pool, method of gambling in which all money bet on the result of a particular event by a number of people is awarded to one or more winners according to conditions established in advance (taxes, operating expenses, and other charges may be deducted from the total pool before prizes are awarded).

Pune, city, west-central Maharashtra state, western India, at the junction of the Mula and Mutha rivers. Called “Queen of the Deccan,” Pune is the cultural capital of the Maratha peoples. The city first gained importance as the capital of the Bhonsle Marathas in the 17th century. It was temporarily

badminton: Origin and development: …directly from the game “poona,” which was played by British army officers stationed in India in the 1860s. The Bath Badminton Club was established in Bath, England, in 1877 and introduced new rules to the game. The formation of the Badminton Association of England (BAE) in 1893 marked a…

Poona Pact, (September 24, 1932), agreement between Hindu leaders in India granting new rights to Dalits (low-caste Hindu groups then often labeled “untouchables”). The pact, signed at Poona (now Pune, Maharashtra), resulted from the Communal Award of August 4, 1932, a proposal by the British

India: Origins of the nationalist movement: …political associations, such as the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha (Poona Public Society), founded by Mahadev Govind Ranade (1842–1901), who had graduated at the top of the first bachelor of arts class at the University of Bombay (now University of Mumbai) in 1862. Ranade found employment in the educational department in Bombay,…

Azad Kashmir: …of plains country in the Punch region that is characterized by interlocking sandy alluvial fans. Thorn scrub and coarse grass are the dominant forms of vegetation in the south; this scrubland gives way to pine forests at higher elevations in the north.

Poonch, town, western Jammu and Kashmir union territory, northern India. It lies at the confluence of the Belar and Poonch rivers, at the southern foot of the western Pir Panjal Range. Poonch is situated near the line of control between the Indian- and Pakistani-administered portions of the Kashmir

Op art: Richard Anuszkiewicz, Larry Poons, and Jeffrey Steele. The movement first attracted international attention with the Op exhibition “The Responsive Eye” at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1965. Op art painters devised complex and paradoxical optical spaces through the illusory manipulation of such…

Lake Poopó, lake in west-central Bolivia, occupying a shallow depression in the Altiplano, or high plateau, at 12,090 feet (3,686 metres) above sea level. Historically the country’s second largest lake, it covered 977 square miles (2,530 square km) at low stage and was about 56 miles (90 km) long

Valdes: …Valdes and his followers—called the Poor, or the Poor of Lyon—were excommunicated for violating the ban on preaching and were banished from the city. They were formally condemned at a church council in 1184 along with other alleged heretics, including the Cathari, against whom Valdes had earlier preached. The severe…

poverty, the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions. Poverty is said to exist when people lack the means to satisfy their basic needs. In this context, the identification of poor people first requires a determination of what constitutes basic

hoagie, submarine sandwich containing Italian meats, cheeses, and other fillings and condiments. The name likely comes from the Philadelphia area where, during World War I, Italian immigrants who worked at the Hog Island shipyard began making sandwiches; they were originally called “hoggies” before

Mongo Beti: …Pauvre Christ de Bomba (1956; The Poor Christ of Bomba), satirizes the destructive influence of French Catholic missionary activities in Cameroon. It was followed by Mission terminée (1957; also published as Mission to Kala and Mission Accomplished), which attacks French colonial policy through a young man who, upon returning to…

Poor Clare, any member of the Franciscan Order of St. Clare, a Roman Catholic religious order of nuns cofounded by St. Clare and St. Francis of Assisi in Italy in 1212. The Poor Clares are considered the second of the three Franciscan orders. Because each convent of Poor Clares is largely

Poor Clare: …the Colettine Poor Clares, or Poor Clares of St. Colette (P.C.C.), and today are located mostly in France. The Capuchin Sisters, originating in Naples in 1538, and the Alcantarines, of 1631, are also Poor Clares of the strict observance.

