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Possible definitions for ibad

abacus
Calculating instrument that uses beads that slide along a series of wires or rods set in a frame to represent the decimal places. Probably of Babylonian origin, it is the ancestor of the modern digital calculator. Used by merchants in the Middle Ages throughout Europe and the Arabic world, it was gradually replaced by arithmetic based on Hindu-Arabic numerals. Though rarely used in Europe past the 18th cent., it is still used in the Middle East, China, and Japan.


Abydos
Sacred city, one of the most important archaeological sites of ancient Egypt. It was a royal necropolis of the first two dynasties, and later a pilgrimage center for the worship of Osiris. The pharaohs, incl. Thutmose III and Ramses III, embellished the temple to Osiris, and some pharaohs had cenotaphs at Abydos. The temple of Seti I, one of the most beautiful, has helped decode Egyptian history: in a long gallery is a relief, the so-called Abydos list of kings, showing Seti and his son Ramses making offerings to the cartouches of 76 dead predecessors.

Ancient Anatolian town northeast of modern Canakkale, Turkey, on the E side of the Dardanelles. It was colonized c.670 BC by the Milesians (see Miletus). Xerxes crossed the strait on a bridge of boats to invade Greece in 480 BC. Abydos is celebrated for its resistance to Philip V of Macedon in 200 BC and for the legend of Hero and Leander.


Acadia
N. Amer. possession of France in the 17th-18th cent., centered in what is now Nova Scotia. Acadia was probably intended to include the other present Maritime Provinces as well as parts of Maine and Quebec. The first European settlement was made by the French colonizer Sieur de Monts in 1604. The area at times was also claimed by the British and was contested often in the 18th-cent. colonial wars; in 1713 Nova Scotia came under British rule. In 1755 many French-speaking Acadians were deported by the British because of imminent war with France; several thousand settled in French-ruled Louisiana, where their descendants were known as Cajuns. The event was the theme for H. W. Longfellow's Evangeline.


Adad
Babylonian and Assyrian god of weather, the son of Anu (sometimes called the son of Bel). He was known as the Lord of Abundance for rains that made the land bloom, but he sent death-dealing storms to his enemies. He was also the god of oracles and divination. Though widely worshiped, he was a minor god and appears to have had no cult center of his own.


Agadir
Seaport (pop., 1994 est.: 155,000), SW Morocco. It was occupied in the 16th cent. by the Portuguese, but later became an independent Moroccan port. After the 1911 Moroccan Crisis when a German gunboat appeared offshore to protect perceived German interests, it was occupied by French troops in 1913. Modern growth began with the port's construction in 1914, and the development of the fishing industry. Destroyed in 1960 by earthquakes, ...

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