Berbice \bor-'bes\ River River, eastern Guyana. Rising in Guyana’s highlands, it flows northward 370 mi (595 km) through dense forests to the Atlantic Ocean. Its basin is restricted by the proximity of the larger Essequibo and Courantyne rivers. Its name derives from a Dutch colony that became part of British Guiana (now Guyana) in 1831.
Berchtesgaden \'berk-t3s-,gad- 3 n\ Town (pop., 1992 est.: 8,000), southern Germany. Located in the Bavarian Alps south of Salzburg, it is surrounded on three sides by Austrian territory. Once part of Austria, it passed to Bavaria in the early 19th century. It was the site of Adolf Hit¬ ler’s villa retreat before and during World War II. In 1938 he met there with Neville Chamberlain. Destroyed by bombing in 1945, the villa was leveled in 1952. Mountain climbing and skiing make the area a popular destination.
Berchtold \'berk-,tolt\, Leopold, count von (b. April 18, 1863, Vienna, Austria—d. Nov. 21, 1942, near Csepreg, Hung.) Austro- Hungarian politician. One of the richest men in Austria-Hungary, he entered the diplomatic service in 1893 and became foreign minister in 1912. After the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand in 1914, Ber¬ chtold delivered an ultimatum to Serbia that led to the outbreak of World War I. He was forced to resign in 1915.
Berengar of Tours \'ber-3n- l gar...'tur\ (b. c. 999, Tours, Touraine—d. Jan. 10, 1088, priory of Saint-Cosme, near Tours) French theologian. He became canon of Tours Cathedral and archdeacon of Angers (c. 1040). He rejected the prevailing eucharistic theology and argued against any mate¬ rial change to the bread and wine. He was opposed by numerous theo¬ logians, most notably Lanfranc, and may have been excommunicated (1050) by Pope Leo IX. He was condemned by the Council of Vercelli (1050) and the Synod at Paris (1051). After a compromise, he was again condemned in 1076, 1078, 1079, and 1080 and spent the rest of his life in ascetic solitude.
Berenson Vber-on-sonV, Bernard (b. June 26, 1865, Vilnius, Lithua¬ nia, Russian Empire—d. Oct. 6, 1959, Settignano, Italy) Lithuanian-born U.S. art historian, critic, and connoisseur. He grew up in Boston and
attended Harvard University, but for most of his life he lived in Italy, where he built a reputation as an authority on Italian Renaissance paint¬ ing. He was adviser to the art dealer Joseph Duveen (1869-1939) and to Isabella Stewart Gardner (1840-1924), founder of Boston’s Gardner Museum. Berenson bequeathed his villa, I Tatti (near Florence), with its art collection and outstanding library, to Harvard to be administered as the Harvard Center for Italian Renaissance Studies. His books include The Drawings of the Florentine Painters (1903,1938, 1961) and Italian Paint¬ ers of the Renaissance (1952).
Berezina River \bo-'raz- 3 n-3\ River, Belarus. It is 365 mi (587 km) long and flows southeast into the Dnieper River. During Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow in 1812, a bitter engagement was fought on the Berezina at the crossroads of the river near Baryslaw, and Russian forces inflicted enormous losses on Napoleon’s army. In 1941 it was the scene of fierce fighting during the German advance on Smolensk.
Berg Vberk\ Former duchy, Holy Roman Empire. Located on the Rhine River, the area now lies in the districts of DOsseldorf and Cologne, Ger¬ many. In the 11th century the counts of Berg acquired Westphalian lands east of Cologne; these were incorporated into a duchy in 1380. Berg became a leading iron and textile manufacturing centre in the 17th—18th centuries. In 1806 Napoleon made it a grand duchy in his Confederation of the Rhine. Following the Congress of Vienna in 1814—15, it became part of Prussia.