Ken Loach: His first feature film, Poor Cow (1967), focuses on the life of a working-class woman whose husband is in jail. It was followed by the poignant Kes (1970), about a boy, abused at home and school, who befriends a fledgling kestrel. That film received much acclaim, including a nomination…

Xavier Herbert: His sprawling saga Poor Fellow My Country (1975) expressed his pessimistic view of life but lacked the richness and vitality of Capricornia. His autobiography, Disturbing Element, was published in 1963.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Early works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky: …first novella, Bednyye lyudi (1846; Poor Folk), than he was hailed as the great new talent of Russian literature by the most influential critic of his day, the “furious” Vissarion Belinsky.

Ivan Turgenev: Early life and works: …at writing plays, some, like A Poor Gentleman (1848), rather obviously imitative of the Russian master Nikolay Gogol. Of these, The Bachelor (1849) was the only one staged at this time, the others falling afoul of the official censors. Others of a more intimately penetrating character, such as One May…

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

Templar, member of the Poor Knights of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, a religious military order of knighthood established at the time of the Crusades that became a model and inspiration for other military orders. Originally founded to protect Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land, the order

Poor Law, in British history, body of laws undertaking to provide relief for the poor, developed in 16th-century England and maintained, with various changes, until after World War II. The Elizabethan Poor Laws, as codified in 1597–98, were administered through parish overseers, who provided relief

public health: National developments in the 18th and 19th centuries: The Poor Law Commission, created in 1834, explored problems of community health and suggested means for solving them. Its report, in 1838, argued that “the expenditures necessary to the adoption and maintenance of measures of prevention would ultimately amount to less than the cost of the…

Andy Warhol: Other movies include Poor Little Rich Girl (1965) and Lupe (1966), both of which featured Edie Sedgwick.

Irving Cummings: …actress had another hit with Poor Little Rich Girl (1936), one of Temple’s strongest vehicles, thanks in part to the superior support of Alice Faye, Jack Haley, and Gloria Stuart. Less popular was the musical Vogues of 1938 (1937), which was set in the fashion industry and starred Baxter and…

Noël Coward: …Day I’ll Find You,” “Poor Little Rich Girl,” “Mad About the Boy,” and “I Went to a Marvellous Party.”

Nikolay Mikhaylovich Karamzin: Karamzin’s tale “Bednaya Liza” (1792; “Poor Liza”), about a village girl who commits suicide after a tragic love affair, soon became the most celebrated work of the Russian sentimental school.

Thomas Hardy: Early life and works: …he wrote the class-conscious novel The Poor Man and the Lady, which was sympathetically considered by three London publishers but never published. George Meredith, as a publisher’s reader, advised Hardy to write a more shapely and less opinionated novel. The result was the densely plotted Desperate Remedies (1871), which was…

Molotov cocktail, a crude bomb, typically consisting of a bottle filled with a flammable liquid and a wick that is ignited before throwing. It is named for Vyacheslav Molotov, the foreign minister of the Soviet Union during and after World War II, though Molotov was not its inventor. It is also

Oliver Onions: His Poor Man’s Tapestry (1946) earned him the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. Onions was married to the Welsh-born novelist Berta Ruck.

Celtic literature: The Gaelic Revival: …inspired the brilliant satirical novel An Béal Bocht (1941; The Poor Mouth) by Flann O’Brien (pseudonym of Brian Ó Nualláin).

Valdes: …Valdes and his followers—called the Poor, or the Poor of Lyon—were excommunicated for violating the ban on preaching and were banished from the city. They were formally condemned at a church council in 1184 along with other alleged heretics, including the Cathari, against whom Valdes had earlier preached. The severe…

Poor People’s Campaign, political campaign that culminated in a demonstration held in Washington, D.C., in 1968, in which participants demanded that the government formulate a plan to help redress the employment and housing problems of the poor throughout the United States. In November 1967 civil

Poor People’s Campaign, political campaign that culminated in a demonstration held in Washington, D.C., in 1968, in which participants demanded that the government formulate a plan to help redress the employment and housing problems of the poor throughout the United States. In November 1967 civil

Poor Richard, unschooled but experienced homespun philosopher, a character created by the American writer and statesman Benjamin Franklin and used as his pen name for the annual Poor Richard’s almanac, edited by Franklin from 1732 to 1757. Although the Poor Richard of the early almanacs was a

