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Suwannee ► swallowing I 1851
across the Alps; surrounded by a larger French force, he succeeded in breaking out and, repulsing the pursuing French, escaped with most of his army, a remarkable feat.
Suwannee \so-'wa-ne\ River River, southeastern Georgia and north¬ ern Florida, U.S. The river rises in the Okefenokee Swamp and enters the Gulf of Mexico at Suwannee Sound after a course of 250 mi (400 km). All but 35 mi (56 km) of its course are in Florida. It is the Swanee River of Stephen Foster’s famed “Old Folks at Home.” In the 1780s the bays and inlets of Suwannee Sound were rendezvous points for pirates.
Suzdal Vsiiz-doA Medieval principality, between the Oka River and the Upper Volga, northeastern Russia. Ruled by a branch of the Rurik dynasty during the 12th-14th centuries, it united with Rostov and in the 12th cen¬ tury with Vladimir. Suzdal-Vladimir achieved great political and eco¬ nomic importance, but in the 13th—14th centuries it disintegrated into small principalities, which ultimately were absorbed by Moscow. See also Vladimir-Suzdal school.
Suzman \'suz-man\, Helen orig. Helen Gavronsky (b. Nov. 7, 1917, Germiston, S.Af.) South African legislator. Bom in the Transvaal to Lithuanian immigrants, she graduated from the University of Witwa- tersrand, where she later taught economic history (1945-52). Elected to Parliament in 1953, she and 11 others formed the Progressive Party to oppose apartheid. Suzman alone of the group was reelected in 1961; until 1974 she often cast the lone vote against an increasing number of apart¬ heid measures. In 1978 she received the UN Human Rights award. Until her retirement in 1989, she remained a significant voice in the South Afri¬ can Parliament.
Svalbard Vsfal-,bar\ Archipelago, Norway. Located in the Arctic Ocean, north of the Arctic Circle, Svalbard consists of nine main islands, the largest being Spitsbergen (formerly West Spitsbergen). The islands are mountainous, with glaciers and snowfields covering nearly 60% of the area. The islands were first visited in modern times by the Dutch in 1596. In the early 20th century many countries, including the U.S., debated ownership of mineral rights there. Officially a Norwegian possession since 1920, the islands have been the site of many scientific polar expeditions (beginning in 1773). The population changes seasonally but numbers about 3,000; there are no indigenous inhabitants. Longyearbyen is the administrative centre.
Svealand \'sva-3-,land\ Region, south-central Sweden. Stretching across the breadth of the country, it covers an area of 31,212 sq mi (80,844 sq km). Settled as early as the Stone Age, it was the original home of the Svear, a people who gave Sweden its name, and it was the political and cultural centre from which Sweden developed and later secured its inde¬ pendence. Its diversified economy includes agriculture, manufacturing, forestry, and mining.
Svedberg \'svad-,bar y ,\ English Vsved-.bsrgV The(odor) (b. Aug. 30, 1884, Flerang, near Gavle, Swed.—d. Feb. 25, 1971, Orebro) Swedish chemist. He won a Nobel Prize in 1926 for his studies in the chemistry of colloids and for his invention of the ultracentrifuge (see centrifuge), which has become invaluable to research in biochemistry and other areas. Svedberg used it to determine precisely the molecular weights of highly complex proteins (e.g., hemoglobin). Later he made studies in nuclear chemistry, contributed to the improvement of the cyclotron, and helped his student Arne Tiselius (1902-71) develop electrophoresis.
Sverdlov Vsv y erd-lof\, Yakov (Mikhaylovich) (b. June 3, 1885, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia—d. March 16, 1919, Moscow) Soviet politi¬ cian. A Bolshevik organizer and agitator in the Urals, he was often arrested and exiled. In the Russian Revolution of 1917, he headed the Bolshevik secretariat and helped plan and execute the October coup that brought the Bolsheviks to power. As titular head of state, he worked closely with Vladimir Lenin to consolidate power in the Communist Party’s Central Committee. His untimely death at age 33 from an infectious illness left a void in the party hierarchy that was filled by Joseph Stalin in 1922.
Sverdlovsk See Yekaterinburg
Svevo Vzva-voV Italo orig. Ettore Schmitz (b. Dec. 19, 1861, Tri¬ este, Austrian Empire—d. Sept. 13, 1928, Motta di Livenza, Italy) Ital¬ ian writer. Though family financial difficulties forced him to leave school and become a bank clerk, he read on his own and began to write. A Life (1892), revolutionary in its analytical, introspective treatment of an inef¬ fectual hero, was ignored on publication, as was As a Man Grows Older
(1898). He gave up writing until, encouraged by James Joyce (then living in Trieste), he produced his most famous novel. Confessions of Zeno (1923), a brilliant work in the form of a patient’s statement for his psy¬ chiatrist. He died in an auto accident. Two short-story collections, essays, dramatic works, correspondence with Eugenio Montale, and his unfinished Further Confessions of Zeno (1969) were published after his death. He is regarded as a pioneer of the psychological novel.
Svyatoslav I Vsvya-to-slofA (d. 972) Grand prince of Kiev (945-72). The greatest of the Varangian princes of early Russian history, he defeated the Khazar and other peoples in the northern Caucasus (963-965) and conquered the Bulgars (967). Hoping to found a Russo-Bulgarian empire, he refused to cede his conquest to the Byzantines until their army defeated him and forced the surrender of Balkan territory (971). He was killed in an ambush on his way back to Kiev.
Swabia German Schwaben \'shvab- 3 n\ Duchy, medieval Germany, and current administrative district. The duchy of Swabia was nearly coex¬ tensive with modern Baden-Wtirttemberg, Hesse, and western Bavaria states, as well as parts of eastern Switzerland and Alsace. The Suevi and Alemanni tribes occupied the area from the 3rd century, and the region was known as Alemannia until the 11th century. In the 7th century Irish missionaries began to introduce Christianity. From c. 10th century it became one of the five great tribal duchies of early medieval Germany. It was ruled by the Hohenstaufen dynasty c. 1077-1268, after which the duchy was divided. Several alliances of cities, known as the Swabian Leagues, were formed in the 14th— 16th centuries. The region was a ter¬ ritorial division of the Holy Roman Empire in the 16th-19th centuries. Its chief cities included Augsburg, Freiburg, Konstanz, and Ulm. Created in 1934, the administrative district is coextensive with the eastern portion of the larger historic region of Swabia and has an area of 3,859 sq mi (9,994 sq km) and a population (2002 est.) of 1,767,193.
swage Vswaj, 'swej\ Perforated cast-iron or steel block with grooved sides, used by metalworkers for shaping their work by holding it on the work (or the work on it) and striking with a hammer or sledge. Swage blocks are used in heading bolts and swaging bars by hand.
Swahili \swa-'he-le\ language Bantu language spoken in Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and Congo (Kinshasa). It is spoken as a first language by more than 2 million people and as a second language by some 60 mil¬ lion. Standard Swahili is based on the Unguja (kiUnguja) dialect of Zan¬ zibar, which was spread far inland in the 19th century by entrepreneurs seeking ivory and slaves. Its use was perpetuated by the European colo¬ nial governments that occupied East Africa toward the end of the century. Modem Swahili is usually written in the Latin alphabet, though Swahili literature in Arabic script dates to the early 18th century. Among Bantu languages, Swahili is remarkable for the number of loanwords it has absorbed, especially from Arabic.