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Caesar

(Encyclopedia) CaesarCaesarsēˈzər [key], ancient Roman patrician family of the Julian gens. There are separate articles on its two most distinguished members, Julius Caesar and Augustus. Another…

Cicero, Roman orator

(Encyclopedia) Cicero (Marcus Tullius Cicero)Cicerosĭsˈərō or Tully, 106 b.c.–43 b.c., greatest Roman orator, famous also as a politician and a philosopher. To the modern reader probably the most…

Brewer's: Roman de Chevalier de Lyon

by Maitre Wace, Canon of Caen in Normandy, and author of Le Brut. The romance referred to is the same as that entitled Ywain and Gawain. Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham…

Brewer's: Chien de Jean de Nivelle

(Le), which never came when it was called. Jean de Nivelle was the eldest son of Jean II. de Montmorency, born about 1423. He espoused the cause of the Duke of Burgundy against the orders…

Brewer's: Coup de Pied de l'Ane

(kick from the ass's foot). A blow given to a vanquished or fallen man; a cowardly blow; an insult offered to one who has not the power of returning or avenging it. The allusion is to the…

The Devil's Dictionary: Peroration

by Ambrose Bierce PERIPATETICPERSEVERANCEPERORATION -n. The explosion of an oratorical rocket. It dazzles, but to an observer having the wrong kind of nose its most conspicuous peculiarity…

Clarence Darrow

At the peak of his career in the 1920s, Clarence Darrow was the most famous trial lawyer in the United States. He grew up in Ohio and began practicing law there in 1878, settling in Chicago,…

Henry Clay

Henry Clay was a towering figure in American politics in the middle part of the 19th century, a presidential aspirant whose political skills earned him the nickname "The Great Compromiser." Clay…