The Emancipation Proclamation consists of two executive orders issued by United States President Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War. The first one, issued on September 22, 1862, declared the freedom of all slaves in any state of...

Claude Debussy was a French composer. He and Maurice Ravel were the most prominent figures associated with Impressionist music, although Debussy disliked the term when applied to his compositions. He was made Chevalier of the Legion of Hono...

Gustav Klimt was an Austrian Symbolist painter and one of the most prominent members of the Vienna Art Nouveau (Vienna Secession) movement. His major works include paintings, murals, sketches, and other art objects, many of which are on dis...

Théo van Rysselberghe, Belgian painter, was born in Ghent in 1862. He studied art at the Academies in Ghent and Brussels, and in 1881 exhibited for the first time at the Salon in Brussels. After the success of the French Impressionists exhi...

Sir William Henry Bragg was a British physicist, chemist, mathematician and active sportsman who uniquely shared a Nobel Prize with his son Lawrence Bragg – the 1915 Nobel Prize in Physics: "for their services in the analysis of crystal str...

Sir Marc Aurel Stein KCIE, FBA, was a Hungarian archaeologist, mainly concerned with exploring ancient Central Asia. He was also a professor at various Indian universities. Stein was influenced by Sven Hedin's 1898 work, Through Asia. He m...

David Hilbert, was a German mathematician. He is recognized as one of the most influential and universal mathematicians of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Hilbert discovered and developed a broad range of fundamental ideas in many areas,...

The Lumière brothers Auguste and Louis, were among the earliest filmmakers. (Appropriately, "lumière" translates as "light" in English.) Their father, Charles Antoine Lumière (1840-1911), ran a photographic firm and both brothers worked for...

Darwin said it first, but Huxley said it best. Known as "Darwin's bulldog" for his tenacious and successful defense of evolution by natural selection, biologist T.H. Huxley wrote Man's Place in Nature to bolster his case with hard facts. Th...

Edouard Manet's submissions to the Salon of 1863, The Picnic among them, were rejected and appeared at the Salon des Refusés. The large canvas became the focus of scandalized critical and public attention. An even greater scandal than that...

The ICRC is an independent, neutral organization ensuring humanitarian protection and assistance for victims of war and armed violence. The ICRC has a permanent mandate under international law to take impartial action for prisoners, the wou...

The Battle of Gettysburg, which took place during the American Civil War in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, was the largest battle ever fought in North America. The battle, which signaled a turning tide in favor of the Unio...

Franz Ferdinand was an Archduke of Austria-Este, Austro-Hungarian and Royal Prince of Hungary and of Bohemia and, from 1896 until his death, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne. His assassination in Sarajevo precipitated Aust...

Louis Marie-Anne Couperus was a Dutch novelist and poet of the late 19th and early 20th Century. He is usually considered one of the foremost figures in Dutch literature. Born in the Netherlands in 1863, Couperus grew up in a wealthy pat...

Sir Frederick Henry Royce, 1st Baronet was a pioneering car manufacturer, who with Charles Stewart Rolls founded the Rolls-Royce company. With his fascination for all things mechanical he became interested in motor cars and bought first, in...