. Air Force housing complex in the town of Khobar, near Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, on June 25, 1996. The bombers drove a tanker truck packed with 5,000 pounds (2,268 kg) of explosives near the complex and then jumped into waiting vehicles,

  • Khobdo (Mongolia)

    Hovd, town, administrative headquarters of Hovd aymag (province), western Mongolia, in the northern foothills of the Mongol Altayn Nuruu (Mongolian Altai Mountains) at an elevation of 4,260 ft (1,300 m). Har Us Nuur (lake) lies to the east and is fed by the Hovd Gol (river). Founded in 1731 as a

  • Khodasevich, Vladislav (Russian author)

    Vladimir Nabokov: Later works and influence of Vladimir Nabokov: …detractors—although his best Russian critic, Vladislav Khodasevich, insisted that Nabokov’s aristocratic view was appropriate to his subject matters: problems of art masked by allegory.

  • Khodorkovsky, Mikhail (Russian businessman)

    Mikhail Khodorkovsky is a Russian oil tycoon and, at one time, was the richest man in Russia. He was imprisoned in 2003 on charges of fraud and tax evasion. One of Russia’s famed “oligarchs,” he was convicted of those crimes and others before being released in 2013. Khodorkovsky, the son of a

  • Khodzhent (Tajikistan)

    Khujand, city, northwestern Tajikistan. The city lies along both banks of the Syr Darya (river) at the entrance to the fertile and heavily populated Fergana Valley. One of the most ancient cities of Central Asia, it lay along the great Silk Road from China to Europe. It was captured by the Arabs in

  • Khoe (people)

    Khoekhoe, any member of a people of Southern Africa whom the first European explorers found in areas of the hinterland and who now generally live either in European settlements or on official reserves in South Africa or Namibia. Khoekhoe (meaning “men of men”) is their name for themselves;

  • Khoe languages

    Khoisan languages: Classification of the Khoisan languages: …three effectively unrelated groups: Northern, Central, and Southern. Sandawe of Tanzania has a distant relationship to the Central group, but the place of Hadza even in relation to Sandawe has always been unclear; and the status of Kwadi, an extinct language of Namibe (formerly Moçâmedes) in southwestern Angola, remains uncertain.…

  • Khoei, Abolqasem al- (Iranian cleric)

    Abolqasem al-Khoei was an Iranian-born cleric who, as a grand ayatollah based in the holy city of Al-Najaf, Iraq, was the spiritual leader of millions of Shīʿite Muslims. Khoei studied Persian poetry and religion as a child. At age 13 he was sent to study Islamic law (Sharīʿah) at Al-Najaf, where

  • Khoekhoe (people)

    Khoekhoe, any member of a people of Southern Africa whom the first European explorers found in areas of the hinterland and who now generally live either in European settlements or on official reserves in South Africa or Namibia. Khoekhoe (meaning “men of men”) is their name for themselves;

  • Khoekhoe languages

    Khoekhoe languages, a subgroup of the Khoe language family, one of three branches of the Southern African Khoisan languages. Two main varieties have been distinguished: the first includes the extinct South African languages !Ora and Gri (click here for an audio clip of !Ora) and the dialects that

  • Khoekhoegowap

    Khoekhoe languages: …coast; the second type is Nama, also known as Nama/Damara and Khoekhoegowap, with about 120,000 speakers mostly in Namibia (click here for an audio clip of Nama). A few Nama speakers are found in Botswana, and there is another small pocket in the Richtersveld in South Africa. The abandoned term…

  • Khohand (Tajikistan)

    Khujand, city, northwestern Tajikistan. The city lies along both banks of the Syr Darya (river) at the entrance to the fertile and heavily populated Fergana Valley. One of the most ancient cities of Central Asia, it lay along the great Silk Road from China to Europe. It was captured by the Arabs in

  • Khōī (Iran)

    Khoy, city, northwestern Iran. The city is well laid out, with cool streams and lines of willows along broad, regular streets. There are several mosques, an extensive brick bazaar, a fine caravansary, and gardens. Khoy is a trade centre and has been of considerable strategic importance. Fortified

  • Khoi languages

    Khoisan languages: Classification of the Khoisan languages: …three effectively unrelated groups: Northern, Central, and Southern. Sandawe of Tanzania has a distant relationship to the Central group, but the place of Hadza even in relation to Sandawe has always been unclear; and the status of Kwadi, an extinct language of Namibe (formerly Moçâmedes) in southwestern Angola, remains uncertain.…

  • Khoikhoi (people)

    Khoekhoe, any member of a people of Southern Africa whom the first European explorers found in areas of the hinterland and who now generally live either in European settlements or on official reserves in South Africa or Namibia. Khoekhoe (meaning “men of men”) is their name for themselves;

  • Khoikhoi languages

    Khoekhoe languages, a subgroup of the Khoe language family, one of three branches of the Southern African Khoisan languages. Two main varieties have been distinguished: the first includes the extinct South African languages !Ora and Gri (click here for an audio clip of !Ora) and the dialects that

  • Khoisan (people)

    Southern Africa: The Khoisan: In the long run these new groups of herders and farmers transformed the hunter-gatherer way of life. Initially, however, distinctions between early pastoralists, farmers, and hunter-gatherers were not overwhelming, and in many areas the various groups coexisted. The first evidence of pastoralism in the…

