Michael (b. Oct. 25, 1921, Sinaia, Rom.) King of Romania. After his father, the future king Carol II, had been excluded from the royal succes¬ sion (1926), Michael was proclaimed king under a three-member regency. Carol reclaimed the throne in 1930, and Michael was reduced to crown prince. With Carol’s abdication in 1940, Michael again became king but was in effect a prisoner of the military dictator Ion Antonescu. In 1944 he helped lead the coup that overthrew the military regime and severed Romania’s ties with the Axis powers. He strongly opposed the commu¬ nists’ subsequent rise to power, but was forced to abdicate in 1947. He went into exile in Switzerland and became an executive with a U.S. bro¬ kerage firm. In 1997 his Romanian citizenship was restored; he subse¬ quently visited the country and sought the return of property holdings that were confiscated.
Michael or Michael Romanov Nro-'ma-nof, 'ro-mo-.nafX Russian
Mikhail Fyodorovich Romanov (b. July 22, 1596—d. July 23, 1645, Moscow) Tsar of Russia (1613-45) and founder of the Romanov dynasty. A young nobleman elected as tsar after the chaotic Time of Troubles, he allowed his mother’s relatives to direct the government early in his reign. They restored order to Russia and made peace with Sweden
(1617) and Poland (1618). In 1619 his father, released from captivity in Poland, returned to Russia and became coruler. Michael’s father domi¬ nated the government, increasing contact with western Europe and strengthening central authority and serfdom. After his death in 1633, Michael’s maternal relatives once again held sway.
Michael VIII Palaeologus \,pa-le-'al-9-g9s\ (b. 1224 or 1225—d. Dec. 11, 1282, Thrace) Nicaean emperor (1259-61) and Byzantine emperor (1261-82), founder of the Palaeologan dynasty. Appointed regent for the six-year-old son of Theodore II (1258), he seized the throne and blinded the rightful heir. He recovered Constantinople from the Latins (1261) and allied with the pope against his rivals, briefly reuniting Greek and Roman churches in 1274 (see Councils of Lyon). In 1281 the new pope, Martin IV, excommunicated him and declared Charles of Anjou’s planned campaign against Byzantium to be a holy Crusade against the schismatic Greeks. The Sicilian Vespers prevented Charles’s expedition and thus saved Byzantium from a second occupation by the Latins.
Michael Cerularius X.ker-u-'lar-e-osN (b. c. 1000, Constantinople—d. Jan. 21, 1059, Madytus, near Constantinople) Greek Orthodox patriarch of Constantinople (1043-58). He thwarted Constantine IX’s efforts to ally the Byzantine and Roman empires against the Normans, and he closed Latin churches in Constantinople that refused to use the Greek language and liturgy (1052). When negotiations broke down between Michael and the papal legates sent by Leo IX, each side excommunicated the other, ini¬ tiating the Schism of 1054. Michael forced Constantine to support the schism, but in 1058 he was exiled by Constantine’s successor.
Michelangelo (di Lodovico Buonarroti) (b. March 6, 1475, Caprese, Republic of Florence—d. Feb. 18, 1564, Rome, Papal States) Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet. He served a brief apprentice¬ ship with Domenico Ghirlandaio in Florence before beginning the first of several sculptures for Lorenzo de'Medici. After Lorenzo’s death in 1492, he left for Bologna and then for Rome. There his Bacchus (1496-97) established his fame and led to a commission for the Pieta (now in St. Peter's Basilica), the masterpiece of his early years, in which he demon¬ strated his unique ability to extract two distinct figures from one marble block. His David (1501-04), commissioned for the cathedral of Florence, is still considered the prime example of the Renaissance ideal of perfect humanity. On the side, he produced several Madonnas for private patrons and his only universally accepted easel painting, The Holy Family (known as the Doni Tondo). Attracted to ambitious sculptural projects, which he did not always complete, he reluctantly agreed to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-12). The first scenes, depicting the story of Noah, are relatively stable and on a small scale, but his confidence grew as he pro¬ ceeded, and the later scenes evince boldness and complexity. His figures for the tombs in Florence’s Medici Chapel (1519-33), which he designed, are among his most accomplished creations. He devoted his last 30 years largely to the Last Judgment fresco in the Sistine Chapel, to writing poetry (he left more than 300 sonnets and madrigals), and to architecture. He was commissioned to complete St. Peter’s Basilica, begun in 1506 and little advanced since 1514. Though it was not quite finished at Michelan¬ gelo’s death, its exterior owes more to him than to any other architect. He is regarded today as among the most exalted of artists.
Michelet \mesh-Te\, Jules (b.
Aug. 21, 1798, Paris, France—d.
Feb. 9, 1874, Heyres) French nation¬ alist historian. He taught history and philosophy before he was appointed head of the historical section of the Record Office in 1831. His time there provided him with unique resources for his life’s work, the 17-volume Histoire de France (1833-67). His method, an attempt to resurrect the past by immersing his own person¬ ality in his narrative, resulted in a historical synthesis of great dramatic power, though the 11 volumes that appeared from 1855 to 1867 are dis¬ torted by his hatred of priests and kings, hasty or abusive treatment of documents, and mania for symbolic interpretation. His other works
Jules Michelet, detail of an oil painting by Thomas Couture; in the Carnavalet Museum, Paris.
GIRAUDON-ART RESOURCE
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Michelin ► Micon I 1251
include the vivid and impassioned Histoire de la revolution frangaise, 7 vol. (1847-53). In his later years he wrote a series of lyrical books on nature, displaying his superb prose style.
Michelin \,me-sh3-Ta n \ in full Compagnie Generale des Eta- blissments Michelin Leading French manufacturer of tires and other rubber products. It was founded in 1888 by the Michelin brothers, Andre (1853-1931) and Edouard (1859-1940), to manufacture tires for bicycles and horse-drawn carriages. It introduced pneumatic tires for automobiles in the 1890s and soon became one of the major European tire producers. Michelin opened its first foreign plant in Turin in 1906 and has since expanded production in many countries; it was reorganized as a holding company in 1951. It also publishes a famous series of travel guides and road maps. Its headquarters are at Clermont-Ferrand.
Michelson Vml-kol-sonV A(lbert) A(braham) (b. Dec. 19, 1852, Strelno, Prussia—d. May 9, 1931, Pasadena, Calif., U.S.) Prussian-born U.S. physicist. His family immigrated to the U.S. in 1854. He studied at the U.S. Naval Academy and in Europe and later taught principally at the University of Chicago (1892-1931), where he headed the physics depart¬ ment. He invented the interferometer, with which he used light to make extremely precise measurements. He is best remembered for the Michelson-Morley experiment, undertaken with Edward W. Morley (1838— 1923), which established that the speed of light is a fundamental constant. Using a more refined interferometer, Michelson measured the diameter of the star Betelgeuse, the first substantially accurate determination of the size of a star. In 1907 he became the first American scientist to receive a Nobel Prize.
Michelson-Morley experiment Attempt to detect the velocity of the Earth with respect to ether, a hypothetical medium in space formerly proposed to carry light waves. It was first performed in Berlin in 1881 by A.A. Michelson and refined in the U.S. in 1887 by Michelson and Edward W. Morley (1838-1923). The procedure assumed that if the speed of light were constant with respect to the ether, the motion of the Earth could be detected by comparing the speed of light in the direction of the Earth’s motion and the speed of light at right angles to the Earth’s motion. No difference was found, and the result discredited the ether theory. As a result, Albert Einstein proposed in 1905 that the speed of light is a univer¬ sal constant.