Arundel and Newcastle, Castle Hedingham, &c. When the keep was circular, as at Conisborough and Windsor, it was called a “shell-keep” (see Castle). The verb “to keep,” from which the noun with its particular meaning here treated was formed, appears in O.E. as cépan, of which the derivation is unknown; no words related to it are found in cognate languages. The earliest meaning (c. 1000) appears to have been to lay hold of, to seize, from which its common uses of to guard, observe, retain possession of, have developed.
KEEWATIN, a district of Canada, bounded E. by Committee
Bay, Fox Channel, and Hudson and James bays, S. and S.W. by
the Albany and English rivers, Manitoba, Lake Winnipeg, and
Nelson river, W. by the 100th meridian, and N. by Simpson and
Rae straits and gulf and peninsula of Boothia; thus including
an area of 445,000 sq. m. Its surface is in general barren and
rocky, studded with innumerable lakes with intervening elevations,
forest-clad below 60° N., but usually bare or covered
with moss or lichens, forming the so-called “barren lands” of
the north. With the exception of a strip of Silurian and
Devonian rocks, 40 to 80 m. wide, extending from the vicinity of
the Severn river to the Churchill, and several isolated areas of
Cambrian and Huronian, the district is occupied by Laurentian
rocks. The principal river is the Nelson, which, with its great
tributary, the Saskatchewan, is 1450 m. long; other tributaries
are the Berens, English, Winnipeg, Red and Assiniboine. The
Hayes, Severn and Winisk also flow from the south-west into
Hudson Bay, and the Ekwan, Attawapiskat and Albany, 500 m.
long, into James Bay. The Churchill, 925 m., Thlewliaza,
Maguse, and Ferguson rivers discharge into Hudson Bay on the
west side; the Kazan, 500 m., and Dubawnt, 660 m., into
Chesterfield Inlet; and Back’s river, rising near Aylmer Lake,
flows north-eastwards 560 m. to the Arctic Ocean. The principal
lakes are St Joseph and Seul on the southern boundary; northern
part of Lake Winnipeg, 710 ft. above the sea; Island;
South Indian; Etawney; Nueltin; Yathkyed, at an altitude
of 300 ft.; Maguse; Kaminuriak; Baker, 30 ft.; Aberdeen,
130 ft.; and Garry. The principal islands are Southampton,
area 17,800 sq. m.; Marble Island, the usual wintering place
for whaling vessels; and Bell and Coats Islands, in Hudson
Bay; and Akimiski, in James Bay.
A few small communities at the posts of the Hudson Bay Company constitute practically the whole of the white population. In 1897 there were 852 Indians in the Churchill and Nelson rivers district, but no figures are available for the district as a whole. The principal posts in Keewatin are Norway House, near the outlet of Lake Winnipeg; Oxford House, on the lake of the same name; York Factory, at the mouth of Hayes river; and Forts Severn and Churchill, at the mouths of the Severn and Churchill rivers respectively. In 1905 the district of Keewatin was included in the North-West Territories and the whole placed under an administrator or acting governor. The derivation of the name is from the Cree—the “north wind.”
KEF, more correctly El-Kef (the Rock), a town of Tunisia,
125 m. by rail S.S.W. of the capital, and 75 m. S.E. of Bona
in Algeria. It occupies the site of the Roman colony of Sicca
Veneria, and is built on the steep slope of a rock in a mountainous
region through which flows the Mellegue, an affluent of
the Mejerda. Situated at the intersection of main routes from
the west and south, Kef occupies a position of strategic importance.
Though distant some 22 m. from the Algerian frontier
it was practically a border post, and its walls and citadel were
kept in a state of defence by the Tunisians. The town with its
half-dozen mosques and tortuous, dirty streets, is still partly
walled. The southern part of the wall has however been
destroyed by the French, and the remainder is being left to
decay. Beyond the part of the wall destroyed is the French
quarter. The kasbah, or citadel, occupies a rocky eminence
on the west side of the town. It was built, or rebuilt, by the
Turks, the material being Roman. It has been restored by
the French, who maintain a garrison here.
