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Transcriber's note: A few typographical errors have been corrected: they
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THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA
A DICTIONARY OF ARTS, SCIENCES, LITERATURE AND GENERAL INFORMATION
ELEVENTH EDITION
VOLUME III
AUSTRIA LOWER to BISECTRIX
[E-Text Edition of Volume III - Part 1 of 2, Slice 1 of 3 - AUSTRIA LOWER
to BACON]
* * * * *
INITIALS USED IN VOLUME III. TO IDENTIFY INDIVIDUAL CONTRIBUTORS,[1] WITH
THE HEADINGS OF THE ARTICLES IN THIS VOLUME SO SIGNED.
A. C. P. - ANNA C. PAUES, PH.D.
Lecturer in Germanic Philology at Newnham College, Cambridge. Formerly
Fellow of Newnham College. Author of _A Fourteenth Century Biblical
Version_; &c.
- Bible, English.
A. C. S. - ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
See biographical article: SWINBURNE, ALGERNON C.
- Beaumont and Fletcher.
A. F. P. - ALBERT FREDERICK POLLARD, M.A., F.R.HIST.SOC.
Professor of English History in the University of London. Fellow of All
Souls' College, Oxford. Assistant Editor of the _Dictionary of National
Biography_, 1893-1901. Lothian prizeman (Oxford), 1892; Arnold prizeman,
1898. Author of _England under the Protector Somerset_; _Henry VIII._;
_Life of Thomas Cranmer_; &c.
- Balnaves; Barnes, Robert; Bilney.
A. Go.* - REV. ALEXANDER GORDON, M.A.
Lecturer on Church History in the University of Manchester.
- Beza.
A. G. G. - SIR ALFRED GEORGE GREENHILL, M.A., F.R.S.
Formerly Professor of Mathematics in the Ordnance College, Woolwich. Author
of _Differential and Integral Calculus with Applications_; _Hydrostatics_;
_Notes on Dynamics_; &c.
- Ballistics.
A. Hl. - ARTHUR HASSALL, M.A.
Student and Tutor of Christ Church, Oxford. Author of _A Handbook of
European History_; _The Balance of Power_; &c. Editor of the 3rd edition of
T. H. Dyer's _History of Modern Europe_.
- Austria-Hungary: _History_ (_in part_).
A. H. N. - ALBERT HENRY NEWMAN, LL.D., D.D.
Professor of Church History, Baylor University, Texas. Professor at
McMaster University, Toronto, 1881-1901. Author of _The Baptist Churches in
the United States_; _Manual of Church History_; _A Century of Baptist
Achievement_.
- Baptists: _American_.
A. H.-S. - SIR A. HOUTUM-SCHINDLER, C.I.E.
General in the Persian Army. Author of _Eastern Persian Irak_.
- Azerb[=a]ij[=a]n; Bakhtiari; Bander Abb[=a]si; Barfurush.
A. H. S. - REV. ARCHIBALD HENRY SAYCE, D.LITT., LL.D.
See the biographical article: SAYCE, A. H.
- Babylon; Babylonia and Assyria; Belshazzar; Berossus.
A. J. L. - ANDREW JACKSON LAMOUREUX.
Librarian, College of Agriculture, Cornell University. Editor of the _Rio
News_ (Rio de Janeiro), 1879-1901.
- Bahia: _State_; Bahia: _City_.
A. L. - ANDREW LANG.
See the biographical article: LANG, ANDREW.
- Ballads.
A. N. - ALFRED NEWTON, F.R.S.
See the biographical article: NEWTON, ALFRED.
- Birds of Paradise.
A. P. H. - ALFRED PETER HILLIER, M.D., M.P.
President, South African Medical Congress, 1893. Author of _South African
Studies_; &c. Served in Kaffir War, 1878-1879. Partner with Dr L. S.
Jameson in medical practice in South Africa till 1896. Member of Reform
Committee, Johannesburg, and Political Prisoner at Pretoria, 1895-1896.
M.P. for Hitchin division of Herts, 1910.
- Basutoland: _History_ (_in part_); Bechuanaland (_in part_).
A. Sp. - ARCHIBALD SHARP.
Consulting Engineer and Chartered Patent Agent.
- Bicycle.
A. St H. G. - Alfred St Hill Gibbons.
Major, East Yorkshire Regiment. Explorer in South Central Africa. Author of
_Africa from South to North through Marotseland_.
- Barotse, Barotseland.
A. W.* - ARTHUR WILLEY, F.R.S., D.SC.
Director of Colombo Museum, Ceylon.
- Balanoglossus.
A. W. H.* - ARTHUR WILLIAM HOLLAND.
Formerly Scholar of St John's College, Oxford. Bacon Scholar of Gray's Inn,
1900.
- Austria-Hungary: _History_ (_in part_); Bavaria: _History_ (_in part_).
A. W. Po. - ALFRED WILLIAM POLLARD, M.A.
Assistant Keeper of Printed Books, British Museum. Fellow of King's
College, London. Hon. Secretary Bibliographical Society. Editor of _Books
about Books_; and _Bibliographica_. Joint-editor of the _Library_. Chief
Editor of the "Globe" _Chaucer_.
- Bibliography and Bibliology.
B. K. - PRINCE BOJIDAR KARAGEORGEVITCH (d. 1908).
Artist, art critic, designer and goldsmith. Contributor to the Paris
_Figaro_, the _Magazine of Art_, &c. Author of _Enchanted India_.
Translator of the works of Tolstoi and Jokai, &c.
- Bashkirtseff.
C. - THE EARL OF CREWE, K.G., F.S.A.
See the biographical article: CREWE, 1ST EARL OF.
- Banville.
C. A. C. - CHARLES ARTHUR CONANT.
Member of Commission on International Exchange of U.S., 1903. Treasurer,
Morton Trust Co., New York, 1902-1906. Author of _History of Modern Banks
of Issue_; _The Principles of Money and Banking_; &c.
- Banks and Banking: _American_.
C. B.* - CHARLES BEMONT, D. ES L., LITT.D. (Oxon.).
See the biographical article: BEMONT, C.
- Baluze; Bearn.
C. F. A. - CHARLES FRANCIS ATKINSON.
Formerly Scholar of Queen's College, Oxford. Captain, 1st City of London
(Royal Fusiliers). Author of _The Wilderness and Cold Harbour_.
- Austrian Succession War: _Military_.
C. F. B. - CHARLES FRANCIS BASTABLE, M.A., LL.D.
Regius Professor of Laws and Professor of Political Economy in the
University of Dublin. Author of _Public Finance_; _Commerce of Nations_;
_Theory of International Trade_; &c.
- Bimetallism.
C. H. T. - CUTHBERT HAMILTON TURNER, M.A.
Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford; Fellow of the British Academy.
Speaker's Lecturer in Biblical Studies in the University of Oxford,
1906-1909. First Editor of the _Journal of Theological Studies_, 1899-1902.
Author of "Chronology of the New Testament," and "Greek Patristic
Commentaries on the Pauline Epistles" in Hastings' _Dictionary of the
Bible_, &c.
- Bible: _New Testament Chronology_.
C. H. W. J. - REV. CLAUDE HERMANN WALTER JOHNS, M.A., LITT.D.
Master of St Catharine's College, Cambridge. Lecturer in Assyriology,
Queens' College, Cambridge, and King's College, London. Author of _Assyrian
Deeds and Documents of the 7th Century B.C._; _The Oldest Code of Laws_;
_Babylonian and Assyrian Laws_; _Contracts and Letters_; &c.
- Babylonian Law.
C. J. L. - SIR CHARLES JAMES LYALL, K.C.S.I., C.I.E., LL.D. (Edin.).
Secretary, Judicial and Public Department, India Office. Fellow of King's
College, London. Secretary to Government of India in Home Department,
1889-1894. Chief Commissioner, Central Provinces, India, 1895-1898. Author
of _Translations of Ancient Arabic Poetry_; &c.
- Bih[=a]r[=i] L[=a]l.
C. Mi. - CHEDOMILLE MIJATOVICH.
Senator of the Kingdom of Servia. Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
Plenipotentiary of the King of Servia to the Court of St James's,
1895-1900, and 1902-1903.
- Belgrade.
C. Pl. - REV. CHARLES PLUMMER, M.A.
Fellow and Chaplain of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Ford's Lecturer,
1901. Author of _Life and Times of Alfred the Great_; &c.
- Bede.
C. R. B. - CHARLES RAYMOND BEAZLEY, M.A., D.LITT., F.R.G.S., F.R.HIST.S.
Professor of Modern History in the University of Birmingham. Formerly
Fellow of Merton College, Oxford, and University Lecturer in the History of
Geography. Lothian prizeman (Oxford), 1889. Lowell Lecturer, Boston, 1908.
Author of _Henry the Navigator_; _The Dawn of Modern Geography_; &c.
- Beatus; Behaim.
C. W. W. - SIR CHARLES WILLIAM WILSON, K.C.B., K.C.M.G., F.R.S.
(1836-1907).
Major-General, Royal Engineers. Secretary to the North American Boundary
Commission, 1858-1862. British Commissioner on the Servian Boundary
Commission. Director-General of the Ordnance Survey, 1886-1894.
Director-General of Military Education, 1895-1898. Author of _From Korti to
Khartoum_; _Life of Lord Clive_; &c.
- Beirut (_in part_)
D. B. Ma. - DUNCAN BLACK MACDONALD, D.D.
Professor of Semitic Languages, Hartford Theological Seminary, U.S.A.
- Bairam
D. C. B. - DEMETRIUS CHARLES BOULGER.
Author of _England and Russia in Central Asia_; _History of China_; _Life
of Gordon_; _India in the 19th Century_; _History of Belgium_; _Belgian
Life in Town and Country_; &c.
- Belgium: _Geography and Statistics_.
D. F. T. - DONALD FRANCIS TOVEY.
Balliol College, Oxford. Author of _Essays in Musical Analysis_--comprising
_The Classical Concerto_, _The Goldberg Variations_, and analyses of many
other classical works.
- Bach, J. S.; Beethoven.
D. G. H. - DAVID GEORGE HOGARTH, M.A.
Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford.
Fellow of the British Academy. Excavated at Paphos, 1888; Naukratis, 1899
and 1903; Ephesus, 1904-1905; Assiut, 1906-1907. Director, British School
at Athens, 1897-1900; Director, Cretan Exploration Fund, 1899.
- Baalbek; Barca; Beirut (_in part_); Bengazi.
D. H. - DAVID HANNAY.
Formerly British Vice-Consul at Barcelona. Author of _Short History of
Royal Navy, 1217-1688_; _Life of Emilio Castelar_; &c.
- Austrian Succession War: _Naval_; Aviles; Bainbridge, William; Barbary
Pirates.
D. Mn. - REV. DUGALD MACFADYEN, M.A.
Minister of South Grove Congregational Church, Highgate. Director of the
London Missionary Society.
- Berry, Charles Albert.
D. S. M.* - DAVID SAMUEL MARGOLIOUTH, M.A., D.LITT.
Laudian Professor of Arabic, Oxford; Fellow of New College. Author of
_Arabic Papyri of the Bodleian Library_; _Mohammed and the Rise of Islam_;
_Cairo, Jerusalem and Damascus_.
- Axum.
D. S.-S. - DAVID SETH-SMITH, F.Z.S.
Curator of Birds to the Zoological Society of London. Formerly President of
the Avicultural Society. Author of _Parrakeets, a Practical Handbook to
those Species kept in Captivity_.
- Aviary.
E. B. - EDWARD BRECK, PH.D.
Formerly Foreign Correspondent of the _New York Herald_ and the _New York
Times_. Author of _Wilderness Pets_.
- Base-Ball.
E. Br. - ERNEST BARKER, M.A.
Fellow and Lecturer of St John's College, Oxford. Formerly Fellow and Tutor
of Merton College. Craven Scholar (Oxford), 1895.
- Baldwin I. to IV. of Jerusalem.
E. Cl. - EDWARD CLODD.
Vice-President of the Folk-Lore Society. Author of _Story of Primitive
Man_; _Primer of Evolution_; _Tom Tit Tot_; _Animism_; _Pioneers of
Evolution_.
- Baer.
E. C. B. - RIGHT REV. EDWARD CUTHBERT BUTLER, O.S.B., D.LITT. (Dubl.).
Abbot of Downside Abbey, Bath.
- Basilian Monks; Benedict of Nursia; Benedictines; St Bernardin of Siena.
E. F. S. - EDWARD FAIRBROTHER STRANGE.
Assistant-Keeper, Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington. Member of
Council, Japan Society. Author of numerous works on art subjects;
Joint-editor of Bell's "Cathedral" Series.
- Beardsley, Aubrey Vincent.
E. G. - EDMUND GOSSE, LL.D.
See the biographical article: GOSSE, EDMUND.
- Baggesen; Ballade; Barnfield; Beaumont, Sir John; Belgium: _Literature_;
Biography.
E. G. B. - EDWARD GRANVILLE BROWNE, M.A., M.R.C.S., M.R.A.S.
Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic and Fellow of Pembroke College,
Cambridge. Fellow of the British Academy. Author of _A Traveller's
Narrative, written to Illustrate the Episode of the Bab_; _The New History
of Mirza Ali Muhammed the Bab_; _Literary History of Persia_; &c.
- Babiism.
E. H. M. - ELLIS HOVELL MINNS, M.A.
Lecturer and Assistant Librarian, and formerly Fellow of Pembroke College,
Cambridge. University Lecturer in Palaeography.
- Bastarnae.
Ed. M. - EDUARD MEYER, D.LITT. (Oxon.), LL.D., PH.D.
Professor of Ancient History in the University of Berlin. Author of
_Geschichte des Alterthums_; _Geschichte des alten Aegyptens_; _Die
Israeliten und ihre Nachbarstamme_; &c.
- Bactria; Bagoas; Bahran; Balash; Behistun.
E. Ma. - EDWARD MANSON.
Barrister-at-Law. Joint-editor of _Journal of Comparative Legislation_,
Author of _Short View of the Law of Bankruptcy_; &c.
- Bankruptcy: _Comparative Law_
E. M. T. - SIR EDWARD MAUNDE THOMPSON, G.C.B., D.C.L., LL.D., LITT.D.
Director and Principal Librarian, British Museum, 1888-1909. Fellow of the
British Academy. Corresponding Member of the Institute of France and of the
Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences. Author of _Handbook of Greek and Latin
Palaeography_. Editor of the _Chronicon Angliae_, &c. Joint-editor of
_Publications of the Palaeographical Society_.
- Autographs.
E. N. S. - E. N. STOCKLEY.
Captain, Royal Engineers. Instructor in Construction at the School of
Military Engineering, Chatham. For some time in charge of the Barracks
Design Branch of the War Office.
- Barracks.
E. Pr. - EDGAR PRESTAGE.
Special Lecturer in Portuguese Literature in the University of Manchester.
Commendador, Portuguese Order of S. Thiago. Corresponding Member of Lisbon
Royal Academy of Sciences and Lisbon Geographical Society.
- Azurara; Barros.
E. Tn. - REV. ETHELRED LEONARD TAUNTON (d. 1907).
Author of _The English Black Monks of St Benedict_; _History of the Jesuits
in England_.
- Baronius.
E. V. - REV. EDMUND VENABLES, M.A., D.D. (1819-1895).
Canon and Precentor of Lincoln. Author of _Episcopal Palaces of England_.
- Basilica (_in part_).
F. C. B. - FRANCIS CRAWFORD BURKITT, M.A., D.D.
Norrisian Professor of Divinity, Cambridge. Fellow of the British Academy.
Part-editor of _The Four Gospels in Syriac transcribed from the Sinaitic
Palimpsest_. Author of _The Gospel History and its Transmission_; _Early
Eastern Christianity_; &c.
- Bible: _New Testament, Higher Criticism._
F. C. C. - FREDERICK CORNWALLIS CONYBEARE, M.A., D.TH. (Giessen).
Fellow of the British Academy. Formerly Fellow of University College,
Oxford. Author of _The Ancient Armenian Texts of Aristotle_; _Myth, Magic
and Morals_; &c.
- Baptism.
F. G. - FREDERICK GREENWOOD.
See the biographical article: GREENWOOD, FREDERICK.
- Beaconsfield, Earl of.
F. G. M. B. - FREDERICK GEORGE MEESON BECK, M.A.
Fellow and Lecturer of Clare College, Cambridge.
- Bernicia.
F. Ll. G. - FRANCIS LLEWELYN GRIFFITH, M.A., PH.D., F.S.A.
Reader in Egyptology, Oxford. Editor of the _Archaeological Survey_ and
_Archaeological Reports_ of the Egypt Exploration Fund. Fellow of the
Imperial German Archaeological Institute.
- Bes.
F. L. L. - LADY LUGARD.
See the biographical article: LUGARD, SIR F. J. D.
- Bauchi.
F. P. - FRANK PODMORE, M.A. (d. 1910).
Pembroke College, Oxford. Author of _Studies in Psychical Research_;
_Modern Spiritualism_; &c.
- Automatic Writing.
F. R. C. - FRANK R. CANA.
Author of _South Africa from the Great Trek to the Union_.
- Basutoland (_in part_); Bahr-el-Ghazal (_in part_); Bechuanaland (_in
part_).
F. R. M. - FRANCIS RICHARD MAUNSELL, C.M.G.
Lieut.-Col., Royal Artillery. Military Vice-Consul, Sivas, Trebizond, Van
(Kurdistan), 1897-1898. Military Attache, British Embassy, Constantinople,
1901-1905. Author of _Central Kurdistan_; &c.
- Baiburt; Bashkala.
F. W. R.* - FREDERICK WILLIAM RUDLER, I.S.O., F.G.S.
Curator and Librarian of the Museum of Practical Geology, London,
1879-1902. President of the Geologists' Association, 1887-1889.
- Aventurine; Beryl.
G. A. B. - GEORGE A. BOULENGER, F.R.S., D.SC., PH.D.
In charge of the Collections of Reptiles and Fishes, Department of Zoology,
British Museum. Vice-President of the Zoological Society of London.
- Axolotl; Batrachia.
G. A. Gr. - GEORGE ABRAHAM GRIERSON, C.I.E., PH.D. D.LITT. (Dublin).
Member of the Indian Civil Service, 1873-1903. In charge of Linguistic
Survey of India, 1898-1902. Gold Medallist, Asiatic Society, 1909.
Vice-President of the Royal Asiatic Society. Formerly Fellow of Calcutta
University. Author of _The Languages of India_; &c.
- Bengali; Bihari.
G. B. B. - GERARD BALDWIN BROWN, M.A.
Professor of Fine Arts, University of Edinburgh. Formerly Fellow of
Brasenose College, Oxford. Author of _From Schola to Cathedral_; _The Fine
Arts_; &c.
- Basilica (_in part_).
G. B. G.* - GEORGE BUCHANAN GRAY, M.A., D.D., D.LITT. (Oxon.)
Professor of Hebrew and Old Testament Exegesis, Mansfield College, Oxford.
Examiner in Hebrew, University of Wales. Author of _The Divine Discipline
of Israel_; &c.
- Bible: _Old Testament, Textual Criticism_, and _Higher Criticism_
G. E. - REV. GEORGE EDMUNDSON, M.A., F.R.HIST.S.
Formerly Fellow and Tutor of Brasenose College, Oxford. Ford's Lecturer,
1909. Hon. Member Dutch Historical Society, and Foreign Member, Netherlands
Association of Literature.
- Belgium: _History_.
G. F. Z. - G. F. ZIMMER, A.M.INST.C.E.
Author of _Mechanical Handling of Material_.
- Biscuit.
G. G. S. - GEORGE GREGORY SMITH, M.A.
Professor of English Literature, Queen's University, Belfast. Author of
_The Days of James IV._; _The Transition Period_; _Specimens of Middle
Scots_; &c.
- Barbour, John.
G. H. C. - GEORGE HERBERT CARPENTER, B.SC.
Professor of Zoology in the Royal College of Science, Dublin. President of
the Association of Economic Biologists. Member of the Royal Irish Academy.
Author of _Insects: their Structure and Life_; &c.
- Bee.
G. Sa. - GEORGE EDWARD BATEMAN SAINTSBURY, LL.D., D.LITT.
See the biographical article: SAINTSBURY, G. E. B.
- Balzac, H. de.
G. W. T. - REV. GRIFFITHES WHEELER THATCHER, M.A., B.D.
Warden of Camden College, Sydney, N.S.W. Formerly Tutor in Hebrew and Old
Testament History at Mansfield College, Oxford.
- Avempace; Averroes; Avicenna; Baid[=a]w[=i]; Bal[=a]dhur[=i]; Beh[=a]
ud-D[=i]n; Beh[=a] ud-Din Zuhair; B[=i]r[=u]n[=i].
H. Br. - HENRY BRADLEY, M.A., PH.D.
Joint-editor of the _New English Dictionary_ (Oxford). Fellow of the
British Academy. Author of _The Story of the Goths_; _The Making of
English_; &c.
- Beowulf.
H. Ch. - HUGH CHISHOLM, M.A.
Formerly Scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. Editor of the 11th
edition of the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. Co-editor of the 10th edition.
- Balfour, A. J.
H. C. R. - SIR HENRY CRESWICKE RAWLINSON, BART., K.C.B.
See the biographical article: RAWLINSON, SIR H. C.
- Bagdad: _City_.
H. Fr. - HENRI FRANTZ.
Art Critic, _Gazette des Beaux Arts_ (Paris).
- Barye; Bastien-Lepage; Baudry, P. J. A.
H. F. G. - HANS FRIEDRICH GADOW, F.R.S., PH.D.
Strickland Curator and Lecturer on Zoology in the University of Cambridge.
Author of "Amphibia and Reptiles" in the _Cambridge Natural History_.
- Bird.
H. H. H.* - HERBERT HENSLEY HENSON, M.A., D.D.
Canon of Westminster Abbey and Rector of St Margaret's, Westminster.
Proctor in Convocation since 1902. Formerly Fellow of All Souls' College,
Oxford. Select Preacher (Oxford), 1895-1896; (Cambridge), 1901. Author of
_Apostolic Christianity_; _Moral Discipline in the Christian Church_; _The
National Church_; _Christ and the Nation_; &c.
- Bible, English: _Revised Version_.
H. H. J. - SIR HARRY HAMILTON JOHNSTON, D.SC., G.C.M.G., K.C.B.
See the biographical article: JOHNSTON, SIR H. H.
- Bantu Languages.
H. M. R. - HUGH MUNRO ROSS.
Formerly Exhibitioner of Lincoln College, Oxford. Editor of _The Times
Engineering Supplement_. Author of _British Railways_.
- Bell: _House Bell._
H. M. W. - H. MARSHALL WARD, M.A., F.R.S., D.SC. (d. 1905).
Formerly Professor of Botany, Cambridge. President of the British
Mycological Society. Author of _Timber and some of its Diseases_; _The
Oak_; _Sach's Lectures the Physiology of Plants_; _Grasses_; _Disease in
Plants_; &c.
- Bacteriology (_in part_); Berkeley, Miles Joseph.
H. N. D. - HENRY NEWTON DICKSON, M.A., D.SC., F.R.G.S.
Professor of Geography, University College, Reading. Author of _Elementary
Meteorology_; _Papers on Oceanography_; &c.
- Baltic Sea.
H. W. C. D. - Henry William Carless Davis, M.A.
Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, Oxford. Fellow of All Souls', Oxford,
1895-1902. Author of _Charlemagne_; _England under the Normans and
Angevins, 1066-1272._
- Becket; Benedictus Abbas.
H. W. S. - H. WICKHAM STEED.
Correspondent of _The Times_ at Rome (1897-1902) and Vienna.
- Austria-Hungary: _History_ (_in part_); Bertani.
I. A. - ISRAEL ABRAHAMS, M.A.
Reader in Talmudic and Rabbinic Literature, University of Cambridge.
President, Jewish Historical Society of England. Author of _A Short History
of Jewish Literature_; _Jewish Life in the Middle Ages_; &c.
- Bahya.
J. An. - JOSEPH ANDERSON, LL.D.
Keeper of the National Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh, and Assistant
Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. Honorary Professor of
Antiquities to the Royal Scottish Academy. Author of _Scotland in Early
Christian and Pagan Times_.
- Barrow.
J. A. H. - JOHN ALLEN HOWE, B.SC.
Curator and Librarian at the Museum of Practical Geology, London.
- Avonian; Bajocian; Barton Beds; Bathonian Series; Bed: _Geology_.
J. B. B. - JOHN BAGNELL BURY, LL.D., LITT.D.
See the biographical article: BURY, J. B.
- Baldwin I. and II.: _of Romania_; Basil I. and II.: _Emperors_;
Belisarius.
J. D. B. - JAMES DAVID BOURCHIER, M.A., F.R.G.S.
King's College, Cambridge. Correspondent of _The Times_ in South-Eastern
Europe. Commander of the Orders of Prince Danilo of Montenegro and of the
Saviour of Greece, and Officer of the Order of St Alexander of Bulgaria.
- Balkan Peninsula.
J. F.-K. - JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY, LITT.D., F.R.HIST.S.
Gilmour Professor of Spanish Language and Literature, Liverpool University.
Norman McColl Lecturer, Cambridge University. Fellow of the British
Academy. Member of the Council of the Hispanic Society of America. Knight
Commander of the Order of Alphonso XII. Author of _A History of Spanish
Literature_.
- Ayala y Herrera; Bello.
J. F. St. - JOHN FREDERICK STENNING, M.A.
Dean and Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford. University Lecturer in Aramaic.
Lecturer in Divinity and Hebrew at Wadham College.
- Bible: _Old Testament: Texts and Versions._
J. H. R. - JOHN HORACE ROUND, M.A., LL.D. (Edin.).
Author of _Feudal England_; _Studies in Peerage and Family History_;
_Peerage and Pedigree_; &c.
- Baron; Baronet; Battle Abbey Roll; Bayeux Tapestry; Beauchamp.
J. Hl. R. - JOHN HOLLAND ROSE, M.A., LITT.D.
Christ's College, Cambridge. Lecturer on Modern History to the Cambridge
University Local Lectures Syndicate. Author of _Life of Napoleon I._;
_Napoleonic Studies_; _The Development of the European Nations_; _The Life
of Pitt_; &c.
- Barras; Beauharnais, Eugene de.
J. M. M. - JOHN MALCOLM MITCHELL.
Sometime Scholar of Queen's College, Oxford. Lecturer in Classics, East
London College (University of London). Joint editor of Grote's _History of
Greece_.
- Bacon, Francis (_in part_); Berkeley, George (_in part_).
J. P.-B. - JAMES GEORGE JOSEPH PENDEREL-BRODHURST.
Editor of the _Guardian_ (London).
- Bed: _Furniture_; Berain.
J. G. Sc. - SIR JAMES GEORGE SCOTT, K.C.I.E.
Superintendent and Political Officer, Southern Shan States. Author of
_Burma, a Handbook_; _The Upper Burma Gazetteer_, &c.
- Bhamo.
J. P. E. - JEAN PAUL HIPPOLYTE EMMANUEL ADHEMAR ESMEIN.
Professor of Law in the University of Paris. Officer of the Legion of
Honour. Member of the Institute of France. Author of _Cours elementaire
d'histoire du droit francais_; &c.
- Bailiff: _Bailli_; Basoche.
J. P. Pe. - REV. JOHN PUNNETT PETERS, PH.D., D.D.
Canon Residentiary, Cathedral of New York. Formerly Professor of Hebrew,
University of Pennsylvania. In charge of Expedition of University of
Pennsylvania conducting excavations at Nippur, 1888-1895. Author of
_Scriptures, Hebrew and Christian_; _Nippur, or Explorations and Adventures
on the Euphrates_; &c.
- Bagdad: _Vilayet_; Bagdad: _City_; Basra.
J. R. P. - SIR JOHN RAHERE PAGET, BART., K.C.
Bencher of the Inner Temple. Formerly Gilbart Lecturer on Banking. Author
of _The Law of Banking_; &c.
- Banks and Banking: _English Law_.
J. Sm.* - JOHN SMITH, C.B.
Formerly Inspector-General in Companies' Liquidation, 1890-1904, and
Inspector-General in Bankruptcy.
- Bankruptcy.
J. S. F. - JOHN SMITH FLETT, D.SC., F.G.S.
Petrographer to the Geological Survey. Formerly Lecturer on Petrology in
Edinburgh University. Neill Medallist of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Bigsby Medallist of the Geological Society of London.
- Basalt; Batholite.
J. T. Be. - JOHN T. BEALBY.
Joint author of Stanford's _Europe_. Formerly Editor of the _Scottish
Geographical Magazine_. Translator of Sven Hedin's _Through Asia, Central
Asia and Tibet_, &c.
- Baikal; Bessarabia (_in part_)
J. Vn. - JULIEN VINSON.
Formerly Professor of Hindustani and Tamil at the Ecole des Langues
Orientales, Paris. Author of _Le Basque et les langues mexicaines_; &c.
- Basques (_in part_).
J. V. B. - JAMES VERNON BARTLET, M.A., D.D. (St Andrews).
Professor of Church History, Mansfield College, Oxford. Author of _The
Apostolic Age_; &c.
- Barnabas.
J. W. He. - JAMES WYCLIFFE HEADLAM, M.A.
Staff Inspector of Secondary Schools under the Board of Education. Formerly
Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. Professor of Greek and Ancient History
at Queen's College, London. Author of _Bismarck and the Foundation of the
German Empire_; &c.
- Austria-Hungary: _History_; Bamberger; Bebel; Benedetti; Beust.
K. L. - REV. KIRSOPP LAKE, M.A.
Lincoln College, Oxford. Professor of Early Christian Literature and New
Testament Exegesis in the University of Leiden. Author of _The Text of the
New Testament_; _The Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus
Christ_; &c.
- Bible: _New Testament: Texts and Versions_ and _Textual Criticism_.
K. S. - KATHLEEN SCHLESINGER.
Author of _The Instruments of the Orchestra_.
- Bagpipe; Banjo; Barbiton; Barrel-organ; Bass Clarinet; Basset Horn;
Bassoon; Batyphone.
L. A. - LYMAN ABBOTT, D.D.
See the biographical article: ABBOTT, L.
- Beecher, Henry Ward.
L. P.* - LOUIS MARIE OLIVIER DUCHESNE.
See the biographical article: DUCHESNE, L. M. O.
- Benedict (I.-X.)
L. J. S. - LEONARD JAMES SPENCER, M.A., F.G.S.
Assistant, Department of Mineralogy, Natural History Museum, South
Kensington. Formerly Scholar of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and
Harkness Scholar. Editor of the _Mineralogical Magazine_.
- Autunite; Axinite; Azurite; Barytes; Bauxite; Biotite.
L. V.* - LUIGI VILLARI.
Italian Foreign Office (Emigration Dept.). Formerly Newspaper Correspondent
in East of Europe. Author of _Italian Life in Town and Country_; &c.
- Azeglio; Bandiera, A. and E.; Bassi, Ugo; Bentivoglio, Giovanni.
L. W. K. - LEONARD WILLIAM KING, M.A., F.S.A.
Assistant to the Keeper of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, British
Museum. Lecturer in Assyrian at King's College, London. Conducted
Excavations at Kuyunjik (Nineveh) for British Museum. Author of _Assyrian
Chrestomathy_; _Annals of the Kings of Assyria_; _Studies in Eastern
History_; _Babylonian Magic and Sorcery_; &c.
- Babylonia and Assyria: _Chronology_.
M. A. C. - MAURICE A. CANNEY, M.A.
Assistant Lecturer in Semitic Languages in the University of Manchester.
Formerly Exhibitioner of St John's College, Oxford. Pusey and Ellerton
Hebrew Scholar (Oxford), 1892; Kennicott Hebrew Scholar, 1895; Houghton
Syriac Prize, 1896.
- Baur.
M. Br. - MARGARET BRYANT.
- Beaumont and Fletcher: _Appendix_.
M. D. Ch. - SIR MACKENZIE DALZELL CHALMERS, K.C.B., C.S.I., M.A.
Trinity College, Oxford. Barrister-at-Law. Formerly Permanent
Under-Secretary of State for Home Department. Author of _Digest of the Law
of Bills of Exchange_; &c.
- Bill of Exchange.
M. G. - MOSES GASTER, PH.D. (Leipzig).
Chief Rabbi of the Sephardic Communities of England. Vice-President,
Zionist Congress, 1898, 1899, 1900. Ilchester Lecturer at Oxford on
Slavonic and Byzantine Literature, 1886 and 1891. Author of _A New Hebrew
Fragment of Ben-Sira_; _The Hebrew Version of the Secretum Secretorum of
Aristotle_.
- Bassarab.
M. H. C. - MONTAGUE HUGHES CRACKANTHORPE, K.C., D.C.L.
Honorary Fellow, St John's College, Oxford. Bencher of Lincoln's Inn.
President of the Eugenics Education Society. Formerly Member of the General
Council of the Bar and of the Council of Legal Education, and Standing
Counsel to the University of Oxford.
- Bering Sea Arbitration.
M. Ja. - MORRIS JASTROW, PH.D.
Professor of Semitic Languages, University of Pennsylvania. Author of
_Religion of the Babylonians and Assyrians_; &c.
- Babylonia and Assyria: _Proper Names_; Babylonian and Assyrian Religion;
Bel; Belit.
M. P.* - LEON JACQUES MAXIME PRINET.
Auxiliary of the Institute of France (Academy of Moral and Political
Sciences), Author of _L'Industrie du sel en Franche-Comte._
- Avaray; Bar-le-Duc; Batarnay; Bauffremont; Beauharnais; Beaujeu;
Beauvillier; Bellegarde: _Family._
N. B. W. - N. B. WAGLE.
Formerly Lecturer on Sanskrit at the Robert Money Institution, Bombay.
Vice-President of the London Indian Society. Author of _Industrial
Development of India_; &c.
- Bhau Daji.
N. H. M. - REV. NEWTON HERBERT MARSHALL., M.A., PH.D. (Halle).
Minister of Heath Street Baptist Church, Hampstead, London. Author of
_Gegenwartige Richtungen der Religionsphilosophie in England_; _Theology
and Truth_.
- Baptists.
N. M. - NORMAN MCLEAN, M.A.
Fellow, Lecturer and Librarian of Christ's College, Cambridge. University
Lecturer in Aramaic. Examiner for the Oriental Languages Tripos and the
Theological Tripos at Cambridge.
- Bardais[=a]n; Bar-Hebraeus; Bar-Sal[=i]b[=i].
N. V. - JOSEPH MARIE NOEL VALOIS.
Member of the Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. Honorary
Archivist at the Archives Nationales. Formerly President of the Societe de
l'Histoire de France and of the Societe de l'Ecole de Chartes.
- Basel, Council of; Benedict XIII. (_anti-pope_).
N. W. T. - NORTHCOTE WHITBRIDGE THOMAS, M.A.
Government Anthropologist to Southern Nigeria. Corresponding Member of the
Societe d'Anthropologie de Paris. Author of _Thought Transference_;
_Kinship and Marriage in Australia_; &c.
- Automatism.
O. Ba. - OSWALD BARRON, F.S.A.
Editor of The _Ancestor_, 1902-1905.
- Beard; Berkeley (_Family_); Bill (_Weapon_).
O. Br. - OSCAR BRILIANT.
- Austria-Hungary: _Statistics_.
O. Hr. - OTTO HENKER, PH.D.
On the Staff of the Carl Zeiss Factory, Jena, Germany.
- Binocular Instrument.
P. A. - PAUL DANIEL ALPHANDERY.
Professor of the History of Dogma, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes,
Sorbonne, Paris. Author of _Les Idees morales chez les heterodoxes latines
au debut du XIII^e siecle_.
- Auto-da-Fe.
P. A. A. - PHILIP A. ASHWORTH, M.A., DOC.JURIS.
New College, Oxford. Barrister-at-Law. Translator of H. R. von Gneist's
_History of the English Constitution_.
- Bavaria: _Statistics_; Berlin.
P. A. K. - PRINCE PETER ALEXEIVITCH KROPOTKIN.
See the biographical article: KROPOTKIN, P. A.
- Baikal; Baku; Bessarabia (_in part_).
P. C. M. - PETER CHALMERS MITCHELL, M.A., F.R.S., F.Z.S., D.SC., LL.D.
Secretary to the Zoological Society of London. University Demonstrator in
Comparative Anatomy and Assistant to Linacre Professor at Oxford,
1888-1891. Examiner in Zoology to the University of London, 1903. Author of
_Outlines of Biology_; &c.
- Biogenesis; Biology.
P. C. Y. - PHILIP CHESNEY YORKE, M.A.
Magdalen College, Oxford.
- Balfour, Sir James.
P. Gi. - PETER GILES, M.A., LITT.D., LL.D.
Fellow and Classical Lecturer of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. University
Reader in Comparative Philology. Formerly Secretary of the Cambridge
Philological Society. Author of _Manual of Comparative Philology_; &c.
- B.
P. S. - PHILIP SCHIDROWITZ, PH.D., F.C.S.
Member of Council, Institute of Brewing; Member of Committee of Society of
Chemical Industry. Author of numerous articles on the Chemistry and
Technology of Brewing, Distilling, &c.
- Beer.
R. A.* - ROBERT ANCHEL.
Archivist of the Departement de l'Eure.
- Billaud-Varenne.
R. Ad. - ROBERT ADAMSON, M.A., LL.D.
See the biographical article: ADAMSON, ROBERT.
- Bacon, Francis; Bacon, Roger; Beneke; Berkeley, Bishop.
R. A. S. M. - ROBERT ALEXANDER STEWART MACALISTER, M.A., F.S.A.
St John's College, Cambridge. Director of Excavations for the Palestine
Exploration Fund. Joint author of _Excavations in Palestine, 1898-1900._
- Bashan; Bethlehem.
R. C. J. - SIR RICHARD CLAVERHOUSE JEBB, LL.D., D.C.L., LITT.D.
See the biographical article: JEBB, SIR RICHARD C.
- Bacchylides.
R. Gn. - SIR ROBERT GIFFEN, F.R.S.
See the biographical article: GIFFEN, SIR R.
- Bagehot; Balance Of Trade.
R. H. C. - REV. ROBERT HENRY CHARLES, M.A., D.D., LITT.D. (Oxon.).
Grinfield Lecturer and Lecturer in Biblical Studies, Oxford. Fellow of the
British Academy. Formerly Senior Moderator of Trinity College, Dublin.
Author and Editor of _Book of Enoch_; _Book of Jubilees_; _Apocalypse of
Baruch_; _Assumption of Moses_; _Ascension of Isaiah_; _Testaments of XII.
Patriarchs_; &c.
- Baruch.
R. H. I. P. - SIR ROBERT HARRY INGLIS PALGRAVE, F.R.S.
Director of Barclay & Co., Ltd., Bankers. Editor of the _Economist_,
1871-1883. Author of _Notes on Banking in Great Britain and Ireland,
Sweden, Denmark and Hamburg_; &c. Editor of _Dictionary of Political
Economy._
- Banks and Banking: _General_.
R. J. M. - RONALD JOHN MCNEILL, M.A.
Christ Church, Oxford. Barrister-at-Law. Formerly Editor of the _St James's
Gazette_ (London).
- Beresford, John.
R. L.* - RICHARD LYDEKKER, F.R.S., F.G.S., F.Z.S.
Trinity College, Cambridge. Member of the Staff of the Geological Survey of
India, 1874-1882. Author of _Catalogues of Fossil Mammals, Reptiles and
Birds in British Museum_; _The Deer of all Lands_; &c.
- Avahi; Aye-Aye; Babirusa; Baboon; Beaver.
R. L. S. - ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
See the biographical article: STEVENSON, R. L. B.
- Beranger.
R. M.* - ROBERT MUIR, M.A., M.D., F.R.C.P. (Edin.).
Professor of Pathology, University of Glasgow. Professor of Pathology at St
Andrews, 1898-1899. Author of _Manual of Bacteriology_; &c.
- Bacteriology: _Pathological Aspects_.
R. N. B. - ROBERT NISBET BAIN (d. 1909).
Assistant Librarian, British Museum, 1883-1909. Author of _Scandinavia: the
Political History of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, 1513-1900_; _The First
Romanovs, 1613-1725_; _Slavonic Europe: the Political History of Poland and
Russia from 1469 to 1796_; _Charles XII. and the Collapse of the Swedish
Empire_; _Gustavus III. and his Contemporaries_; _The Pupils of Peter the
Great_; &c.
- Bakocz; Balassa; Banffy; Bar, Confederation of; Baross; Basil; Bathory;
Batthyany; Bela III. and IV; Bern; Beothy; Bernstorff; Bestuzhev-Ryumin;
Bethlen; Bezborodko; Biren.
S. A. C. - STANLEY ARTHUR COOK, M.A.
Editor for Palestine Exploration Fund. Lecturer and formerly Fellow,
Gonville and Caius College. Author of _Glossary of Aramaic Inscriptions_;
_The Laws of Moses and Code of Hammurabi_; _Critical Notes on Old Testament
History_; &c.
- Baal; Benjamin.
S. C. - SIDNEY COLVIN, M.A., LITT.D.
See the biographical article: COLVIN, SIDNEY.
- Baldovinetti; Bellini.
S. R. D. - SAMUEL ROLLES DRIVER, D.D., LITT.D.
See the biographical article: DRIVER, S. R.
- Bible: _Old Testament: Canon_ and _Chronology_.
T. A. J. - THOMAS ATHOL JOYCE, M.A.
Assistant in Department of Ethnography, British Museum. Hon. Sec., Royal
Anthropological Institute.
- Bechuana.
T. As. - THOMAS ASHBY, M.A., D.LITT. (Oxon.), F.S.A.
Director of British School of Archaeology at Rome. Formerly Scholar of
Christ Church, Oxford. Craven Fellow (Oxford). Corresponding Member of the
Imperial German Archaeological Institute. Author of the _Classical
Topography of the Roman Campagna_; &c.
- Auximum; Avella; Avellino; Avernus; Baiae; Bari; Barletta; Bassano;
Belluno; Benevento; Bergamo; Bertinoro.
T. A. I. - THOMAS ALLAN INGRAM, M.A., LL.D.
Trinity College, Dublin.
- Bailiff; Bill (_law_); Bill of Sale.
T. Ba. - SIR THOMAS BARCLAY, M.P.
Member of the Institute of International Law. Member of the Supreme Council
of the Congo Free State. Officer of the Legion of Honour. Author of
_Problems of International Practice and Diplomacy_; &c. M.P. for Blackburn,
1910.
- Belligerency.
T. E. H. - THOMAS ERSKINE HOLLAND, K.C., D.C.L., LL.D.
Fellow of the British Academy. Fellow of All Souls' College, Oxford.
Formerly Professor of International Law in the University of Oxford.
Bencher of Lincoln's Inn. Author of _Studies in International Law_; _The
Elements of Jurisprudence_; _Alberici Gentilis de jure belli_; _The Laws of
War on Land_; _Neutral Duties in a Maritime War_; &c.
- Bentham, Jeremy.
T. G. C. - THOMAS G. CARVER, M.A., K.C. (d. 1906).
Formerly Scholar of St John's College, Cambridge. 8th Wrangler, 1871.
Author of _On the Law Relating to the Carriage of Goods by Sea_.
- Average.
T. H. D. - REV. THOMAS HERBERT DARLOW, M.A.
Literary Superintendent of the British and Foreign Bible Society. Sometime
Scholar of Clare College, Cambridge. Author of _Historical Catalogue of
Printed Editions of Holy Scriptures_ (vol. i. with H. G. Moule); &c.
- Bible Societies.
T. H. H. - THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY, F.R.S.
See the biographical article: HUXLEY, THOMAS H.
- Biology (_in part_).
T. H. H.* - SIR THOMAS HUNGERFORD HOLDICH K.C.M.G., K.C.I.E., D.SC.,
F.R.G.S.
Colonel in the Royal Engineers. Superintendent, Frontier Surveys, India,
1892-1898. Gold Medallist, R.G.S. (London), 1887. H. M. Commissioner for
the Persa-Beluch Boundary, 1896. Author of _The Indian Borderland_; _The
Gates of India_; &c.
- Badakshan; Bahrein Islands; Bajour; Balkh; Baluchistan; Bamian; Bela;
Bhutan.
T. L. P. - REV. THOMAS LESLIE PAPILLON, M.A.
Hon. Canon of St Albans. Formerly Fellow, Dean and Tutor of New College,
Oxford. Fellow of Merton College. Author of _Manual of Comparative
Philology_; &c.
- Bell.
T. O. - THOMAS OKEY.
Examiner in Basket Work for the City of London Guilds and Institute.
- Basket.
T. W. R. D. - T. W. RHYS DAVIDS, M.A., LL.D., PH.D.
Professor of Comparative Religion in the University of Manchester. Formerly
Professor of Pali and Buddhist Literature, University College, London.
Fellow of the British Academy. Secretary and Librarian of the Royal Asiatic
Society, 1885-1902. Author of _Early Buddhism_; _Buddhist India_; &c.
- Bharahat.
V. H. B. - VERNON HERBERT BLACKMAN, M.A., D.SC.
Professor of Botany in the University of Leeds. Formerly Fellow of St
John's College, Cambridge.
- Bacteriology: _Botany_
W. A. B. C. - REV. WILLIAM AUGUSTUS BREVOORT COOLIDGE, M.A., F.R.G.S.,
PH.D.
Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford. Professor of English History, St
David's College Lampeter, 1880-1881. Author of _Guide to Switzerland_; _The
Alps in Nature and in History_; &c. Editor of the _Alpine Journal_,
1880-1889.
- Baden: _Switzerland_; Barcelonnette; Basel; Basses-Alpes; Beaulieu;
Bellinzona; Bern; Bienne.
W. A. G. - WALTER ARMSTRONG GRAHAM.
His Siamese Majesty's Resident Commissioner for the Siamese Malay State of
Kelantan. Commander, Order of the White Elephant. Member of the Burma Civil
Service, 1889-1903. Author of _The French Roman Catholic Mission in Siam_;
_Kelantan, a Handbook_; &c.
