Stendhal, oil painting by Pierre-Joseph Dedreux-Dorcy; in the Bibliotheque Municipale de Grenoble, France.
COURTESY OF THE BIBLIOTHEQUE MUNICIPALE DE GRENOBLE, FR; PHOTOGRAPH, STUDIO PICCARDY
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
stenography ► Stephenson I 1819
stenography See shorthand
stenotypy \'ste-n3-,tl-pe\ System of machine shorthand in which let¬ ters or groups of letters phonetically represent syllables, words, phrases, and punctuation marks. The machine, usually the commercial Stenotype or Stenograph, is often used in court reporting. Virtually noiseless, it can be operated at more than 250 words per minute. Several keys may be struck simultaneously to print a complete word with one stroke.
Stephen or Stephen of Blois \'blwa\ (b. c. 1097 —d. Oct. 25, 1154) King of England (1135-54). The nephew of Henry I, he pledged to sup¬ port Matilda but claimed the throne himself. In the civil strife that fol¬ lowed, he was unable to win the loyalty of all the barons. Matilda invaded (1139), and, in a display of chivalry, Stephen had her escorted to Bristol. She gained control of most of western England and captured Stephen in battle (1141), but her arrogance provoked a rebellion, and she was forced to leave England (1148). An agreement was reached whereby Matilda’s son Henry of Anjou (later Henry II), who invaded England in 1153, was named as Stephen’s successor.
Stephen known as Stephen the Great (b. 1435—d. July 2, 1504) Prince of Moldavia (1457-1504). With the help of the Walachian prince Vlad III fepeg, Stephen secured the throne of Moldavia. He repelled a Hungarian invasion (1467) and later attacked Walachia (1471), by then under Turkish vassalage. He defeated invading Turks (1475, 1476) and contended with Polish and Hungarian designs on Moldavia. In 1503 Stephen signed a treaty preserving Moldavian independence at the cost of an annual tribute to the Turks.
Stephen, Sir James Fitzjames, 1st Baronet (b. March 3, 1829, London, Eng.—d. March 11, 1894, Ipswich, Suffolk) British legal histo¬ rian and judge. His General View of the Criminal Law of England (1863) was the first attempt to explain the principles of English law since the work of William Blackstone. As a member of the British viceroy’s council in India (1869-72), he helped codify and reform Indian law. He later taught at the Inns of Court (1875-79) and served as a judge of the High Court of Justice (1879-91). His Indictable Offenses Bill, though never enacted, greatly influenced the reformation of criminal law in English- speaking countries.
Stephen, Sir Leslie (b. Nov. 28, 1832, London, Eng.—d. Feb. 22, 1904, London) English critic and man of letters. After attending Eton College and Cambridge University, he gained entry to literary circles and in 1871 began an 11-year tenure as editor of The Cornhill Magazine, for which he wrote literary criticism. His greatest learned work was his His¬ tory of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century (1876), but his most enduring legacy is the Dictionary of National Biography, which he edited from 1882 to 1891, personally writing many hundreds of its meticulous articles. He was the father of Virginia Woolf and the painter Vanessa Bell
(1879-1961).
Stephen, Saint (d. c. ad 36, Jerusalem) First Christian martyr. As told in the Acts of the Apostles, he was a foreign-born Jew who lived in Jerus¬ alem and joined the church at an early date. He was one of seven dea¬ cons appointed by the Apostles to care for elderly women, widows, and orphans. As a Hellenized Jew, he was strongly opposed to the Temple cult of Judaism. For expressing his opposition, he was brought before the Sanhedrin. His defense of Christianity so outraged his hearers that he was condemned to be stoned to death. One of those who assented to the execution was Saul of Tarsus (St. Paul).
Stephen I or Saint Stephen orig. Vajk (b. 970/975, Esztergom, Hung.—d. Aug. 15, 1038, Esztergom; canonized 1083; feast day August 16) First king of Hungary (1000-38) and founder of the Hungarian state. The son of a Magyar chieftain, he was bom a pagan but was later baptized as a Christian. After defeating his cousin to claim the throne, Stephen was crowned; his royal crown was a gift of Pope Sylvester II. His rule was peace¬ ful except for an invasion by Conrad II (1030) and minor disputes with Poland and Bulgaria, and he organized Hungarian government and church administration on German models. He is the patron saint of Hungary.
