criminology Scientific study of nonlegal aspects of crime, including its causes and prevention. Criminology originated in the 18th century when social reformers began to question the use of punishment for retribution rather than deterrence and reform. In the 19th century, scientific methods began to be applied to the study of crime. Today criminologists commonly use statistics, case histories, official records, and sociological field meth¬ ods to study criminals and criminal activity, including the rates and kinds of crime within geographic areas. Their findings are used by lawyers, judges, probation officers, law-enforcement and prison officials, legisla¬ tors, and scholars to better understand criminals and the effects of treat¬ ment and prevention. See also delinquency, penology.
Cripps, Sir (Richard) Stafford (b. April 24, 1889, London, Eng.—d. April 21, 1952, Zurich, Switz.) British statesman. A successful lawyer, he served in Parliament (1931-50). He was on the extreme left of the Labour Party and helped found the Socialist League in 1932. After serving as ambassador to Moscow (1940-42), he joined the British war cabinet and conducted the Cripps Mission (1942), an unsuccessful attempt to rally Indian support against the Japanese. As chancellor of the Exchequer (1947-50), he instituted a rigid austerity program to revive Britain’s economy.
Crispi \'kres-pe\, Francesco (b. Oct. 4, 1819, Ribera, Sicily—d. Aug. 12, 1901, Naples) Italian politician. Exiled from Sicily for his revolution¬ ary activities, he became an associate of Giuseppe Mazzini and encouraged Giuseppe de Garibaldi to conquer Sicily in 1860. He served as a deputy from Sicily in the newly unified Italian parliament (1861-96) and held office in several leftist governments. As premier (1887-91, 1893-96), he insti¬ tuted liberal reforms and later improved the economy but became increas¬ ingly repressive. He embarked on a disastrous foreign policy, organizing Eritrea as a colony and attempting colonial expansion in Africa. He was forced to resign after the Italian defeat at the Battle of Adwa.
Cristofano de Giudicis, Francesco di See Franciabigio
Cristofori \kre-'sto-fo- 1 re\ / Bartolomeo (b. May 4, 1655, Padua, Republic of Venice—d. Jan. 27, 1731, Florence) Italian maker of musi¬ cal instruments. As custodian of musical instruments at the court of Prince Ferdinand de’ Medici, he maintained a variety of instruments. His most famous experiment was the pianoforte, ancestor of the modern piano, which he worked on from 1698, an instrument that, unlike the harpsi¬
chord, could produce changes in volume of sound depending on the force with which the keys were struck. A diagram of its workings was pub¬ lished in 1711 and soon copied by others. Some of his original piano¬ fortes survive.
critical care unit See intensive care unit
critical mass Minimum amount of a given fissionable material neces¬ sary to achieve a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction under specified conditions. Critical mass depends on several factors, including the kind of fissionable material used, its concentration and purity, and the compo¬ sition and geometry of the surrounding reaction system.
critical point In science, the set of conditions under which a liquid and its vapour become identical. The conditions are the critical temperature, the critical pressure, and the critical density. If a closed vessel is filled with a pure substance, partly liquid and partly vapour, and the average density equals the critical density, the critical conditions can be achieved. As the temperature is raised, the vapour pressure increases, and the gas phase becomes denser while the liquid expands and becomes less dense. At the critical point, the densities of liquid and vapour become equal, eliminat¬ ing the boundary between the two.
critical theory Marxist inspired movement in social and political phi¬ losophy originally associated with the work of the Frankfurt school. Draw¬ ing particularly on the thought of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, critical theorists maintain that a primary goal of philosophy is to understand and to help overcome the social structures through which people are domi¬ nated and oppressed. Believing that science, like other forms of knowl¬ edge, has been used as an instrument of oppression, they caution against a blind faith in scientific progress, arguing that scientific knowledge must not be pursued as an end in itself without reference to the goal of human emancipation. Since the 1970s, critical theory has been immensely influ¬ ential in the study of history, law, literature, and the social sciences.
Critius and Nesiotes Vkri-shos, , kri-te-9s...,nes-e- , o- l tez\ or Kritios and Nesiotes (fl. late 5th century bc, Athens, Greece) Greek sculptors. They executed the first masterpieces of freestanding sculpture of the early Classical period: the bronze figures of the Tyrannicides {All bc), com¬ missioned to replace those by Antenor, which were looted in the Persian sack of Athens (480 bc). Marble copies survive in the National Archae¬ ology Museum, Naples.