  • Khoisan languages

    Khoisan languages, a unique group of African languages spoken mainly in southern Africa, with two outlying languages found in eastern Africa. The term is a compound adapted from the words khoekhoe ‘person’ and saan ‘bush dweller’ in Nama, one of the Khoisan languages, and scholars have applied the

  • Khoja (Islam)

    Khoja, caste of Indian Muslims converted from Hinduism to Islam in the 14th century by the Persian pīr (religious leader or teacher) Saḍr-al-Dīn and adopted as members of the Nizārī Ismāʿīliyyah sect of the Shīʿites. Forced to feign either Hinduism, Sunni Islam, or Ithnā ʿAshariyyah in order to

  • Khojent (Tajikistan)

    Khujand, city, northwestern Tajikistan. The city lies along both banks of the Syr Darya (river) at the entrance to the fertile and heavily populated Fergana Valley. One of the most ancient cities of Central Asia, it lay along the great Silk Road from China to Europe. It was captured by the Arabs in

  • Khokhok Kra (isthmus, Myanmar and Thailand)

    Isthmus of Kra, narrow neck of southern Myanmar (Burma) and Thailand, connecting the Malay Peninsula to the Asian mainland. The isthmus lies between the Gulf of Thailand to the east and the Andaman Sea to the west. It is 25–30 miles (40–48 km) wide at its narrowest point, between Chumphon and Kra

  • Kholmogory (Russia)

    Kholmogory, village, port, and administrative centre of Kholmogory rayon (sector), Arkhangelsk oblast (region), northwestern European Russia. It lies along the Northern Dvina River, 47 miles (75 km) southeast of the city of Arkhangelsk. The village has existed since 1355, when it served traders as

  • Kholstomer (work by Tolstoy)

    Leo Tolstoy: First publications of Leo Tolstoy: “Kholstomer” (written 1863; revised and published 1886; “Kholstomer: The Story of a Horse”) has become famous for its dramatic use of a favourite Tolstoyan device, “defamiliarization”—that is, the description of familiar social practices from the “naive” perspective of an observer who does not take them…

  • Kholstomer: The Story of a Horse (work by Tolstoy)

    Leo Tolstoy: First publications of Leo Tolstoy: “Kholstomer” (written 1863; revised and published 1886; “Kholstomer: The Story of a Horse”) has become famous for its dramatic use of a favourite Tolstoyan device, “defamiliarization”—that is, the description of familiar social practices from the “naive” perspective of an observer who does not take them…

  • Khomani (language)

    Khoisan languages: Classification of the Khoisan languages: …the !Kwi dialects, only ǂKhomani is still spoken, by a few individuals in Northern Cape province (click here for an audio clip of the ǂKhomani language). ǂΗuã, a language of southeastern Botswana with fewer than 100 speakers, shares features with both the Southern and the Ju groups. In East…

  • Khomeini, Ayatollah Ruhollah (Iranian religious leader)

    Ruhollah Khomeini was an Iranian Shiʿi cleric who led the revolution that overthrew Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1979 (see Iranian Revolution) and who was Iran’s ultimate political and religious authority for the next 10 years. Khomeini was the grandson and son of mullahs (Shiʿi religious

  • Khomeini, Ruhollah (Iranian religious leader)

    Ruhollah Khomeini was an Iranian Shiʿi cleric who led the revolution that overthrew Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1979 (see Iranian Revolution) and who was Iran’s ultimate political and religious authority for the next 10 years. Khomeini was the grandson and son of mullahs (Shiʿi religious

  • Khomeynī, Rūḥallāh (Iranian religious leader)

    Ruhollah Khomeini was an Iranian Shiʿi cleric who led the revolution that overthrew Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1979 (see Iranian Revolution) and who was Iran’s ultimate political and religious authority for the next 10 years. Khomeini was the grandson and son of mullahs (Shiʿi religious

  • Khoms, Al- (Libya)

    Al-Khums, town, northwestern Libya. It is located on the Mediterranean coast about 60 miles (97 km) southeast of Tripoli. The town was founded by the Turks and gained importance after 1870 by exporting esparto grass (used for cordage, shoes, and paper). Modern economic activities in Al-Khums

  • khomus (musical instrument)

    Sakha: Playing of the khomus, or mouth harp, once an accompaniment to shamanic ritual, has also experienced a resurgence.

  • Khomyakov, Aleksey Stepanovich (Russian poet and theologian)

    Aleksey Stepanovich Khomyakov was a Russian poet and founder of the 19th-century Slavophile movement that extolled the superiority of the Russian way of life. He was also an influential lay theologian of the Russian Orthodox church. Khomyakov came from a family that had for many generations served

  • khon (Thai masked play)

    Southeast Asian arts: The relation of music to dance and theatre: …the Thai masked play, or khon, dancers, chorus, soloists, and orchestra are all coordinated. The musicians know the movements of classical dance and coordinate musical phrases with dance patterns, turns, and movements. In the shadow play, or nang sbek, the dancer, who manipulates a leather puppet, must keep his foot…

  • Khon Kaen (Thailand)

    Khon Kaen, town, northeastern Thailand, on the Khorat Plateau. It is a rice-trading centre on the railway between Nakhon Ratchasima and Udon Thani. Khon Kaen University was founded in 1965; the Rajamangala Institute of Technology, Khon Kaen Campus (1963) is also there. Khon Kaen lies in a region

  • Khon yang lung Dam (story by Viset Savaengseuksa)

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