KRAFFT, or Kraft, Adam (c. 1455-1507), sculptor of the Nuremberg school, was born, probably at Nuremberg, about the middle of the 15th century, and died, some say in the hospital, at Schwabach, about 1507. Of his life few particulars are known beyond the dates of several of his works. He seems to have emerged as sculptor about 1490, the date of the seven reliefs of scenes from the life of Christ, which, like almost every other specimen of his work, are at Nuremberg. The date of his last work, an Entombment, with fifteen life-size figures, in the Holzschuher chapel of the St John’s cemetery, is 1507.

Besides these, Krafft’s chief works are several monumental reliefs in the various churches of Nuremberg; the alto-rilievo Entombment outside St Sebald’s church; Christ Bearing the Cross, above the altar of the same church; and various works made for public and private buildings, as the relief over the door of the Wagehaus, a St George and the Dragon, several Madonnas, and some purely decorative pieces, as coats of arms. His masterpiece is perhaps the magnificent tabernacle, 62 feet high, in the church of St Laurence, 1493-1500. See Wanderer’s Adam Kraft und seine Schule, 1869.

KRAJOVA, or Crajova, a town in the circle of Dolschi, Roumania, is situated near the Schyl, a tributary of the Danube, about 110 miles west of Bucharest. There are prosperous salt-works situated in the town; and from its position at the junction of the Carpathian high-roads with the route from Bucharest to Widdin its trade (largely in the hands of Jews) is important. In 1873 its population was 22,764.

Krajova was the former capital of Little Wallachia. In 1397 it was the scene of a victory of the waiwode Marcea over the Turkish sultan Bajazet; and there, in October 1853, a fight between the Russians and Turks took place.

KRANTZ, or Crantz, Albert (c. 1450-1517), German historian, was a native of Hamburg. He studied law, theology, and history at Rostock and Cologne, and after travelling through western and southern Europe was appointed professor, first of philosophy and subsequently of theology, in the university of Rostock, of which he was rector in 1482. In 1492 he returned to Hamburg as theological lecturer, canon, and prebendary in the cathedral. By the senate of Hamburg he was employed on more than one diplomatic mission abroad, and in 1500 he was chosen by the king of Denmark and the duke of Holstein as arbiter in their dispute regarding the province of Dithmarschen. As dean of the cathedral chapter, to which office he was appointed in 1508, Krantz applied himself with zeal to the reform of ecclesiastical abuses, but, though opposed to various corruptions connected with church discipline, he had little sympathy with the drastic measures of Wickliffe or Huss. A deathbed utterance of his, somewhat desponding in its tone, with reference to Luther and his ninety-five theses has occasionally, but unfairly, been interpreted as a summary condemnation of that Reformer. Krantz died December 7, 1517.

Krantz was the author of a number of historical works which for the period when they were written are characterized by exceptional impartiality and research. The principal of these are Chronicon regnorum aquilonarium Daniae, Sueciae, et Norvegiae, Strasburg, 1545; Vandalia, sive historia de Vandalorum vera origine, &c., Cologne, 1519; Saxonia, 1520; and Metropolis sive Historia ecclesiae in Saxonia, 1548. See life by N. Wilckens, Hamburg, 1722.

KRASNOYARSK, a town of eastern Siberia, capital of the extensive province of Yeniseisk, which stretches as a long strip from the Chinese frontier formed by the Sayan mountains to the shores of the Arctic Ocean. It is situated on the left bank of Yenisei river, at its confluence with the Katcha, and on the highway from Moscow to Irkutsk, 662 miles west-north-west from the latter. It was founded by Cossacks in 1628, and during the early years of its existence it was more than once besieged by the Tartars and Kirghiz. It became the capital of the province in 1822, and is now the seat of the provincial administration. Its commercial importance depends entirely upon the gold-washings of the Yeniseisk district, supplies for which are sent from Krasnoyarsk. The climate is very cold, but dry, so that in the steppe which surrounds the town there is but little snow, even in mid-winter. The Yenisei river is frozen for one hundred and sixty days at Krasnoyarsk. Population, 13,000.