Random Image

You are here: Random Image > Words beginning with x > Random Image for xurel

Possible definitions for xurel

curlew
Any of eight species (genus Numenius) of shorebirds having a sickle-shaped bill that curves downward at the tip, a streaked, gray or brown body, and a long neck and legs. Curlews breed inland in temperate and subarctic regions of the Northern Hemisphere and migrate far south. They eat insects and seeds during migration but feed on worms and fiddler crabs while wintering on marshes and coastal mudflats. The eastern curlew is the largest species (24 in., or 60 cm, long); the common, or Eurasian, curlew, almost as large, is the largest European shorebird. The Eskimo curlew is now virtually extinct.


duel
Formal combat with weapons fought between two persons in the presence of witnesses. Intended to settle a quarrel or point of honor, it represented an alternative to the usual process of justice. The judicial duel, or trial by battle, is reported in ancient sources and was prevalent in medieval Europe. A judge could order two parties to meet in a duel to settle a matter. It was believed that through such an appeal to the "judgment of God" the righteous would emerge victorious; the loser, if still alive, was dealt with according to the law. Duels of honor were private encounters over real or imagined slights or insults. Duels (later fought with pistols) continued to be fought frequently in France until the late 19th cent. and in Germany until World War I. The most famous U.S. duel was that between A. Hamilton and A. Burr (1804). See also ordeal.


Fuseli
Swiss-British painter and writer on art. The son of a portrait painter, he trained in theology as well as in art and art history. He left his native Zurich for London in 1764. Encouraged by Sir J. Reynolds, he went to Italy in 1770 and stayed for eight years; on his return to England, his works exhibited at the Royal Academy, such as The Nightmare (1781), his most famous work, secured his reputation. His subject matter was chiefly literary and his images portrayed macabre fantasies and the grotesque. He was elected a full academician in 1790 and taught painting at the Academy 1799-1805.


Hubel
Canadian-U.S. neurobiologist. Born in Windsor, Ontario, he studied medicine at McGill Univ. and in 1959 joined the faculty of Harvard Medical School. In 1981 he shared a Nobel Prize with T. Wiesel and R. Sperry for investigations of visual perception, one of their achievements being analysis of the flow of nerve impulses from the retina to the brain's sensory and motor centers.


Lorelei
Rock on the bank of the Rhine River near Sankt Goarshausen in Germany. It produces an echo and is associated with the legend of a beautiful maiden who drowned herself over a faithless lover. She was transformed into a siren who lured fishermen to their death. C. Brentano claimed to have invented the essentials of the legend. H. Heine's poem on the Lorelei has been set to music by more than 25 composers.


morel
Any of ...

Top words beginning with X: xylocopid, xeruses, xerography, xanthogen, xylulokinase, xenia, xanthocephalum, xenagogy, xanthoxenite, xanthelasmoidea, xenosaurus, xanthocobaltic, xylans, xiphoidian, xxyy, xylenes, xyloplastic, xiphister, xenisma, xanthomata

More words beginning with X.

Browse the alphabet: A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z