- Bangkok.
W. A. P. - WALTER ALISON PHILLIPS, M.A.
Formerly Exhibitioner of Merton College and Senior Scholar of St John's
College, Oxford. Author of _Modern Europe_; _The War of Greek
Independence_; &c.
- Austria-Hungary: _History_ (_in part_); Babeuf; Balance of Power; Baron;
Bates; Bavaria: _History_; Beguines; Berlin: _Congress and Treaty of_;
Bernard, St.; Biretta.
W. Bo. - WILHELM BOUSSET, D.TH.
Professor of New Testament Exegesis in the University of Gottingen. Author
of _Das Wesen der Religion_; _The Antichrist Legend_; &c.
- Basilides.
W. B. Ca. - W. BROUGHTON CARR.
Formerly Editor of the _British Bee Journal_ and the _Bee-Keepers' Record_.
- Bee: _Bee-keeping_.
W. C. P. - WILLIAM CHARLES POPPLEWELL, M.SC., A.M.I.C.E.
Lecturer in Engineering in Manchester School of Technology (University of
Manchester). Author of _Compressed Air_; _Heat Engines_; &c.
- Bellows and Blowing Machines.
W. E. D. - WILLIAM ERNEST DALBY, M.A., M.INST.C.E., M.I.M.E.
Professor of Civil and Mechanical Engineering at the City and Guilds of
London Institute Central Technical College, South Kensington. Associate
Member of the Institute of Naval Architects. Author of _The Balancing of
Engines_; _Valves and Valve Gear Mechanisms_; &c.
- Bearings.
W. E. G. - SIR WILLIAM EDMUND GARSTIN, G.C.M.G.
Governing Director, Suez Canal Co. Formerly Inspector-General of
Irrigation, Egypt. Adviser to the Ministry of Public Works in Egypt,
1904-1908.
- Bahr-el-Ghazal (_in part_).
W. H. Be. - WILLIAM HENRY BENNETT, M.A., D.D., D.LITT. (Cantab.).
Professor of Old Testament Exegesis in New and Hackney Colleges, London.
Formerly Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge. Lecturer in Hebrew at
Firth College, Sheffield. Author of _Religion of the Post-Exilic Prophets_;
&c.
- Balaam; Beelzebub.
W. H. Ha. - WILLIAM HENRY HADOW, M.A., MUS.DOC.
Principal, Armstrong College, Newcastle-on-Tyne. Formerly Fellow and Tutor
of Worcester College, Oxford. Member of Council, Royal College of Music.
Editor _Oxford History of Music_. Author of _Studies in Modern Music_; &c.
- Bach, K. P. E.
W. J. H.* - WILLIAM JAMES HUGHAN.
Past Senior Grand Deacon of Freemasons of England, 1874. Hon. Senior Warden
of Grand Lodges of Egypt, Quebec and Iona, &c.
- Banker-Marks.
W. L. D. - WILLIAM LESLIE DAVIDSON, LL.D.
Professor of Logic and Metaphysics, Aberdeen University. Author of _The
Logic of Definition_; _Christian Ethics_; &c. Editor of Alexander Bain's
_Autobiography_.
- Bain, Alexander.
W. M. S. - WILLIAM MILLIGAN SLOANE, PH.D., LL.D.
Professor of History, Columbia University, New York. Secretary to George
Bancroft while American Ambassador in Berlin, 1872-1875. Author of _Life of
Napoleon Bonaparte_.
- Bancroft, George.
W. P. C. - WILLIAM PRIDEAUX COURTNEY.
See the article: COURTNEY, L. H., BARON.
- Bath, William Pulteney, Marquess of.
W. P. J. - WILLIAM PRICE JAMES.
University College, Oxford. Barrister-at-Law. High Bailiff of County
Courts, Cardiff. Author of _Romantic Professions_; &c.
- Barrie, J. M.
W. P. R. - HON. WILLIAM PEMBER REEVES.
Director of London School of Economics. Agent-General and High Commissioner
for New Zealand, 1896-1909. Minister of Education, Labour and Justice, New
Zealand, 1891-1896. Author of _The Long White Cloud, a History of New
Zealand_; &c.
- Ballance, John.
W. R. L. - W. R. LETHABY, F.S.A.
Principal of the Central School of Arts and Crafts under the London County
Council. Author of _Architecture, Mysticism and Myth_; &c.
- Baptistery.
W. Sa. - WILLIAM SANDAY, D.D., LL.D., LITT.D.
Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity, arid Canon of Christ Church, Oxford.
Chaplain in Ordinary to His Majesty the King. Hon. Fellow of Exeter
College, Oxford. Fellow of the British Academy. Author of _Inspiration_
(Bampton Lecture, 1893); _Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans_; &c.
- Bible: _New Testament: Canon_.
W. T. Ca. - WILLIAM THOMAS CALMAN, D.SC., F.Z.S.
Assistant in charge of Crustacea, Natural History Museum, South Kensington.
Author of "Crustacea" in Lankester's _Treatise on Zoology_.
- Barnacle.
W. T. T.-D. - SIR WILLIAM TURNER THISELTON-DYER, F.R.S., K.C.M.G., C.I.E.,
D.SC. LL.D., PH.D., F.L.S.
Hon. Student of Christ Church, Oxford. Director, Royal Botanic Gardens,
Kew, 1885-1905. Botanical Adviser to Secretary of State for Colonies,
1902-1906. Joint-author of _Flora of Middlesex_. Editor of _Flora Capenses_
and _Flora of Tropical Africa_.
- Bentham, George.
W. W. - WILLIAM WALLACE, M.A.
See the biographical article: WALLACE, WILLIAM (1844-1897).
- Averroes; Avicenna.
W. We. - REV. WENTWORTH WEBSTER (d. 1906).
Author of _Basque Legends_; &c.
- Basque Provinces; Basques.
W. Wr. - WILLISTON WALKER, PH.D., D.D.
Professor of Church History, Yale University. Author of _History of the
Congregational Churches in the United States_; _The Reformation_; _John
Calvin_; &c.
- Bacon, Leonard.
W. R. S. - W. ROBERTSON SMITH, LL.D.
See the biographical article: SMITH, WILLIAM ROBERTSON.
- Baal.
W. W. R.* - WILLIAM WALKER ROCKWELL, LIC.THEOL.
Assistant Professor of Church History, Union Theological Seminary, New
York. Author of _Die Doppeleke des Landgrafen Philipp von Hessen_.
- Benedict XI., XII., XIII., XIV.
* * * * *
PRINCIPAL UNSIGNED ARTICLES
Azo Compounds.
Azoimide.
Azores.
Baader, F. X.
Baber.
Baby-Farming.
Bachelor.
Backgammon.
Baden: _Grand Duchy_.
Badger.
Badminton.
Bagatelle.
Bahamas.
Balaklava.
Bale, John.
Baliol.
Ballet.
Ballot.
Balneotherapeutics.
Bamboo.
Ban.
Banana.
Bank-notes.
Barbados.
Barbarossa.
Barbed Wire.
Barcelona.
Barclay, Alexander.
Barere de Vieuzac.
Barium.
Barlaam and Josaphat.
Barley.
Barnes, William.
Barometer.
Barrister.
Barrow, Isaac.
Bastiat, F.
Bastille.
Baths.
Battery.
Baudelaire.
Bautzen.
Baxter, Richard.
Bayard, P. T.
Bazaine.
Bean.
Bear.
Bear-Baiting and Bull-Baiting.
Beaton.
Beaufort: _Family_.
Beaufort, Henry.
Beaumarchais.
Beaumont: _Family_.
Becher.
Beddoes, Thomas Lovell.
Bedford, Earls and Dukes of.
Bedfordshire.
Bedouins.
Beecher, Lyman.
Behar.
Beheading.
Bejart.
Belfast: _Ireland_.
Belfort: _Town_.
Bell, Sir Charles.
Belladonna.
Bellarmine.
Bellary.
Belle-Isle, C. L. A. F., Duc de.
Benares.
Benedek.
Benediction.
Benefice.
Benevolence.
Bengal.
Bengel.
Benin.
Benjamin (Judah Philip).
Benson (Archbishop of Canterbury).
Bentley, Richard.
Benton.
Benzaldehyde.
Benzene.
Benzoic Acid.
Berar.
Berbers.
Berengarius.
Beresford, Lord Charles.
Beresford, Viscount.
Bergen.
Beri-Beri.
Berkshire.
Berlioz.
Bermondsey.
Bermudas.
Bernhardt, Sarah.
Bernouilli.
Berthelot.
Berwick (Duke of).
Berwickshire.
Berwick-upon-Tweed.
Beryllium.
Besancon.
Bessemer, Sir Henry.
Bet and Betting.
Betrothal.
Beyle.
Bezique.
Bhagalpur.
Bible Christians.
Bichromates and Chromates.
Bidder.
Bigamy.
Bijapur.
Bikanir.
Bilaspur.
Bilbao.
Billiards.
Binomial.
Birch.
Birkenhead.
Birmingham.
Birney, James G.
Biron, Armand de Gontaut.
Birth.
Biscay (Vizcaya).
[1] A complete list, showing all individual contributors, appears in the
final volume.
* * * * *
[v.03 p.0001]
ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA
ELEVENTH EDITION
VOLUME III
* * * * *
AUSTRIA, LOWER (Ger. _Niederoesterreich_ or _Oesterreich unter der Enns_,
"Austria below the river Enns"), an archduchy and crownland of Austria,
bounded E. by Hungary, N. by Bohemia and Moravia, W. by Bohemia and Upper
Austria, and S. by Styria. It has an area of 7654 sq. m. and is divided
into two parts by the Danube, which enters at its most westerly point, and
leaves it at its eastern extremity, near Pressburg. North of this line is
the low hilly country, known as the _Waldviertel_, which lies at the foot
and forms the continuation of the Bohemian and Moravian plateau. Towards
the W. it attains in the Weinsberger Wald, of which the highest point is
the Peilstein, an altitude of 3478 ft., and descends towards the valley of
the Danube through the Gfoehler Wald (2368 ft.) and the Manhartsgebirge
(1758 ft.). Its most south-easterly offshoots are formed by the Bisamberg
(1180 ft.), near Vienna, just opposite the Kahlenberg. The southern
division of the province is, in the main, mountainous and hilly, and is
occupied by the Lower Austrian Alps and their offshoots. The principal
groups are: the Voralpe (5802 ft.), the Duerrenstein (6156 ft.), the
Oetscher (6205 ft.), the Raxalpe (6589 ft.) and the Schneeberg (6806 ft.),
which is the highest summit in the whole province. To the E. of the famous
ridge of Semmering are the groups of the Wechsel (5700 ft.) and the
Leithagebirge (1674 ft.). The offshoots of the Alpine group are formed by
the Wiener Wald, which attains an altitude of 2929 ft. in the Schoepfl and
ends N.W. of Vienna in the Kahlenberg (1404 ft.) and Leopoldsberg (1380
ft.).
Lower Austria belongs to the watershed of the Danube, which with the
exception of the Lainsitz, which is a tributary of the Moldau, receives all
the other rivers of the province. Its principal affluents on the right are:
the Enns, Ybbs, Erlauf, Pielach, Traisen, Wien, Schwechat, Fischa and
Leitha; on the left the Isper, Krems, Kamp, Goellersau and the March.
Besides the Danube, only the Enns and the March are navigable rivers.
Amongst the small Alpine lakes, the Erlaufsee and the Lunzer See are worth
mentioning. Of its mineral springs, the best known are the sulphur springs
of Baden, the iodine springs of Deutsch-Altenburg, the iron springs of
Pyrawarth, and the thermal springs of Voeslau. In general the climate,
which varies with the configuration of the surface, is moderate and
healthy, although subject to rapid changes of temperature. Although 43.4%
of the total area is arable land, the soil is only of moderate fertility
and does not satisfy the wants of this thickly-populated province. Woods
occupy 34.2%, gardens and meadows 13.1% and pastures 3.2%. Vineyards occupy
2% of the total area and produce a good wine, specially those on the sunny
slopes of the Wiener Wald. Cattle-rearing is not well developed, but game
and fish are plentiful. Mining is only of slight importance, small
quantities of coal and iron-ore being extracted in the Alpine foothill
region; graphite is found near Muehldorf. From an industrial point of view,
Lower Austria stands, together with Bohemia and Moravia, in the front rank
amongst the Austrian provinces. The centre of its great industrial activity
is the capital, Vienna (_q.v._); but in the region of the Wiener Wald up to
the Semmering, owing to its many waters, which can be transformed into
motive power, many factories are spread. The principal industries are, the
metallurgic and textile industries in all their branches, milling, brewing
and chemicals; paper, leather and silk; cloth, _objets de luxe_ and
millinery; physical and musical instruments; sugar, tobacco factories and
foodstuffs. The very extensive commerce of the province has also its centre
in Vienna. The population of Lower Austria in 1900 was 3,100,493, which
corresponds to 405 inhabitants per sq. m. It is, therefore, the most
densely populated province of Austria. According to the language in common
use, 95% of the population [v.03 p.0002] was German, 4.66% was Czech, and
the remainder was composed of Poles, Slovaks, Ruthenians, Croatians and
Italians. According to religion 92.47% of the inhabitants were Roman
Catholics; 5.07% were Jews; 2.11% were Protestants and the remainder
belonged to the Greek church. In the matter of education, Lower Austria is
one of the most advanced provinces of Austria, and 99.8% of the children of
school-going age attended school regularly in 1900. The local diet is
composed of 78 members, of which the archbishop of Vienna, the bishop of St
Poelten and the rector of the Vienna University are members _ex officio_.
Lower Austria sends 64 members, to the Imperial Reichsrat at Vienna. For
administrative purposes, the province is divided into 22 districts and
three towns with autonomous municipalities: Vienna (1,662,269), the capital
(since 1905 including Floridsdorf, 36,599), Wiener-Neustadt (28,438) and
Waidhofen on the Ybbs (4447). Other principal towns are: Baden (12,447),
Bruck on the Leitha (5134), Schwechat (8241), Korneuburg (8298), Stokerau
(10,213), Krems (12,657), Moedling (15,304), Reichenau (7457), Neunkirchen
(10,831), St Poelten (14,510) and Klosterneuburg (11,595).
The original archduchy, which included Upper Austria, is the nucleus of the
Austrian empire, and the oldest possession of the house of Habsburg in its
present dominions.
See F. Umlauft, _Das Erzherzogtum Oesterreich unter der Enns_, vol. i. of
the collection _Die Lander Oesterreich-Ungarns in Wort und Bild_ (Vienna,
1881-1889, 15 vols.); _Die oesterreichisch-ungarische Monarchie in Wort und
Bild_, vol. 4. (Vienna. 1886-1902, 24 vols.); M. Vansca, _Gesch. Nieder- u.
Ober-Oesterreichs_ (in Heeren's _Staatengesch._, Gotha, 1905).
AUSTRIA, UPPER (Ger. _Oberoesterreich_ or _Oesterreich ob der Enns_,
"Austria above the river Enns"), an archduchy and crown-land of Austria,
bounded N. by Bohemia, W. by Bavaria, S. by Salzburg and Styria, and E. by
Lower Austria. It has an area of 4631 sq. m. Upper Austria is divided by
the Danube into two unequal parts. Its smaller northern part is a
prolongation of the southern angle of the Bohemian forest and contains as
culminating points the Ploecklstein (4510 ft.) and the Sternstein (3690
ft.). The southern part belongs to the region of the Eastern Alps,
containing the Salzkammergut and Upper Austrian Alps, which are found
principally in the district of Salzkammergut (_q.v._). To the north of
these mountains, stretching towards the Danube, is the Alpine foothill
region, composed partly of terraces and partly of swelling undulations, of
which the most important is the Hausruckwald. This is a wooded chain of
mountains, with many branches, rich in brown coal and culminating in the
Goeblberg (2950 ft.). Upper Austria belongs to the watershed of the Danube,
which flows through it from west to east, and receives here on the right
the Inn with the Salzach, the Traun, the Enns with the Steyr and on its
left the Great and Little Muehl rivers. The Schwarzenberg canal between the
Great Muehl and the Moldau establishes a direct navigable route between the
Danube and the Elbe. The climate of Upper Austria, which varies according
to the altitude, is on the whole moderate; it is somewhat severe in the
north, but is mild in Salzkammergut. The population of the duchy in 1900
was 809,918, which is equivalent to 174.8 inhabitants per sq. m. It has the
greatest density of population of any of the Alpine provinces. The
inhabitants are almost exclusively of German stock and Roman Catholics. For
administrative purposes, Upper Austria is divided into two autonomous
municipalities, Linz (58,778) the capital, and Steyr (17,592) and 12
districts. Other principal towns are Wels (12,187), Ischl (9646) and
Gmunden (7126). The local diet, of which the bishop of Linz is a member _ex
officio_, is composed of 50 members and the duchy sends 22 members to the
Reichsrat at Vienna. The soil in the valleys and on the lower slopes of the
hills is fertile, indeed 35.08% of the whole area is arable. Agriculture is
well developed and relatively large quantities of the principal cereals are
produced. Upper Austria has the largest proportion of meadows in all
Austria, 18.54%, while 2.49% is lowland and Alpine pasturage. Of the
remainder, woods occupy 34.02%, gardens 1.99% and 4.93% is unproductive.
Cattle-breeding is also in a very advanced stage and together with the
timber-trade forms a considerable resource of the province. The principal
mineral wealth of Upper Austria is salt, of which it extracts nearly 50% of
the total Austrian production. Other important products are lignite, gypsum
and a variety of valuable stones and clays. There are about thirty mineral
springs, the best known being the salt baths of Ischl and the iodine waters
at Hall. The principal industries are the iron and metal manufactures,
chiefly centred at Steyr. Next in importance are the machine, linen, cotton
and paper manufactures, the milling, brewing and distilling industries and
shipbuilding. The principal articles of export are salt, stone, timber,
live-stock, woollen and iron wares and paper.
See Edlbacher, _Landeskunde von Oberoesterreich_ (Linz, 2nd ed., 1883);
Vansca, _op. cit._ in the preceding article.
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY, or the AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN MONARCHY (Ger.
_Oesterreichisch-ungarische Monarchie_ or _Oesterreichisch-ungarisches
Reich_), the official name of a country situated in central Europe, bounded
E. by Russia and Rumania, S. by Rumania, Servia, Turkey and Montenegro, W.
by the Adriatic Sea, Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the German
Empire, and N. by the German Empire and Russia. It occupies about the
sixteenth part of the total area of Europe, with an area (1905) of 239,977
sq. m. The monarchy consists of two independent states: the kingdoms and
lands represented in the council of the empire (_Reichsrat_), unofficially
called Austria (_q.v._) or Cisleithania; and the "lands of St Stephen's
Crown," unofficially called Hungary (_q.v._) or Transleithania. It received
its actual name by the diploma of the emperor Francis Joseph I. of the 14th
of November 1868, replacing the name of the Austrian Empire under which the
dominions under his sceptre were formerly known. The Austro-Hungarian
monarchy is very often called unofficially the Dual Monarchy. It had in
1901 a population of 45,405,267 inhabitants, comprising therefore within
its borders, about one-eighth of the total population of Europe. By the
Berlin Treaty of 1878 the principalities of Bosnia and Herzegovina with an
area of 19,702 sq. m., and a population (1895) of 1,591,036 inhabitants,
owning Turkey as suzerain, were placed under the administration of
Austria-Hungary, and their annexation in 1908 was recognized by the Powers
in 1909, so that they became part of the dominions of the monarchy.
_Government_.--The present constitution of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy
(see AUSTRIA) is based on the Pragmatic Sanction of the emperor Charles
VI., first promulgated on the 19th of April 1713, whereby the succession to
the throne is settled in the dynasty of Habsburg-Lorraine, descending by
right of primogeniture and lineal succession to male heirs, and, in case of
their extinction, to the female line, and whereby the indissolubility and
indivisibility of the monarchy are determined; is based, further, on the
diploma of the emperor Francis Joseph I. of the 20th of October 1860,
whereby the constitutional form of government is introduced; and, lastly,
on the so-called _Ausgleich_ or "Compromise," concluded on the 8th of
February 1867, whereby the relations between Austria and Hungary were
regulated.
The two separate states--Austria and Hungary--are completely independent of
each other, and each has its own parliament and its own government. The
unity of the monarchy is expressed in the common head of the state, who
bears the title Emperor of Austria and Apostolic King of Hungary, and in
the common administration of a series of affairs, which affect both halves
of the Dual Monarchy. These are: (1) foreign affairs, including diplomatic
and consular representation abroad; (2) the army, including the navy, but
excluding the annual voting of recruits, and the special army of each
state; (3) finance in so far as it concerns joint expenditure.
For the administration of these common affairs there are three joint
ministries: the ministry of foreign affairs and of the imperial and royal
house, the ministry of war, and the ministry of finance. It must be noted
that the authority of the joint ministers is restricted to common affairs,
and that they are not allowed to direct or exercise any influence on
affairs of government affecting separately one of the halves of the
monarchy. [v.03 p.0003] The minister of foreign affairs conducts the
international relations of the Dual Monarchy, and can conclude
international treaties. But commercial treaties, and such state treaties as
impose burdens on the state, or parts of the state, or involve a change of
territory, require the parliamentary assent of both states. The minister of
war is the head for the administration of all military affairs, except
those of the Austrian _Landwehr_ and of the Hungarian _Honveds_, which are
committed to the ministries for national defence of the two respective
states. But the supreme command of the army is vested in the monarch, who
has the power to take all measures regarding the whole army. It follows,
therefore, that the total armed power of the Dual Monarchy forms a whole
under the supreme command of the sovereign. The minister of finance has
charge of the finances of common affairs, prepares the joint budget, and
administers the joint state debt. (Till 1909 the provinces of Bosnia and
Herzegovina were also administered by the joint minister of finance,
excepting matters exclusively dependent on the minister of war.) For the
control of the common finances, there is appointed a joint supreme court of
accounts, which audits the accounts of the joint ministries.
_Budget_.--Side by side with the budget of each state of the Dual Monarchy,
there is a common budget, which comprises the expenditure necessary for the
common affairs, namely for the conduct of foreign affairs, for the army,
and for the ministry of finance. The revenues of the joint budget consist
of the revenues of the joint ministries, the net proceeds of the customs,
and the quota, or the proportional contributions of the two states. This
quota is fixed for a period of years, and generally coincides with the
duration of the customs and commercial treaty. Until 1897 Austria
contributed 70%, and Hungary 30% of the joint expenditure, remaining
after-deduction of the common revenue. It was then decided that from 1897
to July 1907 the quota should be 66-46/49 for Austria, and 33-2/49 for
Hungary. In 1907 Hungary's contribution was raised to 36.4%. Of the total
charges 2% is first of all debited to Hungary on account of the
incorporation with this state of the former military frontier.
The Budget estimates for the common administration were as follows in
1905:--
_Revenue_--
Ministry of Foreign Affairs L21,167
Ministry of War 305,907
Ministry of Finance 4,870
Board of Control 18
The Customs 4,780,000
Proportional contributions 15,650,448
-----------
Total L20,762,410
===========
_Expenditure_--
Ministry of Foreign Affairs L485,480
Ministry of War:--
Army 12,679,160
Navy 2,306,100
Ministry of Finance 177,000
Board of Control 13,250
Extraordinary Military Expenditure 4,785,500
Extraordinary Military Expenditure in Bosnia 315,920
-----------
Total L20,762,410
===========
The following table gives in thousands sterling the joint budget for the
years 1875-1905:--
_Expenditure._
1875. 1885. 1895. 1900. 1905.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs 396 368.7 333 433.4 493.8
Ministry of War 9005.4 10,085 12,539 13,887.5 18,087.7
(Army and Navy)
Ministry of Finance 154.2 167.2 170.4 175 177.1
Supreme Court of Accounts 10.5 10.6 10.7 12.5 13.3
Total 9566.1 10,631.5 13,053.1 14,508.4 20,430.3
_Revenue._
For the above Departments 432 258.2 260.7 260.3 331.9
Customs 997.4 402.2 4476 5202.3 4799.7
Proportional Contributions 8136.7 9971.1 8316.4 9045.8 15,650.4
Total 9566.1 10,631.5 13,053.1 14,508.4 20,430.3
_Debt._--Besides the debts of each state of the Dual Monarchy, there is a
general debt, which is borne jointly by Austria and Hungary. The following
table gives in millions sterling the amount of the general debt for the
years 1875-1905:--
1875. 1885. 1895. 1900. 1905.
232.41 231.02 229.67 226.81 224.31
_Delegations_.--The constitutional right of voting money applicable to the
common affairs and of its political control is exercised by the
Delegations, which consist each of sixty members, chosen for one year,
one-third of them by the Austrian Herrenhaus (Upper House) and the
Hungarian Table of Magnates (Upper House), and two-thirds of them by the
Austrian and the Hungarian Houses of Representatives. The delegations are
annually summoned by the monarch alternately to Vienna and to Budapest.
Each delegation has its separate sittings, both alike public. Their
decisions are reciprocally communicated in writing, and, in case of
non-agreement, their deliberations are renewed. Should three such
interchanges be made without agreement, a common plenary sitting is held of
an equal number of both delegations; and these collectively, without
discussion, decide the question by common vote. The common decisions of
both houses require for their validity the sanction of the monarch. Each
delegation has the right to formulate resolutions independently, and to
call to account and arraign the common ministers. In the exercise of their
office the members of both delegations are irresponsible, enjoying
constitutional immunity.
_Army_.--The military system of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy is similar in
both states, and rests since 1868 upon the principle of the universal and
personal obligation of the citizen to bear arms. Its military force is
composed of the common army (_K. und K._); the special armies, namely the
Austrian (_K.K._) _Landwehr_, and the Hungarian _Honveds_, which are
separate national institutions, and the _Landsturm_ or levy-in-mass. As
stated above, the common army stands under the administration of the joint
minister of war, while the special armies are under the administration of
the respective ministries of national defence. The yearly contingent of
recruits for the army is fixed by the military bills voted by the Austrian
and Hungarian parliaments, and is generally determined on the basis of the
population, according to the last census returns. It amounted in 1905 to
103,100 men, of which Austria furnished 59,211 men, and Hungary 43,889.
Besides 10,000 men are annually allotted to the Austrian Landwehr, and
12,500 to the Hungarian Honveds. The term of service is 2 years (3 years in
the cavalry) with the colours, 7 or 8 in the reserve and 2 in the Landwehr;
in the case of men not drafted to the active army the same total period of
service is spent in various special reserves.
For the military and administrative service of the army the Dual Monarchy
is divided into 16 military territorial districts (15 of which correspond
to the 15 army corps) and 108 supplementary districts (105 for the army,
and 3 for the navy). In 1902, since which year no material change was made
in the formal organization of the army, there were 5 cavalry divisions and
31 infantry divisions, formed in 15 army corps, which are located as
follows:--I. Cracow, II. Vienna, III. Graz, IV. Budapest, V. Pressburg, VI.
Kaschau, VII. Temesvar, VIII. Prague, IX. Josefstadt, X. Przemysl,
XI. Lemberg, XII. Herrmannstadt, XIII. Agram, XIV. Innsbruck, XV. Serajewo.
In addition there is the military district of Zara. The usual strength of
the corps is, 2 infantry divisions (4 brigades, 8 or 9 regiments, 32 or 36
battalions), 1 cavalry brigade (18 squadrons), and 1 artillery brigade
(16-18 batteries or 128-144 field-guns), besides technical and departmental
units and in some cases fortress artillery regiments. The infantry is
organized into line regiments, Jaeger and Tirolese regiments, the cavalry
into dragoons, lancers, Uhlans and hussars, the artillery into regiments.
The Austrian _Landwehr_ (which retains the old designation _K.K._, formerly
[v.03 p.0004] applied to the Austrian regular army) is organized in 8
divisions of varying strength, the "Royal Hungarian" Landwehr or Honveds in
7 divisions, both Austrian and Hungarian Landwehr having in addition
cavalry (Uhlans and hussars) and artillery. It is probable that a Landwehr
or Honveds division will, in war, form part of each army corps except in
the case of the Vienna corps, which has 3 divisions in peace. The remaining
men of military age (up to 42) as usual form the _Landsturm_. It is to be
noted that this Landsturm comprises many men who would elsewhere be classed
as Landwehr.
The strength of the Austro-Hungarian army on a peace footing was as follows
in 1905:--
+-----------------------------+---------+---------+---------+--------+
| |Officers.| Men. | Horses. | Guns. |
+-----------------------------+---------+---------+---------+--------+
| Infantry-- | | | | |
| Common Army | 10,801 | 187,604 | 1,152 | .. |
| Austrian Landwehr | 1,883 | 23,905 | 174 | .. |
| Hungarian Honveds | 2,258 | 21,149 | 262 | .. |
| Cavalry-- | | | | |
| Common Army | 1,890 | 45,486 | 40,740 | .. |
| Austrian Landwehr | 170 | 1,861 | 1,282 | .. |
| Hungarian Honveds | 390 | 4,170 | 3,510 | .. |
| Field Artillery | 1,630 | 27,612 | 14,520 | 1,048 |
| Fortress Artillery | 408 | 7,722 | 131 | .. |
| Technical troops | 588 | 9,935 | 19 | .. |
| (Pioneers, and Railway and | | | | |
| Telegraph Regiment) | | | | |
| Transport Service | 461 | 4,312 | 3,097 | .. |
| Sanitary Service | 85 | 3,062 | .. | .. |
| | ------ | ------- | ------ | ------ |
| Total | 20,564 | 336,818 | 64,887 | 1,048 |
| | | | | |
| Belonging to the | | | |
| Common Army | 15,863 | 285,733 | 59,659 | 1,048 |
| Austrian Landwehr | 2,053 | 25,766 | 1,456 | .. |
| Hungarian Honveds | 2,648 25,319 | 3,772 .. |
+-----------------------------+---------+---------+---------+--------+
The troops stationed in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1905 (376 officers and
6372 men) are included in the total for the common army.
The peace strength of the active army in combatants is thus about 350,000
officers and men, inclusive of the two Landwehrs and of the Austrian "K.K."
guards, the Hungarian crown guards, the gendarmerie, &c. The numbers of the
Landsturm and the war strength of the whole armed forces are not published.
It is estimated that the first line army in war would consist of 460,000
infantry, 49,000 cavalry, 78,000 artillery, 21,000 engineers, &c., beside
train and non-combatant soldiers. The Landwehr and Honved would yield
219,000 infantry and 18,000 cavalry, and other reserves 223,000 men. These
figures give an approximate total strength of 1,147,000, not inclusive of
Landsturm.
_Fortifications._--The principal fortifications in Austria-Hungary are:
Cracow and Przemysl in Galicia; Komarom, the centre of the inland
fortifications, Petervarad, O-Arad and Temesvar in Hungary; Serajewo,
Mostar and Bilek in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Alpine frontiers, especially
those in Tirol, have numerous fortifications, whose centre is formed by
Trent and Franzensfeste; while all the military roads leading into
Carinthia have been provided with strong defensive works, as at Malborgeth,
Predil Pass, &c. The two capitals, Vienna and Budapest, are not fortified.
On the Adriatic coast, the naval harbour of Pola is strongly fortified with
sea and land defences; then come Trieste, and several places in Dalmatia,
notably Zara and Cattaro.
_Navy._--The Austro-Hungarian navy is mainly a coast defence force, and
includes also a flotilla of monitors for the Danube. It is administered by
the naval department of the ministry of war. It consisted in 1905 of 9
modern battleships, 3 armoured cruisers, 5 cruisers, 4 torpedo gunboats, 20
destroyers and 26 torpedo boats. There was in hand at the same time a naval
programme to build 12 armourclads, 5 second-class cruisers, 6 third-class
cruisers, and a number of torpedo boats. The headquarters of the fleet are
at Pola, which is the principal naval arsenal and harbour of Austria; while
another great naval station is Trieste.
_Trade._--On the basis of the customs and commercial agreement between
Austria and Hungary, concluded in 1867 and renewable every ten years, the
following affairs, in addition to the common affairs of the monarchy, are
in both states treated according to the same principles:--Commercial
affairs, including customs legislation; legislation on the duties closely
connected with industrial production--on beer, brandy, sugar and mineral
oils; determination of legal tender and coinage, as also of the principles
regulating the Austro-Hungarian Bank; ordinances in respect of such
railways as affect the interests of both states. In conformity with the
customs and commercial compact between the two states, renewed in 1899, the
monarchy constitutes one identical customs and commercial territory,
inclusive of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the principality of Liechtenstein.
The foreign trade of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy is shown in the
following table:--
+--------+-------------+-------------+
| Year. | Imports. | Exports. |
+--------+-------------+-------------+
| 1900 | L70,666,000 | L80,916,000 |
| 1901 | 68,833,000 | 78,841,000 |
| 1902 | 71,666,000 | 79,708,000 |
| 1903 | 78,200,000 | 88,600,000 |
| 1904 | 85,200,000 | 86,200,000 |
| 1905 | 89,430,000 | 93,500,000 |
+--------+-------------+-------------+
The following tables give the foreign trade of the Austro-Hungarian
monarchy as regards raw material and manufactured goods:--
_Imports._
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| | Value in Millions Sterling. |
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
| Articles. | 1900.| 1901.| 1902.| 1903.| 1904.|
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
| Raw material (including | | | | | |
| articles of food; raw | | | | | |
| material for agriculture | 41.5 | 40.5 | 41.8 | 45.9 | 51.9 |
| and industry; and mining | | | | | |
| and smelting products. | | | | | |
| Semi-manufactured goods | 9.6 | 9.6 | 10.3 | 10.6 | 10.8 |
| Manufactured Goods | 19.5 | 18.7 | 19.5 | 21.6 | 22.5 |
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
_Exports._
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| | Value in Millions Sterling. |
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
| Articles. | 1900.| 1901.| 1902.| 1903.| 1904.|
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
| Raw material (as above) | 34.1 | 34.1 | 35.9 | 39 | 35.3 |
| Semi-manufactured goods | 12.6 | 11.1 | 11.1 | 12.4 | 12.6 |
| Manufactured goods. | 34.2 | 33.3 | 32.8 | 37.2 | 38.3 |
+----------------------------+------+------+------+------+------+
The most important place of derivation and of destination for the
Austro-Hungarian trade is the German empire with about 40% of the imports,
and about 60% of the exports. Next in importance comes Great Britain,
afterwards India, Italy, the United States of America, Russia, France,
Switzerland, Rumania, the Balkan states and South America in about the
order named. The principal articles of import are cotton and cotton goods,
wool and woollen goods, silk and silk goods, coffee, tobacco and metals.
The principal articles of export are wood, sugar, cattle, glass and
glassware, iron and ironware, eggs, cereals, millinery, fancy goods,
earthenware and pottery, and leather goods.
_The Austro-Hungarian Bank._--Common to the two states of the monarchy is
the "Austro-Hungarian Bank," which possesses a legal exclusive right to the
issue of bank-notes. It was founded in 1816, and had the title of the
Austrian National Bank until 1878, when it received its actual name. In
virtue of the new bank statute of the year 1899 the bank is a joint-stock
company, with a stock of L8,780,000. The bank's notes of issue must be
covered to the extent of two-fifths by legal specie (gold and current
silver) in reserve; the rest of the paper circulation, according to bank
usage. The state, under certain conditions, takes a portion of the clear
profits of the bank. The management of the bank and the supervision
exercised over it by the state are established on a footing of equality,
both states having each the same influence. The accounts of the bank at the
end of 1900 were as follows: capital, L8,750,000; reserve fund, L428,250;
note circulation, L62,251,000; cash, L50,754,000. In 1907 the reserve fund
was L548,041; note circulation, L84,501,000; cash, L60,036,625. The charter
of the bank, which expired in 1897, was renewed until the end of 1910. In
the Hungarian ministerial crisis of 1909 the question of the renewal of the
charter played a conspicuous part, the more extreme members of the
Independence party demanding the establishment of separate banks for
Austria and Hungary with, at most, common superintendence (see _History_,
below).
(O. BR.)
HISTORY
I. _The Whole Monarchy._
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: The title "Emperor of Austria."]
The empire of Austria, as the official designation of the territories ruled
by the Habsburg monarchy, dates back only to 1804, when Francis II., the
last of the Holy Roman emperors, proclaimed himself emperor of Austria as
Francis I. His motive in doing so was to guard against the great house of
Habsburg being relegated to a position inferior to the _parvenus_
Bonapartes, in the event of the final collapse of the Holy Roman Empire, or
of the possible election of Napoleon as his own successor on the throne of
Charlemagne. The title emperor of Austria, then, replaced that of
"Imperator Romanorum semper Augustus" when the Holy Empire came to an end
in 1806. From the first, however, it was no more than a title, which
represented but ill the actual relation of the Habsburg sovereigns to their
several states. [v.03 p.0005] Magyars and Slavs never willingly recognized
a style which ignored their national rights and implied the superiority of
the German elements of the monarchy; to the Germans it was a poor
substitute for a title which had represented the political unity of the
German race under the Holy Empire. For long after the Vienna Congress of
1814-1815 the "Kaiser" as such exercised a powerful influence over the
imaginations of the German people outside the Habsburg dominions; but this
was because the title was still surrounded with its ancient halo and the
essential change was not at once recognized. The outcome of the long
struggle with Prussia, which in 1866 finally broke the spell, and the
proclamation of the German empire in 1871 left the title of emperor of
Austria stripped of everything but a purely territorial significance. It
had, moreover, by the compact with Hungary of 1867, ceased even fully to
represent the relation of the emperor to all his dominions; and the title
which had been devised to cover the whole of the Habsburg monarchy sank
into the official style of the sovereign of but a half; while even within
the Austrian empire proper it is resented by those peoples which, like the
Bohemians, wish to obtain the same recognition of their national
independence as was conceded to Hungary. In placing the account of the
origin and development of the Habsburg monarchy under this heading, it is
merely for the sake of convenience.
[Sidenote: Origin of the name Austria.]
The first nucleus round which the present dominions of the house of Austria
gradually accumulated was the mark which lay along the south bank of the
Danube, east of the river Enns, founded about A.D. 800 as a defence for the
Frankish kingdom against the Slavs. Although its total length from east to
west was only about 60 m., it was associated in the popular mind with a
large and almost unbroken tract of land in the east of Europe. This fact,
together with the position of the mark with regard to Germany in general
and to Bavaria in particular, accounts for the name _Oesterreich_
(Austria), _i.e._ east empire or realm, a word first used in a charter of
996, where the phrase _in regione vulgari nomine Ostarrichi_ occurs. The
development of this small mark into the Austro-Hungarian monarchy was a
slow and gradual process, and falls into two main divisions, which almost
coincide with the periods during which the dynasties of Babenberg and
Habsburg have respectively ruled the land. The energies of the house of
Babenberg were chiefly spent in enlarging the area and strengthening the
position of the mark itself, and when this was done the house of Habsburg
set itself with remarkable perseverance and marvellous success to extend
its rule over neighbouring territories. The many vicissitudes which have
attended this development have not, however, altered the European position
of Austria, which has remained the same for over a thousand years. Standing
sentinel over the valley of the middle Danube, and barring the advance of
the Slavs on Germany, Austria, whether mark, duchy or empire, has always
been the meeting-place of the Teuton and the Slav. It is this fact which
gives it a unique interest and importance in the history of Europe, and
which unites the ideas of the Germans to-day with those of Charlemagne and
Otto the Great.
[Sidenote: Early inhabitants.]
The southern part of the country now called Austria was inhabited before
the opening of the Christian era by the Taurisci, a Celtic tribe, who were
subsequently called the Norici, and who were conquered by the Romans about
14 B.C. Their land was afterwards included in the provinces of Pannonia and
Noricum, and under Roman rule, Vindobona, the modern Vienna, became a place
of some importance. The part of the country north of the Danube was peopled
by the Marcomanni and the Quadi, and both of these tribes were frequently
at war with the Romans, especially during the reign of the emperor Marcus
Aurelius, who died at Vindobona in A.D. 180 when campaigning against them.
Christianity and civilization obtained entrance into the land, but the
increasing weakness of the Roman empire opened the country to the inroads
of the barbarians, and during the period of the great migrations it was
ravaged in quick succession by a number of these tribes, prominent among
whom were the Huns. The lands on both banks of the river shared the same
fate, due probably to the fact to which Gibbon has drawn attention, that at
this period the Danube was frequently frozen over. About 590 the district
was settled by the Slovenes, or Corutanes, a Slavonic people, who formed
part of the kingdom of Samo, and were afterwards included in the extensive
kingdom of the Avars. The Franks claimed some authority over this people,
and probably some of the princes of the Slovenes had recognized this claim,
but it could not be regarded as serious while the Avars were in possession
of the land. In 791 Charlemagne, after he had established his authority
over the _Bajuvarii_ or Bavarians, crossed the river Enns, and moved
against the Avars. This attack was followed by campaigns on the part of his
lieutenants, and in 805 the Avars were finally subdued, and their land
incorporated with the Frankish empire. [Sidenote: Establishment of the East
Mark.] This step brought the later Austria definitely under the rule of the
Franks, and during the struggle Charlemagne erected a mark, called the East
Mark, to defend the eastern border of his empire. A series of margraves
ruled this small district from 799 to 907, but as the Frankish empire grew
weaker, the mark suffered more and more from the ravages of its eastern
neighbours. During the 9th century the Frankish supremacy vanished, and the
mark was overrun by the Moravians, and then by the Magyars, or Hungarians,
who destroyed the few remaining traces of Frankish influence.
[Sidenote: The house of Babenberg.]
A new era dawned after Otto the Great was elected German king in 936, and
it is Otto rather than Charlemagne who must be regarded as the real founder
of Austria. In August 955 he gained a great victory over the Magyars on the
Lechfeld, freed Bavaria from their presence, and refounded the East Mark
for the defence of his kingdom. In 976 his son, the emperor Otto II.,
entrusted the government of this mark, soon to be known as Austria, to
Leopold, a member of the family of Babenberg (_q.v._), and its
administration was conducted with vigour and success. Leopold and his
descendants ruled Austria until the extinction of the family in 1246, and
by their skill and foresight raised the mark to an important place among
the German states. Their first care was to push its eastern frontier down
the Danube valley, by colonizing the lands on either side of the river, and
the success of this work may be seen in the removal of their capital from
Poechlarn to Melk, then to Tulln, and finally about 1140 to Vienna. The
country as far as the Leitha was subsequently incorporated with Austria,
and in the other direction the district between the Enns and the Inn was
added to the mark in 1156, an important date in Austrian history.
[Sidenote: Duchy of Austria created, 1156.] Anxious to restore peace to
Germany in this year, the new king, Frederick I., raised Austria to the
rank of a duchy, and conferred upon it exceptional privileges. The
investiture was bestowed not only upon Duke Henry but upon his second wife,
Theodora; in case of a failure of male heirs the duchy was to descend to
females; and if the duke had no children he could nominate his successor.
Controlling all the jurisdiction of the land, the duke's only duties
towards the Empire were to appear at any diet held in Bavaria, and to send
a contingent to the imperial army for any campaigns in the countries
bordering upon Austria. In 1186 Duke Leopold I. made a treaty with Ottakar
IV., duke of Styria, an arrangement which brought Styria and upper Austria
to the Babenbergs in 1192, and in 1229 Duke Leopold II. purchased some
lands from the bishop of Freising, and took the title of lord of Carniola.
When the house of Babenberg became extinct in 1246, Austria, stretching
from Passau almost to Pressburg, had the frontiers which it retains to-day,
and this increase of territory had been accompanied by a corresponding
increase in wealth and general prosperity. The chief reason for this
prosperity was the growth of trade along the Danube, which stimulated the
foundation, or the growth, of towns, and brought considerable riches to the
ruler. Under the later Babenbergs Vienna was regarded as one of the most
important of German cities, and it was computed that the duke was as rich
as the archbishop of Cologne, or the margrave of Brandenburg, and was
surpassed in this respect by only one German prince, the [v.03 p.0006] king
of Bohemia. The interests of the Austrian margraves and dukes were not
confined to the acquisition of wealth either in land or chattels. Vienna
became a centre of culture and learning, and many religious houses were
founded and endowed. [Sidenote: Duke Leopold II.] The acme of the early
prosperity of Austria was reached under Duke Leopold II., surnamed the
Glorious, who reigned from 1194 to 1230. He gave a code of municipal law to
Vienna, and rights to other towns, welcomed the Minnesingers to his
brilliant court, and left to his subjects an enduring memory of valour and
wisdom. Leopold and his predecessors were enabled, owing to the special
position of Austria, to act practically as independent rulers. Cherishing
the privilege of 1156, they made treaties with foreign kings, and arranged
marriages with the great families of Europe. With full control of
jurisdiction and of commerce, no great bishopric nor imperial city impeded
the course of their authority, and the emperor interfered only to settle
boundary disputes.
[Sidenote: Duke Frederick II., the Quarrelsome.]
