Ticino River \te-'che-no\ River, Switzerland and Italy. It rises on the slopes of the St. Gotthard range, winds south through Ticino canton, traverses Lake Maggiore, and continues south to the Po River, for a total course of 154 mi (248 km). It is navigable below Lake Maggiore, and is an important source of hydroelectric power for Switzerland. Hannibal defeated the Romans on its banks in 218 bc.
tick Any of some 825 parasitic arachnid species (suborder Ixodida, order Parasitiformes), found world¬ wide. Adults may be slightly more than an inch (30 mm) long, but most species are much smaller. Hard ticks start and end each developmental
Tiberius as a young man, marble bust found in Egypt in 1896; in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen.
COURTESY OF THE NY CARLSBERG GLYPTOTEK, COPENHAGEN
Cattle tick (Boophilus)
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1908 I Ticonderoga ► Tiffany
stage—egg, larva, nymph, adult—on the ground; at the completion of each stage, they attach to a host (usually a mammal), engorge on blood, then drop to the ground. Soft ticks feed intermittently, pass through sev¬ eral nymphal stages, and live in the host’s den or nest. Hard ticks may draw large amounts of blood, secrete paralyzing or lethal neurotoxins, and transmit diseases. Soft ticks may also carry diseases. The deer tick is the principal vector of Lyme disease.
Ticonderoga X.tl-.kan-do-'ro-goX Town (pop., 2000: 5,167) on Lake George, northeastern New York, U.S. In 1755 the French built Fort Car¬ illon on nearby Lake Champlain. Captured by the British in 1759, the fort was renamed Ticonderoga. In 1775, at the start of the American Revolu¬ tion, it was seized by Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys. The British retook it in 1777 but abandoned it after the Battle of Saratoga. The restored fort and the area around the town are now tourist attractions.
Ticonderoga, Battle of (1775) Engagement in the American Revolu¬ tion. Held by the British since 1759, Fort Ticonderoga (in New York) was overrun on the morning of May 10, 1775, in a surprise attack by the Green Mountain Boys under Ethan Allen, assisted by Benedict Arnold. The artil¬ lery seized there was moved to Boston, Mass., by Henry Knox for use against the British.
Ticunas See Tucunas
tidal flat Level muddy surface bordering an estuary, alternately sub¬ merged and exposed to the air by changing tidal levels. In addition to the alternating submergence and exposure, the varying influences of fresh river water and salty marine waters cause physical conditions to vary more widely than in any other marine environment. The mud of a tidal flat is usually rich in dissolved nutrients, plankton, and organic debris, and it supports large numbers of small animals such as crabs and worms. Veg¬ etation is generally sparse, but mats of blue or blue-green algae (see cyanobacteria) may be present.
tidal power Electricity produced by turbines operated by tide flow. Large amounts of power are potentially available from the tides in cer¬ tain locations, such as Canada’s Bay of Fundy, where the tidal range reaches more than 50 ft (15 m), but this potential power is not continu¬ ous and varies with the seasons. The first working modem tidal power plant was built in France in 1961-67 and has 24 power units of 10,000 kilowatts each.
tidal wave See tsunami
tide Regular, periodic rise and fall of the surface of the sea, occurring in most places twice a day. Tides result from differences in the gravitational forces exerted at different points on the Earth’s surface by another body (such as the Moon). Although any celestial body (e.g., Jupiter) produces minute tidal effects, the majority of the tidal forces on the Earth are raised by the Sun (because of its enormous mass) and the Moon (because of its proximity to Earth). In fact, the tidal forces from the Moon are about twice as strong as those from the Sun. The largest tides (spring tides, exhibit¬ ing very large change in sea level between high and low tides) occur at the new and full moon, when the Earth, the Moon, and the Sun are aligned and the Sun’s tidal forces are added to those of the Moon. The smallest tides (neap tides) occur when the Sun and Moon are at right angles (from Earth), when the tidal forces from the Sun partially cancel those from the Moon. The geometry of the coastline and of the water’s basin also affects the range of the tides.