The Roman remains include fragments of a large temple dedicated to Hercules, and of the baths. The ancient cisterns remain, but are empty, being used as part of the barracks. The town is however supplied by water from the same spring which filled the cisterns. The Christian cemetery is on the site of a basilica. There are ruins of another Christian basilica, excavated by the French, the apse being intact and the narthex serving as a church. Many stones with Roman inscriptions are built into the walls of Arab houses. The modern town is much smaller than the Roman colony. Pop. about 6000, including about 100 Europeans (chiefly Maltese).
The Roman colony of Sicca Veneria appears from the character of its worship of Venus (Val. Max. ii. 6, § 15) to have been a Phoenician settlement. It was afterwards a Numidian stronghold, and under the Caesars became a fashionable residential city and one of the chief centres of Christianity in North Africa. The Christian apologist Arnobius the Elder lived here.
See H. Barth, Die Küstenländer des Mittelmeeres (1849); Corpus Inscript. Lat., vol. viii.; Sombrun in Bull. de la soc. de géog. de Bordeaux (1878). Also Cardinal Newman’s Callista: a Sketch of the Third Century (1856), for a “reconstruction” of the manner of life of the early Christians and their oppressors.
KEHL, a town in the grand-duchy of Baden, on the right bank of the Rhine, opposite Strassburg, with which it is connected by a railway bridge and a bridge of boats. Pop. 4000. It has a considerable river trade in timber, tobacco and coal, which has been developed by the formation of a harbour with two basins. The chief importance of Kehl is its connexion with the military defence of Strassburg, to the strategic area of which it belongs. It is encircled by the strong forts Bose, Blumenthal and Kirchbach of that system. In 1678 Kehl was taken from the imperialists by the French, and in 1683 a new fortress, built by Vauban, was begun. In 1697 it was restored to the Empire and was given to Baden, but in 1703 and again in 1733 it was taken by the French, who did not however retain it for very long. In 1793 the French again took the town, which was retaken by the Austrians and was restored to Baden in 1803. In 1808 the French, again in possession, restored the fortifications, but these were dismantled in 1815, when Kehl was again restored to Baden. In August 1870, during the Franco-German War, the French shelled the defenceless town.
KEIGHLEY (locally Keithley), a municipal borough in
the Keighley parliamentary division of the West Riding of
Yorkshire, England, 17 m. W.N.W. of Leeds, on branches of
the Great Northern and Midland railways. Pop. (1901), 41,564.
It is beautifully situated in a deep valley near the junction of
the Worth with the Aire. A canal between Liverpool and Hull
affords it water communication with both west and east coasts.
The principal buildings are the parish church of St Andrew
(dating from the time of Henry I., modernized in 1710, rebuilt
with the exception of the tower in 1805, and again rebuilt in
1878), and the handsome Gothic mechanics’ institute and
technical school (1870). A grammar school was founded in
1713, the operations of which have been extended so as to
embrace a trade school (1871) for boys, and a grammar school
for girls. The principal industries are manufactures of woollen
goods, spinning, sewing and washing machines, and tools. The
town was incorporated in 1882, and the corporation consists
of a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors.
KEI ISLANDS [Ke, Key, Kii, &c.; native, Ewab], a group in the Dutch East Indies, in the residency of Amboyna, between 5° and 6° 5′ S. and 131° 50′ and 133° 15′ E., and consisting of
four parts: Nuhu-Iut or Great Kei, Roa or Little Kei, the
Tayanda, and the Kur group. Great Kei differs physically in
every respect from the other groups. It is of Tertiary formation
(Miocene), and has a chain of volcanic elevations along the
axis, reaching a height of 2600 ft. Its area is 290 sq. m., the
total land area of the group being 572 sq. m. All the other
islands are of post-Tertiary formation and of level surface. The
group has submarine connexion, under relatively shallow sea,
with the Timorlaut group to the south-west and the chain of
islands extending north-west towards Ceram; deep water
separates it on the east from the Aru Islands and on the west
from the inner islands of the Banda Sea. Among the products
are coco-nuts, sago, fish, trepang, timber, copra, maize, yams