The main lines of Austrian policy under the Babenbergs were warfare with
the Hungarians and other eastern neighbours, and a general attitude of
loyalty towards the emperors. The story of the Hungarian wars is a
monotonous record of forays, of assistance given at times to the Babenbergs
by the forces of the Empire, and ending in the gradual eastward advance of
Austria. The traditional loyalty to the emperors, which was cemented by
several marriages between the imperial house and the Babenbergs, was,
however, departed from by the margrave Leopold II., and by Duke Frederick
II. During the investiture struggle Leopold deserted the emperor Henry IV.,
who deprived him of Austria and conferred it upon Vratislav II., duke of
the Bohemians. Unable to maintain his position, Vratislav was soon driven
out, and in 1083 Leopold again obtained possession of the mark, and was
soon reconciled with Henry. Very similar was the result of the conflict
between the emperor Frederick II. and Duke Frederick II. Ignoring the the
privilege of 1156, the emperor claimed certain rights in Austria, and
summoned the duke to his Italian diets. Frederick, who was called the
Quarrelsome, had irritated both his neighbours and his subjects, and
complaints of his exactions and confiscations reached the ears of the
emperor. After the duke had three times refused to appear before the
princes, Frederick placed him under the ban, declared the duchies of
Austria and Styria to be vacant, and, aided by the king of Bohemia, the
duke of Bavaria and other princes, invaded the country in 1236. [Sidenote:
End of the House of Babenberg.] He met with very slight opposition,
declared the duchies to be immediately dependent upon the Empire, made
Vienna an imperial city, and imposed other changes upon the constitution of
Austria. After his departure, however, the duke returned, and in 1239 was
in possession of his former power, while the changes made by the emperor
were ignored. Continuing his career of violence and oppression, Duke
Frederick was killed in battle by the Hungarians in June 1246, when the
family of Babenberg became extinct.
[Sidenote: Dispute as to the Austrian succession.]
The duchies of Austria and Styria were now claimed by the emperor Frederick
II. as vacant fiefs of the Empire, and their government was entrusted to
Otto II., duke of Bavaria. Frederick, however, who was in Italy, harassed
and afflicted, could do little to assert the imperial authority, and his
enemy, Pope Innocent IV., bestowed the two duchies upon Hermann VI.,
margrave of Baden, whose wife, Gertrude, was a niece of the last of the
Babenbergs. Hermann was invested by the German king, William, count of
Holland, but he was unable to establish his position, and law and order
were quickly disappearing from the duchies. The deaths of Hermann and of
the emperor in 1250, however, paved the way for a settlement. Weary of
struggle and disorder, and despairing of any help from the central
authority, the estates of Austria met at Truebensee in 1251, and chose
Ottakar, son of Wenceslaus I., king of Bohemia, as their duke. [Sidenote:
Ottakar of Bohemia, duke.] This step was favoured by the pope, and Ottakar,
eagerly accepting the offer, strengthened his position by marrying
Margaret, a sister of Duke Frederick II., and in return for his investiture
promised his assistance to William of Holland. Styria appears at this time
to have shared the fortunes of Austria, but it was claimed by Bela IV.,
king of Hungary, who conquered the land, and made a treaty with Ottakar in
1254 which confirmed him in its possession. The Hungarian rule was soon
resented by the Styrians, and Ottakar, who had become king of Bohemia in
1253, took advantage of this resentment, and interfered in the affairs of
the duchy. A war with Hungary was the result, but on this occasion victory
rested with Ottakar, and by a treaty made with Bela, in March 1261, he was
recognized as duke of Styria. In 1269 Ottakar inherited the duchy of
Carinthia on the death of Duke Ulrich III., and, his power having now
become very great, he began to aspire to the German throne. He did
something to improve the condition of the duchies by restoring order,
introducing German colonists into the eastern districts, and seeking to
benefit the inhabitants of the towns.
[Sidenote: Rudolph of Habsburg.]
In 1273 Rudolph, count of Habsburg, became German king, and his attention
soon turned to Ottakar, whose power menaced the occupant of the German
throne. Finding some support in Austria, Rudolph questioned the title of
the Bohemian king to the three duchies, and sought to recover the imperial
lands which had been in the possession of the emperor Frederick II. Ottakar
was summoned twice before the diet, the imperial court declared against
him, and in July 1275 he was placed under the ban. War was the result, and
in November 1276 Ottakar submitted to Rudolph, and renounced the duchies of
Austria, Styria and Carinthia. For some time the three duchies were
administered by Rudolph in his capacity as head of the Empire, of which
they formed part. Not content with this tie, however, which was personal to
himself alone, the king planned to make them hereditary possessions of his
family, and to transfer the headquarters of the Habsburgs from the Rhine to
the Danube. [Sidenote: The Habsburgs established in Austria, 1282.] Some
opposition was offered to this scheme; but the perseverance of the king
overcame all difficulties, and one of the most important events in European
history took place on the 27th of December 1282, when Rudolph invested his
sons, Rudolph and Albert, with the duchies of Austria and Styria. He
retained Carinthia in his own hands until 1286, when, in return for
valuable services, he bestowed it upon Meinhard IV., count of Tirol. The
younger Rudolph took no part in the government of Austria and Styria, which
was undertaken by Albert, until his election as German king in 1298. Albert
appears to have been rather an arbitrary ruler. In 1288 he suppressed a
rising of the people of Vienna, and he made the fullest use of the ducal
power in asserting his real or supposed rights. At this time the principle
of primogeniture was unknown in the house of Habsburg, and for many years
the duchies were ruled in common by two, or even three, members of the
family. After Albert became German king, his two elder sons, Rudolph and
Frederick, were successively associated with him in the government, and
after his death in 1308, his four younger sons shared at one time or
another in the administration of Austria and Styria. In 1314 Albert's son,
Frederick, was chosen German king in opposition to Louis IV., duke of Upper
Bavaria, afterwards the emperor Louis IV., and Austria was weakened by the
efforts of the Habsburgs to sustain Frederick in his contest with Louis,
and also by the struggle carried on between another brother, Leopold, and
the Swiss. A series of deaths among the Habsburgs during the first half of
the 14th century left Duke Albert II. and his four sons as the only
representatives of the family. Albert ruled the duchies alone from 1344 to
1356, and after this date his sons began to take part in the government.
[Sidenote: Duke Rudolph IV.] The most noteworthy of these was Duke Rudolph
IV., a son-in-law of the emperor Charles IV., who showed his interest in
learning by founding the university of Vienna in 1365. Rudolph's chief aim
was to make Austria into an independent state, and he forged a series of
privileges the purport of which was to free the duchy from all its duties
towards the Empire. A sharp contest with the emperor followed this
proceeding, and the Austrian duke, annoyed that [v.03 p.0007] Austria was
not raised to the dignity of an electorate by the Golden Bull of 1356, did
not shrink from a contest with Charles. In 1361, however, he abandoned his
pretensions, but claimed the title of archduke (_q.v._) and in 1364
declared that the possessions of the Habsburgs were indivisible. Meanwhile
the acquisition of neighbouring territories had been steadily pressed on.
In 1335 the duchy of Carinthia, and a part of Carniola, were inherited by
Dukes Albert II. and Otto, and in 1363 Rudolph IV. obtained the county of
Tirol. In 1364 Carniola was made into an hereditary duchy; in 1374 part of
Istria came under the rule of the Habsburgs; in 1382 Trieste submitted
voluntarily to Austria, and at various times during the century, other
smaller districts were added to the lands of the Habsburgs.
Rudolph IV. died childless in 1365, and in 1379 his two remaining brothers,
Leopold III. and Albert III., made a division of their lands, by which
Albert retained Austria proper and Carniola, and Leopold got Styria,
Carinthia and Tirol. Leopold was killed in 1386 at the battle of Sempach,
and Albert became guardian for his four nephews, who subsequently ruled
their lands in common. The senior line which ruled in Austria was
represented after the death of Duke Albert III. in 1395 by his son, Duke
Albert IV., and then by his grandson, Duke Albert V., who became German
king as Albert II. in 1438. [Sidenote: Minority of Ladislaus.] Albert
married Elizabeth, daughter of Sigismund, king of Hungary and Bohemia, and
on the death of his father-in-law assumed these two crowns. He died in
1439, and just after his death a son was born to him, who was called
Ladislaus Posthumus, and succeeded to the duchy of Austria and to the
kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia. William and Leopold, the two eldest sons
of Duke Leopold III., and, with their younger brothers Ernest and
Frederick, the joint rulers of Styria, Carinthia and Tirol, died early in
the 15th century, and in 1406 Ernest and Frederick made a division of their
lands. Ernest became duke of Styria and Carinthia, and Frederick, count of
Tirol. Ernest was succeeded in 1424 by his sons, Frederick and Albert, and
Frederick in 1439 by his son, Sigismund, and these three princes were
reigning when King Albert II. died in 1439. Frederick, who succeeded Albert
[Sidenote: Regency of the emperor Frederick III.] as German king, and was
soon crowned emperor as Frederick III., acted as guardian for Sigismund of
Tirol, who was a minor, and also became regent of Austria in consequence of
the infancy of Ladislaus. His rule was a period of struggle and disorder,
owing partly to the feebleness of his own character, partly to the wish of
his brother, Albert, to share his dignities. The Tirolese soon grew weary
of his government, and, in 1446, Sigismund was declared of age. [Sidenote:
Popular revolt under Ulrich Eiczing and Count Ulrich of Cilli.] The estates
of Austria were equally discontented and headed an open revolt, the object
of which was to remove Ladislaus from Frederick's charge and deprive the
latter of the regency. The leading spirit in this movement was Ulrich
Eiczing (Eitzing or von Eiczinger, d. before 1463), a low-born adventurer,
ennobled by Albert II., in whose service he had accumulated vast wealth and
power. In 1451 he organized an armed league, and in December, with the aid
of the populace, made himself master of Vienna, whither he had summoned the
estates. In March 1452 he was joined by Count Ulrich of Cilli, while the
Hungarians and the powerful party of the great house of Rosenberg in
Bohemia attached themselves to the league. Frederick, who had hurried back
from Italy, was besieged in August in the Vienna Neustadt, and was forced
to deliver Ladislaus to Count Ulrich, whose influence had meanwhile
eclipsed that of Eiczing. Ladislaus now ruled nominally himself, under the
tutelage of Count Ulrich. The country was, however, distracted by quarrels
between the party of the high aristocracy, which recognized the count of
Cilli as its chief, and that of the lesser nobles, citizens and populace,
who followed Eiczing. In September 1453 the latter, by a successful
_emeute_, succeeded in ousting Count Ulrich, and remained in power till
February 1455, when the count once more entered Vienna in triumph. Ulrich
of Cilli was killed before Belgrade in November 1456; a year later
Ladislaus himself died (November 1457). Meanwhile Styria and Carinthia
[Sidenote: Austria created an archduchy.] were equally unfortunate under
the rule of Frederick and Albert; and the death of Ladislaus led to still
further complications. Austria, which had been solemnly created an
archduchy by the emperor Frederick in 1453, was claimed by the three
remaining Habsburg princes, and lower Austria was secured by Frederick,
while Albert obtained upper Austria. Both princes were unpopular, and in
1462 Frederick was attacked by the inhabitants of Vienna, and was forced to
surrender lower Austria to Albert, whose spendthrift habits soon made his
rule disliked. A further struggle between the brothers was prevented by
Albert's death in 1463, when the estates did homage to Frederick.
[Sidenote: Hungarian conquest of Austria.] The emperor was soon again at
issue with the Austrian nobles, and was attacked by Matthias Corvinus, king
of Hungary, who drove him from Vienna in 1485. Although hampered by the
inroads of the Turks, Matthias pressed on, and by 1487 was firmly in
possession of Austria, Styria and Carinthia, which seemed quite lost to the
Habsburgs.
[Sidenote: The emperor Maximilian I.]
The decline in the fortunes of the family, however, was to be arrested by
Frederick's son, Maximilian, afterwards the emperor Maximilian I., who was
the second founder of the greatness of the house of Habsburg. Like his
ancestor, Rudolph, he had to conquer the lands over which his descendants
were destined to rule, and by arranging a treaty of succession to the
kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia, he pointed the way to power and empire in
eastern Europe. Soon after his election as king of the Romans in 1486,
Maximilian attacked the Hungarians, and in 1490 he had driven them from
Austria, and recovered his hereditary lands. In the same year he made an
arrangement with his kinsman, Sigismund of Tirol, by which he brought this
county under his rule, and when the emperor Frederick died in 1493,
Maximilian united the whole of the Austrian lands under his sway.
Continuing his acquisitions of territory, he inherited the possessions of
the counts of Goerz in 1500, added some districts to Tirol by intervening
in a succession war in Bavaria, and acquired Gradisca in 1512 as the result
of a struggle with Venice. He did much for the better government of the
Austrian duchies. Bodies were established for executive, financial and
judicial purposes, the Austrian lands constituted one of the imperial
circles which were established in 1512, and in 1518 representatives of the
various diets (_Landtage_) met at Innsbruck, a proceeding which marks the
beginning of an organic unity in the Austrian lands. In these ways
Maximilian proved himself a capable and energetic ruler, although his plans
for making Austria into a kingdom, or an electorate, were abortive.
[Sidenote: Austria at the close of the middle ages.]
At the close of the middle ages the area of Austria had increased to nearly
50,000 sq. m., but its internal condition does not appear to have improved
in proportion to this increase in size. The rulers of Austria lacked the
prestige which attached to the electoral office, and, although five of them
had held the position of German king, the four who preceded Maximilian had
added little or nothing to the power and dignity of this position. The
ecclesiastical organization of Austria was imperfect, so long as there was
no archbishopric within its borders, and its clergy owed allegiance to
foreign prelates. The work of unification which was so successfully
accomplished by Maximilian was aided by two events, the progress of the
Turks in south-eastern Europe, and the loss of most of the Habsburg
possessions on the Rhine. The first tended to draw the separate states
together for purposes of defence, and the second turned the attention of
the Habsburgs to the possibilities of expansion in eastern Europe.
(A. W. H.*)
[Sidenote: Austria under Charles V. and Ferdinand.]
At the time of the death of the emperor Maximilian in 1519 the Habsburg
dominions in eastern Germany included the duchies of Upper and Lower
Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola and the county of Tirol. Maximilian
was succeeded as archduke of Austria as well as emperor by his grandson
Charles of Spain, known in history as the emperor Charles V. To his brother
Ferdinand Charles resigned all his Austrian lands, including his claims on
Bohemia [v.03 p.0008] and Hungary. [Sidenote: Mohacs and its results.]
Austria and Spain were thus divided, and, in spite of the efforts of the
archduke Charles in the Spanish Succession War, were never again united,
for at the battle of Mohacs, on the 28th of August 1526, Suleiman the
Magnificent defeated and killed Louis, king of Bohemia and of Hungary,
whose sister Anne had married Ferdinand. By this victory the Turks
conquered and retained, till the peace of Karlowitz in 1699, the greater
part of Hungary. During most of his life Ferdinand was engaged in combating
the Turks and in attempting to secure Hungary. In John Zapolya, who was
supported by Suleiman, Ferdinand found an active rival. The Turks besieged
Vienna in 1530 and made several invasions of Hungary and Austria. At length
Ferdinand agreed to pay Suleiman an annual tribute for the small
portion--about 12,228 sq. m.--of Hungary which he held. [Sidenote: Charles
V. and Austria.] During Charles V.'s struggles with the German Protestants,
Ferdinand preserved a neutral attitude, which contributed to gain Germany a
short period of internal peace. Though Ferdinand himself did not take a
leading part in German religious or foreign politics, the period was one of
intense interest to Austria. Throughout the years from 1519 to 1648 there
are, said Stubbs, two distinct ideas in progress which "may be regarded as
giving a unity to the whole period.... The Reformation is one, the claims
of the House of Austria is the other." Austria did not benefit from the
reign of Charles V. The emperor was too much absorbed in the affairs of the
rest of his vast dominions, notably those of the Empire, rent in two by
religious differences and the secular ambitions for which those were the
excuse, to give any effective attention to its needs. The peace of
Augsburg, 1555, which recognized a dualism within the Empire in religion as
in politics, marked the failure of his plan of union (see CHARLES V.;
GERMANY; MAURICE OF SAXONY); and meanwhile he had been able to accomplish
nothing to rescue Hungary from the Turkish yoke. It was left for his
brother Ferdinand, a ruler of consummate wisdom (1556-1564) "to establish
the modern Habsburg-Austrian empire with its exclusive territorial
interests, its administrative experiments, its intricacies of religion and
of race."
[Sidenote: The policy of Ferdinand and Maximillian II.]
Before his death Ferdinand divided the inheritance of the German Habsburgs
between his three sons. Austria proper was left to his eldest son
Maximilian, Tirol to the archduke Ferdinand; and Styria with Carinthia and
Carniola to the archduke Charles. Under the emperor Maximilian II.
(1564-1576), who was also king of Bohemia and Hungary, a liberal policy
preserved peace, but he was unable to free his government from its
humiliating position of a tributary to the Turk, and he could do nothing to
found religious liberty within his dominions on a permanent basis. The
whole of Austria and nearly the whole of Styria were mainly Lutheran; in
Bohemia, Silesia and Moravia, various forms of Christian belief struggled
for mastery; and Catholicism was almost confined to the mountains of Tirol.
[Sidenote: The reign of Rudolph II.] The accession of Rudolph II.[1]
(1576-1612), a fanatical Spanish Catholic, changed the situation entirely.
Under him the Jesuits were encouraged to press on the counter-Reformation.
In the early part of his reign there was hardly any government at all. In
Bohemia a state of semi-independence existed, while Hungary preferred
[Sidenote: The family compact, 1606.] the Turk to the emperor. In both
kingdoms Rudolph had failed to assert his sovereign power except in fitful
attempts to extirpate heresy. With anarchy prevalent within the Austrian
dominions some action became necessary. Accordingly in 1606 the archdukes
made a compact agreeing to acknowledge the archduke Matthias as head of the
family. This arrangement proved far from successful. Matthias, who was
emperor from 1612 to 1619, proved unable to restore order, and when he died
Bohemia was practically independent. His successor Ferdinand II.
(1619-1637) was strong of will; and resolved to win back Germany to the
Catholic faith. As archduke of Styria he had crushed out Protestantism
[Sidenote: The Thirty Years' War.] in that duchy, and having been elected
king of Bohemia in 1618 was resolved to establish there the rule of the
Jesuits. His attempt to do so led to the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War
(see BOHEMIA; THIRTY YEARS' WAR). Till 1630 the fortunes of Austria
brightened under the active rule of Ferdinand, who was assisted by
Maximilian of Bavaria and the Catholic League, and by Wallenstein. The
Palatinate was conquered, the Danish king was overthrown, and it seemed
that Austria would establish its predominance over the whole of Germany,
and that the Baltic would become an Austrian lake. The fortunes of Austria
never seemed brighter than in 1628 when Wallenstein began the siege of
Stralsund. [Sidenote: The Swedish and French intervention.] His failure,
followed by the arrival of Gustavus Adolphus in Germany in 1630, proved the
death blow of Austrian hopes. In 1632 Gustavus Adolphus was killed, in 1634
Wallenstein was assassinated, and in 1635 France entered into the war. The
Thirty Years' War now ceased to be a religious struggle between Catholicism
and Protestantism; it resolved itself into a return to the old political
strife between France and the Habsburgs. [Sidenote: The peace of
Westphalia, 1648.] Till 1648 the Bourbon and Habsburg powers continued the
war, and at the peace of Westphalia Austria suffered severe losses.
Ferdinand III. (1637-1657) was forced to yield Alsace to France, to grant
territorial supremacy, including the right of making alliances, to the
states of the Empire, and to acknowledge the concurrent jurisdiction of the
imperial chamber and the Aulic council. The disintegration of the Holy
Roman Empire was now practically accomplished, and though the possession of
the imperial dignity continued to give the rulers of Austria prestige, the
Habsburgs henceforward devoted themselves to their Austrian interests
rather than to those of the Empire.
[Sidenote: Leopold I.]
In 1657 Leopold I., who had already ruled the Austrian dominions for two
years, succeeded his father Ferdinand and was crowned emperor in the
following year. His long reign of 48 years was of great importance for
Austria, as determining both the internal character and the external policy
of the monarchy. The long struggle with France to which the ambitions of
Louis XIV. gave rise, and which culminated in the War of Spanish
Succession, belongs less to the history of Austria proper than to that of
Germany and of Europe. [Sidenote: Wars with Turkey.] Of more importance to
Austria itself was the war with Sweden (1657-60) which resulted in the
peace of Oliva, by which the independence of Poland was secured and the
frontier of Hungary safeguarded, and the campaigns against the Turks
(1662-64 and 1683-99), by which the Ottoman power was driven from Hungary,
and the Austrian attitude towards Turkey and the Slav peoples of the
Balkans determined for a century to come. The first war, due to Ottoman
aggression in Transylvania, ended with Montecuculi's victory over the grand
vizier at St Gothard on the Raab on the 1st of August 1664. The general
political situation prevented Leopold from taking full advantage of this,
and the peace of Vasvar (August 10) left the Turks in possession of
Nagyvarad (Grosswardein) and the fortress of Ersekujvar (Neuhaeusel),
Transylvania being recognized as an independent principality. The next
Turkish war was the direct outcome of Leopold's policy in Hungary, where
the persecution of the Protestants and the suppression of the constitution
in 1658, led to a widespread conspiracy. This was mercilessly suppressed;
and though after a period of arbitrary government (1672-1679), the
palatinate and the constitution, with certain concessions to the
Protestants, were restored, the discontent continued. In 1683, invited by
Hungarian malcontents and spurred on by Louis XIV., the Turks burst into
Hungary, overran the country and appeared before the walls of Vienna. The
victory of the 12th of September, gained over the Turks by John Sobieski
(see JOHN III. SOBIESKI, KING OF POLAND) not only saved the Austrian
capital, but was the first of a series of successes which drove the Turks
permanently beyond the Danube, and established the power of Austria in the
East. The victories of Charles of Lorraine at Parkany (1683) and Esztergom
(Gran) (1685) were followed by the capture of Budapest (1686) and the
defeat of the Ottomans at [v.03 p.0009] Mohacs (1688). In 1688 the elector
took Belgrade; in 1691 Louis William I. of Baden won the battle of
Slankamen, and on the 11th of September 1697 Prince Eugene gained the
crowning victory of Zenta. This was followed, on the 26th of January 1699,
by the peace of Karlowitz, by which Slavonia, Transylvania and all Hungary,
except the banat of Temesvar, were ceded to the Austrian crown. Leopold had
wisely decided to initiate a conciliatory policy in Hungary. At the diet of
Pressburg (1687-1688) the Hungarian crown had been made hereditary in the
house of Habsburg, and the crown prince Joseph had been crowned hereditary
king of Hungary (_q.v._). In 1697 Transylvania was united to the Hungarian
monarchy. A further fact of great prospective importance was the
immigration, after an abortive rising against the Turks, of some 30,000
Slav and Albanian families into Slavonia and southern Hungary, where they
were granted by the emperor Leopold a certain autonomy and the recognition
of the Orthodox religion.
By the conquest of Hungary and Transylvania Leopold completed the edifice
of the Austrian monarchy, of which the foundations had been laid by
Ferdinand I. in 1526. He had also done much for its internal consolidation.
By the death of the archduke Sigismund in 1665 he not only gained Tirol,
but a considerable sum of money, which he used to buy back the Silesian
principalities of Oppeln and Ratibor, pledged by Ferdinand III. to the
Poles. In the administration of his dominions, too, Leopold succeeded in
strengthening the authority of the central government. The old estates,
indeed, survived; but the emperor kept the effective power in his own
hands, and to his reign are traceable the first beginnings of that system
of centralized bureaucracy which was established under Maria Theresa and
survived, for better or for worse, till the revolution of 1848. It was
under Leopold, also, that the Austrian standing army was established in
spite of much opposition; the regiments raised in 1672 were never
disbanded. For the intellectual life of the country Leopold did much. In
spite of his intolerant attitude towards religious dissent, he proved
himself an enlightened patron of learning. He helped in the establishment
of the universities of Innsbruck and Olmuetz; and under his auspices, after
the defeat of the Turks in 1683, Vienna began to develop from a mere
frontier fortress into one of the most brilliant capitals of Europe. (See
LEOPOLD I.)
[Sidenote: War of Spanish Succession.]
Leopold died in 1705 during the war of Spanish Succession (1702-13), which
he left as an evil inheritance to his sons Joseph I. (d. 1711) and Charles
VI. The result of the war was a further aggrandizement of the house of
Austria; but not to the extent that had been hoped. Apart from the fact
that British and Austrian troops had been unable to deprive Philip V. of
his throne, it was from the point of view of Europe at large by no means
desirable that Charles VI. should succeed in reviving the empire of Charles
V. By the treaty of Utrecht, accordingly, Spain was left to the House of
Bourbon, while that of Austria received the Spanish Netherlands, Sardinia
and Naples.
[Sidenote: Austria from 1715 to 1740.]
The treaty of Karlowitz, and the settlement of 1713-1714, marked a new
starting-point in the history of Austria. The efforts of Turkey to regain
her ascendancy in eastern Europe at the expense of the Habsburgs had ended
in failure, and henceforward Turkish efforts were confined to resisting the
steady development of Austria in the direction of Constantinople. The
treaties of Utrecht, Rastadt and Baden had also re-established and
strengthened the position of the Austrian monarchy in western Europe. The
days of French invasions of Germany had for the time ceased, and revenge
for the attacks made by Louis XIV. was found in the establishment of
Austrian supremacy in Italy and in the substitution of Austrian for Spanish
domination in the Netherlands.
The situation, though apparently favourable, was full of difficulty, and
only a statesman of uncommon dexterity could have guided Austria with
success through the ensuing years. Composed of a congeries of nationalities
which included Czechs, Magyars, Ruthenes, Rumanians, Germans, Italians,
Flemings and other races, and with territories separated by many miles, the
Habsburg dominions required from their ruler patience, tolerance,
administrative skill and a full knowledge of the currents of European
diplomacy. Charles VI. possessed none of these qualities; and when he died
in 1740, the weakness of the scattered Habsburg empire rendered it an
object of the cupidity of the continental powers. Yet, though the War of
Spanish Succession had proved a heavy drain on the resources of the
hereditary dominions of the Austrian crown, Charles VI. had done much to
compensate for this by the successes of his arms in eastern Europe. In
1716, in alliance with Venice, he declared war on the Turks; Eugene's
victory at Peterwardein involved the conquest of the banat of Temesvar, and
was followed in 1717 by the capture of Belgrade. By the treaty signed at
Passarowitz on the 21st of July 1718, the banat, which rounded off Hungary
and Belgrade, with the northern districts of Servia, were annexed to the
Habsburg monarchy.
Important as these gains were, the treaty none the less once more
illustrated the perpetual sacrifice of the true interests of the hereditary
dominions of the house of Habsburg to its European entanglements. Had the
war continued, Austria would undoubtedly have extended her conquests down
the Danube. But Charles was anxious about Italy, then in danger from Spain,
which under Alberoni's guidance had occupied Sardinia and Sicily. On the
2nd of August 1718, accordingly, Charles joined the Triple Alliance,
henceforth the Quadruple Alliance. The coercion of Spain resulted in a
peace by which Charles obtained Sicily in exchange for Sardinia. The
shifting of the balance of power that followed belongs to the history of
Europe (_q.v._); for Austria the only important outcome was that in 1731
Charles found himself isolated. [Sidenote: The Pragmatic Sanction.] Being
without a son, he was now anxious to secure the throne for his daughter
Maria Theresa, in accordance with the Pragmatic Sanction of the 19th of
April 1713, in which he had pronounced the indivisibility of the monarchy,
and had settled the succession on his daughter, in default of a male heir.
It now became his object to secure the adhesion of the powers to this
instrument. In 1731 Great Britain and Holland agreed to respect it, in
return for the cession of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla to Don Carlos; but
the hostility of the Bourbon powers continued, resulting in 1733 in the War
of Polish Succession, the outcome of which was the acquisition of Lorraine
by France, and of Naples, Sicily and the Tuscan ports by Don Carlos, while
the power of the Habsburg monarchy in northern Italy was strengthened by
the acquisition of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla. At the same time Spain
and Sardinia adhered to the Pragmatic Sanction. Francis, the dispossessed
duke of Lorraine, was to be compensated with Tuscany. On the 12th of
February 1736 he was married to the archduchess Maria Theresa, and on the
11th of May following he signed the formal act ceding Lorraine to France.
[Sidenote: Treaty of Belgrade, 1739.]
The last years of Charles VI. were embittered by the disastrous outcome of
the war with Turkey (1738-1739), on which he had felt compelled to embark
in accordance with the terms of a treaty of alliance with Russia signed in
1726. After a campaign of varying fortunes the Turks beat the imperial
troops at Krotzka on the 23rd of July 1739 and laid siege to Belgrade,
where on the 1st of September a treaty was signed, which, with the
exception of the banat, surrendered everything that Austria had gained by
the treaty of Passarowitz. On the 20th of October 1740, Charles died,
leaving his dominions in no condition to resist the attacks of the powers,
which, in spite of having adhered to the Pragmatic Sanction, now sought to
profit from their weakness. Yet for their internal development Charles had
done much. His religious attitude was moderate and tolerant, and he did his
best to promote the enlightenment of his subjects. He was zealous, too, for
the promotion of trade and industry, and, besides the East India Company
which he established at Ostend, he encouraged the development of Trieste
and Fiume as sea-ports and centres of trade with the Levant.
[Sidenote: Maria Theresa.]
[v.03 p.0010] The accession of Maria Theresa to the throne of the Habsburgs
marks an important epoch in the history of Austria. For a while, indeed, it
seemed that the monarchy was on the point of dissolution. To the diplomacy
of the 18th century the breach of a solemn compact was but lightly
regarded; and Charles VI. had neglected the advice of Prince Eugene to
leave an effective army of 200,000 men as a more solid guarantee of the
Pragmatic Sanction than the signatures of the powers. As it was, the
Austrian forces, disorganized in the long confusion of the Turkish wars,
were in no condition to withstand Frederick the Great, when in 1740, at the
head of the splendid army bequeathed to him by his father, he invaded
Silesia (see AUSTRIAN SUCCESSION, WAR OF). The Prussian victory at Mollwitz
(April 10, 1741) brought into the field against Austria all the powers
which were ambitious of expansion at her expense: France, Bavaria, Spain,
Saxony and Sardinia. Nor was the peril wholly external. Apart from the
perennial discontents of Magyars and Slavs, the confusion and corruption of
the administration, and the misery caused by the ruin of the finances, had
made the Habsburg dynasty unpopular even in its German states, and in
Vienna itself a large section of public opinion was loudly in favour of the
claims of Charles of Bavaria. Yet the war, if it revealed the weakness of
the Austrian monarchy, revealed also unexpected sources of strength. Not
the least of these was the character of Maria Theresa herself, who to the
fascination of a young and beautiful woman added a very masculine
resolution and judgment. In response to her personal appeal, and also to
her wise and timely concessions, the Hungarians had rallied to her support,
and for the first time in history awoke not only to a feeling of
enthusiastic loyalty to a Habsburg monarch, but also to the realization
that their true interests were bound up with those of Austria (see HUNGARY:
_History_). Although, then, as the result of the war, Silesia was by the
treaty of Dresden transferred from Austria to Prussia, while in Italy by
the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748 cessions were made at the expense of
the house of Habsburg to the Spanish Don Philip and to Sardinia, the
Austrian monarchy as a whole had displayed a vitality that had astonished
the world, and was in some respects stronger than at the beginning of the
struggle, notably in the great improvement in the army and in the
possession of generals schooled by the experience of active service.
The period from 1747 to 1756, the year of the outbreak of the Seven Years'
War, was occupied in preparations for carrying into effect the
determination of Maria Theresa to recover the lost provinces. To give any
chance of success, it was recognized that a twofold change of system was
necessary: in internal and in external affairs. To strengthen the state
internally a complete revolution of its administration was begun under the
auspices of Count F. W. Haugwitz (1700-1765); the motley system which had
survived from the middle ages was gradually replaced by an administrative
machinery uniformly organized and centralized; and the army especially,
hitherto patched together from the quotas raised and maintained by the
various diets and provincial estates, was withdrawn from their
interference. These reforms were practically confined to the central
provinces of the monarchy; for in Hungary, as well as in the outlying
territories of Lombardy and the Netherlands, it was recognized that the
conservative temper of the peoples made any revolutionary change in the
traditional system inadvisable.
[Sidenote: Austrian-French alliance, and Seven Years' War.]
Meanwhile, in foreign affairs, it had become clear that for Austria the
enemy to be dreaded was no longer France, but Prussia, and Kaunitz prepared
the way for a diplomatic revolution, which took effect when, on the 1st of
May 1756, Austria and France concluded the first treaty of Versailles. The
long rivalry between Bourbons and Habsburgs was thus ended, and France and
Austria remained in alliance or at peace until the outbreak of the French
Revolution. So far as Austria was concerned, the Seven Years' War (_q.v._)
in which France and Austria were ranged against Prussia and Great Britain,
was an attempt on the part of Maria Theresa to recover Silesia. It failed;
and the peace of Hubertsburg, signed on the 15th of February 1763, left
Germany divided between Austria and Prussia, whose rivalry for the hegemony
was to last until the victory of Koeniggraetz (1866) definitely decided the
issue in favour of the Hohenzollern monarchy.
[Sidenote: Austria and Bavaria.]
The loss of Silesia led Austria to look for "compensation" elsewhere. The
most obvious direction in which this could be sought was in Bavaria, ruled
by the decadent house of Wittelsbach, the secular rival of the house of
Habsburg in southern Germany. The question of the annexation of Bavaria by
conquest or exchange had occupied the minds of Austrian statesmen
throughout the century: it would not only have removed a perpetual menace
to the peace of Austria, but would have given to the Habsburg monarchy an
overwhelming strength in South Germany. The matter came to an issue in
1777, on the death of the elector Maximilian III. The heir was the elector
palatine Charles Theodore, but Joseph II., who had been elected emperor in
1765, in succession to his father, and appointed co-regent with his
mother--claimed the inheritance, and prepared to assert his claims by
force. The result was the so-called War of Bavarian Succession. As a matter
of fact, however, though the armies under Frederick and Joseph were face to
face in the field, the affair was settled without actual fighting; Maria
Theresa, fearing the chances of another struggle with Prussia, overruled
her son at the last moment, and by the treaty of Teschen agreed to be
content with the cession of the Quarter of the Inn (Innviertel) and some
other districts.
[Sidenote: Russia, Austria and the Ottoman Empire.]
Meanwhile the ambition of Catherine of Russia, and the war with Turkey by
which the empire of the tsars was advanced to the Black Sea and threatened
to establish itself south of the Danube, were productive of consequences of
enormous importance to Austria in the East. Russian control of the Danube
was a far more serious menace to Austria than the neighbourhood of the
decadent Ottoman power; and for a while the policy of Austria towards the
Porte underwent a change that foreshadowed her attitude towards the Eastern
Question in the 19th century. In spite of the reluctance of Maria Theresa,
Kaunitz, in July 1771, concluded a defensive alliance with the Porte. He
would have exchanged this for an active co-operation with Turkey, could
Frederick the Great have been persuaded to promise at least neutrality in
the event of a Russo-Austrian War. But Frederick was unwilling to break
with Russia, with whom he was negotiating the partition of Poland; Austria
in these circumstances dared not take the offensive; and Maria Theresa was
compelled to purchase the modification of the extreme claims of Russia in
Turkey by agreeing to, and sharing in, the spoliation of Poland. [Sidenote:
Partition of Poland.] Her own share of the spoils was the acquisition, by
the first treaty of partition (August 5, 1772), of Galicia and Lodomeria.
Turkey was left in the lurch; and Austrian troops even occupied portions of
Moldavia, in order to secure the communication between the new Polish
provinces and Transylvania. At Constantinople, too, Austria once more
supported Russian policy, and was rewarded, in 1777, by the acquisition of
Bukovina from Turkey. In Italy the influence of the House of Austria had
been strengthened by the marriage of the archduke Ferdinand with the
heiress of the d'Estes of Modena, and the establishment of the archduke
Leopold in the grand-duchy of Tuscany.
[Sidenote: Internal reforms under Maria Theresa.]
In internal affairs Maria Theresa may be regarded as the practical founder
of the unified Austrian state. The new system of centralization has already
been referred to. It only remains to add that, in carrying out this system,
Maria Theresa was too wise to fall into the errors afterwards made by her
son and successor. She was no doctrinaire, and consistently acted on the
principle once laid down by Machiavelli, that while changing the substance,
the prince should be careful to preserve the form of old institutions.
Alongside the new bureaucracy, the old estates survived in somnolent
inactivity, and even in Hungary, though the ancient constitution was left
untouched, the diet was only summoned four times during the reign, and
reforms were carried out, without protest, by royal ordinance. It was under
Maria Theresa, too, [v.03 p.0011] that the attempt was first made to make
German the official language of the whole monarchy; an attempt which was
partly successful even in Hungary, especially so far as the army was
concerned, though Latin remained the official tongue of the diet, the
county-assemblies and the courts.
The social, religious and educational reforms of Maria Theresa also mark
her reign as the true epoch of transition from medieval to modern
conditions in Austria. In religious matters the empress, though a devout
Catholic and herself devoted to the Holy See, was carried away by the
prevailing reaction, in which her ministers shared, against the pretensions
of the papacy. The anti-papal tendency, known as Febronianism (_q.v._), had
made immense headway, not only among the laity but among the clergy in the
Austrian dominions. By a new law, papal bulls could not be published
without the consent of the crown, and the direct intercourse of the bishops
with Rome was forbidden; the privileges of the religious orders were
curtailed; and the education of the clergy was brought under state control.
It was, however, only with reluctance that Maria Theresa agreed to carry
out the papal bull suppressing the Society of Jesus; and, while declaring
herself against persecution, she could never be persuaded to accept the
views of Kaunitz and Joseph in favour of toleration. Parallel with the
assertion of the rights of the state as against the church, was the
revolution effected in the educational system of the monarchy. This, too,
was taken from the control of the church; the universities were remodelled
and modernized by the introduction of new faculties, the study of
ecclesiastical law being transferred from that of theology to that of
jurisprudence, and the elaborate system of elementary and secondary
education was established, which survived with slight modification till
1869.
[Sidenote: Joseph II. and "Josephinism."]
The death of Maria Theresa in 1780 left Joseph II. free to attempt the
drastic revolution from above, which had been restrained by the wise
statesmanship of his mother. He was himself a strange incarnation at once
of doctrinaire liberalism and the old Habsburg autocracy. Of the essential
conditions of his empire he was constitutionally unable to form a
conception. He was a disciple, not of Machiavelli, but of Rousseau; and his
scattered dominions, divided by innumerable divergences of racial and class
prejudice, and encumbered with traditional institutions to which the people
clung with passionate conservatism, he regarded as so much vacant territory
on which to build up his ideal state. He was, in fact, a Revolutionist who
happened also to be an emperor. "Reason" and "enlightenment" were his
watchwords; opposition to his wise measures he regarded as obscurantist and
unreasonable, and unreason, if it proved stubborn, as a vice to be
corrected with whips. In this spirit he at once set to work to reconstruct
the state, on lines that strangely anticipated the principles of the
Constituent Assembly of 1789. He refused to be crowned or to take the oath
of the local constitutions, and divided the whole monarchy into thirteen
departments, to be governed under a uniform system. In ecclesiastical
matters his policy was also that of "reform from above," the complete
subordination of the clergy to the state, and the severance of all
effective ties with Rome. This treatment of the "Fakirs and Ulemas" (as he
called them in his letters), who formed the most powerful element in the
monarchy, would alone have ensured the failure of his plans, but failure
was made certain by the introduction of the conscription, which turned even
the peasants, whom he had done much to emancipate, against him. The
threatened revolt of Hungary, and the actual revolt of Tirol and of the
Netherlands (see BELGIUM: _History_) together with the disasters of the war
with Turkey, forced him, before he died, to the formal reversal of the
whole policy of reform.
In his foreign policy Joseph II. had been scarcely less unhappy. In 1784 he
had resumed his plan of acquiring Bavaria for Austria by negotiating with
the elector Charles Theodore its exchange for the Netherlands, which were
to be erected for his benefit into a "Kingdom of Burgundy." The elector was
not unwilling, but the scheme was wrecked by the opposition of the heir to
the Bavarian throne, the duke of Zweibruecken, in response to whose appeal
Frederick the Great formed, on the 23rd of July 1785, a confederation of
German princes (_Fuerstenbund_) for the purpose of opposing the threatened
preponderance of Austria. Prussia was thus for the first time formally
recognized as the protector of the German states against Austrian ambition,
and had at the same time become the centre of an anti-Austrian alliance,
which embraced Sweden, Poland and the maritime powers. In these
circumstances the war with Turkey, on which Joseph embarked, in alliance
with Russia, in 1788, would hardly have been justified by the most
brilliant success. The first campaign, however, which he conducted in
person was a dismal failure; the Turks followed the Austrian army,
disorganized by disease, across the Danube, and though the transference of
the command to the veteran marshal Loudon somewhat retrieved the initial
disasters, his successes were more than counterbalanced by the alliance,
concluded on the 31st of January 1790, between Prussia and Turkey. Three
weeks later, on the 20th of February 1790, Joseph died broken-hearted.
[Sidenote: Leopold II.]
The situation needed all the statesmanship of the new ruler, Leopold II.
This was less obvious in his domestic than in his foreign policy, though
perhaps equally present. As grand-duke of Tuscany Leopold had won the
reputation of an enlightened and liberal ruler; but meanwhile "Josephinism"
had not been justified by its results, and the progress of the Revolution
in France was beginning to scare even enlightened princes into reaction.
Leopold, then, reverted to the traditional Habsburg methods; the old
supremacy of the Church, regarded as the one effective bond of empire, was
restored; and the _Einheitsstaat_ was once more resolved into its elements,
with the old machinery of diets and estates, and the old abuses. It was the
beginning of that policy of "stability" associated later with Metternich,
which was to last till the cataclysm of 1848. For the time, the policy was
justified by its results. The spirit of revolutionary France had not yet
touched the heart of the Habsburg empire, and national rivalries were
expressed, not so much in expansive ambitions, as in a somnolent clinging
to traditional privileges. Leopold, therefore, who made his debut on the
European stage as the executor of the ban of the Empire against the
insurgent Liegeois, was free to pose as the champion of order against the
Revolution, without needing to fear the resentment of his subjects. He
played this role with consummate skill in the negotiations that led up to
the treaty of Reichenbach (August 15, 1790), which ended the quarrel with
Prussia and paved the way to the armistice of Giurgevo with Turkey
(September 10). Leopold was now free to deal with the Low Countries, which
were reduced to order before the end of the year. On the 4th of August
1791, was signed at Sistova the definitive peace with Turkey, which
practically established the _status quo_.
[Sidenote: Austria and the French Revolution.]
On the 6th of October 1700, Leopold had been crowned Roman emperor at
Frankfort, and it was as emperor, not as Habsburg, that he first found
himself in direct antagonism to the France of the Revolution. The fact that
Leopold's sister, Marie Antoinette, was the wife of Louis XVI. had done
little to cement the Franco-Austrian alliance, which since 1763 had been
practically non-existent; nor was it now the mainspring of his attitude
towards revolutionary France. But by the decree of the 4th of August, which
in the general abolition of feudal rights involved the possessions of many
German princes _enclaves_ in Alsace and Lorraine, the Constituent Assembly
had made the first move in the war against the established European system.
Leopold protested as sovereign of Germany; and the protest was soon
enlarged into one made in the name of Europe. The circular letter of Count
Kaunitz, dated the 6th of July 1791, calling on the sovereigns to unite
against the Revolution, was at once the beginning of the Concert of Europe,
and in a sense the last manifesto of the Holy Roman Empire as "the centre
of political unity." But the common policy proclaimed in the famous
declaration of Pillnitz (August 27), was soon wrecked upon the particular
interests of the powers. Both Austria and Prussia [v.03 p.0012] were much
occupied with the Polish question, and to have plunged into a crusade
against France would have been to have left Poland, where the new
constitution had been proclaimed on the 3rd of May, to the mercy of Russia.
Towards the further development of events in France, therefore, Leopold
assumed at first a studiously moderate attitude; but his refusal to respond
to the demand of the French government for the dispersal of the corps of
_emigres_ assembled under the protection of the German princes on the
frontier of France, and the insistence on the rights of princes
dispossessed in Alsace and Lorraine, precipitated the crisis. On the 25th
of January 1792 the French Assembly adopted the decree declaring that, in
the event of no satisfactory reply having been received from the emperor by
the 1st of March, war should be declared. On the 7th of February Austria
and Prussia signed at Berlin an offensive and defensive treaty of alliance.
Thus was ushered in the series of stupendous events which were to change
the face of Europe and profoundly to affect the destinies of Austria.
Leopold himself did not live to see the beginning of the struggle; he died
on the 1st of March 1792, the day fixed by the Legislative Assembly as that
on which the question of peace or war was to be decided.
[Sidenote: Effects of the Revolutionary Wars.]
The events of the period that followed, in which Austria necessarily played
a conspicuous part, are dealt with elsewhere (see EUROPE, FRENCH
REVOLUTIONARY WARS, NAPOLEON, NAPOLEONIC CAMPAIGNS). Here it will only be
necessary to mention those which form permanent landmarks in the
progressive conformation of the Austrian monarchy. Such was the second
partition of Poland (January 23, 1793), which eliminated the "buffer state"
on which Austrian statesmanship had hitherto laid such importance, and
brought the Austrian and Russian frontiers into contact. Such, too, was the
treaty of Campo Formio (October 17, 1797) which ended the first
revolutionary war. By this treaty the loss of the Belgian provinces was
confirmed, and though Austria gained Venice, the establishment of French
preponderance in the rest of Italy made a breach in the tradition of
Habsburg supremacy in the peninsula, which was to have its full effect only
in the struggles of the next century. The rise of Napoleon, and his
masterful interference in Germany, produced a complete and permanent
revolution in the relations of Austria to the German states. The campaigns
which issued in the treaty of Luneville (February 9, 1801) practically
sealed the fate of the old Empire. Even were the venerable name to survive,
it was felt that it would pass, by the election of the princes now
tributary to France, from the house of Habsburg to that of Bonaparte.
[Sidenote: The "Empire of Austria."] Francis II. determined to forestall
the possible indignity of the subordination of his family to an upstart
dynasty. On the 14th of May 1804, Napoleon was proclaimed emperor of the
French; on the 11th of August Francis II. assumed the style of Francis I.,
hereditary emperor of Austria. [Sidenote: End of the Holy Roman Empire.]