Tieclc\'tek\, (Johann) Ludwig (b. May 31, 1773, Berlin, Prussia—d. April 28, 1853, Berlin) German writer and critic. He was educated at the universities of Halle, Gottingen, and Erlangen. His first works are asso¬ ciated with early Romanticism, the best appealing to the emotions rather than the intellect. Volksmarchen (1797) includes one of his best short novels. Blond Eckbert. This period culminated in the grotesque, lyrical plays Life and Death of St. Genevieve (1800) and Emperor Octavian (1804). Later his writing moved toward realism. While he was an adviser and critic at the Dresden theatre (1825-42), he became a great literary authority.
T'ien See Tian Tien Chih See Dian Chi
T'ien-chin See Tianjin
Tien Shan Vtyen-'shan\ Chinese Tian Shan or T'ien Shan ("Celestial Mountains") Mountain chain, Central Asia. Lying
mainly in Kyrgyzstan and northwestern China (Xinjiang autonomous region), its ranges and valleys stretch for about 1,500 mi (2,500 km) in an east-west direction. Its highest point is Victory Peak (Pik Pobeda) in Kyrgyzstan, which reaches 24,406 ft (7,439 m); the peak was discovered in 1943 by a Soviet expedition. Most of the area’s population lives in the Fergana Valley of Uzbekistan.
T'ien-shih Tao See Five Pecks of Rice Tientsin See Tianjin
Tiepolo \te-'a-p3-lo\, Giovanni Battista or Giambattista Tie- pofo (b. March 5, 1696, Venice—d. March 27, 1770, Madrid) Italian painter and etcher. In the 1730s and ’40s the Venetian clergy and nobility vied for his works. In 1750 he went to Wurzburg with his sons and col¬ laborators, Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo and Lorenzo Tiepolo, to decorate the prince-archbishop’s palace. His Wurzburg frescoes and canvases are his most boldly luminous works. In 1762 he escaped the political dise¬ quilibrium of the Seven Years’ War by accepting an invitation to paint ceilings in the royal palace in Madrid, again with his sons, his last great undertaking; he remained in Spain until his death. Although he initially used a melancholic chiaroscuro style, his later work is full of bright colour and bold brushwork. His luminous, poetic frescoes both extend the tra¬ dition of Baroque ceiling decoration and epitomize Rococo lightness and elegance.
Tiepolo Vtye-po-lo\, Giovanni Domenico or Giandomenico Tiepolo (b. Aug. 30, 1727, Venice—d. March 3, 1804, Venice) Italian painter and printmaker. He was apprenticed to his father, Giovanni Bat¬ tista Tiepolo, in Venice in the early 1740s and worked with him in Madrid from 1762 until the elder’s death in 1770. His most notable early works are the chinoiserie decorations of the Villa Valmarana in Vicenza (1757). Back in Venice, he executed several frescoes and paintings of scenes from the commedia dell’arte. A talented genre painter and caricaturist, he was famous for his many engravings and etchings after his own and his father’s designs.
Tierra del Fuego \te-,er-9-thel- , fwa-go\ Archipelago at the southern extremity of South America. It is separated from the Antarctic Archipelago by the Drake Passage. The southern and western parts are an extension of the Andes Mountains, with peaks exceeding 7,000 ft (2,100 m). About two-thirds of the islands are in Chile, and the remainder are in Argentina. The main island, Tierra del Fuego, is divided roughly equally between Chile (west) and Argentina (east); the city of Ushuaia, Arg., there is the southernmost city in the world. Indigenous peoples were the sole occu¬ pants until 1880, when colonization by Chilean and Argentine nationals was prompted by the discovery of gold. Chile’s only oil field is there.
The region’s name (Spanish: “Land of Fire”) refers to its many volca¬ noes.