Western theatre: Poor theatre: In terms of furthering the actor’s technique, the Polish director Jerzy Grotowski, together with Stanislavsky and Brecht, were the key figures of the 20th century. Grotowski first became internationally known when his Laboratory Theatre, established in Opole, Pol., in 1959, triumphantly toured Europe…

Yorgos Lanthimos: Poor Things and Kinds of Kindness: In 2023 he released Poor Things, a fantasy comedy-drama starring Stone as a pregnant young woman named Victoria Blessington who dies by suicide and is brought back to life by an eccentric scientist named Godwin (“God”) Baxter (Willem Dafoe), who renames her Bella. In a Frankenstein-like twist, the revived…

American literature: Fiction: …several novels, the best being Poor White (1920).

poverty, the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions. Poverty is said to exist when people lack the means to satisfy their basic needs. In this context, the identification of poor people first requires a determination of what constitutes basic

Heinrich Mann: … trilogy—consisting of Die Armen (1917; The Poor); Der Untertan (1918; The Patrioteer); and Der Kopf (1925; The Chief)—carries even further his indictment of the social types produced by the authoritarian state. These novels were accompanied by essays attacking the arrogance of authority and the subservience of the subjects. A lighter…

pimpernel: The scarlet pimpernel (A. arvensis), also called poor-man’s weatherglass, is an annual native to Europe but is naturalized elsewhere, including North America. It grows 6 to 30 cm (2.4 to 12 inches) tall and has red or blue flowers.

potoo: One researcher noted a young common potoo (N. griseus, sometimes N. jamaicensis) wandering over the boughs of the nest tree at about four weeks of age. The same nestling made its first trial flights at 47 days and finally left the nest when 50 days old. Other reports indicate the…

poorwill, (species Phalaenoptilus nuttallii), nocturnal bird of North America belonging to the nightjar family (Caprimulgidae). The poorwill, named for its call, is about 20 cm (8 inches) long and has mottled gray plumage, a short tail with a bit of white at the corners, and a narrow bib, white in

Dutch literature: The 18th century: Even the talented poet Hubert Poot suffered from the delusion of his day that rococo flourish and prescribed form were the criteria of poetry. Prose, too, consisted almost exclusively of translations and bombastic disquisitions. Significantly, Justus van Effen wrote in French before he founded De Hollandsche spectator (1731–35). The…

carbonation: …carbon dioxide gas to a beverage, imparting sparkle and a tangy taste and preventing spoilage. The liquid is chilled and cascaded down in an enclosure containing carbon dioxide (either as dry ice or a liquid) under pressure. Increasing pressure and lowering temperature maximize gas absorption. Carbonated beverages do not require…

toxic waste: Types: …and environmentalists, are categorized as persistent organic pollutants (POPs). Several POPs are pesticides: aldrin, chlordane, DDT, dieldrin, endrin, heptachlor, hexachlorobenzene, mirex, and toxaphene. Other POPs are produced during the combustion process. For example, dioxins and furans are by-products of chemical production and the burning of chlorinated substances, and polychlorinated biphenyls

U2: …1997 the band rush-released the Pop album to fulfill obligations for a stadium tour and was greeted with its worst reviews since Rattle and Hum. Another reinvention was in store, but this time, rather than boldly pushing forward, the band sought to reassure fans by making music that referenced its…

comic strip: Europe: …exclusively for adults—was the witty Pop (1921–60), by John Millar Watt. Pop, together with Reginald Smythe’s Andy Capp (begun 1957), were among the very few European strips to be exported to the United States. For all its satire on the working class, Andy Capp, with its work-shy title character, surprisingly…

Pop art, art movement of the late 1950s and ’60s that was inspired by commercial and popular culture. Although it did not have a specific style or attitude, Pop art was defined as a diverse response to the postwar era’s commodity-driven values, often using commonplace objects (such as comic strips,

pop ballad, form of slow love song prevalent in nearly all genres of popular music. There are rock ballads, soul ballads, country ballads, and even heavy metal ballads. The ballad was originally a narrative folk song (and the term is still sometimes used this way by contemporary folk musicians—as