Two years later, when the defeat of Austerlitz had led to the treaty of
Pressburg (January 1st, 1806) by which Austria lost Venice and Tirol, and
Napoleon's Confederation of the Rhine had broken the unity of Germany,
Francis formally abdicated the title and functions of Holy Roman emperor
(August 6, 1806).
Austria had to undergo further losses and humiliations, notably by the
treaty of Vienna (1809), before the outcome of Napoleon's Russian campaign
in 1812 gave her the opportunity for recuperation and revenge. The skilful
diplomacy of Metternich, who was now at the head of the Austrian
government, enabled Austria to take full advantage of the situation created
by the disaster to Napoleon's arms. His object was to recover Austria's
lost possessions and if possible to add to them, a policy which did not
necessarily involve the complete overthrow of the French emperor. Austria,
therefore, refused to join the alliance between Russia and Prussia signed
on the 17th of March 1813, but pressed on her armaments so as to be ready
in any event. Her opportunity came after the defeats of the Allies at
Luetzen and Bautzen and the conclusion of an armistice at Pleswitz. Between
200,000 and 300,000 Austrian troops were massed in Bohemia; and Austria
took up the role of mediator, prepared to throw the weight of her support
into the scale of whichever side should prove most amenable to her claims.
The news of the battle of Vittoria, following on the reluctance of Napoleon
to listen to demands involving the overthrow of the whole of his political
system in Central Europe, decided Austria in favour of the Allies. By this
fateful decision Napoleon's fall was assured. By the treaty of Trachenberg
(July 12, 1813) the Grand Alliance was completed; on the 16th, 17th and
18th of October the battle of Leipzig was fought; and the victorious
advance into France was begun, which issued, on the 11th of April 1814, in
Napoleon's abdication. (See NAPOLEON, NAPOLEONIC CAMPAIGNS, EUROPE.)
[Sidenote: Congress of Vienna.]
It was a recognition of the decisive part played by Austria in these great
events that Vienna was chosen as the scene of the great international
congress summoned (September 1814) for the purpose of re-establishing the
balance of power in Europe, which Napoleon's conquests had upset. An
account of the congress is given elsewhere (see VIENNA, CONGRESS OF). The
result for Austria was a triumphant vindication of Metternich's diplomacy.
He had, it is true, been unable to prevent the retention of the grand-duchy
of Warsaw by Alexander of Russia; but with the aid of Great Britain and
France (secret treaty of January 3, 1815) he had frustrated the efforts of
Prussia to absorb the whole of Saxony, Bavaria was forced to disgorge the
territories gained for her by Napoleon at Austria's expense, Illyria and
Dalmatia were regained, and Lombardy was added to Venetia to constitute a
kingdom under the Habsburg crown; while in the whole Italian peninsula
French was replaced by Austrian influence. In Germany the settlement was
even more fateful for Austria's future. The Holy Empire, in spite of the
protests of the Holy See, was not restored, Austria preferring the loose
confederation of sovereign states (_Staatenbund_) actually constituted
under her presidency. Such a body, Metternich held, "powerful for defence,
powerless for offence," would form a guarantee of the peace of central
Europe--and of the preponderance of Austria; and in its councils Austrian
diplomacy, backed by the weight of the Habsburg power beyond the borders of
Germany, would exercise a greater influence than any possible prestige
derived from a venerable title that had become a by-word for the union of
unlimited pretensions with practical impotence. Moreover, to the refusal to
revive the Empire--which shattered so many patriotic hopes in
Germany--Austria added another decision yet more fateful. By relinquishing
her claim to the Belgian provinces and other outlying territories in
western Germany, and by acquiescing in the establishment of Prussia in the
Rhine provinces, she abdicated to Prussia her position as the bulwark of
Germany against France, and hastened the process of her own gravitation
towards the Slavonic East to which the final impetus was given in 1866.
[Sidenote: Internal affairs of Austria under Francis II. and Metternich.]
In order to understand the foreign policy of Austria, inseparably
associated with the name of Metternich, during the period from the close of
the congress of Vienna to the outbreak of the revolutions of 1848, it is
necessary to know something of the internal conditions of the monarchy
before and during this time. In 1792 Leopold II. had been succeeded by his
son Francis II. His popular designation of "our good Kaiser Franz" this
monarch owed to a certain simplicity of address and _bonhomie_ which
pleased the Viennese, certainly not to his serious qualities as a ruler. He
shared to the full the autocratic temper of the Habsburgs, their
narrow-mindedness and their religious and intellectual obscurantism; and
the qualities which would have made him a kindly, if somewhat tyrannical,
father of a family, and an excellent head clerk, were hardly those required
by the conditions of the Austrian monarchy during a singularly critical
period of its history.
The personal character of the emperor, moreover, gained a special
importance owing to the modifications that were made in the administrative
system of the empire. This had been originally organized in a series of
departments: Aulic chanceries for Austria, for Hungary and Transylvania, a
general Aulic chamber for finance, domains, mines, trade, post, &c., an
Aulic council [v.03 p.0013] of war, a general directory of accounts, and a
chancery of the household, court and state. The heads of all these
departments had the rank of secretaries of state and met in council under
the royal presidency. In course of time, however, this body became too
unwieldy for an effective cabinet, and Maria Theresa established the
council of state. During the early years of the reign of Francis, the
emperor kept himself in touch with the various departments by means of a
cabinet minister; but he had a passion for detail, and after 1805 he
himself undertook the function of keeping the administration together. At
the same time he had no personal contact with ministers, who might
communicate with him only in writing, and for months together never met for
the discussion of business. The council of state was, moreover, itself soon
enlarged and subdivided; and in course of time the emperor alone
represented any synthesis of the various departments of the administration.
The jurisdiction of the heads of departments, moreover, was strictly
defined, and all that lay outside this was reserved for the imperial
decision. Whatever was covered by established precedent could be settled by
the department at once; but matters falling outside such precedent, however
insignificant, had to be referred to the throne.[2] A system so inelastic,
and so deadening to all initiative, could have but one result. Gradually
the officials, high and low, subjected to an elaborate system of checks,
refused to take any responsibility whatever; and the minutest
administrative questions were handed up, through all the stages of the
bureaucratic hierarchy, to be shelved and forgotten in the imperial
cabinet. For Francis could not possibly himself deal with all the questions
of detail arising in his vast empire, even had he desired to do so. In
fact, his attitude towards all troublesome problems was summed up in his
favourite phrase, "Let us sleep upon it": questions unanswered would answer
themselves.
The result was the gradual atrophy of the whole administrative machine. The
Austrian government was not consciously tyrannical, even in Italy; and
Francis himself, though determined to be absolute, intended also to be
paternal. Nor would the cruelties inflicted on the bolder spirits who dared
to preach reform, which made the Austrian government a by-word among the
nations, alone have excited the passionate spirit of revolt which carried
all before it in 1848. The cause of this is to be sought rather in the
daily friction of a system which had ceased to be efficient and only
succeeded in irritating the public opinion it was powerless to curb.
Metternich himself was fully conscious of the evil. He recognized that the
fault of the government lay in the fact that it did not govern, and he
deplored that his own function, in a decadent age, was but "to prop up
mouldering institutions." He was not constitutionally averse from change;
and he was too clear-sighted not to see that, sooner or later, change was
inevitable. But his interest was in the fascinating game of diplomacy; he
was ambitious of playing the leading part on the great stage of
international politics; and he was too consummate a courtier to risk the
loss of the imperial favour by any insistence on unpalatable reforms,
which, after all, would perhaps only reveal the necessity for the complete
revolution which he feared.
The alternative was to use the whole force of the government to keep things
as they were. The disintegrating force of the ever-simmering racial
rivalries could be kept in check by the army; Hungarian regiments
garrisoned Italy, Italian regiments guarded Galicia, Poles occupied
Austria, and Austrians Hungary. The peril from the infiltration of
"revolutionary" ideas from without was met by the erection round the
Austrian dominions of a Chinese wall of tariffs and censors, which had,
however, no more success than is usual with such expedients.[3] The peril
from the independent growth of Liberalism within was guarded against by a
rigid supervision of the press and the re-establishment of clerical control
over education. Music alone flourished, free from government interference;
but, curiously enough, the movements, in Bohemia, Croatia and elsewhere,
for the revival of the national literatures and languages--which were to
issue in the most difficult problem facing the Austrian government at the
opening of the 20th century--were encouraged in exalted circles, as tending
to divert attention from political to purely scientific interests.
Meanwhile the old system of provincial diets and estates was continued or
revived (in 1816 in Tirol and Vorarlberg, 1817 in Galicia, 1818 in
Carniola, 1828 in the circle of Salzburg), but they were in no sense
representative, clergy and nobles alone being eligible, with a few
delegates from the towns, and they had practically no functions beyond
registering the imperial decrees, relative to recruiting or taxation, and
dealing with matters of local police.[4] Even the ancient right of petition
was seldom exercised, and then only to meet with the imperial disfavour.
And this stagnation of the administration was accompanied, as might have
been expected, by economic stagnation. Agriculture languished, hampered, as
in France before the Revolution, by the feudal privileges of a noble caste
which no longer gave any equivalent service to the state; trade was
strangled by the system of high tariffs at the frontier and internal
_octrois_; and finally public credit was shaken to its foundations by
lavish issues of paper money and the neglect to publish the budget.
[Sidenote: Metternich's policy of stability.]
The maintenance within the empire of a system so artificial and so unsound,
involved in foreign affairs the policy of preventing the success of any
movements by which it might be threatened. The triumph of Liberal
principles or of national aspirations in Germany, or elsewhere in Europe,
might easily, as the events of 1848 proved, shatter the whole rotten
structure of the Habsburg monarchy, which survived only owing to the apathy
of the populations it oppressed. This, then, is the explanation of the
system of "stability" which Metternich succeeded in imposing for thirty
years upon Europe. If he persuaded Frederick William III. that the grant of
a popular constitution would be fatal to the Prussian monarchy, this was
through no love of Prussia; the Carlsbad Decrees and the Vienna Final Act
were designed to keep Germany quiet, lest the sleep of Austria should be
disturbed; the lofty claims of the Troppau Protocol were but to cover an
Austrian aggression directed to purely Austrian ends: and in the Eastern
Question, the moral support given to the "legitimate" authority of the
sultan over the "rebel" Greeks was dictated solely by the interest of
Austria in maintaining the integrity of Turkey. (See EUROPE: _History_;
GERMANY: _History_; ALEXANDER I. of Russia; METTERNICH, &c.)
Judged by the standard of its own aims Metternich's diplomacy was, on the
whole, completely successful. For fifteen years after the congress of
Vienna, in spite of frequent alarms, the peace of Europe was not seriously
disturbed; and even in 1830, the revolution at Paris found no echo in the
great body of the Austrian dominions. The isolated revolts in Italy were
easily suppressed; and the insurrection of Poland, though it provoked the
lively sympathy of the Magyars and Czechs, led to no actual movement in the
Habsburg states. For a moment, indeed, Metternich had meditated taking
advantage of the popular feeling to throw the weight of Austria into the
scale in favour of the Poles, and thus, by re-establishing a Polish kingdom
under Austrian influence, to restore the barrier between the two empires
which the partition of Poland had destroyed. But cautious counsels
prevailed, and by the victory of the Russian arms the _status quo_ was
restored (see POLAND).
[Sidenote: Ferdinand I. 1835-1848.]
The years that followed were not wanting in signs of the coming storm. On
the 2nd of March 1835 Francis I. died, and was succeeded by his son
Ferdinand I. The new emperor was personally amiable, but so enfeebled by
epilepsy as to be incapable of ruling; a veiled regency had to be
constituted to carry on the government, and the vices of the administration
were further accentuated by weakness and divided counsels at the centre.
Under these circumstances [v.03 p.0014] popular discontent made rapid
headway. The earliest symptoms of political agitation were in Hungary,
where the diet began to show signs of vigorous life, and the growing Slav
separatist movements, especially in the south of the kingdom, were rousing
the old spirit of Magyar ascendancy (see HUNGARY: _History_). For
everywhere the Slav populations were growing restive under the
German-Magyar domination. In Bohemia the Czech literary movement had
developed into an organized resistance to the established order, which was
attacked under the disguise of a criticism of the English administration in
Ireland. "Repeal" became the watchword of Bohemian, as of Irish,
nationalists (see BOHEMIA). Among the southern Slavs the "Illyrian"
movement, voiced from 1836 onward in the _Illyrian National Gazette_ of
Ljudevit Gaj, was directed in the first instance to a somewhat shadowy
Pan-Slav union, which, on the interference of the Austrian government in
1844, was exchanged for the more definite object of a revival of "the
Triune Kingdom" (Croatia, Slavonia, Dalmatia) independent of the Hungarian
crown (see CROATIA, &c.). In the German provinces also, in spite of
Metternich's censors and police, the national movements in Germany had
gained an entrance, and, as the revolution of 1848 in Vienna was to show,
the most advanced revolutionary views were making headway.
[Sidenote: Galician Rising, 1846.]
The most important of all the symptoms of the approaching cataclysm was,
however, the growing unrest among the peasants. As had been proved in
France in 1789, and was again to be shown in Russia in 1906, the success of
any political revolution depended ultimately upon the attitude of the
peasant class. In this lies the main significance of the rising in Galicia
in 1846. This was in its origin a Polish nationalist movement, hatched in
the little independent republic of Cracow. As such it had little
importance; though, owing to the incompetence of the Austrian commander,
the Poles gained some initial successes. More fateful was the attitude of
the Orthodox Ruthenian peasantry, who were divided from their Catholic
Polish over-lords by centuries of religious and feudal oppression. The
Poles had sought, by lavish promises, to draw them into their ranks; their
reply was to rise in support of the Austrian government. In the fight at
Gdow (February 26th), where Benedek laid the foundations of the military
reputation that was to end so tragically at Koeniggraetz, flail and scythe
wrought more havoc in the rebel ranks than the Austrian musketry. Since, in
spite of this object-lesson, the Polish nobles still continued their
offers, the peasants consulted the local Austrian authorities as to what
course they should take; and the local authorities, unaccustomed to
arriving at any decision without consulting Vienna, practically gave them
_carte blanche_ to do as they liked. A hideous _jacquerie_ followed for
three or four days; during which cartloads of dead were carried into
Tarnow, where the peasants received a reward for every "rebel" brought in.
This affair was not only a scandal for which the Austrian government,
through its agents, was responsible; but it placed the authorities at
Vienna in a serious dilemma. For the Ruthenians, elated by their victory,
refused to return to work, and demanded the abolition of all feudal
obligations as the reward of their loyalty. To refuse this claim would have
meant the indefinite prolongation of the crisis; to concede it would have
been to invite the peasantry of the whole empire to put forth similar
demands on pain of a general rising. On the 13th of April 1846 an imperial
decree abolished some of the more burdensome feudal obligations; but this
concession was greeted with so fierce an outcry, as an authoritative
endorsement of the atrocities, that it was again revoked, and Count Franz
von Stadion was sent to restore order in Galicia. The result was, that the
peasants saw that though their wrongs were admitted, their sole hope of
redress lay in a change of government, and added the dead weight of their
resentment to the forces making for revolution. It was the union of the
agrarian with the nationalist movements that made the downfall of the
Austrian system inevitable.
[Sidenote: Revolutions of 1848.]
The material for the conflagration in Austria was thus all prepared when in
February 1848 the fall of Louis Philippe fanned into a blaze the
smouldering fires of revolution throughout Europe. On the 3rd of March,
Kossuth, in the diet at Pressburg, delivered the famous speech which was
the declaration of war of Hungarian Liberalism against the Austrian system.
"From the charnel-house of the Vienna cabinet," he exclaimed, "a
pestilential air breathes on us, which dulls our nerves and paralyses the
flight of our spirit." Hungary liberated was to become the centre of
freedom for all the races under the Austrian crown, and the outcome was to
be a new "fraternization of the Austrian peoples." In the enthusiasm of the
moment the crucial question of the position to be occupied by the
conflicting nationalities in this "fraternal union" was overlooked.
Germanism had so far served as the basis of the Austrian system, not as a
national ideal, but because "it formed a sort of unnational mediating, and
common element among the contradictory and clamorous racial tendencies."
But with the growth of the idea of German unity, Germanism had established
a new ideal, of which the centre lay beyond the boundaries of the Austrian
monarchy, and which was bound to be antagonistic to the aspirations of
other races. The new doctrine of the fraternization of the Austrian races
would inevitably soon come into conflict with the traditional German
ascendancy strengthened by the new sentiment of a united Germany. It was on
this rock that, both in Austria and in Germany, the revolution suffered
shipwreck.
Meanwhile events progressed rapidly. On the 11th of March a meeting of
"young Czechs" at Prague drew up a petition embodying nationalist and
liberal demands; and on the same day the diet of Lower Austria petitioned
the crown to summon a meeting of the delegates of the diets to set the
Austrian finances in order. To this last proposal the government, next day,
gave its consent. But in the actual temper of the Viennese the slightest
concession was dangerous. The hall of the diet was invaded by a mob of
students and workmen, Kossuth's speech was read and its proposals adopted
as the popular programme, and the members of the diet were forced to lead a
tumultuous procession to the Hofburg, to force the assent of the government
to a petition based on the catch-words of the Revolution. [Sidenote: Fall
of Metternich, March 13, 1848.] The authorities, taken by surprise, were
forced to temporize and agreed to lay the petition before the emperor.
Meanwhile round the hall of the diet a riot had broken out; the soldiers
intervened and blood was shed. The middle classes now joined the rebels;
and the riots had become a revolution. Threatened by the violence of the
mob, Metternich, on the evening of the 13th of March, escaped from the
Hofburg and passed into exile in England.
The fall of Metternich was the signal for the outburst of the storm, not in
Austria only, but throughout central Europe. In Hungary, on the 31st of
March, the government was forced to consent to a new constitution which
virtually erected Hungary into an independent state. On the 8th of April a
separate constitution was promised to Bohemia; and if the petition of the
Croats for a similar concession was rejected, this was due to the armed mob
of Vienna, which was in close alliance with Kossuth and the Magyars. The
impotence of the Austrian government in this crisis was due to the
necessity of keeping the bulk of the Austrian forces in Italy, where the
news of Metternich's fall had also led to a concerted rising against the
Habsburg rule (see ITALY). Upon the fortunes of war in the peninsula
depended the ultimate issue of the revolutions so far as Austria was
concerned.
The army and the prestige of the imperial tradition were, in fact, the two
sheet-anchors that enabled the Habsburg monarchy to weather the storm. For
the time the latter was the only one available; but it proved invaluable,
especially in Germany, in preventing any settlement, until Radetzky's
victory of Novara had set free the army, and thus once more enabled Austria
to back her policy by force. The Austrian government, in no position to
refuse, had consented to send delegates from its German provinces to the
parliament of united Germany, which met at Frankfort on the 18th of May
1848. The question at [v.03 p.0015] once arose of the place of the Austrian
monarchy in united Germany. Were only its German provinces to be included?
Or was it to be incorporated whole? As to the first, the Austrian
government would not listen to the suggestion of a settlement which would
have split the monarchy in half and subjected it to a double allegiance. As
to the second, German patriots could not stomach the inclusion in Germany
of a vast non-German population. The dilemma was from the first so obvious
that the parliament would have done well to have recognized at once that
the only possible solution was that arrived at, after the withdrawal of the
Austrian delegates, by the exclusion of Austria altogether and the offer of
the crown of Germany to Frederick William of Prussia. But the shadow of the
Holy Empire, immemorially associated with the house of Habsburg, still
darkened the counsels of German statesmen. The Austrian archduke John had
been appointed regent, pending the election of an emperor; and the
political leaders could neither break loose from the tradition of Austrian
hegemony, nor reconcile themselves with the idea of a mutilated Germany,
till it was too late, and Austria was once more in a position to
re-establish the system devised by her diplomacy at the congress of Vienna.
(See GERMANY: _History._)
This fatal procrastination was perhaps not without excuse, in view of the
critical situation of the Austrian monarchy during 1848. For months after
the fall of Metternich Austria was practically without a central
government. Vienna itself, where on the 14th of March the establishment of
a National Guard was authorized by the emperor, was ruled by a committee of
students and citizens, who arrogated to themselves a voice in imperial
affairs, and imposed their will on the distracted ministry. On the 15th of
March the government proposed to summon a central committee of local diets;
but this was far from satisfying public opinion, and on the 25th of April a
constitution was proclaimed, including the whole monarchy with the
exception of Hungary and Lombardo-Venetia. This was, however, met by
vigorous protests from Czechs and Poles, while its provisions for a partly
nominated senate, and the indirect election of deputies, excited the wrath
of radical Vienna. Committees of students and national guards were formed;
on the 13th of May a Central Committee was established; and on the 15th a
fresh insurrection broke out, as a result of which the government once more
yielded, recognizing the Central Committee, admitting the right of the
National Guard to take an active part in politics, and promising the
convocation of a National Convention on the basis of a single chamber
elected by universal suffrage. On the 17th the emperor left Vienna for
Innsbruck "for the benefit of his health," and thence, on the 20th, issued
a proclamation in which he cast himself on the loyalty of his faithful
provinces, and, while confirming the concessions of March, ignored those of
the 15th of May. The flight of the emperor had led to a revulsion of
feeling in Vienna; but the issue of the proclamation and the attempt of the
government to disperse the students by closing the university, led to a
fresh outbreak on the 26th. Once more the ministry conceded all the demands
of the insurgents, and even went so far as to hand over the public treasury
and the responsibility of keeping order to a newly constituted Committee of
Public Safety.
[Sidenote: National movements.]
The tide was now, however, on the turn. The Jacobinism of the Vienna
democracy was not really representative of any widespread opinion even in
the German parts of Austria, while its loud-voiced Germanism excited the
lively opposition of the other races. Each of these had taken advantage of
the March troubles to press its claims, and everywhere the government had
shown the same yielding spirit. In Bohemia, where the attempt to hold
elections for the Frankfort parliament had broken down on the opposition of
the Czechs and the conservative German aristocracy, a separate constitution
had been proclaimed on the 8th of April; on March the 23rd the election by
the diet of Agram of Baron Joseph Jellachich as ban of Croatia was
confirmed, as a concession to the agitation among the southern Slavs; on
the 18th of March Count Stadion had proclaimed a new constitution for
Galicia. Even where, as in the case of the Serbs and Rumans, the government
had given no formal sanction to the national claims, the emperor was
regarded as the ultimate guarantee of their success; and deputations from
the various provinces poured into Innsbruck protesting their loyalty.
To say that the government deliberately adopted the Machiavellian policy of
mastering the revolution by setting race against race would be to pay too
high a compliment to its capacity. The policy was forced upon it; and was
only pursued consciously when it became obvious. Count Stadion began it in
Galicia, where, before bombarding insurgent Cracow into submission (April
26), he had won over the Ruthenian peasants by the abolition of feudal dues
and by forwarding a petition to the emperor for the official recognition of
their language alongside Polish. But the great object lesson was furnished
by the events in Prague, where the quarrel between Czechs and Germans,
radicals and conservatives, issued on the 12th of June in a rising of the
Czech students and populace. The suppression of this rising, and with it of
the revolution in Bohemia, on the 16th of June, by Prince Windischgraetz,
was not only the first victory of the army, but was the signal for the
outbreak of a universal race war, in which the idea of constitutional
liberty was sacrificed to the bitter spirit of national rivalry. The
parliament at Frankfort hailed Windischgraetz as a national hero, and
offered to send troops to his aid; the German revolutionists in Vienna
welcomed every success of Radetzky's arms in Italy as a victory for
Germanism. The natural result was to drive the Slav nationalities to the
side of the imperial government, since, whether at Vienna or at Budapest,
the radicals were their worst enemies.
The 16th of June had been fatal to the idea of an independent Bohemia,
fatal also to Pan-Slav dreams. To the Czechs the most immediate peril now
seemed that from the German parliament, and in the interests of their
nationality they were willing to join the Austrian government in the
struggle against German liberalism. The Bohemian diet, summoned for the
19th, never met. Writs were issued in Bohemia for the election to the
Austrian Reichsrath; and when, on the 10th of July, this assembled, the
Slav deputies were found to be in a majority. This fact, which was to lead
to violent trouble later, was at first subordinate to other issues, of
which the most important was the question of the emancipation of the
peasants. After long debates the law abolishing feudal services--the sole
permanent outcome of the revolution--was carried on the 31st of August, and
on the 7th of September received the imperial consent. The peasants thus
received all that they desired, and their vast weight was henceforth thrown
into the scale of the government against the revolution.
[Sidenote: Jellachich and "Illyrism."]
Meanwhile the alliance between the Slav nationalities and the conservative
elements within the empire had found a powerful representative in
Jellachich, the ban of Croatia. At first, indeed, his activity had been
looked at askance at Innsbruck, as but another force making for
disintegration. He had apparently identified himself with the "Illyrian"
party, had broken off all communications with the Hungarian government,
and, in spite of an imperial edict issued in response to the urgency of
Batthyani, had summoned a diet to Agram, which on the 9th of June decreed
the separation of the "Triune Kingdom" from Hungary. The imperial
government, which still hoped for Magyar aid against the Viennese
revolutionists, repudiated the action of the ban, accused him of
disobedience and treason, and deprived him of his military rank. But his
true motives were soon apparent; his object was to play off the nationalism
of the "Illyrians" against the radicalism of Magyars and Germans, and thus
to preserve his province for the monarchy; and the Hungarian radicals
played into his hands. The fate of the Habsburg empire depended upon the
issue of the campaign in Italy, which would have been lost by the
withdrawal of the Magyar and Croatian regiments; and the Hungarian
government chose this critical moment to tamper with the relations of the
army to the monarchy. In May a National Guard had been established; [v.03
p.0016] and the soldiers of the line were invited to join this, with the
promise of higher pay; on the 1st of June the garrison of Pest took the
oath to the Constitution. On the 10th Jellachich issued a proclamation to
the Croatian regiments in Italy, bidding them remain and fight for the
emperor and the common Fatherland. His loyalty to the tradition of the
imperial army was thus announced, and the alliance was cemented between the
army and the southern Slavs.
Jellachich, who had gone to Innsbruck to lay the Slav view before the
emperor, was allowed to return to Agram, though not as yet formally
reinstated. Here the diet passed a resolution denouncing the dual system
and demanding the restoration of the union of the empire. Thus was
proclaimed the identity of the Slav and the conservative points of view;
the radical "Illyrian" assembly had done its work, and on the 9th of July
Jellachich, while declaring it "permanent," prorogued it indefinitely "with
a paternal greeting," on the ground that the safety of the Fatherland
depended now "more upon physical than upon moral force." The diet thus
prorogued never met again. Absolute master of the forces of the banat,
Jellachich now waited until the intractable politicians of Pest should give
him the occasion and the excuse for setting the imperial army in motion
against them.
[Sidenote: Hungary.]
The occasion was not to be long postponed. Every day the rift between the
dominant radical element in the Hungarian parliament and imperial court was
widened. Kossuth and his followers were evidently aiming at the complete
separation of Hungary from Austria; they were in sympathy, if not in
alliance, with the German radicals in Vienna and Frankfort; they were less
than half-hearted in their support of the imperial arms in Italy. The
imperial government, pressed by the Magyar nationalists to renounce
Jellachich and all his works, equivocated and procrastinated, while within
its councils the idea of a centralized state, to replace the loose
federalism of the old empire, slowly took shape under the pressure of the
military party. It was encouraged by the news from Italy, where, on the
25th of July, Radetzky had won the battle of Custozza, and on the 6th of
August the Austrian standard once more floated over the towers of Milan. At
Custozza Magyar hussars, Croats from the Military Frontier, and Tirolese
sharpshooters had fought side by side. The possibility was obvious of
combating the radical and nationalist revolution by means of the army, with
its spirit of comradeship in arms and its imperialist tradition.
So early as the beginning of July, Austrian officers, with the permission
of the minister of war, had joined the Serb insurgents who, under
Stratemirovi['c], were defying the Magyar power in the banat. By the end of
August the breach between the Austrian and Hungarian governments was open
and complete; on the 4th of September Jellachich was reinstated in all his
honours, and on the 11th he crossed the Drave to the invasion of Hungary.
The die was thus cast; and, though efforts continued to be made to arrange
matters, the time for moderate counsels was passed. The conservative
leaders of the Hungarian nationalists, Eotvos and Deak, retired from public
life; and, though Batthyani consented to remain in office, the slender hope
that this gave of peace was ruined by the flight of the palatine (September
24) and the murder of Count Lamberg, the newly appointed commissioner and
commander-in-chief in Hungary, by the mob at Pest (September 27). The
appeal was now to arms; and the fortunes of the Habsburg monarchy were
bound up with the fate of the war in Hungary (see HUNGARY: _History_).
Meanwhile, renewed trouble had broken out in Vienna, where the radical
populace was in conflict alike with the government and with the Slav
majority of the Reichsrath. The German democrats appealed for aid to the
Hungarian government; but the Magyar passion for constitutional legality
led to delay, and before the Hungarian advance could be made effective, it
was too late. On the 7th of October the emperor Ferdinand had fled from
Schoenbrunn to Olmuetz, a Slav district, whence he issued a proclamation
inviting whoever loved "Austria and freedom" to rally round the throne. On
the 11th Windischgraetz proclaimed his intention of marching against
rebellious Vienna, and on the 16th an imperial rescript appointed him a
field-marshal and commander-in-chief of all the Austrian armies except that
of Italy. Meanwhile, of the Reichsrath, the members of the Right and the
Slav majority had left Vienna and announced a meeting of the diet at Bruenn
for the 20th of October; all that remained in the capital was a rump of
German radicals, impotent in the hands of the proletariat and the students.
The defence of the city was hastily organized under Bern, an ex-officer of
Napoleon; but in the absence of help from Hungary it was futile. On the
28th of October Windischgraetz began his attack; on the 1st of November he
was master of the city.
The fall of revolutionary Vienna practically involved that of the
revolution in Frankfort and in Pest. From Italy the congratulations of
Radetzky's victorious army came to Windischgraetz, from Russia the even
more significant commendations of the emperor Nicholas. The moral of the
victory was painted for all the world by the military execution of Robert
Blum, whose person, as a deputy of the German parliament, should have been
sacrosanct. The time had, indeed, not yet come to attempt any conspicuous
breach with the constitutional principle; but the new ministry was such as
the imperial sentiment would approve, inimical to the German ideals of
Frankfort, devoted to the traditions of the Habsburg monarchy. At its head
was Prince Felix Schwarzenberg (_q.v._), the "army-diplomat," a statesman
at once strong and unscrupulous. On the 27th of November a proclamation
announced that the continuation of Austria as a united state was necessary
both for Germany and for Europe. [Sidenote: Accession of Francis Joseph,
1848] On the 2nd of December the emperor Ferdinand, bound by too many
personal obligations to the revolutionary parties to serve as a useful
instrument for the new policy, abdicated, and his nephew Francis Joseph
ascended the throne. The proclamation of the new emperor was a gage of
defiance thrown down to Magyars and German unionists alike: "Firmly
determined to preserve undimmed the lustre of our crown," it ran, "but
prepared to share our rights with the representatives of our peoples, we
trust that with God's aid and in common with our peoples we shall succeed
in uniting all the countries and races of the monarchy in one great body
politic."
While the Reichsrath, transferred to Kremsier, was discussing "fundamental
rights" and the difficult question of how to reconcile the theoretical
unity with the actual dualism of the empire, the knot was being cut by the
sword on the plains of Hungary. The Hungarian retreat after the bloody
battle of Kapolna (February 26-27, 1849) was followed by the dissolution of
the Kremsier assembly, and a proclamation in which the emperor announced
his intention of granting a constitution to the whole monarchy "one and
indivisible." On the 4th of March the constitution was published; but it
proved all but as distasteful to Czechs and Croats as to the Magyars, and
the speedy successes of the Hungarian arms made it, for the while, a dead
letter. It needed the intervention of the emperor Nicholas, in the loftiest
spirit of the Holy Alliance, before even an experimental unity of the
Habsburg dominions could be established (see HUNGARY: _History_).
The capitulation of Vilagos, which ended the Hungarian insurrection, gave
Schwarzenberg a free hand for completing the work of restoring the _status
quo ante_ and the influence of Austria in Germany. The account of the
process by which this was accomplished belongs to the history of Germany
(_q.v._). Here it will suffice to say that the terms of the Convention of
Olmuetz (September 29, 1850) seemed at the time a complete triumph for
Austria over Prussia. As a matter of fact, however, the convention was, in
the words of Count Beust, "not a Prussian humiliation, but an Austrian
weakness." It was in the power of Austria to crush Prussia and to put an
end to the dual influence in the Confederation which experience had proved
to be unworkable; she preferred to re-establish a discredited system, and
to leave to Prussia time and opportunity to gather strength for the
inevitable conflict.
[Sidenote: Triumph of Austria.]
In 1851 Austria had apparently triumphed over all its [v.03 p.0017]
difficulties. The revolutionary movements had been suppressed, the attempt
of Prussia to assume the leadership in Germany defeated, the old Federal
Diet of 1815 had been restored. Vienna again became the centre of a
despotic government the objects of which were to Germanize the Magyars and
Slavs, to check all agitation for a constitution, and to suppress all
attempts to secure a free press. For some ten years the Austrian dominion
groaned under one of the worst possible forms of autocratic government. The
failure of the Habsburg emperor to perpetuate this despotic regime was due
(1) to the Crimean War, (2) to the establishment of Italian unity, and (3)
to the successful assertion by Prussia of its claim to the leadership in
Germany. The disputes which resulted in the Crimean War revealed the fact
that "gratitude" plays but a small part in international affairs. In the
minds of Austrian statesmen the question of the free navigation of the
Danube, which would have been imperilled by a Russian occupation of the
Principalities, outweighed their sense of obligation to Russia, on which
the emperor Nicholas had rashly relied. That Austria at first took no
active part in the war was due, not to any sentimental weakness, but to the
refusal of Prussia to go along with her and to the fear of a Sardinian
attack on her Italian provinces. But, on the withdrawal of the Russian
forces from the Principalities, these were occupied by Austrian troops, and
on the 2nd of December 1854, a treaty of alliance was signed at Vienna,
between Great Britain, Austria and France, by which Austria undertook to
occupy Moldavia and Walachia during the continuance of the war and "to
defend the frontier of the said principalities against any return of the
Russian forces." By Article III., in the event of war between Russia and
Austria the alliance both offensive and defensive was to be made effective
(Hertslet, No. 252). With the progressive disasters of the Russian arms,
however, Austria grew bolder, and it was the ultimatum delivered by her to
the emperor Alexander II. in December 1855, that forced Russia to come to
terms (Treaty of Paris, March 30, 1856).
Though, however, Austria by her diplomatic attitude had secured, without
striking a blow, the settlement in her sense of the Eastern Question, she
emerged from the contest without allies and without friends. The "Holy
Alliance" of the three autocratic northern powers, recemented at
Muenchengraetz in 1833, which had gained for Austria the decisive
intervention of the tsar in 1849, had been hopelessly shattered by her
attitude during the Crimean War. Russia, justly offended, drew closer her
ties with Prussia, where Bismarck was already hatching the plans which were
to mature in 1866; and, if the attitude of Napoleon in the Polish question
prevented any revival of the alliance of Tilsit, the goodwill of Russia was
assured for France in the coming struggle with Austria in Italy. Already
the isolation of Austria had been conspicuous in the congress of Paris,
where Cavour, the Sardinian plenipotentiary, laid bare before assembled
Europe the scandal of her rule in Italy. It was emphasized during the
campaign of 1859, when Sardinia, in alliance with France, laid the
foundations of united Italy. The threat of Prussian intervention, which
determined the provisions of the armistice of Villafranca, was due, not to
love of Austria, but to fear of the undue aggrandizement of France. The
campaign of 1859, and the diplomatic events that led up to it, are dealt
with elsewhere (see ITALY, ITALIAN WARS, NAPOLEON III., CAVOUR). The
results to Austria were two-fold. Externally, she lost all her Italian
possessions except Venice; internally, her failure led to the necessity of
conciliating public opinion by constitutional concessions.
The proclamation on the 26th of February 1861 of the new constitution for
the whole monarchy, elaborated by Anton von Schmerling, though far from
satisfying the national aspirations of the races within the empire, at
least gave Austria a temporary popularity in Germany; the liberalism of the
Habsburg monarchy was favourably contrasted with the "reactionary" policy
of Prussia, where Bismarck was defying the majority of the diet in his
determination to build up the military power of Prussia. The meeting of the
princes summoned to Frankfort by the emperor Francis Joseph, in 1863,
revealed the ascendancy of Austria among the smaller states of the
Confederation; but it revealed also the impossibility of any consolidation
of the Confederation without the co-operation of Prussia, which stood
outside. Bismarck had long since decided that the matter could only be
settled by the exclusion of Austria altogether, and that the means to this
end were not discussion, but "Blood and Iron." The issue was forced by the
developments of the tangled Schleswig-Holstein Question (_q.v._), which led
to the definitive breach between the two great German powers, to the
campaign of 1866, and the collapse of Austria on the field of Koniggratz
(July 3. See SEVEN WEEKS' WAR).
(W. A. P.; A. HL.)
[Sidenote: Establishment of the dual monarchy.]
The war of 1866 began a new era in the history of the Austrian empire. By
the treaty of Prague (August 23, 1866) the emperor surrendered the position
in Germany which his ancestors had held for so many centuries; Austria and
Tirol, Bohemia and Salzburg, ceased to be German, and eight million Germans
were cut off from all political union with their fellow-countrymen. At the
same time the surrender of Venetia completed the work of 1859, and the last
remnant of the old-established Habsburg domination in Italy ceased. The war
was immediately followed by a reorganization of the government. The Magyar
nation, as well as the Czechs, had refused to recognize the validity of the
constitution of 1861 which had established a common parliament for the
whole empire; they demanded that the independence of the kingdom of Hungary
should be restored. Even before the war the necessity of coming to terms
with the Hungarians had been recognized. In June 1865 the emperor Francis
Joseph visited Pest and replaced the chancellors of Transylvania and
Hungary, Counts Francis Zichy and Nadasdy, supporters of the February
constitution, by Count Majlath, a leader of the old conservative magnates.
This was at once followed by the resignation of Schmerling, who was
succeeded by Count Richard Belcredi. On the 20th of September the
Reichsrath was prorogued, which was equivalent to the suspension of the
constitution; and in December the emperor opened the Hungarian diet in
person, with a speech from the throne that recognized the validity of the
laws of 1848. Before any definite arrangement as to their re-introduction
could be made, however, the war broke out; and after the defeats on the
field of battle the Hungarian diet was able to make its own terms. They
recognized no union between their country and the other parts of the
monarchy except that which was based on the Pragmatic Sanction.[5] All
recent innovations, all attempts made during the last hundred years to
absorb Hungary in a greater Austria, were revoked. An agreement was made by
which the emperor was to be crowned at Pest and take the ancient oath to
the Golden Bull; Hungary (including Transylvania and Croatia) was to have
its own parliament and its own ministry; Magyar was to be the official
language; the emperor was to rule as king; there was to be complete
separation of the finances; not even a common nationality was recognized
between the Hungarians and the other subjects of the emperor; a Hungarian
was to be a foreigner in Vienna, an Austrian a foreigner in Budapest. A
large party wished indeed that nothing should be left but a purely personal
union similar to that between England and Hanover. Deak and the majority
agreed, however, that there should be certain institutions common to
Hungary and the rest of the monarchy; these were--(1) foreign affairs,
including the diplomatic and consular service; (2) the army and navy; (3)
the control of the expenses required for these branches of the public
service.
[Sidenote: Delegations.]
Recognizing in a declaratory act the legal existence of these common
institutions, they also determined the method by which they should be
administered. In doing so they carried out with great exactitude the
principle of dualism, establishing in form a complete parity between
Hungary on one side and the other territories of the king on the other.
They made it a condition [v.03 p.0018] that there should be constitutional
government in the rest of the monarchy as well as in Hungary, and a
parliament in which all the other territories should be represented. From
both the Hungarian and the Austrian parliament there was to be elected a
_Delegation_, consisting of sixty members; to these Delegations the common
ministers were to be responsible, and to them the estimates for the joint
services were to be submitted. The annual meetings were to be held
alternately in Vienna and in Pest. They were very careful that these
Delegations should not overshadow the parliaments by which they were
appointed. The Delegations were not to sit together; each was to meet
separately; they were to communicate by writing, every document being
accompanied by a translation in Magyar or German, as the case might be;
only if after three times exchanging notes they failed to agree was there
to be a common session; in that case there would be no discussion, and they
were to vote in silence; a simple majority was sufficient. There were to be
three ministers for common purposes--(1) for foreign affairs; (2) for war;
(3) for finance; these ministers were responsible to the Delegations, but
the Delegations were really given no legislative power. The minister of war
controlled the common army, but even the laws determining the method by
which the army was to be recruited had to be voted separately in each of
the parliaments. The minister of finance had to lay before them the common
budget, but they could not raise money or vote taxes; after they had passed
the budget the money required had to be provided by the separate
parliaments. Even the determination of the proportion which each half of
the monarchy was to contribute was not left to the Delegations. It was to
be fixed once every ten years by separate committees chosen for that
purpose from the Austrian Reichsrath and the Hungarian parliament, the
so-called _Quota-Deputations_. In addition to these "common affairs" the
Hungarians, indeed, recognized that there were certain other matters which
it was desirable should be managed on identical principles in the two
halves of the monarchy--namely, customs and excise currency; the army and
common railways. For these, however, no common institutions were created;
they must be arranged by agreement; the ministers must confer and then
introduce identical acts in the Hungarian and the Austrian parliaments.
[Sidenote: Financial settlement.]
The main principles of this agreement were decided during the spring of
1867; but during this period the Austrians were not really consulted at
all. The negotiations on behalf of the court of Vienna were entrusted to
Beust, whom the emperor appointed chancellor of the empire and also
minister-president of Austria. He had no previous experience of Austrian
affairs, and was only anxious at once to bring about a settlement which
would enable the empire to take a strong position in international
politics. In the summer of 1867, however (the Austrian Reichsrath having
met), the two parliaments each elected a deputation of fifteen members to
arrange the financial settlement. The first matter was the debt, amounting
to over 3000 million gulden, in addition to the floating debt, which had
been contracted during recent years. The Hungarians laid down the principle
that they were in no way responsible for debts contracted during a time
when they had been deprived of their constitutional liberties; they
consented, however, to pay each year 29 1/2 million gulden towards the
interest. The whole responsibility for the payment of the remainder of the
interest, amounting annually to over a hundred million gulden, and the
management of the debt, was left to the Austrians. The Hungarians wished
that a considerable part of it should be repudiated. It was then agreed
that the two states should form a Customs Union for the next ten years; the
customs were to be paid to the common exchequer; all sums required in
addition to this to meet the expenses were to be provided as to 30% by
Hungary and as to 70% by Austria. After the financial question had been
thus settled, the whole of these arrangements were then, on the 21st and
the 24th of December 1867, enacted by the two parliaments, and the system
of dualism was established.
The acts were accepted in Austria out of necessity; but no parties were
really satisfied. The Germans, who accepted the principle of dualism, were
indignant at the financial arrangements; for Hungary, while gaining more
than an equal share of power, paid less than one-third of the common
expenses. On the other hand, according to British ideas of taxable
capacity, Hungary paid, and still pays, more than her share. The Germans,
however, could at least hope that in the future the financial arrangements
might be revised; the complaints of the Slav races were political, and
within the constitution there was no means of remedy, for, while the
settlement gave to the Hungarians all that they demanded, it deprived the
Bohemians or Galicians of any hope that they would be able to obtain
similar independence. Politically, the principle underlying the agreement
was that the empire should be divided into two portions; in one of these
the Magyars were to rule, in the other the Germans; in either section the
Slav races--the Serbs and Croatians, the Czechs, Poles and Slovenes--were
to be placed in a position of political inferiority.[6]
The logical consistency with which the principle of Dualism was carried out
is shown in a change of title. By a letter to Beust of the 14th of November
1868 the emperor ordered that he should henceforward be styled, not as
before "Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, King of Bohemia, &c.," but
"Emperor of Austria, King of Bohemia, &c., and Apostolic King of Hungary,"
thereby signifying the separation of the two districts over which he rules.
His shorter style is "His Majesty the Emperor and King," and "His Imperial
and Apostolic Royal Majesty"; the lands over which he rules are called "The
Austrian-Hungarian Monarchy" or "The Austrian-Hungarian Realm." The new
terminology, "Imperial and Royal" (_Kaiserlich und Koeniglich_), has since
then been applied to all those branches of the public service which belong
to the common ministries; this was first the case with the diplomatic
service; not till 1889 was it applied to the army, which for some time kept
up the old style of _Kaiserlich-Koeniglich_; in 1895 it was applied to the
ministry of the imperial house, an office always held by the minister for
foreign affairs. The minister for foreign affairs was at first called the
_Reichskanzler_; but in 1871, when Andrassy succeeded Beust, this was given
up in deference to Hungarian feeling, for it might be taken to imply that
there was a single state of which he was minister. The old style
_Kaiserlich-Koeniglich_, the "K.K." which has become so familiar through
long use, is still retained in the Austrian half of the monarchy. There
are, therefore, _e.g._, three ministries of finance: the _Kaiserlich und
Koeniglich_ for joint affairs; the _Kaiserlich-Koeniglich_ for Austrian
affairs; the _Kiralye_ for Hungary.
[Sidenote: Common affairs.]