Berg \'berk\, Alban (Maria Johannes) (b. Feb. 9, 1885, Vienna, Austria-Hungary—d. Dec. 24, 1935, Vienna, Austria) Austrian composer. He was largely self-taught musically until he met Arnold Schoenberg at age 19. This would prove to be the decisive event in his life, and Schoen¬ berg would remain his teacher for eight years. Under his influence, Berg’s early late-Romantic tonal works gave way to increasing atonality and finally (1925) to 12-tone composition. His Expressionist opera Wozzeck (1922) would become the most universally acclaimed post-Romantic opera. His second opera, Lulu, on which he worked for six years, remained unfinished at his death. Berg’s other works include two string quartets, including the Lyric Suite (1926); Three Pieces for Orchestra (1915); and a violin concerto (1935).
Berg, Paul (b. June 30, 1926, New York, N.Y., U.S.) U.S. biochemist. He received his Ph.D. from Western Reserve University. While studying the actions of isolated genes, he devised methods for splitting DNA mol¬ ecules at selected sites and attaching the resulting segments to the DNA of a virus or plasmid, which could then enter bacterial or animal cells. The foreign DNA was incorporated into the host and caused the synthe¬ sis of proteins not ordinarily found there. One of the earliest practical results of this research was the development of a strain of bacteria that contained the gene for producing insulin. In 1980 Berg shared a Nobel Prize with Walter Gilbert (b. 1932) and Frederick Sanger.
bergamot Vbor-go-.matN Any of several North American perennial plants of the mint family, also known as bee balm, fragrant balm, and Indi¬ an’s plume. The leaves are used as an herb to flavour tea, punches, lem¬ onade, and other cold drinks. Monarda didyma, native to the U.S., is made into Oswego tea, a beverage used by the American Indian Oswego tribe and said to be the drink adopted by the 18th-century colonists during their boycott of British tea. The pear-shaped fruit of the bergamot orange ( Cit¬ rus bergamia ), found chiefly in Calabria, Italy, is valued by the flavour¬ ing and perfume industries for the essential oil extracted from its peel. The bergamot pear, a popular winter pear cultivated in Britain, is a large, round fruit with yellowish green skin.
Bergen City (pop., 2000 est.: municipality, 229,496), southwestern Nor¬ way. It is Norway’s second largest city and most important port. Founded in 1070 by King Olaf III, it was Norway’s capital in the 12th—13th cen¬ turies. In the 14th century, German Hanseatic League merchants acquired control over its trade; their influence in a weakened Norway lasted into the 16th century. Repeatedly destroyed by fire (most notably in 1702 and 1916), Bergen has been resurrected each time. Its economy is based largely on fishing and shipbuilding. It was the birthplace of Edvard Grieg and the violinist Ole Bull.
Bergen, Edgar orig. Edgar John Bergren (b. Feb. 16, 1903, Chi¬ cago, Ill., U.S.—d. Sept. 30, 1978, Las Vegas, Nev.) U.S. comedian and ventriloquist. As a boy he developed the skill in ventriloquism that he later used to earn his tuition at Northwestern University. After stints in vaude¬ ville and nightclubs, he took his act to radio, where the Edgar Bergen-
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Bergen-Belsen ► Berkeley I 203
Charlie McCarthy Show (with his caustic and irrepressible dummy Charlie McCarthy) was one of the most popular programs for 20 years (1937-57). His daughter, Candice (b. 1946), was a successful screen and television actress.
Bergen-Belsen or Belsen Nazi concentration camp near Bergen and Belsen, villages in what was then Prussian Hannover, Germany. Estab¬ lished in 1943 partly as a prisoner-of-war camp and partly as a Jewish transit camp, it was designed for 10,000 prisoners but eventually held about 60,000, most of whom lacked any food or shelter. It contained no gas chambers, but some 35,000 prisoners died there, including Anne Frank, between January and mid-April 1945. As the first such camp to be liberated by the Western Allies (April 15, 1945), it received instant noto¬ riety. Some 28,000 prisoners died of diseases and other causes in the weeks after their liberation by British troops.