Paul Allen: He cofounded, with Patton, the Experience Music Project (EMP; 2000), an interactive music museum, and founded the Allen Institute for Brain Science (2003), a brain research facility. (The EMP expanded its focus and was renamed the Museum of Pop Culture in 2016.) In 2004 he cofounded, with Patton, the Allen…

popular music, any commercially oriented music principally intended to be received and appreciated by a wide audience, generally in literate, technologically advanced societies dominated by urban culture. Unlike traditional folk music, popular music is written by known individuals, usually

Omphalea: triandra, the Jamaican cobnut, or pop nut, is native to the West Indies and cultivated in Europe. It grows to about 3.5 metres (11.5 feet) and bears yellow nuts 3.75 centimetres (1.5 inches) thick, which are edible if the poisonous embryo is removed. Juice from the fruit…

tent: “Pop” tents are designed with spring-loaded frames that erect the tent automatically when released; these are usually hemispheric in shape.

Pop Warner: …organizations for young boys, the Pop Warner Youth Football League, in 1934.

Pop Warner: …organizations for young boys, the Pop Warner Youth Football League, in 1934.

Pop Warner: …organizations for young boys, the Pop Warner Youth Football League, in 1934.

the Doors: Legacy and honors: …influence on singers such as Iggy Pop, Echo and the Bunnymen’s Ian McCulloch, and Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder. The Doors’ releases continued to sell in the millions, and The Doors, a 1991 movie directed by Oliver Stone and starring Val Kilmer as Morrison, was a critical and popular success. The…

Loudonia: …when compressed, is called the pop-flower.

Popa Hill, extinct volcano, central Myanmar (Burma), at the northern end of the Pegu Mountains. It rises to 4,981 feet (1,518 m), has a mile-wide crater, and is the highest point in the range. Popa Hill is believed to be the home of the 37 nats, or spirits, that are a part of Burmese local

Popa Hill, extinct volcano, central Myanmar (Burma), at the northern end of the Pegu Mountains. It rises to 4,981 feet (1,518 m), has a mile-wide crater, and is the highest point in the range. Popa Hill is believed to be the home of the 37 nats, or spirits, that are a part of Burmese local

Vasko Popa was a Serbian poet who wrote in a succinct modernist style that owed more to French surrealism and Serbian folk traditions than to the Socialist Realism that dominated Eastern European literature after World War II. Popa fought with a partisan group during World War II and then studied

Romanian literature: Between the wars: Victor Popa wrote about rural subjects, while G.M. Zamfirescu’s protagonists were typical Bucharest citizens, and D.D. Pătrăscanu wittily described political life.

Popayán, capital of Cauca departamento, southwestern Colombia, at the base of Puracé Volcano (15,603 feet [4,756 m]) on a tributary of the Cauca River, 5,702 feet (2,241 m) above sea level. Founded in 1535, the city has always been an administrative centre. During the colonial era, landowners and

popcorn, a variety of corn (maize), the kernels of which, when exposed to heat or microwaves, are exploded into large fluffy masses. The corn used for popping may be any of about 25 different varieties of Zea mays; the two major types are rice popcorn, in which the grains are pointed at both base

Ben Elton: Published novels and other works: …some of them bestsellers, including Popcorn (1996), which won the 1996 Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award. The book Inconceivable (1999) is a semi-autobiographical take on the journey of Elton and his wife—Australian saxophonist Sophie Gare—through the process of in vitro fertilization (IVF). He adapted the book into the romantic…

Popé was a Tewa Pueblo who led an all-Indian revolt in 1680 against the Spanish invaders in what is now the southwestern United States, driving them out of Santa Fe and temporarily restoring the old Pueblo way of life. Little is known of Popé’s life before 1675. In that year he was imprisoned by

pope, (Latin papa, from Greek pappas, “father”), the title, since about the 9th century, of the bishop of Rome, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church. It was formerly given, especially from the 3rd to the 5th century, to any bishop and sometimes to simple priests as an ecclesiastical title

Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger: …Papst und das Konzil (1869; The Pope and the Council), under the pen name Janus. This book, which criticized the Vatican Council and the doctrine of infallibility, immediately was placed on the Vatican’s Index of Forbidden Books.