The settlement with Hungary consisted then of three parts:--(1) the
political settlement, which was to be permanent and has since remained part
of the fundamental constitution of the monarchy; (2) the periodical
financial settlement, determining the partition of the common expenses as
arranged by the Quota-Deputations and ratified by the parliaments; (3) the
Customs Union and the agreement as to currency--a voluntary and terminable
arrangement made between the two governments and parliaments. The history
of the common affairs which fall under the management of the common
ministries is, then, the history of the foreign policy of the empire and of
the army. It is with this and this alone that the Delegations are occupied,
and it is to this that we must now turn. The annual meetings call for
little notice; they have generally been the occasion on which the foreign
minister has explained and justified his policy; according to the English
custom, red books, sometimes containing important despatches, have been
laid before them; but the debates have caused less embarrassment to the
government than is generally the case in parliamentary assemblies, and the
army budget has generally been passed with few and unimportant alterations.
[Sidenote: Foreign policy.]
For the first four years, while Beust was chancellor, the foreign policy
was still influenced by the feelings left by the war of 1866. We do not
know how far there was a real intention to revenge Koeniggraetz and recover
the position lost in Germany. This would be at least a possible policy, and
one to which Beust by his previous history would be inclined. There were
sharp passages of arms with the [v.03 p.0019] Prussian government regarding
the position of the South German states; a close friendship was maintained
with France; there were meetings of the emperor and of Napoleon at Salzburg
in 1868, and the next year at Paris; the death of Maximilian in Mexico cast
a shadow over the friendship, but did not destroy it. The opposition of the
Hungarians and financial difficulties probably prevented a warlike policy.
In 1870 there were discussions preparatory to a formal alliance with France
against the North German Confederation, but nothing was signed.[7] The war
of 1870 put an end to all ideas of this kind; the German successes were so
rapid that Austria was not exposed to the temptation of intervening, a
temptation that could hardly have been resisted had the result been
doubtful or the struggle prolonged. The absorption of South Germany in the
German empire took away the chief cause for friction; and from that time
warm friendship, based on the maintenance of the established order, has
existed between the two empires. Austria gave up all hope of regaining her
position in Germany; Germany disclaimed all intention of acquiring the
German provinces of Austria. Beust's retirement in 1871 put the finishing
touch on the new relations. His successor, Count Andrassy, a Hungarian,
established a good understanding with Bismarck; and in 1872 the visit of
the emperor Francis Joseph, accompanied by his minister, to Berlin, was the
final sign of the reconciliation with his uncle. The tsar was also present
on that occasion, and for the next six years the close friendship between
the three empires removed all danger of war. Three years later the full
reconciliation with Italy followed, when Francis Joseph consented to visit
Victor Emmanuel in Venice.
[Sidenote: The Eastern question.]
The outbreak of disturbance in the Balkans ended this period of calm. The
insurrection in Bosnia and Herzegovina immediately affected Austria;
refugees in large numbers crossed the frontier and had to be maintained by
the government. The political problem presented was a very difficult one.
The sympathy of the Slav inhabitants of the empire made it impossible for
the government of Vienna to regard with indifference the sufferings of
Christians in Turkey. Active support was impossible, because the
Hungarians, among whom the events of 1848 had obliterated the remembrance
of the earlier days of Turkish conquest, were full of sympathy for the
Turks. It was a cardinal principle of Austrian policy that she could not
allow the erection of new Slav states on her southern frontier. Moreover,
the disturbances were fomented by Russian agents, and any increase of
Russian influence (for which the Pan-Slav party was working) was full of
danger to Austria. For a time the mediation of Germany preserved the good
understanding between the two eastern empires. In 1875 Andrassy drafted a
note, which was accepted by the powers, requiring Turkey to institute the
reforms necessary for the good government of the provinces. Turkey agreed
to do this, but the insurgents required a guarantee from the Powers that
Turkey would keep her engagements. This could not be given, and the
rebellion continued and spread to Bulgaria. The lead then passed to Russia,
and Austria, even after the outbreak of war, did not oppose Russian
measures. At the beginning of 1877 a secret understanding had been made
between the two powers, by which Russia undertook not to annex any
territory, and in other ways not to take steps which would be injurious to
Austria. The advance of the Russian army on Constantinople, however, was a
serious menace to Austrian influence; Andrassy therefore demanded that the
terms of peace should be submitted to a European conference, which he
suggested should meet at Vienna. The peace of San Stefano violated the
engagements made by Russia, and Andrassy was therefore compelled to ask for
a credit of 60 million gulden and to mobilize a small portion of the army;
the money was granted unanimously in the Hungarian Delegation, though the
Magyars disliked a policy the object of which appeared to be not the
defence of Turkey against Russia, but an agreement with Russia which would
give Austria compensation at the expense of Turkey; in the Austrian
Deputation it was voted only by a majority of 39 to 20, for the Germans
were alarmed at the report that it would be used for an occupation of part
of the Turkish territory.
[Sidenote: Bosnia and Herzegovina.]
The active share taken by Great Britain, however, relieved Austria from the
necessity of having recourse to further measures. By an arrangement made
beforehand, Austria was requested at the congress of Berlin to undertake
the occupation and administration of Bosnia and Herzegovina--an honourable
but arduous task. The provinces could not be left to the Turks; Austria
could not allow them to fall under Russian influence. The occupation was
immediately begun, and 60,000 Austrian troops, under the command of General
Philippovich,[8] crossed the frontier on the 29th of July. The work was,
however, more difficult than had been anticipated; the Mahommedans offered
a strenuous resistance; military operations were attended with great
difficulty in the mountainous country; 200,000 men were required, and they
did not succeed in crushing the resistance till after some months of
obstinate fighting. The losses on either side were very heavy; even after
the capture of Serajevo in August, the resistance was continued; and
besides those who fell in battle, a considerable number of the insurgents
were put to death under military law. The opposition in the Delegations,
which met at the end of the year, was so strong that the government had to
be content with a credit to cover the expenses for 1879 of less than half
what they had originally asked, and the supplementary estimate of
40,000,000 gulden for 1878 was not voted till the next year. In 1879 the
Porte, after long delay, recognized the occupation on the distinct
understanding that the sovereignty of the sultan was acknowledged. A civil
administration was then established, the provinces not being attached to
either half of the empire, but placed under the control of the joint
minister of finance. The government during the first two years was not very
successful; the Christian population were disappointed at finding that they
still had, as in the old days, to pay rent to the Mahommedan begs. There
were difficulties also between the Roman Catholics and the members of the
Greek Church. In 1881 disturbances in Dalmatia spread over the frontier
into Herzegovina, and another expedition had to be sent to restore order.
When this was done Benjamin de Kallay was appointed minister, and under his
judicious government order and prosperity were established in the
provinces. In accordance with another clause of the treaty of Berlin,
Austria was permitted to place troops in the sanjak of Novi-Bazar, a
district of great strategic importance, which separated Servia and
Montenegro, and through which the communication between Bosnia and Salonica
passed. This was done in September 1879, an agreement with Turkey having
specified the numbers and position of the garrison. Another slight
alteration of the frontier was made in the same year, when, during the
delimitation of the new frontier of Montenegro, the district of Spizza was
incorporated in the kingdom of Dalmatia.
[Sidenote: Italy and the Irredentists.]
The congress of Berlin indirectly caused some difficulties with Italy. In
that country was a large party which, under the name of the "Irredentists,"
demanded that those Italian-speaking districts, South Tirol, Istria and
Trieste, which were under Austrian rule, should be joined to Italy; there
were public meetings and riots in Italy; the Austrian flag was torn down
from the consulate in Venice and the embassy at Rome insulted. The
excitement spread across the frontier; there were riots in Trieste, and in
Tirol it was necessary to make some slight movement of troops as a sign
that the Austrian government was determined not to surrender any territory.
For a short time there was apprehension that the Italian government might
not be strong enough to resist the movement, and might even attempt to
realize these wishes by means of an alliance with Russia; but the danger
quickly passed away.
[Sidenote: Alliance with Germany.]
In the year 1879 the European position of the monarchy was [v.03 p.0020]
placed on a more secure footing by the conclusion of a formal alliance with
Germany. In the autumn of that year Bismarck visited Vienna and arranged
with Andrassy a treaty by which Germany bound herself to support Austria
against an attack from Russia, Austria-Hungary pledging herself to help
Germany against a combined attack of France and Russia; the result of this
treaty, of which the tsar was informed, was to remove, at least for the
time, the danger of war between Austria-Hungary and Russia. It was the last
achievement of Andrassy, who had already resigned, but it was maintained by
his successor, Baron Haymerle, and after his death in 1881 by Count
Kalnoky. It was strengthened in 1882 by the adhesion of Italy, for after
1881 the Italians required support, owing to the French occupation of
Tunis, and after five years it was renewed. Since that time it has been the
foundation on which the policy of Austria-Hungary has depended, and it has
survived all dangers arising either from commercial differences (as between
1880 and 1890) or national discord. The alliance was naturally very popular
among the German Austrians; some of them went so far as to attempt to use
it to influence internal policy, and suggested that fidelity to this
alliance required that there should be a ministry at Vienna which supported
the Germans in their internal struggle with the Slavs; they represented it
as a national alliance of the Teutonic races, and there were some Germans
in the empire who supported them in this view. The governments on both
sides could of course give no countenance to this theory; Bismarck
especially was very careful never to let it be supposed that he desired to
exercise influence over the internal affairs of his ally. Had he done so,
the strong anti-German passions of the Czechs and Poles, always inclined to
an alliance with France, would have been aroused, and no government could
have maintained the alliance. After 1880, the exertions of Count Kalnoky
again established a fairly good understanding with Russia, as was shown by
the meetings of Francis Joseph with the tsar in 1884 and 1885, but the
outbreak of the Bulgarian question in 1885 again brought into prominence
the opposed interests of Russia and Austria-Hungary. In the December of
this year Austria-Hungary indeed decisively interfered in the war between
Bulgaria and Servia, for at this time Austrian influence predominated in
Servia, and after the battle of Slivnitza the Austro-Hungarian minister
warned Prince Alexander of Bulgaria that if he advanced farther he would be
met by Austro-Hungarian as well as Servian troops. But after the abdication
of Alexander, Count Kalnoky stated in the Delegations that Austria-Hungary
would not permit Russia to interfere with the independence of Bulgaria.
This decided step was required by Hungarian feeling, but it was a policy in
which Austria-Hungary could not depend on the support of Germany, for--as
Bismarck stated--Bulgaria was not worth the bones of a single Pomeranian
grenadier. Austria-Hungary also differed from Russia as to the position of
Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria, and during 1886-1887 much alarm was caused by
the massing of Russian troops on the Galician frontier. Councils of war
were summoned to consider how this exposed and distant province was to be
defended, and for some months war was considered inevitable; but the danger
was averted by the renewal of the Triple Alliance and the other decisive
steps taken at this time by the German government (see GERMANY).[9]
Since this time the foreign policy of Austria-Hungary has been peaceful and
unambitious; the close connexion with Germany has so far been maintained,
though during the last few years it has been increasingly difficult to
prevent the violent passions engendered by national enmity at home from
reacting on the foreign policy of the monarchy; it would scarcely be
possible to do so, were it not that discussions on foreign policy take
place not in the parliaments but in the Delegations where the numbers are
fewer and the passions cooler. In May 1895 Count Kalnoky had to retire,
owing to a difference with Banffy, the Hungarian premier, arising out of
the struggle with Rome. He was succeeded by Count Goluchowski, the son of a
well-known Polish statesman. In 1898 the expulsion of Austrian subjects
from Prussia, in connexion with the Anti-Polish policy of the Prussian
government, caused a passing irritation, to which Count Thun, the Austrian
premier, gave expression. The chief objects of the government in recent
years have been to maintain Austro-Hungarian trade and influence in the
Balkan states by the building of railways, by the opening of the Danube for
navigation, and by commercial treaties with Rumania, Servia and Bulgaria;
since the abdication of King Milan especially, the affairs of Servia and
the growth of Russian influence in that country have caused serious
anxiety.
[Sidenote: The army.]
The disturbed state of European politics and the great increase in the
military establishments of other countries made it desirable for Austria
also to strengthen her military resources. The bad condition of the
finances rendered it, however, impossible to carry out any very great
measures. In 1868 there had been introduced compulsory military service in
both Austria and Hungary; the total of the army available in war had been
fixed at 800,000 men. Besides this joint army placed under the joint
ministry of war, there was in each part of the monarchy a separate militia
and a separate minister for national defence. In Hungary this national
force or _honved_ was kept quite distinct from the ordinary army; in
Austria, however (except in Dalmatia and Tirol, where there was a separate
local militia), the _Landwehr_, as it was called, was practically organized
as part of the standing army. At the renewal of the periodical financial
and economic settlement (_Ausgleich_) in 1877 no important change was made,
but in 1882 the system of compulsory service was extended to Bosnia and
Herzegovina, and a reorganization was carried out, including the
introduction of army corps and local organization on the Prussian plan.
This was useful for the purposes of speedy mobilization, though there was
some danger that the local and national spirit might penetrate into the
army. In 1886 a law was carried in either parliament creating a
_Landsturm_, and providing for the arming and organization of the whole
male population up to the age of forty-two in case of emergency, and in
1889 a small increase was made in the annual number of recruits. A further
increase was made in 1892-1893. In contrast, however, with the military
history of other continental powers, that of Austria-Hungary shows a small
increase in the army establishment. Of recent years there have been signs
of an attempt to tamper with the use of German as the common language for
the whole army. This, which is now the principal remnant of the old
ascendancy of German, and the one point of unity for the whole monarchy, is
a matter on which the government and the monarch allow no concession, but
in the Hungarian parliament protests against it have been raised, and in
1899 and 1900 it was necessary to punish recruits from Bohemia, who
answered the roll call in the Czechish _zde_ instead of the German _hier_.
[Sidenote: The Customs Union.]
In those matters which belong to the periodical and terminable agreement,
the most important is the Customs Union, which was established in 1867, and
it is convenient to treat separately the commercial policy of the dual
state.[10] At first the customs tariff in Austria-Hungary, as in most other
countries, was based on a number of commercial treaties with Germany,
France, Italy, Great Britain, &c., each of which specified the maximum
duties that could be levied on certain articles, and all of which contained
a "most favoured nation" clause. The practical result was a system very
nearly approaching to the absence of any customs duties, and for the period
for which these treaties lasted a revision of the tariff could not be
carried out by means of legislation. After the year 1873, a strong movement
in favour of protective duties made itself felt among the Austrian
manufacturers who were affected by the competition of German, English and
Belgian goods, and Austria was influenced by the general movement in
economic thought which about this time caused the reaction [v.03 p.0021]
against the doctrines of free trade. Hungary, on the other hand, was still
in favour of free trade, for there were no important manufacturing
industries in that country, and it required a secure market for
agricultural produce. After 1875 the commercial treaties expired; Hungary
thereupon also gave notice to terminate the commercial union with Austria,
and negotiations began as to the principle on which it was to be renewed.
This was done during the year 1877, and in the new treaty, while raw
material was still imported free of duty, a low duty was placed on textile
goods as well as on corn, and the excise on sugar and brandy was raised.
All duties, moreover, were to be paid in gold--this at once involving a
considerable increase. The tariff treaties with Great Britain and France
were not renewed, and all attempts to come to some agreement with Germany
broke down, owing to the change of policy which Bismarck was adopting at
this period. The result was that the system of commercial treaties ceased,
and Austria-Hungary was free to introduce a fresh tariff depending simply
on legislation, an "autonomous tariff" as it is called. With Great Britain,
France and Germany, there was now only a "most favoured nation" agreement;
fresh commercial treaties were made with Italy (1879), Switzerland and
Servia (1881). During 1881-1882 Hungary, desiring means of retaliation
against the duties on corn and the impediments to the importation of cattle
recently introduced into Germany, withdrew her opposition to protective
duties; the tariff was completely revised, protective duties were
introduced on all articles of home production, and high finance duties on
other articles such as coffee and petroleum. At the same time special
privileges were granted to articles imported by sea, so as to foster the
trade of Trieste and Fiume; as in Germany a subvention was granted to the
great shipping companies, the Austrian Lloyd and Adria; the area of the
Customs Union was enlarged so as to include Trieste, Istria and Dalmatia,
as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 1887 a further increase of duties was
laid on corn (this was at the desire of Hungary as against Rumania, for a
vigorous customs war was being carried on at this time) and on woollen and
textile goods. Austria, therefore, during these years completely gave up
the principle of free trade, and adopted a nationalist policy similar to
that which prevailed in Germany. A peculiar feature of these treaties was
that the government was empowered to impose an additional duty
(_Retorsionszoll_) on goods imported from countries in which
Austria-Hungary received unfavourable treatment. In 1881 this was fixed at
10% (5% for some articles), but in 1887 it was raised to 30 and 15%
respectively. In 1892 Austria-Hungary joined with Germany, Italy, Belgium,
and Switzerland in commercial treaties to last for twelve years, the object
being to secure to the states of central Europe a stable and extended
market; for the introduction of high tariffs in Russia and America had
crippled industry. Two years later Austria-Hungary also arranged with
Russia a treaty similar to that already made between Russia and Germany;
the reductions in the tariff secured in these treaties were applicable also
to Great Britain, with which there still was a most favoured nation treaty.
The system thus introduced gave commercial security till the year 1903.
[Sidenote: Reform of the Currency.]
The result of these and other laws was an improvement in financial
conditions, which enabled the government at last to take in hand the
long-delayed task of reforming the currency. Hitherto the currency had been
partly in silver (gulden), the "Austrian currency" which had been
introduced in 1857, partly in paper money, which took the form of notes
issued by the Austro-Hungarian Bank. This institution had, in 1867,
belonged entirely to Austria; it had branches in Hungary, and its notes
were current throughout the monarchy, but the direction was entirely
Austrian. The Hungarians had not sufficient credit to establish a national
bank of their own, and at the settlement of 1877 they procured, as a
concession to themselves, that it should be converted into an
Austro-Hungarian bank, with a head office at Pest as well as at Vienna, and
with the management divided between the two countries. This arrangement was
renewed in 1887. In 1848 the government had been obliged to authorize the
bank to suspend cash payments, and the wars of 1859 and 1866 had rendered
abortive all attempts to renew them. The notes, therefore, formed an
inconvertible paper currency. The bank by its charter had the sole right of
issuing notes, but during the war of 1866 the government, in order to raise
money, had itself issued notes (_Staatsnoten_) to the value of 312 million
gulden, thereby violating the charter of the bank. The operation begun in
1892 was therefore threefold: (1) the substitution of a gold for a silver
standard; (2) the redemption of the _Staatsnoten_; (3) the resumption of
cash payments by the bank.
In 1867 Austria-Hungary had taken part in the monetary conference which led
to the formation of the Latin Union; it was intended to join the Union, but
this was not done. A first step, however, had been taken in this direction
by the issue of gold coins of the value of eight and four gulden. No
attempt was made, however, to regulate the relations of these coins to the
"Austrian" silver coinage; the two issues were not brought into connexion,
and every payment was made in silver, unless it was definitely agreed that
it should be paid in gold. In 1879, owing to the continued depreciation of
silver, the free coinage of silver was suspended. In 1892 laws introducing
a completely new coinage were carried in both parliaments, in accordance
with agreements made by the ministers. The unit in the new issue was to be
the krone, divided into 100 heller; the krone being almost of the same
value (24-25th) as the franc. (The twenty-krone piece in gold weighs 6.775
gr., the twenty-franc piece 6.453.) The gold krone was equal to .42 of the
gold gulden, and it was declared equal to .5 of the silver gulden, so much
allowance being made for the depreciation of silver. The first step towards
putting this act into practice was the issue of one-krone pieces (silver),
which circulated as half gulden, and of nickel coins; all the copper coins
and other silver coins were recalled, the silver gulden alone being left in
circulation. The coinage of the gold four- and eight-gulden was suspended.
Nothing more could be done till the supply of gold had been increased. The
bank was required to buy gold (during 1892 it bought over forty M. gulden),
and was obliged to coin into twenty- or ten-krone pieces all gold brought
to it for that purpose. Then a loan of 150 M. gulden at 4% was made, and
from the gold (chiefly bar gold and sovereigns) which Rothschild, who
undertook the loan, paid in, coins of the new issue were struck to the
value of over 34 million kronen. This was, however, not put into
circulation; it was used first for paying off the _Staatsnoten_. By 1894
the state was able to redeem them to the amount of 200 million gulden,
including all those for one gulden. It paid them, however, not in gold, but
in silver (one-krone pieces and gulden) and in bank notes, the coins and
notes being provided by the bank, and in exchange the newly-coined gold was
paid to the bank to be kept as a reserve to cover the issue of notes. At
the same time arrangements were made between Austria and Hungary to pay off
about 80 million of exchequer bills which had been issued on the security
of the government salt-works, and were therefore called "_salinenscheine._"
In 1899 the remainder of the _Staatsnoten_ (112 million gulden) were
redeemed in a similar manner. The bank had in this way acquired a large
reserve of gold, and in the new charter which was (after long delay) passed
in 1899, a clause was introduced requiring the resumption of cash payments,
though this was not to come into operation immediately. Then from 1st
January 1900 the old reckoning by gulden was superseded, that by krone
being introduced in all government accounts, the new silver being made a
legal tender only for a limited amount. For the time until the 1st of July
1908, however, the old gulden were left in circulation, payments made in
them, at the rate of two kronen to one gulden, being legal up to any
amount.
This important reform has thereby been brought to a satisfactory
conclusion, and at a time when the political difficulties had reached a
most acute stage. It is indeed remarkable that notwithstanding the
complicated machinery of the dual monarchy, and the numerous obstacles
which have to be overcome before a reform affecting both countries can be
carried out, the financial, the commercial, and the foreign policy has been
conducted since 1870 with success. The credit of the state has risen, the
chronic deficit has disappeared, the currency has been put on a sound
basis, and part of the unfunded debt has been paid off. Universal military
service has been introduced, and all this has been done in the presence of
difficulties greater than existed in any other civilized country.
[Sidenote: The Ausgleich with Hungary.]
Each of the financial and economic reforms described above was, of course,
the subject of a separate law, but, so far as they are determined at the
general settlement which takes place between Austria and Hungary every ten
years, they are comprised under the expression "Ausgleich" (compact or
compromise), which includes especially the determination of the Quota, and
to this extent they are all dealt with together as part of a general
settlement and bargain. In this settlement a concession on commercial
policy would be set off against a gain on the financial agreement; _e.g._
in 1877 Austria gave Hungary a share in the management of the bank, while
the arrangement for paying the bonus on exported sugar was favourable to
Austria; on the other hand, since the increased duty on coffee and
petroleum would fall more heavily on Austria, the Austrians wished to
persuade the Hungarians to pay a larger quota of the common expenses, and
there was also a dispute whether Hungary was partly responsible for a debt
of 80 M. [v.03 p.0022] gulden to the bank. Each measure had, therefore, to
be considered not only on its own merits, but in relation to the general
balance of advantage, and an amendment in one might bring about the
rejection of all. The whole series of acts had to be carried in two
parliaments, each open to the influence of national jealousy and race
hatred in its most extreme form, so that the negotiations have been
conducted under serious difficulties, and the periodical settlement has
always been a time of great anxiety. The first settlement occupied two full
years, from 1876, when the negotiations began, to June 1878, when at last
all the bills were carried successfully through the two parliaments; and it
was necessary to prolong the previous arrangements (which expired at the
end of 1877) till the middle of 1878. First the two ministries had to agree
on the drafts of all the bills; then the bills had to be laid before the
two parliaments. Each parliament elected a committee to consider them, and
the two committees carried on long negotiations by notes supplemented by
verbal discussions. Then followed the debates in the two parliaments; there
was a ministerial crisis in Austria, because the House refused to accept
the tax on coffee and petroleum which was recommended by the ministers; and
finally a great council of all the ministers, with the emperor presiding,
determined the compromise that was at last accepted. In 1887 things went
better; there was some difficulty about the tariff, especially about the
tax on petroleum, but Count Taaffe had a stronger position than the
Austrian ministers of 1877. Ten years later, on the third renewal, the
difficulties were still greater. They sprang from a double cause. First the
Austrians were determined to get a more favourable division of the common
expenses; that of 1867 still continued, although Hungary had grown
relatively in wealth.[11] Moreover, a proposed alteration in the taxes on
sugar would be of considerable advantage to Hungary; the Austrians,
therefore, demanded that henceforth the proportion should be not 68.6:31.4
but 58:42. On this there was a deadlock; all through 1897 and 1898 the
Quota-Deputations failed to come to an agreement. This, however, was not
the worst. Parliamentary government in Austria had broken down; the
opposition had recourse to obstruction, and no business could be done.
Their object was to drive out the Badeni government, and for that reason
the obstruction was chiefly directed against the renewal of the Ausgleich;
for, as this was the first necessity of state, no government could remain
in office which failed to carry it through. The extreme parties of the
Germans and the anti-Semites were also, for racial reasons, opposed to the
whole system. When, therefore, the government at the end of 1897 introduced
the necessary measures for prolonging the existing arrangements
provisionally till the differences with Hungary had been settled, scenes of
great disorder ensued, and at the end of the year the financial
arrangements had not been prolonged, and neither the bank charter nor the
Customs Union had been renewed. The government, therefore (Badeni having
resigned), had to proclaim the necessary measures by imperial warrant. Next
year it was even worse, for there was obstruction in Hungary as well as in
Austria; the Quota-Deputations again came to no agreement, and the
proposals for the renewal of the Bank charter, the reform of the currency,
the renewal of the Customs Union, and the new taxes on beer and brandy,
which were laid before parliament both at Vienna and Pest, were not carried
in either country; this time, therefore, the existing arrangements had to
be prolonged provisionally by imperial and royal warrant both in Austria
and Hungary. During 1899 parliamentary peace was restored in Hungary by the
resignation of Banffy; in Austria, however, though there was again a change
of ministry the only result was that the Czechs imitated the example of the
Germans and resorted to obstruction so that still no business could be
done. The Austrian ministry, therefore, came to an agreement with the
Hungarians that the terms of the new Ausgleich should be finally proclaimed
in Austria by imperial warrant; the Hungarians only giving their assent to
this in return for considerable financial concessions.
The main points of the agreement were: (1) the Bank charter was to be
renewed till 1910, the Hungarians receiving a larger share in the direction
than they had hitherto enjoyed; (2) the Customs Union so far as it was
based on a reciprocal and binding treaty lapsed, both sides, however,
continuing it in practice, and promising to do so until the 31st of
December 1907. Not later than 1901 negotiations were to be begun for a
renewal of the alliance, and if possible it was to be renewed from the year
1903, in which year the commercial treaties would expire. If this were
done, then the tariff would be revised before any fresh commercial treaties
were made. If it were not done, then no fresh treaties would be made
extending beyond the year 1907, so that if the Commercial Union of Austria
and Hungary were not renewed before 1907, each party would be able to
determine its own policy unshackled by any previous treaties. These
arrangements in Hungary received the sanction of the parliament; but this
could not be procured in Austria, and they were, therefore, proclaimed by
imperial warrant; first of all, on 20th July, the new duties on beer,
brandy and sugar; then on 23rd September the Bank charter, &c. In November
the Quota-Deputations at last agreed that Hungary should henceforward pay
33-3/49, a very small increase, and this was also in Austria proclaimed in
the same way. The result was that a working agreement was made, by which
the Union was preserved.
(J. W. HE.)
[Sidenote: Austro-Hungarian crisis, 1903-1907.]
Since the years 1866-1871 no period of Austro-Hungarian development has
been so important as the years 1903-1907. The defeat of the old Austria by
Prussia at Sadowa in 1866, the establishment of the Dual Monarchy in 1867
and the foundation of the new German empire in 1871, formed the
starting-point of Austro-Hungarian history properly so called; but the
Austro-Hungarian crisis of 1903-1906--a crisis temporarily settled but not
definitively solved,--and the introduction of universal suffrage in
Austria, discredited the original interpretation of the dual system and
raised the question whether it represented the permanent form of the
Austro-Hungarian polity.
At the close of the 19th century both states of the Dual Monarchy were
visited by political crises of some severity. Parliamentary life in Austria
was paralysed by the feud between Germans and Czechs that resulted directly
from the Badeni language ordinances of 1897 and indirectly from the
development of Slav influence, particularly that of Czechs and Poles during
the Taaffe era (1879-1893). Government in Austria was carried on by
cabinets of officials with the help of the emergency clause (paragraph 14)
of the constitution. Ministers, nominally responsible to parliament, were
in practice responsible only to the emperor. Thus during the closing years
of last and the opening years of the present century, political life in
Austria was at a low ebb and the constitution was observed in the letter
rather than in spirit.
Hungary was apparently better situated. Despite the campaign of obstruction
that overthrew the Banffy and led to the formation of the Szell cabinet in
1899, the hegemony of the Liberal party which, under various names, had
been the mainstay of dualism since 1867, appeared to be unshaken. But clear
signs of the decay of the dualist and of the growth of an extreme
nationalist Magyar spirit were already visible. The Army bills of 1889,
which involved an increase of the peace footing of the joint
Austro-Hungarian army, had been carried with difficulty, despite the
efforts of Koloman Tisza and of Count Julius Andrassy the Elder. Demands
tending towards the Magyarization of the joint army had been advanced and
had found such an echo in Magyar public opinion that Count Andrassy was
obliged solemnly to warn the country of the dangers of nationalist
Chauvinism and to remind it of its obligations under the Compact of 1867.
The struggle over the civil marriage and divorce laws that filled the
greater part of the nineties served and was perhaps intended by the Liberal
leaders to serve as a diversion in favour of the Liberal-dualist
standpoint; nevertheless, Nationalist feeling found strong expression
during the negotiations of Banffy and Szell with various Austrian premiers
for the renewal of the economic _Ausgleich_, or "Customs and Trade
Alliance." At the end of 1902 the Hungarian premier, Szell, concluded with
the Austrian premier, Koerber, a new customs and trade alliance [v.03
p.0023] comprising a joint Austro-Hungarian tariff as a basis for the
negotiation of new commercial treaties with Germany, Italy and other
states. This arrangement, which for the sake of brevity will henceforth be
referred to as the Szell-Koerber Compact, was destined to play an important
part in the history of the next few years, though it was never fully
ratified by either parliament and was ultimately discarded. Its conclusion
was prematurely greeted as the end of a period of economic strife between
the two halves of the monarchy and as a pledge of a decade of peaceful
development. Events were soon to demonstrate the baselessness of these
hopes.
[Sidenote: The Army question.]
In the autumn of 1902 the Austrian and the Hungarian governments, at the
instance of the crown and in agreement with the joint minister for war and
the Austrian and Hungarian ministers for national defence, laid before
their respective parliaments bills providing for an increase of 21,000 men
in the annual contingents of recruits. 16,700 men were needed for the joint
army, and the remainder for the Austrian and Hungarian national defence
troops (Landwehr and honved). The total contribution of Hungary would have
been some 6500 and of Austria some 14,500 men. The military authorities
made, however, the mistake of detaining in barracks several thousand
supernumerary recruits (_i.e._ recruits liable to military service but in
excess of the annual 103,000 enrollable by law) pending the adoption of the
Army bills by the two parliaments. The object of this apparently
high-handed step was to avoid the expense and delay of summoning the
supernumeraries again to the colours when the bills should have received
parliamentary sanction; but it was not unnaturally resented by the
Hungarian Chamber, which has ever possessed a lively sense of its
prerogatives. The Opposition, consisting chiefly of the independence party
led by Francis Kossuth (eldest son of Louis Kossuth), made capital out of
the grievance and decided to obstruct ministerial measures until the
supernumeraries should be discharged. The estimates could not be
sanctioned, and though Kossuth granted the Szell cabinet a vote on account
for the first four months of 1903, the Government found itself at the mercy
of the Opposition. At the end of 1902 the supernumeraries were
discharged--too late to calm the ardour of the Opposition, which proceeded
to demand that the Army bills should be entirely withdrawn or that, if
adopted, they should be counterbalanced by concessions to Magyar
nationalist feeling calculated to promote the use of the Magyar language in
the Hungarian part of the army and to render the Hungarian regiments, few
of which are purely Magyar, more and more Magyar in character. Szell, who
vainly advised the crown and the military authorities to make timely
concessions, was obliged to reject these demands which enjoyed the secret
support of Count Albert Apponyi, the Liberal president of the Chamber and
of his adherents. The obstruction of the estimates continued. On the 1st of
May the Szell cabinet found itself without supply and governed for a time
"_ex-lex_"; Szell, who had lost the confidence of the crown, resigned and
was succeeded (June 26) by Count Khuen-Hedervary, previously ban, or
governor, of Croatia. Before taking office Khuen-Hedervary negotiated with
Kossuth and other Opposition leaders, who undertook that obstruction should
cease if the Army bills were withdrawn. Despite the fact that the Austrian
Army bill had been voted by the Reichsrath (February 19), the crown
consented to withdraw the bills and thus compelled the Austrian parliament
to repeal, at the dictation of the Hungarian obstructionists, what it
regarded as a patriotic measure. Austrian feeling became embittered towards
Hungary and the action of the crown was openly criticized.
[Sidenote: The Magyar words of command.]
Meanwhile the Hungarian Opposition broke its engagement. Obstruction was
continued by a section of the independence party; and Kossuth, seeing his
authority ignored, resigned the leadership. The obstructionists now raised
the cry that the German words of command in the joint army must be replaced
by Magyar words in the regiments recruited from Hungary--a demand which,
apart from its disintegrating influence on the army, the crown considered
to be an encroachment upon the royal military prerogatives as defined by
the Hungarian Fundamental Law XII. of 1867. Clause 11 of the law runs:--"In
pursuance of the constitutional military prerogatives of His Majesty,
everything relating to the unitary direction, leadership and inner
organization of the whole army, and thus also of the Hungarian army as a
complementary part of the whole army, is recognized as subject to His
Majesty's disposal." The cry for the Magyar words of command on which the
subsequent constitutional crisis turned, was tantamount to a demand that
the monarch should differentiate the Hungarian from the Austrian part of
the joint army, and should render it impossible for any but Magyar officers
to command Hungarian regiments, less than half of which have a majority of
Magyar recruits. The partisans of the Magyar words of command based their
claim upon clause 12 of the Fundamental Law XII. of 1867--which
runs:--"Nevertheless the country reserves its right periodically to
complete the Hungarian army and the right of granting recruits, _the fixing
of the conditions on which the recruits are granted,_ the fixing of the
term of service and all the dispositions concerning the stationing and the
supplies of the troops according to existing law both as regards
legislation and administration." Since Hungary reserved her right to fix
the conditions on which recruits should be granted, the partisans of the
Magyar words of command argued that the abolition of the German words of
command in the Hungarian regiments might be made such a condition, despite
the enumeration in the preceding clause 11, of everything appertaining to
the unitary leadership and inner organization of the joint Austro-Hungarian
army as belonging to the constitutional military prerogatives of the crown.
Practically, the dispute was a trial of strength between Magyar nationalist
feeling and the crown. Austrian feeling strongly supported the monarch in
his determination to defend the unity of the army, and the conflict
gradually acquired an intensity that appeared to threaten the very
existence of the dual system.
When Count Khuen-Hedervary took office and Kossuth relinquished the
leadership of the independence party, the extension of the crisis could not
be foreseen. A few extreme nationalists continued to obstruct the
estimates, and it appeared as though their energy would soon flag. An
attempt to quicken this process by bribery provoked, however, an outburst
of feeling against Khuen-Hedervary who, though personally innocent, found
his position shaken. Shortly afterwards Magyar resentment of an army order
issued from the cavalry manoeuvres at Chlopy in Galicia--in which the
monarch declared that he would "hold fast to the existing and well-tried
organization of the army" and would never "relinquish the rights and
privileges guaranteed to its highest war-lord"; and of a provocative
utterance of the Austrian premier Koerber in the Reichsrath led to the
overthrow of the Khuen-Hedervary cabinet (September 30) by an immense
majority. The cabinet fell on a motion of censure brought forward by
Kossuth, who had profited by the bribery incident to resume the leadership
of his party.
[Sidenote: Stephen Tisza.]
An interval of negotiation between the crown and many leading Magyar
Liberals followed, until at the end of October 1903 Count Stephen Tisza,
son of Koloman Tisza, accepted a mission to form a cabinet after all others
had declined. As programme Tisza brought with him a number of concessions
from the crown to Magyar nationalist feeling in regard to military matters,
particularly in regard to military badges, penal procedure, the transfer of
officers of Hungarian origin from Austrian to Hungarian regiments, the
establishment of military scholarships for Magyar youths and the
introduction of the two years' service system. In regard to the military
language, the Tisza programme--which, having been drafted by a committee of
nine members, is known as the "programme of the nine"--declared that the
responsibility of the cabinet extends to the military prerogatives of the
crown, and that "the legal influence of parliament exists in this respect
as in respect of every constitutional right." The programme, however,
expressly excluded for "weighty political reasons affecting great interests
of the nation" the question of the military [v.03 p.0024] language; and on
Tisza's motion the Liberal party adopted an addendum, sanctioned by the
crown: "the party maintains the standpoint that the king has a right to fix
the language of service and command in the Hungarian army on the basis of
his constitutional prerogatives as recognized in clause 11 of law XII. of
1867."
Notwithstanding the concessions, obstruction was continued by the Clericals
and the extreme Independents, partly in the hope of compelling the crown to
grant the Magyar words of command and partly out of antipathy towards the
person of the young calvinist premier. In March 1904, Tisza, therefore,
introduced a drastic "guillotine" motion to amend the standing orders of
the House, but withdrew it in return for an undertaking from the Opposition
that obstruction would cease. This time the Opposition kept its word. The
Recruits bill and the estimates were adopted, the Delegations were enabled
to meet at Budapest--where they voted L22,000,000 as extraordinary
estimates for the army and navy and especially for the renewal of the field
artillery--and the negotiations for new commercial treaties with Germany
and Italy were sanctioned, although parliament had never been able to
ratify the Szell-Koerber compact with the tariff on the basis of which the
negotiations would have to be conducted. But, as the autumn session
approached, Tisza foresaw a new campaign of obstruction, and resolved to
revert to his drastic reform of the standing orders. The announcement of
his determination caused the Opposition to rally against him, and when on
the 18th of November the Liberal party adopted a "guillotine" motion by a
show of hands in defiance of orthodox procedure, a section of the party
seceded. On the 13th of December the Opposition, infuriated by the
formation of a special corps of parliamentary constables, invaded and
wrecked the Chamber. Tisza appealed to the country and suffered, on the
26th of January 1905, an overwhelming defeat at the hands of a coalition
composed of dissentient Liberals, Clericals, Independents and a few
Banffyites. The Coalition gained an absolute majority and the Independence
party became the strongest political group. Nevertheless the various
adherents of the dual system retained an actual majority in the Chamber and
prevented the Independence party from attempting to realize its programme
of reducing the ties between Hungary and Austria to the person of the joint
ruler. On the 25th of January, the day before his defeat, Count Tisza had
signed on behalf of Hungary the new commercial treaties concluded by the
Austro-Hungarian foreign office with Germany and Italy on the basis of the
Szell-Koerber tariff. He acted _ultra vires_, but by his act saved Hungary
from a severe economic crisis and retained for her the right to benefit by
economic partnership with Austria until the expiry of the new treaties in
1917.
[Sidenote: Deadlock of 1905.]
A deadlock, lasting from January 1905 until April 1906, ensued between the
crown and Hungary and, to a great extent, between Hungary and Austria. The
Coalition, though possessing the majority in the Chamber, resolved not to
take office unless the crown should grant its demands, including the Magyar
words of command and customs separation from Austria. The crown declined to
concede these points, either of which would have wrecked the dual system as
interpreted since 1867. The Tisza cabinet could not be relieved of its
functions till June 1905, when it was succeeded by a non-parliamentary
administration under the premiership of General Baron Fejervary, formerly
minister for national defence. Seeing that the Coalition would not take
office on acceptable terms, Fejervary obtained the consent of the crown to
a scheme, drafted by Kristoffy, minister of the interior, that the dispute
between the crown and the Coalition should be subjected to the test of
universal suffrage and that to this end the franchise in Hungary be
radically reformed. The scheme alarmed the Coalition, which saw that
universal suffrage might destroy not only the hegemony of the Magyar
nobility and gentry in whose hands political power was concentrated, but
might, by admitting the non-Magyars to political equality with the Magyars,
undermine the supremacy of the Magyar race itself. Yet the Coalition did
not yield at once. Not until the Chamber had been dissolved by military
force (February 19, 1906) and an open breach of the constitution seemed
within sight did they come to terms with the crown and form an
administration. The miserable state of public finances and the depression
of trade doubtless helped to induce them to perform a duty which they ought
to have performed from the first; but their chief motive was the desire to
escape the menace of universal suffrage or, at least, to make sure that it
would be introduced in such a form as to safeguard Magyar supremacy over
the other Hungarian races.
[Sidenote: Pact of 1906.]
The pact concluded (April 8, 1906) between the Coalition and the crown is
known to have contained the following conditions:--All military questions
to be suspended until after the introduction of universal suffrage; the
estimates and the normal contingent of recruits to be voted for 1905 and
1906; the extraordinary military credits, sanctioned by the delegations in
1904, to be voted by the Hungarian Chamber; ratification of the commercial
treaties concluded by Tisza; election of the Hungarian Delegation and of
the Quota-Deputation; introduction of a suffrage reform at least as far
reaching as the Kristoffy scheme. These "capitulations" obliged the
Coalition government to carry on a dualist policy, although the majority of
its adherents became, by the general election of May 1906, members of the
Kossuth or Independence party, and, as such, pledged to the economic and
political separation of Hungary from Austria save as regards the person of
the ruler. Attempts were, however, made to emphasize the independence of
Hungary. During the deadlock (June 2, 1905) Kossuth had obtained the
adoption of a motion to authorize the compilation of an autonomous
Hungarian tariff, and on the 28th of May 1906, the Coalition cabinet was
authorized by the crown to present the Szell-Koerber tariff to the Chamber
in the form of a Hungarian autonomous tariff distinct from but identical
with the Austrian tariff. This concession of form having been made to the
Magyars without the knowledge of the Austrian government, Prince Konrad
Hohenlohe, the Austrian premier, resigned office; and his successor, Baron
Beck, eventually (July 6) withdrew from the table of the Reichsrath the
whole Szell-Koerber compact, declaring that the only remaining economic
ties between the two countries were freedom of trade, the commercial
treaties with foreign countries, the joint state bank and the management of
excise. If the Hungarian government wished to regulate its relationship to
Austria in a more definite form, added the Austrian premier, it must
conclude a new agreement before the end of the year 1907, when the
reciprocity arrangement of 1899 would lapse. The Hungarian government
replied that any new arrangement with Austria must be concluded in the form
of a commercial treaty as between two foreign states and not in the form of
a "customs and trade alliance."
[Sidenote: Agreement of 1907.]
Austria ultimately consented to negotiate on this basis. In October 1907 an
agreement was attained, thanks chiefly to the sobering of Hungarian opinion
by a severe economic crisis, which brought out with unusual clearness the
fact that separation from Austria would involve a period of distress if not
of commercial ruin for Hungary. Austria also came to see that separation
from Hungary would seriously enhance the cost of living in Cisleithania and
would deprive Austrian manufacturers of their best market. The main
features of the new "customs and commercial treaty" were: (1) Each state to
possess a separate but identical customs tariff. (2) Hungary to facilitate
the establishment of direct railway communication between Vienna and
Dalmatia, the communication to be established by the end of 1911, each
state building the sections of line that passed through its own territory.
(3) Austria to facilitate railway communication between Hungary and
Prussia. (4) Hungary to reform her produce and Stock Exchange laws so as to
prevent speculation in agrarian produce. (5) A court of arbitration to be
established for the settlement of differences between the two states,
Hungary selecting four Austrian and Austria four Hungarian judges, the
presidency of the court being decided by lot, and each government being
represented before the court by its own delegates. (6) Impediments [v.03
p.0025] to free trade in sugar to be practically abolished. (7) Hungary to
be entitled to redeem her share of the old Austrian debt (originally
bearing interest at 5 and now at 4.2%) at the rate of 4.325% within the
next ten years; if not redeemed within ten years the rate of capitalization
to decrease annually by 1/12% until it reaches 4.2%. This arrangement
represents a potential economy of some L2,000,000 capital for Hungary as
compared with the original Austrian demand that the Hungarian contribution
to the service of the old Austrian debt be capitalized at 4.2%. (8) The
securities of the two governments to rank as investments for savings banks,
insurance companies and similar institutions in both countries, but not as
trust fund investments. (9) Commercial treaties with foreign countries to
be negotiated, not, as hitherto, by the joint minister for foreign affairs
alone, but also by a nominee of each government. (10) The quota of Austrian
and Hungarian contribution to joint expenditure to be 63.6 and 36.4
respectively--an increase of 2% in the Hungarian quota, equal to some
L200,000 a year.
The economic dispute between Hungary and Austria was thus settled for ten
years after negotiations lasting more than twelve years. One important
question, however, that of the future of the joint State Bank, was left
over for subsequent decision. During the negotiations for the customs and
commercial treaty, the Austrian government attempted to conclude for a
longer period than ten years, but was unable to overcome Hungarian
resistance. Therefore, at the end of 1917, the commercial treaties with
Germany, Italy and other countries, and the Austro-Hungarian customs and
commercial treaty, would all lapse. Ten years of economic unity remained
during which the Dual Monarchy might grow together or grow asunder,
increasing accordingly in strength or in weakness.
(H. W. S.)
During this period of internal crisis the international position of the
Dual Monarchy was threatened by two external dangers. The unrest in
Macedonia threatened to reopen the Eastern Question in an acute form; with
Italy the irredentist attitude of the Zanardelli cabinet led in 1902-1903
to such strained relations that war seemed imminent. The southern Tirol,
the chief passes into Italy, strategic points on the Istrian and Dalmatian
coasts, were strongly fortified, while in the interior the Tauern,
Karawanken and Wochein railways were constructed, partly in order to
facilitate the movement of troops towards the Italian border. The tension
was relaxed with the fall of the Zanardelli government, and comparatively
cordial relations were gradually re-established.
[Sidenote: Balkan crisis.]