Stephen II (b. Rome—d. April 26,757, Rome) Pope (752-757). He freed the papacy from Byzantium and allied it with the Franks against the Lom¬ bards, who were threatening Rome. In Gaul he anointed Pippin III, Charle¬ magne, and Carloman as kings of the Romans, and in return Pippin led his army against the Lombardic king Aistulf (754,756). The victorious Franks granted the pope territory in Ravenna, Rome, Venetia, and Istria, thus establishing the Papal States under Stephen’s rule. (See Donation of Pippin)
Stephen Bathory \'ba-tor-e\ Hungarian Istvan Bathory Polish Stefan Batory (b. Sept. 27, 1533, Szilagysomlyo, Transylvania —d. Dec. 12, 1586, near Grodno, grand duchy of Lith.) Prince of Transylva¬ nia (1571-76) and king of Poland (1575-86). In 1571 he was elected prince of Transylvania by the Hungarians, and in 1575, as son-in-law of the late Sigismund I, he was elected king of Poland by the Polish nobility. A forceful and ambitious monarch, he successfully defended Poland’s eastern Baltic provinces against Russian incursion and forced the cession of Livonia to Poland in 1582. He planned to unite Poland, Muscovy, and Transylvania and was preparing to renew the war against Russia when he died.
Stephen Decansky See Stefan Decansky Stephen Dusan See Stefan Dusan Stephen Nemanja See Stefan Nemanja
Stephens, Alexander H(amilton) (b. Feb. 11, 1812, Wilkes county, Ga., U.S.—d. March 4, 1883, Atlanta, Ga.) U.S. politician. He served in the U.S. House of Representatives (1843-59), where he defended slavery but opposed dissolution of the Union. When Georgia seceded, he was elected vice president of the Confederacy. He supported constitutional government, opposed attempts by Jefferson Davis to infringe on individuals’ rights, and advocated a program of prisoner exchanges. He led the delegation to the Hampton Roads Conference (1865). After the war he was held in Boston for five months. He served again in the House (1873-82) and as governor of Georgia (1882-83).
Stephens, John Lloyd (b. Nov. 28, 1805, Shrewsbury, N.J., U.S.—d. Oct. 12, 1852, New York, N.Y.) U.S. traveler and archaeologist. Stephens’s travels in the Middle East resulted in two books. With his illustrator friend Frederick Catherwood he embarked for Honduras in 1839 to explore ancient Maya ruins rumoured to exist. At Copan, Uxmal, Palenque, and elsewhere, they identified major new sites. They described their findings in Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan (1841) and recounted a second trip in Incidents of Travel in Yucatan (1843). Their books created a storm of popular and scholarly interest in the region.
Stephens, Uriah Smith (b. Aug. 3, 1821, Cape May, N.J., U.S.—d. Feb. 13, 1882, Philadelphia, Pa.) U.S. labour leader. Apprenticed as a tai¬ lor, he became involved in reform movements such as abolitionism and utopian socialism, and in 1862 he helped organize the Garment Cutters’ Association of Philadelphia. In 1869 he cofounded the Noble Order of the Knights of Labor, the first national labour union in the U.S., and became its first leader (or grand master workman). The high calling of the union and the hostility of union-busters led Stephens to favour secrecy and ritual in its meetings, which became increasingly controversial, as did Stephens’s opposition to strikes. In 1878 he resigned his post.
Stephenson, George (b. June 9, 1781, Wylam, Northumberland, Eng.—d. Aug. 12, 1848, Chester¬ field, Derbyshire) English engineer, principal inventor of the locomotive.
Son of a coal-mine mechanic, he himself became chief mechanic at a coal mine, where his interest in steam engines led to experiments on a machine to pull coal-filled cars out of the mines. In 1815 he devised a powerful “steam blast” system that made the locomotive practical. In 1825 he built a steam locomotive for the first passenger railway, from Stockton to Darlington, which could carry 450 people at 15 mph (24 km/hr). In 1829, assisted by his son Robert Stephenson, he built his improved locomotive, the Rocket, which won a speed competition at 36 mph (58 km/hr) and became the model for later locomotives. His company built all eight locomotives for the new Liverpool-Manchester railway (1830).