Benedict XVI was the bishop of Rome and head of the Roman Catholic Church from 2005 to 2013. Prior to his election as pope, Benedict led a distinguished career as a theologian and as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. His papacy faced several challenges, including a decline

Known for his humble demeanor and his policies of reform, Pope Francis ushered in a new era of leadership of the Roman Catholic Church when he was elected to the papacy in March 2013. Francis is the first pope from the Western Hemisphere, the first from South America (Argentina), and the first from

Greek literature: Old Athenian School: … novel I Pápissa Ioánna (1866; Pope Joan) is a hilarious satire on medieval and modern religious practices as well as a pastiche of the historical novel. Pávlos Kalligás, in Thános Vlékas (1855), treated contemporary problems such as brigandage. In Loukís Láras (1879; Eng. trans., Loukis Laras) Dimítrios Vikélas presented a…

St. Paul VI: Social and ecumenical interests: …Vatican, Paul VI conferred the Pope John XXIII Peace Prize on the Albanian-born Mother Teresa, who had spent most of her life in India, where she had founded a special religious congregation of women dedicated to the alleviation of the countless ills of the poorest classes in the country. Paul…

Pope Marcellus Mass, mass by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, the best known of his more than 100 masses. Published in 1567, the work is renowned for its intricate interplay of vocal lines and has been studied for centuries as a prime example of Renaissance polyphonic choral music. Palestrina

Stuart Rosenberg: Last films: Also popular was The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984), a crime comedy based on Vincent Patrick’s novel set in Little Italy. Mickey Rourke gave a strong performance as a small-timer who aspires to greater things, and Eric Roberts was typically over-the-top as his hopelessly ill-fated cousin.

Titian: Portraits: …the celebrated official portrait of Pope Paul III Without Cap. Although a state symbol of the pontiff, the characterization of the crafty statesman, bent with age, comes through.

Albert Augustus Pope was an American manufacturer. Pope served in the Civil War and subsequently made a fortune in a Boston shoe-supply business. In 1877 he founded a successful bicycle factory in Hartford, Connecticut. In the 1890s he began producing gasoline automobiles and electric automobiles

Alexander Pope was a poet and satirist of the English Augustan period, best known for his poems An Essay on Criticism (1711), The Rape of the Lock (1712–14), The Dunciad (1728), and An Essay on Man (1733–34). He is one of the most epigrammatic of all English authors. Pope’s father, a wholesale

National Enquirer: …was bought in 1952 by Generoso Pope, Jr., the son of the late owner of the Italian-language daily Il Progresso Italo-Americano. Under Pope’s ownership the Enquirer converted to a tabloid format in 1953. It foundered during the first years, but circulation rose dramatically after Pope refocused its editorial direction to…

John Pope was a Union general in the American Civil War who was relieved of command following the Confederate triumph at the Second Battle of Bull Run. A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1842, Pope served as a topographical engineer with the army throughout most of the 1840s

John R. Pope was an American architect whose most important design was the National Gallery of Art (completed in 1941 and since 1978 known as the West Building of the National Gallery) in Washington, D.C. Trained at the American Academy at Rome and later at the École des Beaux-Arts (Paris), Pope

John R. Pope was an American architect whose most important design was the National Gallery of Art (completed in 1941 and since 1978 known as the West Building of the National Gallery) in Washington, D.C. Trained at the American Academy at Rome and later at the École des Beaux-Arts (Paris), Pope

John R. Pope was an American architect whose most important design was the National Gallery of Art (completed in 1941 and since 1978 known as the West Building of the National Gallery) in Washington, D.C. Trained at the American Academy at Rome and later at the École des Beaux-Arts (Paris), Pope

William Lisle Bowles: …pamphlet war known as the “Pope-Bowles controversy,” in which Pope’s chief defenders were Thomas Campbell and Lord Byron; Byron’s characterization of Bowles as “the maudlin prince of mournful sonneteers” is perhaps the only memorable remnant of this seven-year-long (1819–26) public argument.