In the affairs of the Balkan Peninsula a temporary agreement with Russia
was reached in 1903 by the so-called "February Programme," supplemented in
the following October by the "Muerzsteg Programme" (see MACEDONIA; TURKEY;
EUROPE: _History_). The terms of the Muerzsteg programme were observed by
Count Goluchowski, in spite of the ruin of Russian prestige in the war with
Japan, so long as he remained in office. In October 1906, however, he
retired, and it was soon clear that his successor, Baron von Aerenthal,[12]
was determined to take advantage of the changed European situation to take
up once more the traditional policy of the Habsburg monarchy in the Balkan
Peninsula. He gradually departed from the Muerzsteg basis, and in January
1908 deliberately undermined the Austro-Russian agreement by obtaining from
the sultan a concession for a railway from the Bosnian frontier through the
sanjak of Novibazar to the Turkish terminus at Mitrovitza. This was done in
the teeth of the expressed wish of Russia; it roused the helpless
resentment of Servia, whose economic dependence upon the Dual Monarchy was
emphasized by the outcome of the war of tariffs into which she had plunged
in 1906, and who saw in this scheme another link in the chain forged for
her by the Habsburg empire; it offended several of the great powers, who
seemed to see in this railway concession the price of the abandonment by
Austria-Hungary of her interest in Macedonian reforms. That Baron von
Aerenthal was able to pursue a policy apparently so rash, was due to the
fact that he could reckon on the support of Germany. The intimate relations
between the two powers had been revealed during the dispute between France
and Germany about Morocco; in the critical division of the 3rd of March
1906 at the Algeciras Conference Austria-Hungary, alone of all the powers,
had sided with Germany, and it was a proposal of the Austro-Hungarian
plenipotentiary that formed the basis of the ultimate settlement between
Germany and France (see MOROCCO: _History_). The cordial relations thus
emphasized encouraged Baron Aerenthal, in the autumn of 1908, to pursue a
still bolder policy. The revolution in Turkey had entirely changed the face
of the Eastern Question; the problem of Macedonian reform was swallowed up
in that of the reform of the Ottoman empire generally, there was even a
danger that a rejuvenated Turkey might in time lay claim to the provinces
occupied by Austria-Hungary under the treaty of Berlin; in any case, the
position of these provinces, governed autocratically from Vienna, between a
constitutional Turkey and a constitutional Austria-Hungary, would have been
highly anomalous. In the circumstances Baron Aerenthal determined on a bold
policy. Without consulting the co-signatory powers of the treaty of Berlin,
and in deliberate violation of its provisions, the king-emperor issued, on
the 13th of October, a decree annexing Bosnia and Herzegovina to the
Habsburg Monarchy, and at the same time announcing the withdrawal of the
Austro-Hungarian troops from the sanjak of Novibazar. (See EUROPE:
_History_.)
[Sidenote: Internal difficulties.]
Meanwhile the relations between the two halves of the Dual Monarchy had
again become critical. The agreement of 1907 had been but a truce in the
battle between two irreconcilable principles: between Magyar nationalism,
determined to maintain its ascendancy in an independent Hungary, and
Habsburg imperialism, equally determined to preserve the economic and
military unity of the Dual Monarchy. In this conflict the tactical
advantage lay with the monarchy; for the Magyars were in a minority in
Hungary, their ascendancy was based on a narrow and artificial franchise,
and it was open to the king-emperor to hold _in terrorem_ over them an
appeal to the disfranchised majority. It was the introduction of a
Universal Suffrage Bill by Mr Joseph Kristoffy, minister of the interior in
the "unconstitutional" cabinet of Baron Fejervary, which brought the
Opposition leaders in the Hungarian parliament to terms and made possible
the agreement of 1907. But the Wekerle ministry which succeeded that of
Fejervary on the 9th of April 1906 contained elements which made any
lasting compromise impossible. The burning question of the "Magyar word of
command" remained unsettled, save in so far as the fixed determination of
the king-emperor had settled it; the equally important question of the
renewal of the charter of the Austro-Hungarian State Bank had also formed
no part of the agreement of 1907. On the other hand, the Wekerle ministry
was pledged to a measure of franchise reform, a pledge which they showed no
eagerness to redeem, though the granting of universal suffrage in the
Austrian half of the Monarchy had made such a change inevitable. In March
1908 Mr Hallo laid before the Hungarian parliament a formal proposal that
the charter of the Austro-Hungarian Bank, which was to expire at the end of
1910, should not be renewed; and that, in the event of failure to negotiate
a convention between the banks of Austria and Hungary, a separate Hungarian
Bank should be established. This question, obscured during the winter by
the Balkan crisis, once more became acute in the spring of 1909. In the
Coalition cabinet itself opinion was sharply divided, but in the end the
views of the Independence party prevailed, and Dr Wekerle laid the proposal
for a separate Hungarian Bank before the king-emperor and the Austrian
government. Its reception was significant. The emperor Francis Joseph
pointed out that the question of a separate Bank for Hungary [v.03 p.0026]
did not figure in the act of 1867, and could not be introduced into it,
_especially since the capital article of the ministerial programme_, i.e.
_electoral reform, was not realized, nor near being realized_. This was
tantamount to an appeal from the Magyar _populus_ to the Hungarian _plebs_,
the disfranchised non-Magyar majority; an appeal all the more significant
from the fact that it ignored the suffrage bill brought in on behalf of the
Hungarian government by Count Julius Andrassy in November 1908, a bill
which, under the guise of granting the principle of universal suffrage, was
ingeniously framed so as to safeguard and even to extend Magyar ascendancy
(see HUNGARY: _History_). In consequence of this rebuff Dr Wekerle tendered
his resignation on the 27th of April. Months passed without it being
possible to form a new cabinet, and a fresh period of crisis and agitation
was begun.
(W. A. P.)
II. _Austria Proper since_ 1867.
As already explained, the name Austria is used for convenience to designate
those portions of the possessions of the house of Habsburg, which were not
included by the settlement of 1867 among the lands of the Hungarian crown.
The separation of Hungary made it necessary to determine the method by
which these territories[13] were henceforth to be governed. It was the
misfortune of the country that there was no clear legal basis on which new
institutions could be erected. Each of the territories was a separate
political unit with a separate history, and some of them had a historic
claim to a large amount of self-government; in many the old feudal estates
had survived till 1848. [Sidenote: The February Constitution.] Since that
year the empire had been the subject of numerous experiments in government;
by the last, which began in 1860, _Landtage_ or diets have been instituted
in each of the territories on a nearly uniform system and with nearly
identical powers, and by the constitution published in February 1861 (the
February Constitution, as it is called), which is still the ultimate basis
for the government, there was instituted a _Reichsrath_ or parliament for
the whole empire; it consisted of a House of Lords (_Herrenhaus_), in which
sat the archbishops and prince bishops, members of the imperial family, and
other members appointed for life, besides some hereditary members, and a
Chamber of Deputies. The members of the latter for each territory were not
chosen by direct election, but by the diets. The diets themselves were
elected for six years; they were chosen generally (there were slight local
differences) in the following way: (a) a certain number of bishops and
rectors of universities sat in virtue of their office; (b) the rest of the
members were chosen by four electoral bodies or _curiae_,--(1) the owners
of estates which before 1848 had enjoyed certain feudal privileges, the
so-called great proprietors; (2) the chambers of commerce; (3) the towns;
(4) the rural districts. In the two latter classes all had the suffrage who
paid at least ten gulden in direct taxes. The districts were so arranged as
to give the towns a very large representation in proportion to their
populations. In Bohemia, _e.g._, the diet consisted of 241 members: of
these five were _ex officio_ members; the feudal proprietors had seventy;
the towns and chambers of commerce together had eighty-seven; the rural
districts seventy-nine. The electors in the rural districts were 236,000,
in the towns 93,000. This arrangement seems to have been deliberately made
by Schmerling, so as to give greater power to the German inhabitants of the
towns; the votes of the proprietors would, moreover, nearly always give the
final decision to the court and the government, for the influence exercised
by the government over the nobility would generally be strong enough to
secure a majority in favour of the government policy.
This constitution had failed; territories so different in size, history and
circumstances were not contented with similar institutions, and a form of
self-government which satisfied Lower Austria and Salzburg did not satisfy
Galicia and Bohemia. The Czechs of Bohemia, like the Magyars, had refused
to recognize the common parliament on the ground that it violated the
historic rights of the Bohemian as of the Hungarian crown, and in 1865 the
constitution of 1861 had been superseded, while the territorial diets
remained. In 1867 it was necessary once more to summon, in some form or
another, a common parliament for the whole of Austria, by which the
settlement with Hungary could be ratified.
[Sidenote: Centralists and Federalists.]
This necessity brought to a decisive issue the struggle between the parties
of the Centralists and Federalists. The latter claimed that the new
constitution must be made by agreement with the territories; the former
maintained that the constitution of 1861 was still valid, and demanded that
in accordance with it the Reichsrath should be summoned and a
"constitutional" government restored. The difference between the two
parties was to a great extent, though not entirely, one of race. The kernel
of the empire was the purely German district, including Upper and Lower
Austria, Salzburg, Tirol (except the south) and Vorarlberg, all Styria
except the southern districts, and a large part of Carinthia. There was
strong local feeling, especially in Tirol, but it was local feeling similar
to that which formerly existed in the provinces of France; among all
classes and parties there was great, loyalty both to the ruling house and
to the idea of the Austrian state; but while the Liberal party, which was
dominant in Lower Austria and Styria, desired to develop the central
institutions, there was a strong Conservative and Clerical party which
supported local institutions as a protection against the Liberal influence
of a centralized parliament and bureaucracy, and the bishops and clergy
were willing to gain support in the struggle by alliance with the
Federalists.
[Sidenote: The Slavonic Lands.]
Very different was it in the other territories where the majority of the
population was not German--and where there was a lively recollection of the
time when they were not Austrian. With Palacky, they said, "We existed
before Austria; we shall continue to exist after it is gone." Especially
was this the case in Bohemia. In this great country, the richest part of
the Austrian dominions, where over three-fifths of the population were
Czech, racial feeling was supported by the appeal to historic law. A great
party, led by Palacky and Rieger, demanded the restoration of the Bohemian
monarchy in its fullest extent, including Moravia and Silesia, and insisted
that the emperor should be crowned as king of Bohemia at Prague as his
predecessors had been, and that Bohemia should have a position in the
monarchy similar to that obtained by Hungary. Not only did the party
include all the Czechs, but they were supported by many of the great nobles
who were of German descent, including Count Leo Thun, his brother-in-law
Count Heinrich Clam-Martinitz, and Prince Friedrich von Schwarzenberg,
cardinal archbishop of Prague, who hoped in a self-governing kingdom of
Bohemia to preserve that power which was threatened by the German Liberals.
The feudal nobles had great power arising from their wealth, the great
traditions of their families, and the connexion with the court, and by the
electoral law they had a large number of representatives in the diet. On
the other hand the Germans of Bohemia, fearful of falling under the control
of the Czechs, were the most ardent advocates of centralization. The Czechs
were supported also by their fellow-countrymen in Moravia, and some of the
nobles, headed by Count Belcredi, brother of the minister; but in Bruenn
there was a strong German party. In Silesia the Germans had a considerable
majority, and as [v.03 p.0027] there was a large Polish element which did
not support the Czechs, the diet refused to recognize the claims of the
Bohemians.
The Poles of Galicia stood apart from the other Slav races. The
German-speaking population was very small, consisting chiefly of government
officials, railway servants and Jews; but there was a large minority (some
43%) of Ruthenes. The Poles wished to gain as much autonomy as they could
for their own province, but they had no interest in opposing the
centralization of other parts; they were satisfied if Austria would
surrender the Ruthenes to them. They were little influenced by the pan-Slav
agitation; it was desirable for them that Austria, which gave them freedom
and power, should continue strong and united. Their real interests were
outside the monarchy, and they did not cease to look forward to a
restoration of the Polish kingdom. The great danger was that they might
entangle Austria in a war with Russia.
The southern Slavs had neither the unity, nor the organization, nor the
historical traditions of the Czechs and Poles; but the Slovenes, who formed
a large majority of the population in Carniola, and a considerable minority
in the adjoining territory of Carinthia and the south of Styria, demanded
that their language should be used for purposes of government and
education. Their political ideal was an "Illyrian" kingdom, including
Croatia and all the southern Slavs in the coast district, and a not very
successful movement had been started to establish a so-called Illyrian
language, which should be accepted by both Croats and Slovenes. There was,
however, another element in the southern districts, viz. the Serbs, who,
though of the same race and language as the Croats, were separated from
them by religion. Belonging to the Orthodox Church they were attracted by
Russia. They were in constant communication with Servia and Montenegro; and
their ultimate hope, the creation of a great Servian kingdom, was less easy
to reconcile with loyalty to Austria. Of late years attempts have been made
to turn the Slovenian national movement into this direction, and to attract
the Slovenes also towards the Orthodox non-Austrian Slavs.
[Sidenote: South Dalmatia.]
In the extreme south of Dalmatia is a small district which had not formed
part of the older duchy of Dalmatia, and had not been joined to the
Austrian empire till 1814; in former years part of it formed the republic
of Ragusa, and the rest belonged to Albania. The inhabitants of this part,
who chiefly belonged to the Greek Church, still kept up a close connexion
with Albania and with Montenegro, and Austrian authority was maintained
with difficulty. Disturbances had already broken out once before; and in
1869 another outbreak took place. This district had hitherto been exempted
from military service; by the law of 1869, which introduced universal
military service, those who had hitherto been exempted were required to
serve, not in the regular army but in the militia. The inhabitants of the
district round the Bocche di Cattaro (the Bocchesi, as they are commonly
called) refused to obey this order, and when a military force was sent it
failed to overcome their resistance; and by an agreement made at Knezlac in
December 1869, Rodics, who had taken command, granted the insurgents all
they asked and a complete amnesty. After the conquest of Bosnia another
attempt was made to enforce military service; once more a rebellion broke
out, and spread to the contiguous districts of Herzegovina. This time,
however, the government, whose position in the Balkans had been much
strengthened by the occupation of the new provinces, did not fear to act
with decision. A considerable force was sent under General Baron Stephan
von Jovanovich (1828-1885); they were supported from sea by the navy, and
eventually the rebellion was crushed. An amnesty was proclaimed, but the
greater number of the insurgents sought refuge in Montenegro rather than
submit to military service.
The Italians of Trieste and Istria were the only people of the empire who
really desired separation from Austria; annexation to Italy was the aim of
the _Italianissimi_, as they were called. The feeling was less strong in
Tirol, where, except in the city of Trent, they seem chiefly to have wished
for separate local institutions, so that they should no longer be governed
from Innsbruck. The Italian-speaking population on the coast of Dalmatia
only asked that the government should uphold them against the pressure of
the Slav races in the interior, and for this reason were ready to support
the German constitutionalists.
[Sidenote: German Constitutional party.]
The party of centralization was then the Liberal German party, supported by
a few Italians and the Ruthenes, and as years went by it was to become the
National German party. They hoped by a common parliament to create the
feeling of a common Austrian nationality, by German schools to spread the
use of the German language. Every grant of self-government to the
territories must diminish the influence of the Germans, and bring about a
restriction in the use of the German language; moreover, in countries such
as Bohemia, full self-government would almost certainly mean that the
Germans would become the subject race. This was a result which they could
not accept. It was intolerable to them that just at the time when the
national power of the non-Austrian Germans was so greatly increased, and
the Germans were becoming the first race in Europe, they themselves should
resign the position as rulers which they had won during the last three
hundred years. They maintained, moreover, that the ascendancy of the
Germans was the only means of preserving the unity of the monarchy; German
was the only language in which the different races could communicate with
one another; it must be the language of the army, the civil service and the
parliament. They laid much stress on the historic task of Austria in
bringing German culture to the half-civilized races of the east. They
demanded, therefore, that all higher schools and universities should remain
German, and that so far as possible the elementary schools should be
Germanized. They looked on the German schoolmaster as the apostle of German
culture, and they looked forward to the time when the feeling of a common
Austrian nationality should obscure the national feeling of the Slavs, and
the Slavonic idioms should survive merely as the local dialects of the
peasantry, the territories becoming merely the provinces of a united and
centralized state. The total German population was not quite a third of the
whole. The maintenance of their rule was, therefore, only possible by the
exercise of great political ability, the more so, since, as we have seen,
they were not united among themselves, the clergy and Feudal party being
opposed to the Liberals. Their watchword was the constitution of 1861,
which had been drawn up by their leaders; they demanded that it should be
restored, and with it parliamentary government. They called themselves,
therefore, the Constitutional party. But the introduction of parliamentary
government really added greatly to the difficulty of the task before them.
In the old days German ascendancy had been secured by the common army, the
civil service and the court. As soon, however, as power was transferred to
a parliament, the Germans must inevitably be in a minority, unless the
method of election was deliberately arranged so as to give them a majority.
Parliamentary discussion, moreover, was sure to bring out those racial
differences which it was desirable should be forgotten, and the elections
carried into every part of the empire a political agitation which was very
harmful when each party represented a different race.
[Sidenote: Crisis of 1867.]
The very first events showed one of those extraordinary changes of policy
so characteristic of modern Austrian history. The decision of the
government on the constitutional question was really determined by
immediate practical necessity. The Hungarians required that the settlement
should be ratified by a parliament, therefore a parliament must be procured
which would do this. It must be a parliament in which the Germans had a
majority, for the system of dualism was directly opposed to the ambitions
of the Slavs and the Federalists. Belcredi, who had come into power in 1865
as a Federalist, and had suspended the constitution of 1861 on the 2nd of
January 1867, ordered new elections for the diets, which were then to elect
deputies to an extraordinary Reichsrath which should consider the
_Ausgleich_, or compact with Hungary. The wording of the decree implied
that the February constitution did not exist as of law; the Germans and
Liberals, strenuously objecting to a "feudal-federal" constitution which
would give the Slavs a preponderance in the empire, maintained that the
February constitution was still in force, and that changes could only be
introduced by a regular Reichsrath summoned in accordance with it,
protested against the decree, and, in some cases, threatened not to take
part in the elections. As the Federalists [v.03 p.0028] were all opposed to
the Ausgleich, it was clear that a Reichsrath chosen in these circumstances
would refuse to ratify it, and this was probably Belcredi's intention. As
the existence of the empire would thereby be endangered, Beust interfered;
Belcredi was dismissed, Beust himself became minister-president on the 7th
of February 1867, and a new edict was issued from Vienna ordering the diets
to elect a Reichsrath, according to the constitution, which was now said to
be completely valid. Of course, however, those diets in which there was a
Federalist majority, viz. those of Bohemia, Moravia, Carinthia and Tirol,
which were already pledged to support the January policy of the government,
did not acquiesce in the February policy; and they refused to elect except
on terms which the government could not accept. The first three were
immediately dissolved. In the elections which followed in Bohemia the
influence of the government was sufficient to secure a German majority
among the landed proprietors; the Czechs, who were therefore in a minority,
declared the elections invalid, refused to take any part in electing
deputies for the Reichsrath, and seceded altogether from the diet. The
result was that Bohemia now sent a large German majority to Vienna, and the
few Czechs who were chosen refused to take their seat in the parliament.
[Sidenote: Beust's compact with the Poles.] Had the example of the Czechs
been followed by the other Slav races it would still have been difficult to
get together a Reichsrath to pass the Ausgleich. It was, however, easier to
deal with the Poles of Galicia, for they had no historical rights to
defend; and by sending delegates to Vienna they would not sacrifice any
principle or prejudice any legal claim; they had only to consider how they
could make the best bargain. Their position was a strong one; their votes
were essential to the government, and the government could be useful to
them; it could give them the complete control over the Ruthenes. A compact
then was easily arranged.
Beust promised them that there should be a special minister for Galicia, a
separate board for Galician education, that Polish should be the language
of instruction in all secondary schools, that Polish instead of German
should be the official language in the law courts and public offices,
Ruthenian being only used in the elementary schools under strict
limitations. On these terms the Polish deputies, led by Ziemialkowski,
agreed to go to Vienna and vote for the Ausgleich.
[Sidenote: The constitution of 1867.]
When the Reichsrath met, the government had a large majority; and in the
House, in which all the races except the Czechs were represented, the
Ausgleich was ratified almost unanimously. This having been done, it was
possible to proceed to special legislation for the territories, which were
henceforward officially known as "the kingdoms and lands represented in the
Reichsrath." A series of fundamental laws were carried, which formally
established parliamentary government, with responsibility of ministers, and
complete control over the budget, and there were included a number of
clauses guaranteeing personal rights and liberties in the way common to all
modern constitutions. The influence of the Poles was still sufficient to
secure considerable concessions to the wishes of the Federalists, since if
they did not get what they wished they would leave the House, and the
Slovenes, Dalmatians and Tirolese would certainly follow them. Hence the
German Liberals were prevented from introducing direct elections to the
Reichsrath, and the functions of the Reichsrath were slightly less
extensive than they had hitherto been. Moreover, the Delegation was to be
chosen not by the House as a whole, but by the representatives of the
separate territories. This is one reason for the comparative weakness of
Austria as compared with Hungary, where the Delegation is elected by each
House as a whole; the Bohemian representatives, _e.g._, meet and choose 10
delegates, the Galicians 7, those from Trieste 1; the Delegation, is,
therefore, not representative of the majority of the chamber of deputies,
but includes representatives of all the groups which may be opposing the
government there, and they can carry on their opposition even in the
Delegation. So it came about in 1869, that on the first occasion when there
was a joint sitting of the Delegations to settle a point in the budget,
which Hungary had accepted and Austria rejected, the Poles and Tirolese
voted in favour of the Hungarian proposal.
[Sidenote: The Buerger Ministerium.]
As soon as these laws had been carried (December 1867), Beust retired from
the post of minister-president; and in accordance with constitutional
practice a parliamentary ministry was appointed entirely from the ranks of
the Liberal majority; a ministry generally known as the "Buerger
Ministerium" in which Giskra and Herbst--the leaders of the German party in
Moravia and Bohemia--were the most important members. Austria now began its
new life as a modern constitutional state. From this time the maintenance
of the revised constitution of 1867 has been the watchword of what is
called the Constitutional party. The first use which the new government
made of their power was to settle the finances, and in this their best work
was done. Among them were nearly all the representatives of trade and
industry, of commercial enterprise and financial speculation; they were the
men who hoped to make Austria a great industrial state, and at this time
they were much occupied with railway enterprise. Convinced free-traders,
they hoped by private energy to build up the fortunes of the country,
parliamentary government--which meant for them the rule of the educated and
well-to-do middle class--being one of the means to this end. They accepted
the great burden of debt which the action of Hungary imposed upon the
country, and rejected the proposals for repudiation, but notwithstanding
the protest of foreign bondholders they imposed a tax of 16% on all
interest on the debt. They carried out an extension of the commercial
treaty with Great Britain by which a further advance was made in the
direction of free trade.
[Sidenote: The Liberals and the concordat.]
Of equal importance was their work in freeing Austria from the control of
the Church, which checked the intellectual life of the people. The
concordat of 1855 had given the Church complete freedom in the management
of all ecclesiastical affairs; there was full liberty of intercourse with
Rome, the state gave up all control over the appointment of the clergy, and
in matters of church discipline the civil courts had no voice--the clergy
being absolutely subject to the power of the bishops, who could impose
temporal as well as spiritual penalties. The state had even resigned to the
Church all authority over some departments of civil life, and restored the
authority of the canon law. This was the case as regards marriage; all
disputes were to be tried before ecclesiastical courts, and the marriage
registers were kept by the priests. All the schools were under the control
of the Church; the bishops could forbid the use of books prejudicial to
religion; in elementary schools all teachers were subject to the inspection
of the Church, and in higher schools only Roman Catholics could be
appointed. It had been agreed that the whole education of the Roman
Catholic youth, in all schools, private as well as public, should be in
accordance with the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. The authority of
the Church extended even to the universities. Some change in this system
was essential; the Liberal party demanded that the government should simply
state that the concordat had ceased to exist. To this, however, the emperor
would not assent, and there was a difficulty in overthrowing an act which
took the form of a treaty. The government wished to come to some agreement
by friendly discussion with Rome, but Pius IX. was not willing to abate
anything of his full claims. The ministry, therefore, proceeded by internal
legislation, and in 1868 introduced three laws: (1) a marriage law
transferred the decisions on all questions of marriage from the
ecclesiastical to the civil courts, abolished the authority of the canon
law, and introduced civil marriage in those cases where the clergy refused
to perform the ceremony; (2) the control of secular education was taken
from the Church, and the management of schools transferred to local
authorities which were to be created by the diets; (3) complete civil
equality between Catholics and non-Catholics was established. These laws
were carried through both Houses in May amid almost unparalleled
excitement, and at once received the imperial sanction, notwithstanding the
protest of all the bishops, led by Joseph Othmar [v.03 p.0029] von Rauscher
(1797-1875), cardinal archbishop of Vienna, who had earned his red hat by
the share he had taken in arranging the concordat of 1855, and now
attempted to use his great personal influence with the emperor (his former
pupil) to defeat the bill.
The ministry had the enthusiastic support of the German population in the
towns. They were also supported by the teaching profession, which desired
emancipation from ecclesiastical control, and hoped that German schools and
German railways were to complete the work which Joseph II. had begun. But
the hostility of the Church was dangerous. The pope, in an allocution of
22nd June 1868, declared that these "damnable and abominable laws" which
were "contrary to the concordat, to the laws of the Church and to the
principles of Christianity," were "absolutely and for ever null and void."
The natural result was that when they were carried into effect the bishops
in many cases refused to obey. They claimed that the laws were inconsistent
with the concordat, that the concordat still was in force, and that the
laws were consequently invalid. The argument was forcible, but the courts
decided against them. Rudigier, bishop of Linz, was summoned to a criminal
court for disturbing the public peace; he refused to appear, for by the
concordat bishops were not subject to temporal jurisdiction; and when he
was condemned to imprisonment the emperor at once telegraphed his full
pardon. In the rural districts the clergy had much influence; they were
supported by the peasants, and the diets of Tirol and Vorarlberg, where
there was a clerical majority, refused to carry out the school law.
On the proclamation of papal infallibility in 1870, the government took the
opportunity of declaring that the concordat had lapsed, on the ground that
there was a fundamental change in the character of the papacy. Nearly all
the Austrian prelates had been opposed to the new doctrine; many of them
remained to the end of the council and voted against it, and they only
declared their submission with great reluctance. The Old Catholic movement,
however, never made much progress in Austria. Laws regulating the position
of the Church were carried in 1874. (For the concordat see Laveleye, _La
Prusse et l'Autriche_, Paris, 1870.)
[Sidenote: Nationalism in Galicia and Bohemia.]
During 1868 the constitution then was open to attack on two sides, for the
nationalist movement was gaining ground in Bohemia and Galicia. In Galicia
the extreme party, headed by Smolka, had always desired to imitate the
Czechs and not attend at Vienna; they were outvoted, but all parties agreed
on a declaration in which the final demands of the Poles were drawn up;[14]
they asked that the powers of the Galician diet should be much increased,
and that the members from Galicia should cease to attend the Reichsrath on
the discussion of those matters with which the Galician diet should be
qualified to deal. If these demands were not granted they would leave the
Reichsrath. In Bohemia the Czechs were very active; while the Poles were
parading their hostility to Russia in such a manner as to cause the emperor
to avoid visiting Galicia, some of the Czech leaders attended a Slav
demonstration at Moscow, and in 1868 they drew up and presented to the diet
at Prague a "declaration" which has since been regarded as the official
statement of their claims. They asked for the full restoration of the
Bohemian kingdom; they contended that no foreign assembly was qualified to
impose taxes in Bohemia; that the diet was not qualified to elect
representatives to go to Vienna, and that a separate settlement must be
made with Bohemia similar to that with Hungary. This declaration was signed
by eighty-one members, including many of the feudal nobles and bishops.[15]
The German majority declared that they had forfeited their seats, and
ordered new elections. The agitation spread over the country, serious riots
took place, and with a view to keeping order the government decreed
exceptional laws. Similar events happened in Moravia, and in Dalmatia the
revolt broke out among the Bocchesi.
[Sidenote: Parliamentary breakdown of 1870.]
Before the combination of Clericals and Federalists the ministry broke
down; they were divided among themselves; Counts Taaffe and Alfred Potocki,
the minister of agriculture, wished to conciliate the Slav races--a policy
recommended by Beust, probably with the sympathy of the emperor; the others
determined to cripple the opposition by taking away the elections for the
Reichsrath from the diets. Taaffe and his friends resigned in January 1870,
but the majority did not long survive. In March, after long delay, the new
Galician demands were definitely rejected; the whole of the Polish club,
followed by the Tirolese and Slovenes, left the House, which consequently
consisted of 110 members--the Germans and German representatives from
Bohemia and Moravia. It was clearly impossible to govern with such a
parliament. Not four years had gone by, and the new constitution seemed to
have failed like the old one. The only thing to do was to attempt a
reconciliation with the Slavs. The ministry resigned, and Potocki and
Taaffe formed a government with this object. Potocki, now
minister-president, then entered on negotiations, hoping to persuade the
Czechs to accept the constitution. Rieger and Thun were summoned to Vienna;
he himself went to Prague, but after two days he had to give up the attempt
in despair. Feudals and Czechs all supported the declaration of 1868, and
would accept no compromise, and he returned to Vienna after what was the
greatest disappointment of his life. Government, however, had to be carried
on; the war between Germany and France broke out in July, and Austria might
be drawn into it; the emperor could not at such a crisis alienate either
the Germans or the Slavs. The Reichsrath and all the diets were dissolved.
This time in Bohemia the Czechs, supported by the Feudals and the
Clericals, gained a large majority; they took their seats in the diet only
to declare that they did not regard it as the legal representative of the
Bohemian kingdom, but merely an informal assembly, and refused to elect
delegates for the Reichsrath. The Germans in their turn now left the diet,
and the Czechs voted an address to the crown, drawn up by Count Thun,
demanding the restoration of the Bohemian kingdom. When the Reichsrath met
there were present only 130 out of 203 members, for the whole Bohemian
contingent was absent; the government then, under a law of 1868, ordered
that as the Bohemian diet had sent no delegates, they were to be chosen
directly from the people. Twenty-four Constitutionalists and thirty
_Declaranten_ were chosen; the latter, of course, did not go to Vienna, but
the additional twenty-four made a working majority by which the government
was carried on for the rest of the year.
[Sidenote: The ministry of Hohenwart.]
But Potocki's influence was gone, and as soon as the European crisis was
over, in February 1871, the emperor appointed a ministry chosen not from
the Liberals but from the Federalists and Clericals, led by Count Hohenwart
and A. E. F. Schaeffle, a professor at the university of Vienna, chiefly
known for his writings on political economy. They attempted to solve the
problem by granting to the Federalists all their demands. So long as
parliament was sitting they were kept in check; as soon as it had voted
supplies and the Delegations had separated, they ordered new elections in
all those diets where there was a Liberal majority. By the help of the
Clericals they won enough seats to put the Liberals in a minority in the
Reichsrath, and it would be possible to revise the constitution if the
Czechs consented to come. They would only attend, however, on their own
terms, which were a complete recognition by the government of the claims
made in the Declaration. This was agreed to; and on the 12th of September
at the opening of the diet, the governor read a royal message recognizing
the separate existence of the Bohemian kingdom, and promising that the
emperor should be crowned as king at Prague. It was received with delight
throughout Bohemia, and the Czechs drew a draft constitution of fundamental
rights. On this the Germans, now that they were in a minority, left the
diet, and began preparations for resistance. In Upper Austria, Moravia and
Carinthia, where they were outvoted by the Clericals, they seceded, and the
whole work of 1867 was on the point of being overthrown. Were the movement
not stopped the constitution would be superseded, and the union with
Hungary endangered. Beust and Andrassy warned the emperor of the danger,
and the crown prince of Saxony was summoned [v.03 p.0030] by Beust to
remonstrate with him. A great council was called at Vienna (October 20), at
which the emperor gave his decision that the Bohemian demands could not be
accepted. The Czechs must come to Vienna, and consider a revision of the
constitution in a constitutional manner. Hohenwart resigned, but at the
same time Beust was dismissed, and a new cabinet was chosen once more from
among the German Liberals, under the leadership of Prince Adolf Auersperg,
whose brother Carlos had been one of the chief members in the Buerger
Ministerium. For the second time in four years the policy of the government
had completely changed within a few months. On 12th September the decree
had been published accepting the Bohemian claims; before the end of the
year copies of it were seized by the police, and men were thrown into
prison for circulating it.
[Sidenote: Auersperg's ministry, 1871 to 1879.]
Auersperg's ministry held office for eight years. They began as had the
Buerger Ministerium, with a vigorous Liberal centralizing policy. In
Bohemia they succeeded at first in almost crushing the opposition. In 1872
the diet was dissolved; and the whole influence of the government was used
to procure a German majority. Koller, the governor, acted with great
vigour. Opposition newspapers were suppressed; cases in which Czech
journalists were concerned were transferred to the German districts, so
that they were tried by a hostile German jury. Czech manifestoes were
confiscated, and meetings stopped at the slightest appearance of disorder;
and the riots were punished by quartering soldiers upon the inhabitants.
The decision between the two races turned on the vote of the feudal
proprietors, and in order to win this a society was formed among the German
capitalists of Vienna (to which the name of _Chabrus_ was popularly given)
to acquire by real or fictitious purchase portions of those estates to
which a vote was attached. These measures were successful; a large German
majority was secured; Jews from Vienna sat in the place of the Thuns and
the Schwarzenbergs; and as for many years the Czechs refused to sit in the
diet, the government could be carried on without difficulty. A still
greater blow to the Federalists was the passing of a new electoral law in
1873. The measure transferred the right of electing members of the
Reichsrath from the diets to the direct vote of the people, the result
being to deprive the Federalists of their chief weapon; it was no longer
possible to take a formal vote of the legal representatives in any
territory refusing to appoint deputies, and if a Czech or Slovene member
did not take his seat the only result was that a single constituency was
unrepresented, and the opposition weakened. The measure was strongly
opposed. A petition with 250,000 names was presented from Bohemia; and the
Poles withdrew from the Reichsrath when the law was introduced. But enough
members remained to give the legal quorum, and it was carried by 120 to 2
votes. At the same time the number of members was increased to 353, but the
proportion of representatives from the different territories was maintained
and the system of election was not altered. The proportion of members
assigned to the towns was increased, the special representatives of the
chambers of commerce and of the landed proprietors were retained, and the
suffrage was not extended. The artificial system which gave to the Germans
a parliamentary majority continued.
[Sidenote: Czech dissensions.]
At this time the Czechs were much weakened by quarrels among themselves. A
new party had arisen, calling themselves Radicals, but generally known as
the Young Czechs. They disliked the alliance with the aristocracy and the
clergy; they wished for universal suffrage, and recalled the Hussite
traditions. They desired to take their seats in the diet, and to join with
the Germans in political reform. They violently attacked Rieger, the leader
of the Old Czechs, who maintained the alliance with the Feudalists and the
policy of passive opposition. Twenty-seven members of the diet led by Gregr
and Stadkowsky, being outvoted in the Czech Club, resigned their seats.
They were completely defeated in the elections which followed, but for the
next four years the two parties among the Czechs were as much occupied in
opposing one another as in opposing the Germans. These events might have
secured the predominance of the Liberals for many years. The election after
the reform bill gave them an increased majority in the Reichsrath.
Forty-two Czechs who had won seats did not attend; forty-three Poles stood
aloof from all party combination, giving their votes on each occasion as
the interest of their country seemed to require; the real opposition was
limited to forty Clericals and representatives of the other Slav races, who
were collected on the Right under the leadership of Hohenwart. Against them
were 227 Constitutionalists, and it seemed to matter little that they were
divided into three groups; there were 105 in the Liberal Club under the
leadership of Herbst, 57 Constitutionalists, elected by the landed
proprietors, and a third body of Radicals, some of whom were more
democratic than the old Constitutional party, while others laid more stress
on nationality. They used their majority to carry a number of important
laws regarding ecclesiastical affairs. Yet within four years the government
was obliged to turn for support to the Federalists and Clericals, and the
rule of the German Liberals was overthrown. [Sidenote: Financial crisis of
1873.] Their influence was indirectly affected by the great commercial
crisis of 1873. For some years there had been active speculations on the
Stock Exchange; a great number of companies, chiefly banks and building
societies, had been founded on a very insecure basis. The inevitable crisis
began in 1872; it was postponed for a short time, and there was some hope
that the Exhibition, fixed for 1873, would bring fresh prosperity; the hope
was not, however, fulfilled, and the final crash, which occurred in May,
brought with it the collapse of hundreds of undertakings. The loss fell
almost entirely on those who had attempted to increase their wealth by
speculative investment. Sound industrial concerns were little touched by
it, but speculation had become so general that every class of society was
affected, and in the investigation which followed it became apparent that
some of the most distinguished members of the governing Liberal party,
including at least two members of the government, were among those who had
profited by the unsound finance. It appeared also that many of the leading
newspapers of Vienna, by which the Liberal party was supported, had
received money from financiers. For the next two years political interest
was transferred from parliament to the law courts, in which financial
scandals were exposed, and the reputations of some of the leading
politicians were destroyed.[16]
[Sidenote: Fall of the Liberal ministry.]
This was to bring about a reaction against the economic doctrines which had
held the field for nearly twenty years; but the full effect of the change
was not seen for some time. What ruined the government was the want of
unity in the party, and their neglect to support a ministry which had been
taken from their own ranks. In a country like Austria, in which a mistaken
foreign policy or a serious quarrel with Hungary might bring about the
disruption of the monarchy, parliamentary government was impossible unless
the party which the government helped in internal matters were prepared to
support it in foreign affairs and in the commercial policy bound up with
the settlement with Hungary. This the constitutional parties did not do.
During discussions on the economic arrangement with Hungary in 1877 a large
number voted against the duties on coffee and petroleum, which were an
essential part of the agreement; they demanded, moreover, that the treaty
of Berlin should be laid before the House, and 112 members, led by Herbst,
gave a vote hostile to some of its provisions, and in the Delegation
refused the supplies necessary for the occupation of Bosnia. They doubtless
were acting in accordance with their principles, but the situation was such
that it would have been impossible to carry out their wishes; the only
result was that the Austrian ministers and Andrassy had to turn for help to
the Poles, who began to acquire the position of a government party, which
they have kept since then. At the beginning of 1870 Auersperg's
resignation, which had long been offered, was accepted. The
constitutionalists remained [v.03 p.0031] in power; but in the
reconstructed cabinet, though Stremayr was president, Count Taaffe, as
minister of the interior, was the most important member.
Parliament was dissolved in the summer, and Taaffe, by private
negotiations, first of all persuaded the Bohemian feudal proprietors to
give the Feudalists, who had long been excluded, a certain number of seats;
secondly, he succeeded where Potocki had failed, and came to an agreement
with the Czechs; they had already, in 1878, taken their seats in the diet
at Prague, and now gave up the policy of "passive resistance," and
consented to take their seats also in the parliament at Vienna.
[Sidenote: Count Taaffe.]
On entering the House they took the oath without reservation, but in the
speech from the throne the emperor himself stated that they had entered
without prejudice to their convictions, and on the first day of the session
Rieger read a formal reservation of right. The Liberals had also lost many
seats, so that the House now had a completely different aspect; the
constitutionalists were reduced to 91 Liberals and 54 Radicals; but the
Right, under Hohenwart, had increased to 57, and there were 57 Poles and 54
Czechs. A combination of these three parties might govern against the
constitutionalists. Taaffe, who now became first minister, tried first of
all to govern by the help of the moderates of all parties, and he included
representatives of nearly every party in his cabinet. But the Liberals
again voted against the government on an important military bill, an
offence almost as unpardonable in Austria as in Germany, and a great
meeting of the party decided that they would not support the government.
Taaffe, therefore, was obliged to turn for support to the Right. The German
members of the government resigned, their place was taken by Clericals,
Poles and Czechs, Smolka was elected president of the Lower House of the
Reichsrath, and the German Liberals found themselves in a minority opposed
by the "iron ring" of these three parties, and helpless in the parliament
of their own creation. For fourteen years Taaffe succeeded in maintaining
the position he had thus secured. He was not himself a party man; he had
sat in a Liberal government; he had never assented to the principles of the
Federalists, nor was he an adherent of the Clerical party. He continued to
rule according to the constitution; his watchword was "unpolitical
politics," and he brought in little contentious legislation. The great
source of his strength was that he stood between the Right and a Liberal
government. There was a large minority of constitutionalists; they might
easily become a majority, and the Right were therefore obliged to support
Taaffe in order to avert this. They continued to support him, even if they
did not get from him all that they could have wished, and the Czechs
acquiesced in a foreign policy with which they had little sympathy.
Something, however, had to be done for them, and from time to time
concessions had to be made to the Clericals and the Federalists.
[Sidenote: The Clericals.]
The real desire of the Clericals was an alteration of the school law, by
which the control of the schools should be restored to the Church and the
period of compulsory education reduced. In this, however, the government
did not meet them, and in 1882 the Clericals, under Prince Alfred v.
Liechtenstein, separated from Hohenwart's party and founded their own club,
so that they could act more freely. Both the new Clerical Club and the
remainder of the Conservatives were much affected by the reaction against
the doctrines of economic Liberalism. They began to adopt the principles of
Christian Socialism expounded by Rudolf Mayer and Baron von Vogelfang, and
the economic revolt against the influence of capital was with them joined
to a half-religious attack upon the Jews. They represented that Austria was
being governed by a close ring of political financiers, many of whom were
Jews or in the pay of the Jews, who used the forms of the constitution,
under which there was no representation of the working classes, to exploit
the labour of the poor at the same time that they ruined the people by
alienating them from Christianity in "godless schools." It was during these
years that the foundation for the democratic clericalism of the future was
laid. The chief political leader in this new tendency was Prince Aloys v.
Liechtenstein, who complained of the political influence exercised by the
chambers of commerce, and demanded the organization of working men in
gilds. It was by their influence that a law was introduced limiting the
rate of interest, and they co-operated with the government in legislation
for improving the material condition of the people, which had been
neglected during the period of Liberal government, and which was partly
similar to the laws introduced at the same time in Germany.
[Sidenote: Special legislation.]
There seems no doubt that the condition of the workmen in the factories of
Moravia and the oil-mines of Galicia was peculiarly unfortunate; the hours
of work were very long, the conditions were very injurious to health, and
there were no precautions against accidents. The report of a parliamentary
inquiry, called for by the Christian Socialists, showed the necessity for
interference. In 1883 a law was carried, introducing factory inspection,
extending to mines and all industrial undertakings. The measure seems to
have been successful, and there is a general agreement that the inspectors
have done their work with skill and courage. In 1884 and 1885 important
laws were passed regulating the work in mines and factories, and
introducing a maximum working day of eleven hours in factories, and ten
hours in mines. Sunday labour was forbidden, and the hours during which
women and children could be employed were limited. Great power was given to
the administrative authorities to relax the application of these laws in
special cases and special trades. This power was at first freely used, but
it was closely restricted by a further law of 1893. In 1887-1888 laws,
modelled on the new German laws, introduced compulsory insurance against
accidents and sickness. These measures, though severely criticized by the
Opposition, were introduced to remedy obvious, and in some cases terrible
social evils. Other laws to restore gilds among working men had a more
direct political object. Another form of state socialism was the
acquisition of railways by the state. Originally railways had been built by
private enterprise, supported in some cases by a state guarantee; a law of
1877 permitted the acquisition of private lines; when Taaffe retired the
state possessed nearly 5000 m. of railway, not including those which
belonged to Austria and Hungary conjointly. In 1889 a minister of railways
was appointed. In this policy military considerations as well as economic
were of influence. In every department we find the same reaction against
the doctrines of _laissez-faire_. In 1889 for the first time the Austrian
budget showed a surplus, partly the result of the new import duties, partly
due to a reform of taxation.
For a fuller description of these social reforms, see the _Jahrbuch fur
Gesetzgebung_ (Leipzig, 1886, 1888 and 1894); also the annual summary of
new laws in the _Zeitschrift fur Staatswissenschaft_ (Stuttgart). For the
Christian Socialists, see Nitti, _Catholic Socialism_ (London, 1895).
[Sidenote: The language question.]
Meanwhile it was necessary for the government to do something for the
Czechs and the other Slavs, on whose support they depended for their
majority. The influence of the government became more favourable to them in
the matter of language, and this caused the struggle of nationalities to
assume the first place in Austrian public life--a place which it has ever
since maintained. The question of language becomes a political one, so far
as it concerns the use of different languages in the public offices and law
courts, and in the schools. There never was any general law laying down
clear and universal rules, but since the time of Joseph II. German had been
the ordinary language of the government. All laws were published in German;
German was the sole language used in the central public offices in Vienna,
and the language of the court and of the army; moreover, in almost every
part of the monarchy it had become the language of what is called the
_internal service_ in the public offices and law courts; all books and
correspondence were kept in German, not only in the German districts, but
also in countries such as Bohemia and Galicia. The bureaucracy and the law
courts had therefore become a network of German-speaking officialism
extending over the whole country; no one had any share in the government
[v.03 p.0032] unless he could speak and write German. The only exception
was in the Italian districts; not only in Italy itself (in Lombardy, and
afterwards in Venetia), but in South Tirol, Trieste, Istria and Dalmatia,
Italian has always been used, even for the internal service of the
government offices, and though the actual words of command are now given in
German and the officers are obliged to know Serbo-Croatian it remains to
this day the language of the Austrian navy. Any interference with the use
of German would be a serious blow to the cause of those who hoped to
Germanize the whole empire. Since 1867 the old rules have been maintained
absolutely as regards the army, and German has also, as required by the
military authorities, become the language of the railway administration. It
remains the language of the central offices in Vienna, and is the usual,
though not the only, language used in the Reichsrath. In 1869 a great
innovation was made, when Polish was introduced throughout the whole of
Galicia as the normal language of government; and since that time the use
of German has almost entirely disappeared in that territory. Similar
innovations have also begun, as we shall see, in other parts.
