Aasvär (ōs′vār), a group of small islands off the Norwegian coast, under the Arctic Circle, where there is an important herring-fishery.
Ab, the eleventh month of the Jewish civil, the fifth of the ecclesiastical, year—part of July and part of August.
Ababda, or Ababdeh (abab′de) (Gebadei of Pliny), a nomadic African race inhabiting Upper Egypt and part of Nubia, between the Nile and the Red Sea, dark-brown in colour. Their language is Arabic and they are Mahommedans in religion. They number about 40,000.
Ab′aca, or Manilla Hemp, a strong fibre yielded by the leaf-stalks of a kind of plantain (Musa textĭlis) which grows in the Indian Archipelago, and is cultivated in the Philippines. The outer fibres of the leaf-stalks are made into strong and durable ropes, the inner into various fine fabrics.
Ab′aco, Great and Little, two islands of the Bahamas group, (q.v.). Pop. about 4000.
Ab′acus, a Latin term applied to an apparatus used in elementary schools for facilitating arithmetical operations, consisting of a number of parallel cords or wires, upon which balls or beads are strung, the uppermost wire being appropriated to units, the next to tens, &c.—The uppermost member or division of the capital of a column, immediately under the architrave.
Abad′don (Heb. destruction), the name given in Rev. ix. 11 as that of the angel of the bottomless pit, otherwise called Apollyon. In Job, xxvi, 6, it designates the underworld, or Hades.
Abakansk′, a fortified place in Siberia, near the Upper Yenisei, founded by Peter the Great in 1707.