Pope Francis in a Popemobile, 2023Popemobiles are specially designed vehicles that are used to transport the pope, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church.© Horacio Villalobos/Getty Images Popemobile, motorized vehicle used to transport the pope, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, when he

Andrea Bocelli: …by the press as “popera”) in an effort to expand his audience base. Criticized by some reviewers as being too lightweight to be taken seriously by the opera world, Bocelli nevertheless performed in The Merry Widow in 1999, singing three arias, and made his American operatic debut later that…

Since the early days of Christianity, more than 260 popes have served as the leader of what would become the Roman Catholic Church. Indeed, Roman Catholic tradition holds that the role was first held by St. Peter the Apostle, one of the original disciples of Jesus. Popes are elected by an assembly

Robert Altman: 1980s and ’90s of Robert Altman: …direction of Paramount’s big-budget musical Popeye (1980), with Robin Williams in the title role, seemed to have kept the filmmaker in the Hollywood mainstream. That Altman was an unusual choice for the project seemed immaterial until the film failed to deliver the sort of big profits the studio had expected.…

Popeye, a pugnacious, wisecracking cartoon sailor who possesses superhuman strength after ingesting an always-handy can of spinach. Popeye was created by Elzie Crisler Segar, who in 1929 introduced the character into his existing newspaper cartoon strip, Thimble Theatre. Popeye is a scrappy little

Arthur Hiller: Early work: Popi (1969) was especially noted for the strong performance by Alan Arkin as an immigrant in Spanish Harlem who stages an elaborate scam to gain a better life for his two sons.

Poland: Communist Poland: In 1984 a popular priest, Jerzy Popieluszko, was murdered by the secret police, but, for the first time in such a case, state agents were arrested and charged with the crime.

mode: Jewish and Eastern Christian chant: …of the ēchoi are called popievki; but similar popievki could be employed in more than one ēchos. The use of some popievki is limited to the beginning, the middle, or the end of a chant. Occasionally, two popievki are merged into a compound popievka.

Roman road system: …Messina was known as the Via Popilia. By the beginning of the 2nd century bce, four other great roads radiated from Rome: the Via Aurelia, extending northwest to Genua (Genoa); the Via Flaminia, running north to the Adriatic, where it joined the Via Aemilia, crossed the Rubicon, and led northwest;…

Japanese beetle, (species Popillia japonica), an insect that is a major pest and belongs to the subfamily Rutelinae (family Scarabaeidae, order Coleoptera). It was accidentally introduced into the United States from Japan about 1916, probably as larvae in the soil around imported plants. Japanese

Antiochus IV Epiphanes: Early career: …of Alexandria, the Roman ambassador, Gaius Popillius Laenas, presented Antiochus with the ultimatum that he evacuate Egypt and Cyprus immediately. Antiochus, taken by surprise, asked for time to consider. Popillius, however, drew a circle in the earth around the king with his walking stick and demanded an unequivocal answer before…

Andrzej Wajda: …and Popiół i diament (1958; Ashes and Diamonds), constituted a popular trilogy that is considered to have launched the Polish film school. The movies deal in symbolic imagery with sweeping social and political changes in Poland during the World War II-era German occupation, the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, and the…

Jerzy Andrzejewski: …in Popiół i diament (1948; Ashes and Diamonds), translated into 27 languages and generally considered his finest novel. It presents a dramatic conflict between young Polish patriots and the communist regime during the last days of World War II. In 1958 Andrzej Wajda, the leading director of the Polish cinema,…

Popish Plot, (1678), in English history, a totally fictitious but widely believed plot in which it was alleged that Jesuits were planning the assassination of King Charles II in order to bring his Roman Catholic brother, the Duke of York (afterward King James II), to the throne. The allegations

Western philosophy: Ways of ordering the history: …Erasmus to Descartes (1960) by Richard H. Popkin (1923–2005). In the second type of ordering, the historian, impressed by the producers of ideas as much as by the ideas themselves—that is, with philosophers as agents—reviews the succession of great philosophical personalities in their rational achievements. This ordering has produced the…

poplar, (genus Populus), genus of some 35 species of trees in the willow family (Salicaceae), native to the Northern Hemisphere. The poplar species native to North America are divided into three loose groups: the cottonwoods, the aspens, and the balsam poplars. The name Populus refers to the fact