Crittenden, John J(ordan) (b. Sept. 10, 1787, near Versailles, Ky., U.S.—d. July 26, 1863, Frankfort, Ky.) U.S. politician. A graduate of the College of William and Mary (1807), he became territorial attorney gen¬ eral in Illinois (1809). He also served in the U.S. Senate (1817-19, 1835- 40, 1842-48,1855-61), as U.S. attorney general (1840—41,1850-53), and as governor of Kentucky (1848-50). He is best known for the Crittenden Compromise. In 1861 he chaired the Frankfort convention of leaders of bor¬ der states, which asked the South to reconsider its position on secession.
Crittenden Compromise Series of compromises in 1860-61 intended to forestall the American Civil War. Sen. John J. Crittenden pro¬ posed constitutional amendments that would reenact provisions of the Missouri Compromise and extend them to the western territories, indemnify owners of fugitive slaves whose return was prevented by antislavery ele¬ ments in the North, allow a form of popular sovereignty in the territories, and protect slavery in the District of Columbia. The plan was rejected by president-elect Abraham Lincoln and narrowly defeated in the Senate.
Crivelli \kre-'vel-le. Carlo (b. c. 1430/35, Venice, Republic of Venice—d. c. 1493/95) Italian painter. The son of a painter, he worked mainly in the Marches, a provincial region of central Italy. All his works were of religious subjects, done in an elaborate, old-fashioned style remi¬ niscent of the linearism of Andrea Mantegna. Characterized by heavy ornamentation, sharp outlines, and exaggerated facial expressions, his paintings are closer to the religious intensity of Gothic art than to the rationalism of the Renaissance.
croaker See drum
Croatia \kr6-'a-sh3\ officially Republic of Croatia Country, west- central Balkans, southeastern Europe. Area: 21,851 sq mi (56,594 sq km). Population (2005 est.): 4,440,000. Capitaclass="underline" Zagreb. The people are mainly Croats, with a large Serbian minority. Language: Croatian (official). Reli¬ gions: Christianity (predominantly Roman Catholic [Croats]; also Eastern Orthodox [Serbs]); also Islam. Currency: kuna. Croatia includes the tra¬ ditional regions of Dalmatia, Istria, and Croatia-Slavonia. Istria and Dal-
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Croce ► Croix de Feu I 485
cattle breeding is important. The central mountain belt is known for fruit, and the farms of Istria and Dalmatia produce grapes and olives. The most important industries are food pro¬ cessing, wine making, textiles, chemicals, and petroleum and natural gas. Croatia is a republic with a unicameral legislature; its head of state is the president, and the head of government is the prime minister. The Croats, a southern Slavic people, arrived in the 7th century ad and came under Charlemagne’s rule in the 8th century. They converted to Christianity soon afterward and formed a kingdom in the 10th century. Croatia retained its independence under native kings until 1102, when the crown passed into the hands of the Hungarian dynasty. Nonetheless, even under dynastic union with Hungary, institutions of separate Croatian statehood were maintained. The area associated with the name Croatia shifted gradually north and west as its territory was eroded, first with the loss of Dalmatia to Venice by 1420 and then as a result of Ottoman conquests in the 16th century. During the 16th century the remainder of Croatia came under the rule of the Austrian Habsburgs. In 1867 it became part of the Austro- Hungarian Empire, with Dalmatia and Istria ruled by Vienna and Croatia- Slavonia a Hungarian crown land. In 1918, after the defeat of Austria- Hungary in World War I, Croatia joined other southern Slavic territories to form the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, which was renamed Yugoslavia in 1929. In World War II an independent state of Croatia was established by Germany and Italy, embracing Croatia-Slavonia, part of Dalmatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina; after the war Croatia was rejoined to Yugoslavia as a people’s republic. Croatia declared its independence in 1991, sparking insurrections by Croatian Serbs, who carved out autono¬ mous regions with Yugoslav army help; Croatia took back most of these regions by 1995. With some stability returning, Croatia’s economy began to revive in the late 1990s and early 21st century.