Different from this is what is called the _external service_. Even in the
old days it was customary to use the language of the district in
communication between the government offices and private individuals, and
evidence could be given in the law courts in the language generally spoken.
This was not the result of any law, but depended on administrative
regulations of the government service; it was practically necessary in
remote districts, such as Galicia and Bukovina, where few of the population
understood German. In some places a Slav-speaking individual would himself
have to provide the interpreter, and approach the government in German.
Local authorities, _e.g._ town councils and the diets, were free to use
what language they wished, and in this matter the Austrian government has
shown great liberality. The constitution of 1867 laid down a principle of
much importance, by which previous custom became established as a right.
Article 19 runs: "All races of the empire have equal rights, and every race
has an inviolable right to the preservation and use of its own nationality
and language. The equality of all customary (_landesueblich_) languages in
school, office and public life, is recognized by the state. In those
territories in which several races dwell, the public and educational
institutions are to be so arranged that, without applying compulsion to
learn a second _Landessprache_, each of the races receives the necessary
means of education in its own language." The application of this law gives
great power to the government, for everything depends on what is meant by
_landesueblich_, and it rests with them to determine when a language is
customary. The Germans demand the recognition of German as a customary
language in every part of the empire, so that a German may claim to have
his business attended to in his own language, even in Dalmatia and Galicia.
In Bohemia the Czechs claim that their language shall be recognized as
customary, even in those districts such as Reichenberg, which are almost
completely German; the Germans, on the other hand, claim that the Czech
language shall only be recognized in those towns and districts where there
is a considerable Czech population. What Taaffe's Administration did was to
interpret this law in a sense more favourable to the Slavs than had
hitherto been the case.
Peculiar importance is attached to the question of education. The law of
1867 required that the education in the elementary schools in the Slav
districts should be given in Czech or Slovenian, as the case might be. The
Slavs, however, required that, even when a small minority of Slav race
settled in any town, they should not be compelled to go to the German
schools, but should have their own school provided for them; and this
demand was granted by Prazak, minister of education under Count Taaffe. The
Germans had always hoped that the people as they became educated would
cease to use their own particular language. Owing to economic causes the
Slavs, who increase more rapidly than the Germans, tend to move westwards,
and large numbers settle in the towns and manufacturing districts. It might
have been expected that they would then cease to use their own language and
become Germanized; but, on the contrary, the movement of population is
spreading their language and they claim that special schools should be
provided for them, and that men of their own nationality should be
appointed to government offices to deal with their business. This has
happened not only in many places in Bohemia, but in Styria, and even in
Vienna, where there has been a great increase in the Czech population and a
Czech school has been founded. The introduction of Slavonic into the middle
and higher schools has affected the Germans in their most sensitive point.
They have always insisted that German is the _Kultur-sprache_. On one
occasion Count A. Auersperg (Anastasius Gruen) entered the diet of Carniola
carrying the whole of the Slovenian literature under his arm, as evidence
that the Slovenian language could not well be substituted for German as a
medium of higher education.
The first important regulations which were issued under the law of 1867
applied to Dalmatia, and for that country between 1872 and 1876 a series of
laws and edicts were issued determining to what extent the Slavonic idioms
were to be recognized. Hitherto all business had been done in Italian, the
language of a small minority living in the seaport towns. The effect of
these laws has been to raise Croatian to equality with Italian. It has been
introduced in all schools, so that nearly all education is given in
Croatian, even though a knowledge of Italian is quite essential for the
maritime population; and it is only in one or two towns, such as Zara, the
ancient capital of the country, that Italian is able to maintain itself.
Since 1882 there has been a Slav majority in the diet, and Italian has been
disused in the proceedings of that body. In this case the concessions to
the Servo-Croatians had been made by the Liberal ministry; they required
the parliamentary support of the Dalmatian representatives, who were more
numerous than the Italian, and it was also necessary to cultivate the
loyalty of the Slav races in this part so as to gain a support for Austria
against the Russian party, which was very active in the Balkan Peninsula.
It was better to sacrifice the Italians of Dalmatia than the Germans of
Carinthia.[17]
It was not till 1879 that the Slovenes received the support of the
government. In Carniola they succeeded, in 1882, in winning a majority in
the diet, and from this time, while the diet of Styria is the centre of the
German, that of Carniola is the chief support of the Slovene agitation. In
the same year they won the majority in the town council of Laibach, which
had hitherto been German. They were able, therefore, to introduce Illyrian
as the official language, and cause the names of the streets to be written
up in Illyrian. This question of street names is, as it were, a sign of
victory. Serious riots broke out in some of the towns of Istria when, for
the first time, Illyrian was used for this purpose as well as Italian. In
Prague the victory of the Czechs has been marked by the removal of all
German street names, and the Czech town council even passed a by-law
forbidding private individuals to have tablets put up with the name of the
street in German. In consequence of a motion by the Slovene members of the
Reichsrath and a resolution of the diet of Carniola, the government also
declared Slovenian to be a recognized language for the whole of Carniola,
for the district of Cilli in Styria, and for the Slovene and mixed
districts in the south of Carinthia, and determined that in Laibach a
Slovene gymnasium should be maintained as well as the German one.
The Germans complain that in many cases the government acted very unfairly
to them. They constantly refer to the case of Klagenfurt. This town in
Carinthia had a population of 16,491 German-speaking Austrians; the
Slovenian-speaking population numbered 568, of whom 180 were inhabitants of
the gaol or the hospital. The government, however, in 1880 declared
Slovenian a customary language, so that provision had to be made in public
offices and law courts for dealing with business in Slovenian. It must be
remembered, however, that even though the town was German, the rural
population of the surrounding villages was chiefly Slovene.
It was in Bohemia and Moravia that the contest was fought out with the
greatest vehemence. The two races were nearly equal, and the victory of
Czech would mean that nearly two [v.03 p.0033] million Germans would be
placed in a position of subordination; but for the last twenty years there
had been a constant encroachment by Czech on German. This was partly due to
the direct action of the government. An ordinance of 1880 determined that
henceforward all business which had been brought before any government
office or law court should be dealt with, within the office, in the
language in which it was introduced; this applied to the whole of Bohemia
and Moravia, and meant that Czech would henceforward have a position within
the government service. It was another step in the same direction when, in
1886, it was ordered that "to avoid frequent translations" business
introduced in Czech should be dealt with in the same language in the high
courts of Prague and Bruenn. Then not only were a large number of Czech
elementary schools founded, but also many middle schools were given to the
Czechs, and Czech classes introduced in German schools; and, what affected
the Germans most, in 1882 classes in Czech were started in the university
of Prague--a desecration, as it seemed, of the oldest German university.
The growth of the Slav races was, however, not merely the result of
government assistance; it had begun long before Taaffe assumed office; it
was to be seen in the census returns and in the results of elections.
Prague was no longer the German city it had been fifty years before; the
census of 1880 showed 36,000 Germans to 120,000 Czechs. It was the same in
Pilsen. In 1861 the Germans had a majority in this town; in 1880 they were
not a quarter of the population. This same phenomenon, which occurs
elsewhere, cannot be attributed to any laxity of the Germans. The
generation which was so vigorously demanding national rights had themselves
all been brought up under the old system in German schools, but this had
not implanted in them a desire to become German. It was partly due to
economic causes--the greater increase among the Czechs, and the greater
migration from the country to the towns; partly the result of the romantic
and nationalist movement which had arisen about 1830, and partly the result
of establishing popular education and parliamentary government at the same
time. As soon as these races which had so long been ruled by the Germans
received political liberty and the means of education, they naturally used
both to reassert their national individuality.
It may be suggested that the resistance to the German language is to some
extent a result of the increased national feeling among the Germans
themselves. They have made it a matter of principle. In the old days it was
common for the children of German parents in Bohemia to learn Czech; since
1867 this has ceased to be the case. It may almost be said that they make
it a point of honour not to do so. A result of this is that, as educated
Czechs are generally bilingual, it is easier for them to obtain
appointments in districts where a knowledge of Czech is required, and the
Germans, therefore, regard every order requiring the use of Czech as an
order which excludes Germans from a certain number of posts. This attitude
of hostility and contempt is strongest among the educated middle class; it
is not shown to the same extent by the clergy and the nobles.
The influence of the Church is also favourable to the Slav races, not so
much from principle as owing to the fact that they supply more candidates
for ordination than the Germans. There is no doubt, however, that the
tendency among Germans has been to exalt the principle of nationality above
religion, and to give it an absolute authority in which the Roman Catholic
Church cannot acquiesce. In this, as in other ways, the Germans in Austria
have been much influenced by the course of events in the German empire.
This hostility of the Church to the German nationalist movement led in 1898
to an agitation against the Roman Catholic Church, and among the Germans of
Styria and other territories large numbers left the Church, going over
either to Protestantism or to Old Catholicism. This "Los von Rom" movement,
which was caused by the continued alliance of the Clerical party with the
Slav parties, is more of the nature of a political demonstration than of a
religious movement.
[Sidenote: German hostility.]
The Germans, so long accustomed to rule, now saw their old ascendancy
threatened, and they defended it with an energy that increased with each
defeat. In 1880 they founded a great society, the _Deutscher Schulverein_,
to establish and assist German schools. It spread over the whole of the
empire; in a few years it numbered 100,000 members, and had an income of
nearly 300,000 gulden; no private society in Austria had ever attained so
great a success. In the Reichsrath a motion was introduced, supported by
all the German Liberal parties, demanding that German should be declared
the language of state and regulating the conditions under which the other
idioms could be recognized; it was referred to a committee from which it
never emerged, and a bill to the same effect, introduced in 1886, met a
similar fate. In Bohemia they demanded, as a means of protecting themselves
against the effect of the language ordinances, that the country should be
divided into two parts; in one German was to be the sole language, in the
other Czech was to be recognized. A proposal to this effect was introduced
by them in the diet at the end of 1886, but since 1882 the Germans had been
in a minority. The Czechs, of course, refused even to consider it; it would
have cut away the ground on which their whole policy was built up, namely,
the indissoluble unity of the Bohemian kingdom, in which German and Czech
should throughout be recognized as equal and parallel languages. It was
rejected on a motion of Prince Karl Schwarzenberg without discussion, and
on this all the Germans rose and left the diet, thereby imitating the
action of the Czechs in old days when they had the majority.
[Sidenote: New German parties.]
These events produced a great change on the character of the German
opposition. It became more and more avowedly racial; the defence of German
nationality was put in the front of their programme. The growing national
animosity added bitterness to political life, and destroyed the possibility
of a strong homogeneous party on which a government might depend. The
beginning of this movement can be traced back to the year 1870. About that
time a party of young Germans had arisen who professed to care little for
constitutionalism and other "legal mummies," but made the preservation and
extension of their own nationality their sole object. As is so often the
case in Austria, the movement began in the university of Vienna, where a
_Leseverein_ (reading club) of German students was formed as a point of
cohesion for Germans, which had eventually to be suppressed. The first
representative of the movement in parliament was Herr von Schoenerer, who
did not scruple to declare that the Germans looked forward to union with
the German empire. They were strongly influenced by men outside Austria.
Bismarck was their national hero, the anniversary of Sedan their political
festival, and approximation to Germany was dearer to them than the
maintenance of Austria. After 1878 a heightening of racial feeling began
among the Radicals, and in 1881 all the German parties in opposition joined
together in a club called the United Left, and in their programme put in a
prominent place the defence of the position of the Germans as the condition
for the existence of the state, and demanded that German should be
expressly recognized as the official language. The younger and more ardent
spirits, however, found it difficult to work in harmony with the older
constitutional leaders. They complained that the party leaders were not
sufficiently decisive in the measures for self-defence. In 1885 great
festivities in honour of Bismarck's eightieth birthday, which had been
arranged in Graz, were forbidden by the government, and the Germans of
Styria were very indignant that the party did not take up the matter with
sufficient energy. After the elections of 1885 the Left, therefore, broke
up again into two clubs, the "German Austrian," which included the more
moderate, and the "German," which wished to use sharper language. The
German Club, _e.g._, congratulated Bismarck on his measures against the
Poles; the German Austrians refused to take cognizance of events outside
Austria with which they had nothing to do. Even the German Club was not
sufficiently decided for Herr von Schoenerer and his friends, who broke off
from it and founded a "National German Union." They spoke much of
_Germanentum_ and _Unverfaelschtes Deutschtum_, and they advocated a
political union with the German empire, and were strongly anti-Hungarian
and wished to resign all control over Galicia, if by a closer union with
Germany they could secure German supremacy in Bohemia and the south Slav
countries. They play the same part in Austria as does the "pan-Germanic
Union" in Germany. When in 1888 the [v.03 p.0034] two clubs, the German
Austrians and the Germans, joined once more under the name of the "United
German Left" into a new club with eighty-seven members, so as the better to
guard against the common danger and to defeat the educational demands of
the Clericals, the National Germans remained apart with seventeen members.
They were also infected by the growing spirit of anti-Semitism. The German
parties had originally been the party of the capitalists, and comprised a
large number of Jews; this new German party committed itself to violent
attacks upon the Jews, and for this reason alone any real harmony between
the different branches would have been impossible.
[Sidenote: The agreement with Bohemia.]
Notwithstanding the concessions about language the Czechs had, however,
made no advance towards their real object--the recognition of the Bohemian
kingdom. Perhaps the leaders of the party, who were now growing old, would
have been content with the influence they had already attained, but they
were hard pressed at home by the Young Czechs, who were more impatient.
When Count Thun was appointed governor of Bohemia their hopes ran high, for
he was supposed to favour the coronation of the emperor at Prague. In 1890,
however, instead of proceeding to the coronation as was expected, Taaffe
attempted to bring about a reconciliation between the opposing parties. The
influence by which his policy was directed is not quite clear, but the
Czechs had been of recent years less easy to deal with, and Taaffe had
never really shown any wish to alter the constitution; his policy always
was to destroy the influence of parliament by playing off one party against
the other, and so to win a clear field for the government. During the month
of January conferences were held at Vienna, with Taaffe in the chair, to
which were invited representatives of the three groups into which the
Bohemian representatives were divided, the German party, the Czechs, and
the Feudal party. After a fortnight's discussion an agreement was made on
the basis of a separation between the German and the Czech districts, and a
revision of the electoral law. A protocol enumerating the points agreed on
was signed by all who had taken part in the conference, and in May bills
were laid before the diet incorporating the chief points in the agreement.
But they were not carried; the chief reason being that the Young Czechs had
not been asked to take part in the conference, and did not consider
themselves bound by its decisions; they opposed the measures and had
recourse to obstruction, and a certain number of the Old Czechs gradually
came over to them. Their chief ground of criticizing the proposed measures
was that they would threaten the unity of the Bohemian country.[18] At the
elections in 1891 a great struggle took place between the Old and the Young
Czechs. The latter were completely victorious; Rieger, who had led the
party for thirty years, disappeared from the Reichsrath. The first result
was that the proposed agreement with Bohemia came to an end. But the
disappearance of the Old Czechs made the parliamentary situation very
insecure. The Young Czechs could not take their place: their Radical and
anti-clerical tendencies alarmed the Feudalists and Clericalists who formed
so large a part of the Right; they attacked the alliance with Germany; they
made public demonstration of their French sympathies; they entered into
communication with other Slav races, especially the Serbs of Hungary and
Bosnia; they demanded universal suffrage, and occasionally supported the
German Radicals in their opposition to the Clerical parties, especially in
educational matters; under their influence disorder increased in Bohemia, a
secret society called the _Umladina_ (an imitation of the Servian society
of that name) was discovered, and stringent measures had to be taken to
preserve order. The government therefore veered round towards the German
Liberals; some of the ministers most obnoxious to the Germans resigned, and
their places were taken by Germans. For two years the government seemed to
waver, looking now to the Left, now to Hohenwart and his friends; for a
time Taaffe really had the support of all parties except the Young Czechs.
[Sidenote: Electoral reform.]
After two years he gave up his cautious policy and took a bold move. In
October 1893 he introduced a reform bill. Universal suffrage had long been
demanded by the working men and the Socialists; the Young Czechs also had
put it on their programme, and many of the Christian Socialists and
anti-Semites desired an alteration of the franchise. Taaffe's bill, while
keeping the _curiae_ of the feudal proprietors and the chambers of commerce
as they were, and making no change in the number of members, proposed to
give the franchise in both towns and rural districts to every one who could
read and write, and had resided six months in one place. This was opposed
by the Liberals, for with the growth of socialism and anti-Semitism, they
knew that the extension of the franchise would destroy their influence. On
this Taaffe had probably calculated, but he had omitted to inquire what the
other parties would do. He had not even consulted Hohenwart, to whose
assistance he owed his long tenure of power. Not even the pleasure of
ruining the Liberals was sufficient to persuade the Conservatives to vote
for a measure which would transfer the power from the well-to-do to the
indigent, and Hohenwart justly complained that they ought to have been
secure against surprises of this kind. The Poles also were against a
measure which would give more influence to the Ruthenes. The position of
the government was hopeless, and without waiting for a division Taaffe
resigned.
[Sidenote: The coalition ministry, 1893.]
The event to which for fourteen years the Left had looked forward had now
happened. Once more they could have a share in the government, which they
always believed belonged to them by nature. Taught by experience and
adversity, they did not scruple to enter into an alliance with their old
enemies, and a coalition ministry was formed from the Left, the Clericals
and the Poles. The president was Prince Alfred Windisch-Graetz, grandson of
the celebrated general, one of Hohenwart's ablest lieutenants; Hohenwart
himself did not take office. Of course an administration of this kind could
not take a definite line on any controversial question, but during 1894
they carried through the commercial treaty with Russia and the laws for the
continuance of the currency reform. The differences of the clubs appeared,
however, in the discussions on franchise reform; the government, not strong
enough to have a policy of its own, had referred the matter to a committee;
for the question having once been raised, it was impossible not to go on
with it. This would probably have been fatal to the coalition, but the
final blow was given by a matter of very small importance arising from the
disputes on nationality. The Slovenes had asked that in the gymnasium at
Cilli classes in which instruction was given in Slovenian should be formed
parallel to the German classes. This request caused great excitement in
Styria and the neighbouring districts; the Styrian diet (from which the
Slovene minority had seceded) protested. The Slovenes were, however,
members of the Hohenwart Club, so Hohenwart and his followers supported the
request, which was adopted by the ministry. The German Left opposed it;
they were compelled to do so by the popular indignation in the German
districts; and when the vote was carried against them (12th June 1895) they
made it a question of confidence, and formally withdrew their support from
the government, which therefore at once resigned.
[Sidenote: Badeni's ministry.]
After a short interval the emperor appointed as minister-president Count
Badeni, who had earned a great reputation as governer of Galicia. He formed
an administration the merit of which, as of so many others, was that it was
to belong to no party and to have no programme. He hoped to be able to work
in harmony with the moderate elements of the Left; his mission was to carry
through the composition (_Ausgleich_) with Hungary; to this everything else
must be subordinated. During 1896 he succeeded in carrying a franchise
reform bill, which satisfied nearly all parties. All the old categories of
members were maintained, but a fifth _curia_ was added, in which almost any
one might vote who had resided six months in one place and was not in
domestic service; in this way seventy-two would be added to the existing
members. This matter having been [v.03 p.0035] settled, parliament was
dissolved. The result of the elections of 1897 was the return of a House so
constituted as to make any strong government impossible. On both sides the
anti-Semitic parties representing the extreme demagogic elements were
present in considerable numbers. The United German Left had almost
disappeared; it was represented only by a few members chosen by the great
proprietors; in its place there were the three parties--the German Popular
party, the German Nationalists, and the German Radicals--who all put
questions of nationality first and had deserted the old standpoint of the
constitution. Then there were the fourteen Social Democrats who had won
their seats under the new franchise. The old party of the Right was,
however, also broken up; side by side with forty-one Clericals there were
twenty-eight Christian Socialists led by Dr Lueger, a man of great
oratorical power, who had won a predominant influence in Vienna, so long
the centre of Liberalism, and had quite eclipsed the more modest efforts of
Prince Liechtenstein. As among the German National party, there were strong
nationalist elements in his programme, but they were chiefly directed
against Jews and Hungarians; Lueger had already distinguished himself by
his violent attacks on Hungary, which had caused some embarrassment to the
government at a time when the negotiations for the _Ausgleich_ were in
progress. Like anti-Semites elsewhere, the Christian Socialists were
reckless and irresponsible, appealing directly to the passions and
prejudices of the most ignorant. There were altogether 200 German members
of the Reichsrath, but they were divided into eight parties, and nowhere
did there seem to be the elements on which a government could be built up.
The parliamentary situation is best explained by the following table
showing the parties:--
_German Liberals_-- 1897. 1901.
Constitutional Landed Proprietors 28 28
German Radicals 49 41
German Popular Party 42 51
Schoenerer Group 5 21
Kronawetter 1 ..
Democrat 1 ..
-- 126 -- 141
_Social Democrats_ 14 10
_German Conservatives_--
German Clericals 30} 37
German Popular Party 15}
Christian Socialists 28 23
-- 73 -- 60
_Federalist Great Proprietors_ 16 16
_Czechs_--
Young Czechs 60 53
Radical Young Czechs 1 4
Clerical Czechs 1 2
Agrarian Czechs 1 6
-- 63 -- 65
_Poles_--
Polish Club 59 60
Stoyalovski Group 6 ..
Popular Polish Party 3 11
-- 68 -- 71
_Slovenes_--
Clerical Slovenes 11 ..
Radical " 5 ..
-- 16 -- 16
_Italians_--
Liberal Italians 14 ..
Clerical " 5 ..
-- 19 -- 19
_Croatians_ 11 9
_Serbs_ 2 2
_Ruthenes_--
Ruthenes 6 ..
Young Ruthenes 5 ..
-- 11 -- 11
_Rumanians_--
Rumanians 5 ..
Young Rumanians 1 ..
-- 6 -- 5
--- ---
Total 425 425
The most remarkable result of the elections was the disappearance of the
Liberals in Vienna. In 1879, out of 37 members returned in Lower Austria,
33 were Liberals, but now they were replaced to a large extent by the
Socialists. It was impossible to maintain a strong party of moderate
constitutionalists, on whom the government could depend, unless there was a
large nucleus from Lower Austria. The influence of Lueger was very
embarrassing; he had now a majority of two-thirds in the town council, and
had been elected burgomaster. The emperor had refused to confirm the
election; he had been re-elected, and then the emperor, in a personal
interview, appealed to him to withdraw. He consented to do so; but, after
the election of 1897 had given him so many followers in the Reichsrath,
Badeni advised that his election as burgomaster should be confirmed. There
was violent antipathy between the Christian Socialists and the German
Nationalists, and the transference of their quarrels from the Viennese
Council Chamber to the Reichsrath was very detrimental to the orderly
conduct of debate.
[Sidenote: Socialism.]
The limited suffrage had hitherto prevented socialism from becoming a
political force in Austria as it had in Germany, and the national divisions
have always impeded the creation of a centralized socialist party. The
first object of the working classes necessarily was the attainment of
political power; in 1867 there had been mass demonstrations and petitions
to the government for universal suffrage. During the next years there was
the beginning of a real socialist movement in Vienna and in Styria, where
there is a considerable industrial population; after 1879, however, the
growth of the party was interrupted by the introduction of anarchical
doctrines. Most's paper, the _Freiheit_, was introduced through
Switzerland, and had a large circulation. The anarchists, under the
leadership of Peukert, seem to have attained considerable numbers. In
1883-1884 there were a number of serious strikes, collisions between the
police and the workmen, followed by assassinations; it was a peculiarity of
Austrian anarchists that in some cases they united robbery to murder. The
government, which was seriously alarmed, introduced severe repressive
measures; the leading anarchists were expelled or fled the country. In
1887, under the leadership of Dr Adler, the socialist party began to revive
(the party of violence having died away), and since then it has steadily
gained in numbers; in the forefront of the political programme is put the
demand for universal suffrage. In no country is the 1st of May, as the
festival of Labour, celebrated so generally.
Badeni after the election sent in his resignation, but the emperor refused
to accept it, and he had, therefore, to do the best he could and turn for
support to the other nationalities. The strongest of them were the
fifty-nine Poles and sixty Young Czechs; he therefore attempted, as Taaffe
had done, to come to some agreement with them. The Poles were always ready
to support the government; among the Young Czechs the more moderate had
already attempted to restrain the wilder spirits of the party, and they
were quite prepared to enter into negotiations. They did not wish to lose
the opportunity which now was open to them of winning influence over the
administration. What they required was further concession as to the
language in Bohemia. [Sidenote: The language ordinances of 1897.] In May
1897 Badeni, therefore, published his celebrated _ordinances_. They
determined (1) that all correspondence and documents regarding every matter
brought before the government officials should be conducted in the language
in which it was first introduced. This applied to the whole of Bohemia, and
meant the introduction of Czech into the government offices throughout the
whole of the kingdom; (2) after 1903 no one was to be appointed to a post
under the government in Bohemia until he had passed an examination in
Czech. These ordinances fulfilled the worst fears of the Germans. The
German Nationalists and Radicals declared that no business should be done
till they were repealed and Badeni dismissed. They resorted to obstruction.
They brought in repeated motions to impeach the ministers, and parliament
had to be prorogued in June, although no business of any kind had been
transacted. Badeni had not anticipated the effect his ordinances would
have; as a Pole he had little experience in the western part of the empire.
During the recess he tried to open negotiations, but [v.03 p.0036] the
Germans refused even to enter into a discussion until the ordinances had
been withdrawn. The agitation spread throughout the country; great meetings
were held at Eger and Aussig, which were attended by Germans from across
the frontier, and led to serious disturbances; the cornflower, which had
become the symbol of German nationality and union with Germany, was freely
worn, and the language used was in many cases treasonable. The emperor
insisted that the Reichsrath should again be summoned to pass the necessary
measures for the agreement with Hungary; scenes then took place which have
no parallel in parliamentary history. To meet the obstruction it was
determined to sit at night, but this was unsuccessful. On one occasion Dr
Lecher, one of the representatives of Moravia, spoke for twelve hours, from
9 P.M. till 9 A.M., against the Ausgleich. The opposition was not always
limited to feats of endurance of this kind. On the 3rd of November there
was a free fight in the House; it arose from a quarrel between Dr Lueger
and the Christian Socialists on the one side (for the Christian Socialists
had supported the government since the confirmation of Lueger as
burgomaster) and the German Nationalists under Herr Wolf, a German from
Bohemia, the violence of whose language had already caused Badeni to
challenge him to a duel. The Nationalists refused to allow Lueger to speak,
clapping their desks, hissing and making other noises, till at last the
Young Czechs attempted to prevent the disorder by violence. On the 24th of
November the scenes of disturbance were renewed. The president, Herr v.
Abrahamovitch, an Armenian from Galicia, refused to call on Schoenerer to
speak. The Nationalists therefore stormed the platform, and the president
and ministers had to fly into their private rooms to escape personal
violence, until the Czechs came to their rescue, and by superiority in
numbers and physical strength severely punished Herr Wolf and his friends.
The rules of the House giving the president no authority for maintaining
order, he determined, with the assent of the ministers, to propose
alterations in procedure. The next day, when the sitting began, one of the
ministers, Count Falkenhayn, a Clerical who was very unpopular, moved "That
any member who continued to disturb a sitting after being twice called to
order could be suspended--for three days by the president, and for thirty
days by the House." The din and uproar was such that not a word could be
heard, but at a pre-arranged signal from the president all the Right rose,
and he then declared that the new order had been carried, although the
procedure of the House required that it should be submitted to a committee.
The next day, at the beginning of the sitting, the Socialists rushed on the
platform, tore up and destroyed all the papers lying there, seized the
president, and held him against the wall. After he had escaped, eighty
police were introduced into the House and carried out the fourteen
Socialists. The next day Herr Wolf was treated in the same manner. The
excitement spread to the street. Serious disorders took place in Vienna and
in Graz; the German opposition had the support of the people, and Lueger
warned the ministers that as burgomaster he would be unable to maintain
order in Vienna; even the Clerical Germans showed signs of deserting the
government. [Sidenote: Badeni resigns.] The emperor, hastily summoned to
Vienna, accepted Badeni's resignation, the Germans having thus by
obstruction attained part of their wishes. The new minister, Gautsch, a man
popular with all parties, held office for three months; he proclaimed the
budget and the Ausgleich, and in February replaced the language ordinances
by others, under which Bohemia was to be divided into three districts--one
Czech, one German and one mixed. The Germans, however, were not satisfied
with this; they demanded absolute repeal. The Czechs also were offended;
they arranged riots at Prague; the professors in the university refused to
lecture unless the German students were defended from violence; Gautsch
resigned, and Thun, who had been governor of Bohemia, was appointed
minister. Martial law was proclaimed in Bohemia, and strictly enforced.
Thun then arranged with the Hungarian ministers a compromise about the
Ausgleich.
[Sidenote: Renewed conflict between Germans and Czechs.]
The Reichsrath was again summoned, and the meetings were less disturbed
than in the former year, but the Germans still prevented any business from
being done. The Germans now had a new cause of complaint. Paragraph 14 of
the Constitutional law of 1867 provided that, in cases of pressing
necessity, orders for which the assent of the Reichsrath was required
might, if the Reichsrath were not in session, be proclaimed by the emperor;
they had to be signed by the whole ministry, and if they were not laid
before the Reichsrath within four months of its meeting, or if they did not
receive the approval of both Houses, they ceased to be valid. The Germans
contended that the application of this clause to the Ausgleich was invalid,
and demanded that it should be repealed. Thun had in consequence to retire,
in September 1899. His successor, Count Clary, began by withdrawing the
ordinances which had been the cause of so much trouble, but it was now too
late to restore peace. The Germans were not sufficiently strong and united
to keep in power a minister who had brought them the relief for which they
had been clamouring for two years. The Czechs, of course, went into
opposition, and used obstruction. The extreme German party, however, took
the occasion to demand that paragraph 14 should be repealed. Clary
explained that this was impossible, but he gave a formal pledge that he
would not use it. The Czechs, however, prevented him passing a law on
excise which was a necessary part of the agreements with Hungary; it was,
therefore, impossible for him to carry on the government without breaking
his word; there was nothing left for him to do but to resign, after holding
office for less than three months. The emperor then appointed a ministry of
officials, who were not bound by his pledge, and used paragraph 14 for the
necessary purposes of state. They then made way for a ministry under Herr
v. Koerber. During the early months of 1900 matters were more peaceful, and
Koerber hoped to be able to arrange a compromise; but the Czechs now
demanded the restoration of their language in the internal service of
Bohemia, and on 8th June, by noise and disturbance, obliged the president
to suspend the sitting. The Reichsrath was immediately dissolved, the
emperor having determined to make a final attempt to get together a
parliament with which it would be possible to govern. The new elections on
which so much was to depend did not take place till January 1901. They
resulted in a great increase of the extreme German Nationalist parties.
Schoenerer and the German Radicals--the fanatical German party who in their
new programme advocated union of German Austria with the German empire--now
numbered twenty-one, who chiefly came from Bohemia. They were able for the
first time to procure the election of one of their party in the Austrian
Delegation, and threatened to introduce into the Assembly scenes of
disorder similar to those which they had made common in the Reichsrath. All
those parties which did not primarily appeal to national feeling suffered
loss; especially was this the case with the two sections of the Clericals,
the Christian Socialists and the Ultramontanes; and the increasing enmity
between the German Nationalists (who refused even the name German to a
Roman Catholic) and the Church became one of the most conspicuous features
in the political situation. The loss of seats by the Socialists showed that
even among the working men the national agitation was gaining ground; the
diminished influence of the anti-Semites was the most encouraging sign.
Notwithstanding the result of the elections, the first months of the new
parliament passed in comparative peace. There was a truce between the
nationalities. The Germans were more occupied with their opposition to the
Clericals than with their feud with the Slavs. The Czechs refrained from
obstruction, for they did not wish to forfeit the alliance with the Poles
and Conservatives, on which their parliamentary strength depended, and the
Germans used the opportunity to pass measures for promoting the material
prosperity of the country, especially for an important system of canals
which would bring additional prosperity to the coal-fields and manufactures
of Bohemia.
(J. W. HE.)
[Sidenote: Public works policy.]
The history of Austria since the general election of 1901 is the [v.03
p.0037] history of franchise reform as a crowning attempt to restore
parliament to normal working conditions. The premier, Dr von Koerber, who
had undertaken to overcome obstruction and who hoped to effect a compromise
between Germans and Czechs, induced the Chamber to sanction the estimates,
the contingent of recruits and other "necessities of state" for 1901 and
1902, by promising to undertake large public works in which Czechs and
Germans were alike interested. These public works were chiefly a canal from
the Danube to the Oder; a ship canal from the Danube to the Moldau near
Budweis, and the canalization of the Moldau from Budweis to Prague; a ship
canal running from the projected Danube-Oder canal near Prerau to the Elbe
near Pardubitz, and the canalization of the Elbe from Pardubitz to Melnik;
a navigable connexion between the Danube-Oder Canal and the Vistula and the
Dniester. It was estimated that the construction of these four canals would
require twenty years, the funds being furnished by a 4% loan amortizable in
ninety years. In addition to the canals, the cabinet proposed and the
Chamber sanctioned the construction of a "second railway route to Trieste"
designed to shorten the distance between South Germany, Salzburg and the
Adriatic, by means of a line passing under the Alpine ranges of central and
southern Austria. The principal sections of this line were named after the
ranges they pierced, the chief tunnels being bored through the Tauern,
Karawanken and Wochein hills. Sections were to be thrown open to traffic as
soon as completed and the whole work to be ended during 1909. The line
forms one of the most interesting railway routes in Europe. The cost,
however, greatly exceeded the estimate sanctioned by parliament; and the
contention that the parliamentary adoption of the Budget in 1901-1902 cost
the state L100,000,000 for public works, is not entirely unfounded. True,
these works were in most cases desirable and in some cases necessary, but
they were hastily promised and often hastily begun under pressure of
political expediency. The Koerber administration was for this reason
subsequently exposed to severe censure.
[Sidenote: Koerber's parliamentary difficulties.]
Despite these public works Dr von Koerber found himself unable to induce
parliament to vote the Budgets for 1903, 1904 or 1905, and was obliged to
revert to the expedient employed by his predecessors of sanctioning the
estimates by imperial ordinance under paragraph 14 of the constitution. His
attempts in December 1902 and January 1903 to promote a compromise between
Czechs and Germans proved equally futile. Koerber proposed that Bohemia be
divided into 10 districts, of which 5 would be Czech, 3 German and 2 mixed.
Of the 234 district tribunals, 133 were to be Czech, 94 German and 7 mixed.
The Czechs demanded on the contrary that both their language and German
should be placed on an equal footing throughout Bohemia, and be used for
all official purposes in the same way. As this demand involved the
recognition of Czech as a language of internal service in Bohemia it was
refused by the Germans. Thenceforward, until his fall on the 31st of
December 1904, Koerber governed practically without parliament. The Chamber
was summoned at intervals rather as a pretext for the subsequent employment
of paragraph 14 than in the hope of securing its assent to legislative
measures. The Czechs blocked business by a pile of "urgency motions" and
occasionally indulged in noisy obstruction. On one occasion a sitting
lasted 57 hours without interruption. In consequence of Czech
aggressiveness, the German parties (the German Progressists, the German
Populists, the Constitutional Landed Proprietors and the Christian
Socialists) created a joint executive committee and a supreme committee of
four members to watch over German racial interests.
[Sidenote: Baron Gautsch premier.]
By the end of 1904 it had become clear that the system of government by
paragraph 14, which Dr von Koerber had perfected was not effective in the
long run. Loans were needed for military and other purposes, and paragraph
14 itself declares that it cannot be employed for the contraction of any
lasting burden upon the exchequer, nor for any sale of state patrimony. As
the person of the premier had become so obnoxious to the Czechs that his
removal would be regarded by them as a concession, his resignation was
suddenly accepted by the emperor, and, on the 1st of January 1905, a former
premier, Baron von Gautsch, was appointed in his stead. Parliamentary
activity was at once resumed; the Austro-Hungarian tariff contained in the
Szell-Koerber compact was adopted, the estimates were discussed and the
commercial treaty with Germany ratified. In the early autumn, however, a
radical change came over the spirit of Austrian politics. For nearly three
years Austria had been watching with bitterness and depression the course
of the crisis in Hungary. Parliament had repeatedly expressed its
disapproval of the Magyar demands upon the crown, but had succeeded only in
demonstrating its own impotence. The feeling that Austria could be
compelled by imperial ordinance under paragraph 14 to acquiesce in whatever
concessions the crown might make to Hungary galled Austrian public opinion
and prepared it for coming changes. In August 1905 the crown took into
consideration and in September sanctioned the proposal that universal
suffrage be introduced into the official programme of the Fejervary cabinet
then engaged in combating the Coalition in Hungary. It is not to be
supposed that the king of Hungary assented to this programme without
reflecting that what he sought to further in Hungary, it would be
impossible for him, as emperor of Austria, to oppose in Cisleithania. His
subsequent action justifies, indeed, the belief that, when sanctioning the
Fejervary programme, the monarch had already decided that universal
suffrage should be introduced in Austria; but even he can scarcely have
been prepared for the rapidity with which the movement in Austria gained
ground and accomplished its object.
[Sidenote: Franchise reform.]
On the 15th of September 1905 a huge socialist and working-class
demonstration in favour of universal suffrage took place before the
parliament at Budapest. The Austrian Socialist party, encouraged by this
manifestation and influenced by the revolutionary movement in Russia,
resolved to press for franchise reform in Austria also. An initial
demonstration, resulting in some bloodshed, was organized in Vienna at the
beginning of November. At Prague, Graz and other towns, demonstrations and
collisions with the police were frequent. The premier, Baron Gautsch, who
had previously discountenanced universal suffrage while admitting the
desirability of a restricted reform, then changed attitude and permitted an
enormous Socialist demonstration, in support of universal suffrage, to take
place (November 28) in the Vienna Ringstrasse. Traffic was suspended for
five hours while an orderly procession of workmen, ten abreast, marched
silently along the Ringstrasse past the houses of parliament. The
demonstration made a deep impression upon public opinion. On the same day
the premier promised to introduce by February a large measure of franchise
reform so framed as to protect racial minorities from being overwhelmed at
the polls by majorities of other races. On the 23rd of February 1906 he
indeed brought in a series of franchise reform measures. Their main
principles were the abolition of the _curia_ or electoral class system and
the establishment of the franchise on the basis of universal suffrage; and
the division of Austria electorally into racial compartments within which
each race would be assured against molestation from other races. The
Gautsch redistribution bill proposed to increase the number of
constituencies from 425 to 455, to allot a fixed number of constituencies
to each province and, within each province, to each race according to its
numbers and tax-paying capacity. The reform bill proper proposed to
enfranchise every male citizen above 24 years of age with one year's
residential qualification.
At first the chances of the adoption of such a measure seemed small. It was
warmly supported from outside by the Social Democrats, who held only 11
seats in the House; inside, the Christian Socialists or Lueger party were
favourable on the whole as they hoped to gain seats at the expense of the
German Progressives and German Populists and to extend their own
organization throughout the empire. The Young Czechs, too, were favourable,
while the Poles reserved their attitude. Hostile [v.03 p.0038] in principle
and by instinct, they waited to ascertain the mind of the emperor, before
actively opposing the reform. With the exception of the German Populists
who felt that a German "Liberal" party could not well oppose an extension
of popular rights, all the German Liberals were antagonistic, some
bitterly, to the measure. The Constitutional Landed Proprietors who had
played so large a part in Austrian politics since the 'sixties, and had for
a generation held the leadership of the German element in parliament and in
the country, saw themselves doomed and the leadership of the Germans given
to the Christian Socialists. None of the representatives of the _curia_
system fought so tenaciously for their privileges as did the German
nominees of the _curia_ of large landed proprietors. Their opposition
proved unavailing. The emperor frowned repeatedly upon their efforts.
[Sidenote: Baron Beck premier.]
Baron Gautsch fell in April over a difference with the Poles, and his
successor, Prince Konrad zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfuerst, who had taken over
the reform bills, resigned also, six weeks later, as a protest against the
action of the crown in consenting to the enactment of a customs tariff in
Hungary distinct from, though identical with, the joint Austro-Hungarian
tariff comprised in the Szell-Koerber compact and enacted as a joint tariff
by the Reichsrath. A new cabinet was formed (June 2) by Baron von Beck,
permanent under secretary of state in the ministry for agriculture, an
official of considerable ability who had first acquired prominence as an
instructor of the heir apparent, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, in
constitutional and administrative law. By dint of skilful negotiation with
the various parties and races, and steadily supported by the emperor who,
on one occasion, summoned the recalcitrant party leaders to the Hofburg _ad
audiendum verbum_ and told them the reform "must be accomplished," Baron
Beck succeeded, in October 1906, in attaining a final agreement, and on the
1st of December in securing the adoption of the reform. During the
negotiations the number of constituencies was raised to 516, divided,
according to provinces, as follows:--
Bohemia . . . . . . . . 130 previously 110
Galicia . . . . . . . . 106 " 78
Lower Austria . . . . . . . 64 " 46
Moravia . . . . . . . . 49 " 43
Styria. . . . . . . . . 30 " 27
Tirol . . . . . . . . . 25 " 21
Upper Austria . . . . . . . 22 " 20
Austrian Silesia . . . . . . 15 " 12
Bukovina . . . . . . . . 14 " 11
Carniola . . . . . . . . 12 " 11
Dalmatia . . . . . . . . 11 " 11
Carinthia . . . . . . . . 10 " 10
Salzburg . . . . . . . . 7 " 7
Istria. . . . . . . . . 6 " 5
Goerz and Gradisca. . . . . . 6 " 5
Trieste and territory . . . . . 5 " 5
Vorarlberg. . . . . . . . 4 " 4
In the allotment of the constituencies to the various races their
tax-paying capacity was taken into consideration. In mixed districts
separate constituencies and registers were established for the electors of
each race, who could only vote on their own register for a candidate of
their own race. Thus Germans were obliged to vote for Germans and Czechs
for Czechs; and, though there might be victories of Clerical over Liberal
Germans or of Czech Radicals over Young Czechs, there could be no victories
of Czechs over Germans, Poles over Ruthenes, or Slovenes over Italians. The
constituencies were divided according to race as follows:--
Germans of all parties. . . . . 233 previously 205
Czechs of all parties . . . . . 108 " 81
Poles . . . . . . . . . 80 " 71
Southern Slavs (Slovenes, Croats,
Serbs) . . . . . . . . 37 " 27
Ruthenes . . . . . . . . 34 " 11
Italians . . . . . . . . 19 " 18
Rumanians . . . . . . . . 5 " 5
These allotments were slightly modified at the polls by the victory of some
Social Democratic candidates not susceptible of strict racial
classification. The chief feature of the allotment was, however, the formal
overthrow of the fiction that Austria is preponderatingly a German country
and not a country preponderatingly Slav with a German dynasty and a German
facade. The German constituencies, though allotted in a proportion unduly
favourable, left the Germans, with 233 seats, in a permanent minority as
compared with the 259 Slav seats. Even with the addition of the "Latin"
(Rumanian and Italian) seats the "German-Latin block" amounted only to 257.
This "block" no longer exists in practice, as the Italians now tend to
co-operate rather with the Slavs than with the Germans. The greatest
gainers by the redistribution were the Ruthenes, whose representation was
trebled, though it is still far from being proportioned to their numbers.
This and other anomalies will doubtless be corrected in future revisions of
the allotment, although the German parties, foreseeing that any revision
must work out to their disadvantage, stipulated that a two-thirds majority
should be necessary for any alteration of the law.
[Sidenote: General election 1907.]
After unsuccessful attempts by the Upper House to introduce plural voting,
the bill became law in January 1907, the peers insisting only upon the
establishment of a fixed _maximum_ number or _numerus clausus_, of
non-hereditary peers, so as to prevent the resistance of the Upper Chamber
from being overwhelmed at any critical moment by an influx of crown
nominees appointed _ad hoc_. The general election which took place amid
considerable enthusiasm on the 14th of May resulted in a sweeping victory
for the Social Democrats whose number rose from 11 to 87; in a less
complete triumph for the Christian Socialists who increased from 27 to 67;
and in the success of the extremer over the conservative elements in all
races. A classification of the groups in the new Chamber presents many
difficulties, but the following statement is approximately accurate. It
must be premised that, in order to render the Christian Socialist or Lueger
party the strongest group in parliament, an amalgamation was effected
between them and the conservative Catholic party:--
_German Conservatives_-- Total.
Christian Socialists. . . . . . . . 96
German Agrarians. . . . . . . . . 19
_German Liberals_--
Progressives. . . . . . . . . . 15
Populists . . . . . . . . . . 29
Pan-German radicals (Wolf group). . . . . 13
Unattached Pan-Germans . . . . . . . 3
" Progressives . . . . . . . 2
_Czechs_-- -- 177
Czech Agrarians . . . . . . . . . 28
Young Czechs. . . . . . . . . . 18
Czech Clericals . . . . . . . . . 17
Old Czechs . . . . . . . . . . 7
Czech National Socialists . . . . . . 9
Realists. . . . . . . . . . . 2
Unattached Czech. . . . . . . . . 1
_Social Democrats_-- -- 82
Of all races. . . . . . . . . . 87 87
_Poles_--
Democrats . . . . . . . . . . 26
Conservatives . . . . . . . . . 15
Populists . . . . . . . . . . 18
Centre . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Independent Socialist . . . . . . . 1
_Ruthenes_-- -- 72
National Democrats . . . . . . . . 25
Old or Russophil Ruthenes . . . . . . 5
_Slovenes_-- -- 30
Clericals . . . . . . . . . . 17
_Southern Slav Club_--
Croats . . }
Serbs . . .} . . . . . . . . 20 37
Slovene Liberals }
_Italians_--
Clerical Populists . . . . . . . . 11
Liberals. . . . . . . . . . . 4
-- 15
_Rumanians_--
Rumanian Club . . . . . . . . . 5 5
_Jews_--
Zionists. . . . . . . . . . . 4
Democrats . . . . . . . . . . 1 5
--
Unclassified, vacancies, &c. . . . . . 6 6
---
516
[v.03 p.0039] The legislature elected by universal suffrage worked fairly
smoothly during the first year of its existence. The estimates were voted
with regularity, racial animosity was somewhat less prominent, and some
large issues were debated. The desire not to disturb the emperor's Diamond
Jubilee year by untoward scenes doubtless contributed to calm political
passion, and it was celebrated in 1908 with complete success. But it was no
sooner over than the crisis over the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina,
which is dealt with above, eclipsed all purely domestic affairs in the
larger European question.
(H. W. S.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--1. _Sources_. A collection of early authorities on Austrian
history was published in 3 vols. folio by Hieronymus Pez (Leipzig,
1721-1725) under the title _Scriptores rerum Austriacarum veteres et
genuini_, of which a new edition was printed at Regensburg in 1745, and
again, under the title of _Rerum Austriacarum scriptores_, by A. Rauch at
Vienna in 1793-1794. It was not, however, till the latter half of the 19th
century that the vast store of public and private archives began to be
systematically exploited. Apart from the material published in the
_Monumenta Germ. Hist_. of Pertz and his collaborators, there are several
collections devoted specially to the sources of Austrian history. Of these
the most notable is the _Fontes rerum Austriacarum_, published under the
auspices of the Historical Commission of the Imperial Academy of Sciences
at Vienna; the series, of which the first volume was published in 1855, is
divided into two parts: (i.) _Scriptores_, of which the 9th vol. appeared
in 1904; (ii.) _Diplomataria et Acta_, of which the 58th vol. appeared in
1906. It covers the whole range of Austrian history, medieval and modern.
Another collection is the _Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte,
Literatur und Sprache Oesterreichs und seiner Kronlaender_, edited by J.
Hirn and J. E. Wackernagel (Graz, 1895, &c.), of which vol. x. appeared in
1906. Besides these there are numerous accounts and inventories of public
and private archives, for which see Dahlmann-Waitz, _Quellenkunde_ (ed.
1906), pp. 14-15, 43, and suppl. vol. (1907), pp. 4-5. Of collections of
treaties the most notable is that of L. Neumann, _Recueil des traites
conclus par l'Autriche avec les puissances etrangeres depuis 1763_ (6
vols., Leipzig, 1855: c.), continued by A. de Plason (18 vols., Vienna,
1877-1905). In 1907, however, the Imperial Commission for the Modern
History of Austria issued the first volume of a new series,
_Oesterreichische Staatsvertraege_, which promises to be of the utmost
value. Like the _Recueil des traites conclus par la Russie_ of T. T. de
Martens, it is compiled on the principle of devoting separate volumes to
the treaties entered into with the several states; this is obviously
convenient as enabling the student to obtain a clear review of the
relations of Austria to any particular state throughout the whole period
covered. For treaties see also J. Freiherr von Vasque von Puettlingen,
_Uebersicht der oesterreichischen Staatsvertraege seit Maria Theresa bis
auf die neueste Zeit_ (Vienna, 1868); and L. Bittner, _Chronologisches
Verzeichnis der oesterreichischen Staatsvertraege_ (Band G, 1526-1723,
Vienna, 1903).
2. _Works_.--(a) _General._ Archdeacon William Coxe's _History of the House
of Austria, 1218-1792_ (3 vols., London, 1817), with its continuation by W.
Kelly (London, 1853; new edition, 1873), remains the only general history
of Austria in the English language. It has, of course, long been superseded
as a result of the research indicated above. The amount of work that has
been devoted to this subject since Coxe's time will be seen from the
following list of books, which are given in the chronological order of
their publication:--J. Majlath, _Geschichte des oesterreichischen
Kaiserstaates_ (5 vols., Hamburg, 1834-1850); Count F. von Hartig, _Genesis
der Revolution in Oesterreich im Jahre 1848_ (Leipzig, 1851; 3rd edition,
enlarged, _ib._, 1851; translated as appendix to Coxe's _House of Austria_,
ed. 1853), a work which created a great sensation at the time and remains
of much value; W. H. Stiles, _Austria in 1848-1849_ (2 vols., New York,
1852), by an eye-witness of events; M. Buedinger, _Oesterreichische Gesch.
bis zum Ausgange des dreizehnten Jahrhunderts_, vol. i. to A.D. 1055
(Leipzig, 1858); A. Springer, _Geschichte Oesterreichs seit dem Wiener
Frieden_, 1809 (2 vols. to 1849; Leipzig, 1863-1865); A. von Arneth,
_Geschichte Maria Theresias_ (10 vols., Vienna, 1863-1879); the series
_Oesterreichische Gesch. fuer das Volk_, 17 vols., by various authors
(Vienna, 1864, &c.), for which see Dahlmann-Waitz, p. 86; H. Bidermann,
_Gesch. der oesterreichischen Gesamtstaatsidee_, 1526-1804, parts 1 and 2
to 1740 (Innsbruck, 1867, 1887); J. A. Freiherr von Helfert, _Gesch.
Oesterreichs vom Ausgange des Oktoberaufstandes_, 1848, vols. i.-iv.
(Leipzig and Prague, 1869-1889); W. Rogge, _Oesterreich von Vilagos bis zur
Gegenwart_ (3 vols., Leipzig and Vienna, 1872, 1873), and _Oesterreich seit
der Katastrophe Hohenwart-Beust_ (Leipzig, 1879), written from a somewhat
violent German standpoint; Franz X. Krones (Ritter von Marchland),
_Handbuch der Gesch. Oesterreichs_ (5 vols., Berlin, 1876-1879), with
copious references, _Gesch. der Neuzeit Oesterreichs vom 18ten Jahrhundert
bis auf die Gegenwart_ (Berlin, 1879), from the German-liberal point of
view, and _Grundriss der oesterreichischen Gesch_. (Vienna, 1882); Baron
Henry de Worms, _The Austro-Hungarian Empire_ (London, 2nd ed., 1876);
Louis Asseline, _Histoire de l'Autriche depuis la mort de Marie Therese_
(Paris, 1877), sides with the Slavs against Germans and Magyars; Louis
Leger, _Hist. de l'Autriche-Hongrie_ (Paris, 1879), also strongly
Slavophil; A. Wolf, _Geschichtliche Bilder aus Oesterreich_ (2 vols.,
Vienna, 1878-1880), and _Oesterreich unter Maria Theresia, Joseph II. und
Leopold I._ (Berlin, 1882); E. Wertheimer, _Gesch. Oesterreichs und Ungarns
im ersten Jahrzehnt des 19ten Jahrhunderts_ (2 vols., Leipzig, 1884-1890);
A. Huber, _Gesch. Oesterreichs_, vols. i. to v. up to 1648 (in Heeren's
_Gesch. der europ. Staaten_, Gotha, 1885-1895); J. Emmer, _Kaiser Franz
Joseph I., fuenfzig Jahre oesterreichischer Gesch_. (2 vols., Vienna,
1898); F. M. Mayer, _Gesch. Oesterreichs mit besonderer Ruecksicht auf das
Kulturleben_ (2 vols. 2nd ed., Vienna, 1900-1901); A. Dopsch, _Forschungen
zur inneren Gesch. Oesterreichs_, vol. i. 1 (Innsbruck, 1903); Louis
Eisenmann, _Le Compromis austro-hongrois de 1867_ (Paris, 1904); H.
Friedjung, _Oesterreich von 1848 bis 1860_ (Stuttgart, 1908 seq.); Geoffrey
Drage, _Austria-Hungary_ (London, 1909).
(b) _Constitutional._--E. Werunsky, _Oesterreichische Reichs- und
Rechtsgeschichte_ (Vienna, 1894, &c.); A. Bechmann, _Lehrbuch der
oesterreichischen Reichsgesch_. (Prague, 1895-1896); A. Huber,
_Oesterreichische Reichsgesch_. (Leipzig and Vienna, 1895, 2nd ed. by A.
Dopsch, _ib._, 1901); A. Luschin von Ebengreuth, _Oesterreichische
Reichsgesch_. (2 vols., Bamberg, 1895, 1896), a work of first-class
importance; and _Grundriss der oesterreichischen Reichsgesch_. (Bamberg,
1899); G. Kolmer, _Parlament und Verfassung in Oesterreich_, vols. i. to
iii. from 1848 to 1885 (Vienna, 1902-1905). For relations with Hungary see
J. Andrassy, _Ungarns Ausgleich mit Oesterreich, 1867_ (Leipzig, 1897); L.
Eisenmann, _Le Compromis austro-hongrois de 1867_ (Paris, 1904).
(c) _Diplomatic._--A. Beer, _Zehn Jahre oesterreichischer Politik,
1801-1810_ (Leipzig, 1877), and _Die orientalische Politik Oesterreichs
seit 1774_ (Prague and Leipzig, 1883); A. Fournier, _Gentz und Cobenzl:
Gesch. der oest. Politik in den Jahren 1801-1805_ (Vienna, 1880); F. von
Demelitsch, _Metternich und seine auswaertige Politik_, vol. i. (1809-1812,
Stuttgart, 1898); H. Uebersberger, _Oesterreich und Russland seit dem Ende
des 15ten Jahrhunderts_, vol. i. 1488 to 1605 (Kommission fuer die neuere
Gesch. Oesterreichs, Vienna, 1905). See further the bibliographies to the
articles on METTERNICH, GENTZ, &c. For the latest developments of the
"Austrian question" see Andre Cheradame, _L'Europe et la question
d'Autriche au seuil du XX^e siecle_ (Paris, 1901), and _L'Allemagne, la
France et la question d'Autriche_ (76, 1902); Rene Henry, _Questions
d'Autriche-Hongrie et question d'orient_ (Paris, 1903), with preface by
Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu; "Scotus Viator," _The Future of Austria-Hungary_
(London, 1907).
(d) _Racial Question._--There is a very extensive literature on the
question of languages and race in Austria. The best statement of the legal
questions involved is in Josef Ulbrith and Ernst Mischler's _Oesterr.
Staatswoerterbuch_ (3 vols., Vienna, 1894-1897; 2nd ed. 1904, &c.). See
also Dummreicher, _Suedostdeutsche Betrachtungen_ (Leipzig, 1893);
Hainisch, _Die Zukunft der Deutsch-Oesterreicher_ (Vienna, 1892); Herkner,
_Die Zukunft der Deutsch-Oesterreicher_ (_ib._ 1893); L. Leger, _La Save,
le Danube et le Balkan_ (Paris, 1884); Bressnitz von Sydacoff, _Die
panslavistische Agitation_ (Berlin, 1899); Bertrand Auerbach, _Les Races et
les nationalites en Autriche-Hongrie_ (Paris, 1898).
(e) _Biographical._--C. von Wurzbach, _Biographisches Lexikon des
Kaisertums Oesterreich_ (60 vols., Vienna, 1856-1891); also the _Allgemeine
deutsche Biographie_.
Many further authorities, whether works, memoirs or collections of
documents, are referred to in the lists appended to the articles in this
book on the various Austrian sovereigns and statesmen. For full
bibliography see Dahlmann-Waitz, _Quellenkunde_ (ed. 1906, and subsequent
supplements); many works, covering particular periods, are also enumerated
in the bibliographies in the several volumes of the _Cambridge Modern
History_.
(W. A. P.)
[1] Rudolph V. as archduke of Austria, II. as emperor.
[2] Thus, while the number of recruits, though varying from year to year,
could be settled by the war department, the question of the claim of a
single conscript for exemption, on grounds not recognized by precedent,
could only be settled by imperial decree.
[3] Forbidden books were the only ones read, and forbidden newspapers the
only ones believed.
[4] In Hungary the diet was not summoned at all between 1811 and 1825, nor
in Transylvania between 1811 and 1834.
[5] For the separate political histories of Austria and Hungary see the
section on II. _Austria Proper_, below, and HUNGARY; the present section
deals with the history of the whole monarchy as such.
[6] Baron H. de Worms, _The Austro-Hungarian Empire_ (London, 1876), and
Beust's _Memoirs_.
[7] See General Le Brun, _Souvenirs militaires_ (1866-1870, Paris, 1895);
also, Baron de Worms, _op. cit_., and the article on BEUST.
[8] Josef, Freiherr Philippovi['c] von Philippsberg (1818-1889), belonged
to an old Christian noble family of Bosnia.
[9] Sir Charles Dilke, _The Present Position of European Politics_ (London,
1887).
[10] Matlekovits, _Die Zollpolitik der oesterreichisch-ungarischen
Monarchie_ (Leipzig, 1891), gives the Hungarian point of view; Bazant, _Die
Handelspolitik Oesterreich-Ungarns_ (1875-1892, Leipzig, 1894).
[11] The only change was that as the military frontier had been given over
to Hungary, Hungary in consequence of this addition of territory had to pay
2%, the remaining 98% being divided as before, so that the real proportion
was 31.4 and 68.6.
[12] Alois, Count Lexa von Aerenthal, was born on the 27th of September
1854 at Gross-Skal in Bohemia, studied at Bonn and Prague, was attache at
Paris (1877) and afterwards at St Petersburg, envoy extraordinary at
Bucharest (1895) and ambassador at St Petersburg (1896). He was created a
count on the emperor's 79th birthday in 1909.
[13] It is impossible to avoid using the word "Austria" to designate these
territories, though it is probably incorrect. Officially the word "Austria"
is not found, and though the sovereign is emperor of Austria, an Austrian
empire appears not to exist; the territories are spoken of in official
documents as "the kingdoms and lands represented in the Reichsrath." The
Hungarians and the German party in Austria have expressed their desire that
the word Austria should be used, but it has not been gratified. On the
other hand, expressions such as "Austrian citizens," "Austrian law" are
found. The reason of this peculiar use is probably twofold. On the one
hand, a reluctance to confess that Hungary is no longer in any sense a part
of Austria; on the other hand, the refusal of the Czechs to recognize that
their country is part of Austria. Sometimes the word _Erblaender_, which
properly is applied only to the older ancestral dominions of the house of
Habsburg, is used for want of a better word.
[14] The documents are printed in Baron de Worms, _op. cit_.
[15] It is printed in the _Europaischer Geschichtskalender_ (1868).
[16] See Wirth, _Geschichte der Handelskrisen_ (Frankfort, 1885); and an
interesting article by Schaeffle in the _Zeitschrift f. Staatswissenschaft_
(Stuttgart, 1874).
[17] For Dalmatia, see T. G. Jackson, _Dalmatia &c._, (Oxford, 1889).
[18] On this see Menger, _Der Ausgleich mit Boehmen_ (Vienna, 1891), where
the documents are printed.
AUSTRIAN SUCCESSION, WAR OF THE (1740-1748). This war began with the
invasion of Silesia by Frederick II. of Prussia in 1740, and was ended by
the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen) in 1748. After 1741 nearly all the
powers of Europe were involved in the struggle, but the most enduring
interest of the war lies in the struggle of Prussia and Austria for
Silesia. Southwest Germany, the Low Countries and Italy were, as usual, the
battle-grounds of France and Austria. The constant allies of France and
Prussia were Spain and Bavaria; various other powers at intervals joined
them. The cause of Austria was supported almost as a matter of course by
England and Holland, the traditional enemies of France. Of Austria's allies
from time to time Sardinia and Saxony were the most important.
1. _Frederick's Invasion of Silesia, 1740._--Prussia in 1740 was a small,
compact and thoroughly organized power, with an army 100,000 strong. The
only recent war service of this army had been in the desultory Rhine
campaign of 1733-35. It was therefore regarded as one of the minor armies
of Europe, and few thought that it could rival the forces of Austria and
France. But it was drilled to a perfection not hitherto attained, and the
Prussian infantry soldier was so well trained and equipped that [v.03
p.0040] he could fire five shots to the Austrian's three, though the
cavalry and artillery were less efficient. But the initial advantage of
Frederick's army was that it had, undisturbed by wars, developed the
standing army theory to full effect. While the Austrians had to wait for
drafts to complete the field forces, Prussian regiments could take the
field at once, and thus Frederick was able to overrun Silesia almost
unopposed. His army was concentrated quietly upon the Oder, and without
declaration of war, on the 16th of December 1740, it crossed the frontier
into Silesia. The Austrian generals could do no more than garrison a few
fortresses, and with the small remnant of their available forces fell back
to the mountain frontier of Bohemia and Moravia. The Prussian army was soon
able to go into winter quarters, holding all Silesia and investing the
strong places of Glogau, Brieg and Neisse.
2. _Silesian Campaign of 1741._--In February 1741, the Austrians collected
a field army under Count Neipperg (1684-1774) and made preparations to
reconquer Silesia. The Austrians in Neisse and Brieg still held out.
Glogau, however, was stormed on the night of the 9th of March, the
Prussians, under Prince Leopold (the younger) of Anhalt-Dessau, executing
their task in one hour with a mathematical precision which excited
universal admiration. But the Austrian army in Moravia was now in the
field, and Frederick's cantonments were dispersed over all Upper Silesia.
It was a work of the greatest difficulty to collect the army, for the
ground was deep in snow, and before it was completed Neisse was relieved
and the Prussians cut off from their own country by the march of Neipperg
from Neisse on Brieg; a few days of slow manoeuvring between these places
ended in the battle of Mollwitz (10th April 1741), the first pitched battle
fought by Frederick and his army. The Prussian right wing of cavalry was
speedily routed, but the day was retrieved by the magnificent discipline
and tenacity of the infantry. The Austrian cavalry was shattered in
repeated attempts to ride them down, and before the Prussian volleys the
Austrian infantry, in spite of all that Neipperg and his officers could do,
gradually melted away. After a stubborn contest the Prussians remained
masters of the field. Frederick himself was far away. He had fought in the
cavalry melee, but after this, when the battle seemed lost, he had been
persuaded by Field Marshal Schwerin to ride away. Schwerin thus, like
Marshal Saxe at Fontenoy, remained behind to win the victory, and the king
narrowly escaped being captured by wandering Austrian hussars. The
immediate result of the battle was that the king secured Brieg, and
Neipperg fell back to Neisse, where he maintained himself and engaged in a
war of manoeuvre during the summer. But Europe realized suddenly that a new
military power had arisen, and France sent Marshal Belleisle to Frederick's
camp to negotiate an alliance. Thenceforward the "Silesian adventure"
became the War of the Austrian Succession. The elector of Bavaria's
candidature for the imperial dignity was to be supported by a French
"auxiliary" army, and other French forces were sent to observe Hanover.
Saxony was already watched by a Prussian army under Prince Leopold of
Anhalt-Dessau, the "old Dessauer," who had trained the Prussian army to its
present perfection. The task of Sweden was to prevent Russia from attacking
Prussia, but her troops were defeated, on the 3rd of September 1741, at
Wilmanstrand by a greatly superior Russian army, and in 1742 another great
reverse was sustained in the capitulation of Helsingfors. In central Italy
an army of Neapolitans and Spaniards was collected for the conquest of the
Milanese.
3. _The Allies in Bohemia._--The French duly joined the elector's forces on
the Danube and advanced on Vienna; but the objective was suddenly changed,
and after many countermarches the allies advanced, in three
widely-separated corps, on Prague. A French corps moved via Amberg and
Pilsen. The elector marched on Budweis, and the Saxons (who had now joined
the allies) invaded Bohemia by the Elbe valley. The Austrians could at
first offer little resistance, but before long a considerable force
intervened at Tabor between the Danube and the allies, and Neipperg was now
on the march from Neisse to join in the campaign. He had made with
Frederick the curious agreement of Klein Schnellendorf (9th October 1741),
by which Neisse was surrendered after a mock siege, and the Austrians
undertook to leave Frederick unmolested in return for his releasing
Neipperg's army for service elsewhere. At the same time the Hungarians,
moved to enthusiasm by the personal appeal of Maria Theresa, had put into
the field a _levee en masse_, or "insurrection," which furnished the
regular army with an invaluable force of light troops. A fresh army was
collected under Field Marshal Khevenhueller at Vienna, and the Austrians
planned an offensive winter campaign against the Franco-Bavarian forces in
Bohemia and the small Bavarian army that remained on the Danube to defend
the electorate. The French in the meantime had stormed Prague on the 26th
of November, the grand-duke Francis, consort of Maria Theresa, who
commanded the Austrians in Bohemia, moving too slowly to save the fortress.
The elector of Bavaria, who now styled himself archduke of Austria, was
crowned king of Bohemia (19th December 1741) and elected to the imperial
throne as Charles VII. (24th January 1742), but no active measures were
undertaken. In Bohemia the month of December was occupied in mere
skirmishes. On the Danube, Khevenhueller, the best general in the Austrian
service, advanced on the 27th of December, swiftly drove back the allies,
shut them up in Linz, and pressed on into Bavaria. Munich itself
surrendered to the Austrians on the coronation day of Charles VII. At the
close of this first act of the campaign the French, under the old Marshal
de Broglie, maintained a precarious foothold in central Bohemia, menaced by
the main army of the Austrians, and Khevenhueller was ranging unopposed in
Bavaria, while Frederick, in pursuance of his secret obligations, lay
inactive in Silesia. In Italy the allied Neapolitans and Spaniards had
advanced towards Modena, the duke of which state had allied himself with
them, but the vigilant Austrian commander Count Traun had outmarched them,
captured Modena, and forced the duke to make a separate peace.
4. _Campaign of 1742._--Frederick had hoped by the truce to secure Silesia,
for which alone he was fighting. But with the successes of Khevenhueller
and the enthusiastic "insurrection" of Hungary, Maria Theresa's opposition
became firmer, and she divulged the provisions of the truce, in order to
compromise Frederick with his allies. The war recommenced. Frederick had
not rested on his laurels; in the uneventful summer campaign of 1741 he had
found time to begin that reorganization of his cavalry which was before
long to make it even more efficient than his infantry. Charles VII., whose
territories were overrun by the Austrians, asked him to create a diversion
by invading Moravia. In December 1741, therefore, Schwerin had crossed the
border and captured Olmuetz. Glatz also was invested, and the Prussian army
was concentrated about Olmuetz in January 1742. A combined plan of
operations was made by the French, Saxons and Prussians for the rescue of
Linz. But Linz soon fell; Broglie on the Moldau, weakened by the departure
of the Bavarians to oppose Khevenhueller, and of the Saxons to join forces
with Frederick, was in no condition to take the offensive, and large forces
under Prince Charles of Lorraine lay in his front from Budweis to Iglau.
Frederick's march was made towards Iglau in the first place. Bruenn was
invested about the same time (February), but the direction of the march was
changed, and instead of moving against Prince Charles, Frederick pushed on
southwards by Znaim and Nikolsburg. The extreme outposts of the Prussians
appeared before Vienna. But Frederick's advance was a mere foray, and
Prince Charles, leaving a screen of troops in front of Broglie, marched to
cut off the Prussians from Silesia, while the Hungarian levies poured into
Upper Silesia by the Jablunka Pass. The Saxons, discontented and
demoralized, soon marched off to their own country, and Frederick with his
Prussians fell back by Zwittau and Leutomischl to Kuttenberg in Bohemia,
where he was in touch with Broglie on the one hand and (Glatz having now
surrendered) with Silesia on the other. No defence of Olmuetz was
attempted, and the small Prussian corps remaining in Moravia fell back
towards Upper Silesia. Prince Charles, in pursuit of the king [v.03 p.0041]
marched by Iglau and Teutsch (Deutsch) Brod on Kuttenberg, and on the 17th
of May was fought the battle of Chotusitz or Czaslau, in which after a
severe struggle the king was victorious. His cavalry on this occasion
retrieved its previous failure, and its conduct gave an earnest of its
future glory not only by its charges on the battlefield, but its vigorous
pursuit of the defeated Austrians. Almost at the same time Broglie fell
upon a part of the Austrians left on the Moldau and won a small, but
morally and politically important, success in the action of Sahay, near
Budweis (May 24, 1742). Frederick did not propose another combined
movement. His victory and that of Broglie disposed Maria Theresa to cede
Silesia in order to make good her position elsewhere, and the separate
peace between Prussia and Austria, signed at Breslau on the 11th of June,
closed the First Silesian War. The War of the Austrian Succession
continued.
5. _The French at Prague._--The return of Prince Charles, released by the
peace of Breslau, put an end to Broglie's offensive. The prince pushed back
the French posts everywhere, and his army converged upon Prague, where,
towards the end of June 1742, the French were to all intents and purposes
surrounded. Broglie had made the best resistance possible with his inferior
forces, and still displayed great activity, but his position was one of
great peril. The French government realized at last that it had given its
general inadequate forces. The French army on the lower Rhine, hitherto in
observation of Hanover and other possibly hostile states, was hurried into
Franconia. Prince Charles at once raised the siege of Prague (September
14), called up Khevenhueller with the greater part of the Austrian army on
the Danube, and marched towards Amberg to meet the new opponent. Marshal
Maillebois (1682-1762), its commander, then manoeuvred from Amberg towards
the Eger valley, to gain touch with Broglie. Marshal Belleisle, the
political head of French affairs in Germany and a very capable general, had
accompanied Broglie throughout, and it seems that Belleisle and Broglie
believed that Maillebois' mission was to regain a permanent foothold for
the army in Bohemia; Maillebois, on the contrary, conceived that his work
was simply to disengage the army of Broglie from its dangerous position,
and to cover its retreat. His operations were no more than a demonstration,
and had so little effect that Broglie was sent for in haste to take over
the command from him, Belleisle at the same time taking over charge of the
army at Prague. Broglie's command was now on the Danube, east of
Regensburg, and the imperial (chiefly Bavarian) army of Charles VII. under
Seckendorf aided him to clear Bavaria of the Austrians. This was effected
with ease, for Khevenhueller and most of his troops had gone to Bohemia.
Prince Charles and Khevenhueller now took post between Linz and Passau,
leaving a strong force to deal with Belleisle in Prague. This, under Prince
Lobkowitz, was little superior in numbers or quality to the troops under
Belleisle, under whom served Saxe and the best of the younger French
generals, but its light cavalry swept the country clear of provisions. The
French were quickly on the verge of starvation, winter had come, and the
marshal resolved to retreat. On the night of the 16th of December 1742, the
army left Prague to be defended by a small garrison under Chevert, and took
the route of Eger. The retreat (December 16-26) was accounted a triumph of
generalship, but the weather made it painful and costly. The brave Chevert
displayed such confidence that the Austrians were glad to allow him freedom
to join the main army. The cause of the new emperor was now sustained only
in the valley of the Danube, where Broglie and Seckendorf opposed Prince
Charles and Khevenhueller, who were soon joined by the force lately
opposing Belleisle.
In Italy, Traun held his own with ease against the Spaniards and
Neapolitans. Naples was forced by a British squadron to withdraw her troops
for home defence, and Spain, now too weak to advance in the Po valley, sent
a second army to Italy via France. Sardinia had allied herself with
Austria, and at the same time neither state was at war with France, and
this led to curious complications, combats being fought in the Isere valley
between the troops of Sardinia and of Spain, in which the French took no
part.
6. _The Campaign of 1743_ opened disastrously for the emperor. The French
and Bavarian armies were not working well together, and Broglie and
Seckendorf had actually quarrelled. No connected resistance was offered to
the converging march of Prince Charles's army along the Danube,
Khevenhueller from Salzburg towards southern Bavaria, and Prince Lobkowitz
(1685-1755) from Bohemia towards the Naab. The Bavarians suffered a severe
reverse near Braunau (May 9, 1743), and now an Anglo-allied army commanded
by King George II., which had been formed on the lower Rhine on the
withdrawal of Maillebois, was advancing southward to the Main and Neckar
country. A French army, under Marshal Noailles, was being collected on the
middle Rhine to deal with this new force. But Broglie was now in full
retreat, and the strong places of Bavaria surrendered one after the other
to Prince Charles. The French and Bavarians had been driven almost to the
Rhine when Noailles and the king came to battle. George, completely
outmanoeuvred by his veteran antagonist, was in a position of the greatest
danger between Aschaffenburg and Hanau in the defile formed by the Spessart
Hills and the river Main. Noailles blocked the outlet and had posts all
around, but the allied troops forced their way through and inflicted heavy
losses on the French, and the battle of Dettingen is justly reckoned as a
notable victory of the British arms (June 27). Both Broglie, who, worn out
by age and exertions, was soon replaced by Marshal Coigny (1670-1759), and
Noailles were now on the strict defensive behind the Rhine. Not a single
French soldier remained in Germany, and Prince Charles prepared to force
the passage of the great river in the Breisgau while the king of England
moved forward via Mainz to co-operate by drawing upon himself the attention
of both the French marshals. The Anglo-allied army took Worms, but after
several unsuccessful attempts to cross, Prince Charles went into winter
quarters. The king followed his example, drawing in his troops to the
northward, to deal, if necessary, with the army which the French were
collecting on the frontier of Flanders. Austria, England, Holland and
Sardinia were now allied. Saxony changed sides, and Sweden and Russia
neutralized each other (peace of Abo, August 1743). Frederick was still
quiescent; France, Spain and Bavaria alone continued actively the struggle
against Maria Theresa.
In Italy, the Spaniards on the Panaro had achieved a Pyrrhic victory over
Traun at Campo Santo (February 8, 1743), but the next six months were
wasted in inaction, and Lobkowitz, joining Traun with reinforcements from
Germany, drove back the enemy to Rimini. The Spanish-Piedmontese war in the
Alps continued without much result, the only incident of note being a
combat at Casteldelfino won by the king of Sardinia in person.
7. _Campaign of 1744._--With 1744 began the Second Silesian War. Frederick,
disquieted by the universal success of the Austrian cause, secretly
concluded a fresh alliance with Louis XV. France had posed hitherto as an
auxiliary, her officers in Germany had worn the Bavarian cockade, and only
with England was she officially at war. She now declared war direct upon
Austria and Sardinia (April 1744). A corps was assembled at Dunkirk to
support the cause of the Pretender in Great Britain, and Louis in person,
with 90,000 men, prepared to invade the Austrian Netherlands, and took
Menin and Ypres. His presumed opponent was the allied army previously under
King George and now composed of English, Dutch, Germans and Austrians. On
the Rhine, Coigny was to make head against Prince Charles, and a fresh army
under the prince de Conti was to assist the Spaniards in Piedmont and
Lombardy. This plan was, however, at once dislocated by the advance of
Charles, who, assisted by the veteran Traun, skilfully manoeuvred his army
over the Rhine near Philipsburg (July 1), captured the lines of
Weissenburg, and cut off the French marshal from Alsace. Coigny, however,
cut his way through the enemy at Weissenburg and posted himself near
Strassburg. Louis XV. now abandoned the invasion of Flanders, and his army
moved down to take a decisive part [v.03 p.0042] in the war in Alsace and
Lorraine. At the same time Frederick crossed the Austrian frontier
(August).
The attention and resources of Austria were fully occupied, and the
Prussians were almost unopposed. One column passed through Saxony, another
through Lusatia, while a third advanced from Silesia. Prague, the
objective, was reached on the 2nd of September. Six days later the Austrian
garrison was compelled to surrender, and the Prussians advanced to Budweis.
Maria Theresa once again rose to the emergency, a new "insurrection" took
the field in Hungary, and a corps of regulars was assembled to cover
Vienna, while the diplomatists won over Saxony to the Austrian side. Prince
Charles withdrew from Alsace, unmolested by the French, who had been thrown
into confusion by the sudden and dangerous illness of Louis XV. at Metz.
Only Seckendorf with the Bavarians pursued him. No move was made by the
French, and Frederick thus found himself after all isolated and exposed to
the combined attack of the Austrians and Saxons. Marshal Traun, summoned
from the Rhine, held the king in check in Bohemia, the Hungarian irregulars
inflicted numerous minor reverses on the Prussians, and finally Prince
Charles arrived with the main army. The campaign resembled that of 1742;
the Prussian retreat was closely watched, and the rearguard pressed hard.
Prague fell, and Frederick, completely outmanoeuvred by the united forces
of Prince Charles and Traun, regained Silesia with heavy losses. At the
same time, the Austrians gained no foothold in Silesia itself. On the
Rhine, Louis, now recovered, had besieged and taken Freiburg, after which
the forces left in the north were reinforced and besieged the strong places
of Flanders. There was also a slight war of manoeuvre on the middle Rhine.
In 1744 the Italian war became for the first time serious. A grandiose plan
of campaign was formed, and as usual the French and Spanish generals at the
front were hampered by the orders of their respective governments. The
object was to unite the army in Dauphine with that on the lower Po. The
adhesion of Genoa was secured, and a road thereby obtained into central
Italy. But Lobkowitz had already taken the offensive and driven back the
Spanish army of Count de Gages towards the Neapolitan frontier. The king of
Naples at this juncture was compelled to assist the Spaniards at all
hazards. A combined army was formed at Velletri, and defeated Lobkowitz
there on the 11th of August. The crisis past, Lobkowitz then went to
Piedmont to assist the king against Conti, the king of Naples returned
home, and de Gages followed the Austrians with a weak force. The war in the
Alps and the Apennines was keenly contested. Villefranche and Montalban
were stormed by Conti on the 20th of April, a desperate fight took place at
Peyre-Longue on the 18th of July, and the king of Sardinia was defeated in
a great battle at Madonna del Olmo (September 30) near Coni (Cuneo). Conti
did not, however, succeed in taking this fortress, and had to retire into
Dauphine for his winter quarters. The two armies had, therefore, failed in
their attempt to combine, and the Austro-Sardinians still lay between them.
8. _Campaign of 1745._--The interest of the next campaign centres in the
three greatest battles of the war--Hohenfriedberg, Kesselsdorf and
Fontenoy. The first event of the year was the Quadruple Alliance of
England, Austria, Holland and Saxony, concluded at Warsaw on the 8th of
January. Twelve days previously, the death of Charles VII. submitted the
imperial title to a new election, and his successor in Bavaria was not a
candidate. The Bavarian army was again unfortunate; caught in its scattered
winter quarters (action of Amberg, January 7), it was driven from point to
point, and the young elector had to abandon Munich once more. The peace of
Fuessen followed on the 22nd of April, by which he secured his hereditary
states on condition of supporting the candidature of the grand-duke
Francis, consort of Maria Theresa. The "imperial" army ceased _ipso facto_
to exist, and Frederick was again isolated. No help was to be expected from
France, whose efforts this year were centred on the Flanders campaign. In
effect, on the 10th of May, before Frederick took the field, Louis XV. and
Saxe had besieged Tournay, and inflicted upon the relieving army of the
duke of Cumberland the great defeat of Fontenoy (_q.v._). In Silesia the
customary small war had been going on for some time, and the concentration
of the Prussian army was not effected without severe fighting. At the end
of May, Frederick, with about 65,000 men, lay in the camp of Frankenstein,
between Glatz and Neisse, while behind the Riesengebirge about Landshut
Prince Charles had 85,000 Austrians and Saxons. On the 4th of June was
fought the battle of Hohenfriedberg (_q.v._) or Striegau, the greatest
victory as yet of Frederick's career, and, of all his battles, excelled
perhaps by Leuthen and Rossbach only. Prince Charles suffered a complete
defeat and withdrew through the mountains as he had come. Frederick's
pursuit was methodical, for the country was difficult and barren, and he
did not know the extent to which the enemy was demoralized. The manoeuvres
of both leaders on the upper Elbe occupied all the summer, while the
political questions of the imperial election and of an understanding
between Prussia and England were pending. The chief efforts of Austria were
directed towards the valleys of the Main and Lahn and Frankfort, where the
French and Austrian armies manoeuvred for a position from which to overawe
the electoral body. Marshal Traun was successful, and the grand-duke became
the emperor Francis I. on the 13th of September. Frederick agreed with
England to recognize the election a few days later, but Maria Theresa would
not conform to the treaty of Breslau without a further appeal to the
fortune of war. Saxony joined in this last attempt. A new advance of Prince
Charles quickly brought on the battle of Soor, fought on ground destined to
be famous in the war of 1866. Frederick was at first in a position of great
peril, but his army changed front in the face of the advancing enemy and by
its boldness and tenacity won a remarkable victory (September 30). But the
campaign was not ended. An Austrian contingent from the Main joined the
Saxons under Marshal Rutowski, and a combined movement was made in the
direction of Berlin by Rutowski from Saxony and Prince Charles from
Bohemia. The danger was very great. Frederick hurried up his forces from
Silesia and marched as rapidly as possible on Dresden, winning the actions
of Katholisch-Hennersdorf (November 24) and Goerlitz (November 25). Prince
Charles was thereby forced back, and now a second Prussian army under the
old Dessauer advanced up the Elbe from Magdeburg to meet Rutowski. The
latter took up a strong position at Kesselsdorf between Meissen and
Dresden, but the veteran Leopold attacked him directly and without
hesitation (December 14). The Saxons and their allies were completely
routed after a hard struggle, and Maria Theresa at last gave way. In the
peace of Dresden (December 25) Frederick recognized the imperial election,
and retained Silesia, as at the peace of Breslau.
9. _Operations in Italy, 1745-1747._--The campaign in Italy this year was
also no mere war of posts. In March 1745 a secret treaty allied the Genoese
republic with France, Spain and Naples. A change in the command of the
Austrians favoured the first move of the allies, De Gages moved from Modena
towards Lucca, the French and Spaniards in the Alps under Marshal
Maillebois advanced through the Riviera to the Tanaro, and in the middle of
July the two armies were at last concentrated between the Scrivia and the
Tanaro, to the unusually large number of 80,000. A swift march on Piacenza
drew the Austrian commander thither, and in his absence the allies fell
upon and completely defeated the Sardinians at Bassignano (September 27), a
victory which was quickly followed by the capture of Alessandria, Valenza
and Casale. Jomini calls the concentration of forces which effected the
victory "le plus remarquable de toute la guerre." But the complicated
politics of Italy brought it about that Maillebois was ultimately unable to
turn his victory to account. Indeed, early in 1746, Austrian troops, freed
by the peace with Frederick, passed through Tirol into Italy; the
Franco-Spanish winter quarters were brusquely attacked, and a French
garrison of 6000 men at Asti was forced to capitulate. At the same time
Count Browne with an Austrian corps struck at the allies on the lower Po,
and cut off their communication with the main body [v.03 p.0043] in
Piedmont. A series of minor actions thus completely destroyed the great
concentration. The allies separated, Maillebois covering Liguria, the
Spaniards marching against Browne. The latter was promptly and heavily
reinforced, and all that the Spaniards could do was to entrench themselves
at Piacenza; the Spanish Infant as supreme commander calling up Maillebois
to his aid. The French, skilfully conducted and marching rapidly, joined
forces once more, but their situation was critical, for only two marches
behind them the army of the king of Sardinia was in pursuit, and before
them lay the principal army of the Austrians. The pitched battle of
Piacenza (June 16) was hard fought, and Maillebois had nearly achieved a
victory when orders from the Infant compelled him to retire. That the army
escaped at all was in the highest degree creditable to Maillebois and to
his son and chief of staff, under whose leadership it eluded both the
Austrians and the Sardinians, defeated an Austrian corps in the battle of
Rottofreddo (August 12), and made good its retreat on Genoa. It was,
however, a mere remnant of the allied army which returned, and the
Austrians were soon masters of north Italy, including Genoa (September).
But they met with no success in their forays towards the Alps. Soon Genoa
revolted from the oppressive rule of the victors, rose and drove out the
Austrians (December 5-11), and the French, now commanded by Belleisle, took
the offensive (1747). Genoa held out against a second Austrian siege, and
after the plan of campaign had as usual been referred to Paris and Madrid,
it was relieved, though a picked corps of the French army under the
chevalier de Belleisle, brother of the marshal, was defeated in the almost
impossible attempt (July 19) to storm the entrenched pass of Exiles (Col di
Assietta), the chevalier, and with him the _elite_ of the French nobility,
being killed at the barricades. Before the steady advance of Marshal
Belleisle the Austrians retired into Lombardy, and a desultory campaign was
waged up to the conclusion of peace.
In North America the most remarkable incident of what has been called "King
George's War" was the capture of the French Canadian fortress of Louisburg
by a British expedition (April 20-June 16, 1745), of which the military
portion was furnished by the colonial militia under Colonel (afterwards
Lieutenant-General Sir William) Pepperell (1696-1759) of Maine. Louisburg
was then regarded merely as a nest of privateers, and at the peace it was
given up, but in the Seven Years' War it came within the domain of grand
strategy, and its second capture was the preliminary step to the British
conquest of Canada. For the war in India, see INDIA: _History_.
10. _Later Campaigns._--The last three campaigns of the war in the
Netherlands were illustrated by the now fully developed genius of Marshal
Saxe. After Fontenoy the French carried all before them. The withdrawal of
most of the English to aid in suppressing the 'Forty-Five rebellion at home
left their allies in a helpless position. In 1746 the Dutch and the
Austrians were driven back towards the line of the Meuse, and most of the
important fortresses were taken by the French. The battle of Roucoux (or
Raucourt) near Liege, fought on the 11th of October between the allies
under Prince Charles of Lorraine and the French under Saxe, resulted in a
victory for the latter. Holland itself was now in danger, and when in April
1747 Saxe's army, which had now conquered the Austrian Netherlands up to
the Meuse, turned its attention to the United Provinces, the old fortresses
on the frontier offered but slight resistance. The prince of Orange and the
duke of Cumberland underwent a severe defeat at Lauffeld (Lawfeld, &c.,
also called Val) on the 2nd of July 1747, and Saxe, after his victory,
promptly and secretly despatched a corps under (Marshal) Loewendahl to
besiege Bergen-op-Zoom. On the 18th of September Bergen-op-Zoom was stormed
by the French, and in the last year of the war Maestricht, attacked by the
entire forces of Saxe and Loewendahl, surrendered on the 7th of May 1748. A
large Russian army arrived on the Meuse to join the allies, but too late to
be of use. The quarrel of Russia and Sweden had been settled by the peace
of Abo in 1743, and in 1746 Russia had allied herself with Austria.
Eventually a large army marched from Moscow to the Rhine, an event which
was not without military significance, and in a manner preluded the great
invasions of 1813-1814 and 1815. The general peace of Aix-la-Chapelle
(Aachen) was signed on the 18th of October 1748.
11. _General Character of the War._--Little need be said of the military
features of the war. The intervention of Prussia as a military power was
indeed a striking phenomenon, but her triumph was in a great measure due to
her fuller application of principles of tactics and discipline universally
recognized though less universally enforced. The other powers reorganized
their forces after the war, not so much on the Prussian model as on the
basis of a stricter application of known general principles. Prussia,
moreover, was far ahead of all the other continental powers in
administration, and over Austria, in particular, her advantage in this
matter was almost decisive of the struggle. Added to this was the personal
ascendancy of Frederick, not yet a great general, but energetic and
resolute, and, further, opposed to generals who were responsible for their
men to their individual sovereigns. These advantages have been decisive in
many wars, almost in all. The special feature of the war of 1740 to 1748,
and of other wars of the time, is the extraordinary disparity between the
end and the means. The political schemes to be executed by the French and
other armies were as grandiose as any of modern times; their execution,
under the then conditions of time and space, invariably fell short of
expectation, and the history of the war proves, as that of the Seven Years'
War was to prove, that the small standing army of the 18th century could
conquer by degrees, but could not deliver a decisive blow. Frederick alone,
with a definite end and proportionate means wherewith to achieve it,
succeeded completely. The French, in spite of their later victories,
obtained so little of what they fought for that Parisians could say to each
other, when they met in the streets, "You are as stupid as the Peace." And
if, when fighting for their own hand, the governments of Europe could so
fail of their purpose, even less was to be expected when the armies were
composed of allied contingents, sent to the war each for a different
object. The allied national armies of 1813 co-operated loyally, for they
had much at stake and worked for a common object; those of 1741 represented
the divergent private interests of the several dynasties, and achieved
nothing.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Besides general works on Frederick's life and reign, of
which Carlyle, Preuss and v. Taysen are of particular importance, and
Frederick's own works, see the Prussian official _Die I. und II.
schlesischen Kriege_ (Berlin, 1890-1895); Austrian official _Kriege der
Kaiserin Maria Theresia; Gesch. des oesterr. Erbfolgekrieges_ (Vienna, from
1895); Jomini, _Traite des grandes operations militaires_, introduction to
vol. i. (Paris, 4th edition, 1851); C. von B.-K., _Geist und Stoff im
Kriege_ (Vienna, 1895); v. Arneth, _Maria Teresias ersten Regierungsjahre_
(1863); v. Schoening, _Die 5 erste Jahre der Regierung Friedrichs des
Grossen_; Bernhardi, _Friedrich der Grosse als Feldherr_ (Berlin, 1881); v.
Canitz, _Nachrichten, &c., ueber die Taten und Schicksale der Reiterei,
&c_. (Berlin, 1861); Gruenhagen, _Gesch. des I. schlesischen Krieges_
(Gotha, 1881-1882); Orlich, _Gesch. der schlesischen Kriege_; Deroy,
_Beitraege zur Gesch. des oesterr. Erbfolgekrieges_ (Munich, 1883);
Crousse, _La Guerre de la succession dans les provinces belgiques_ (Paris,
1885); Duncker, _Militaerische, &c., Aktenstuecke zur Gesch. des I. schles.
Krieges_; _Militaer-Wochenblatt_ supplements 1875, 1877, 1878, 1883, 1891,
1901, &c. (Berlin); _Mitteilungen des k.k. Kriegsarchivs_, from 1887
(Vienna); Baumgart, _Die Litteratur, &c., ueber Friedrich d. Gr_. (Berlin,
1886); Fortescue, _History of the British Army_, vol. ii.; F. H. Skrine,
_Fontenoy and the War of the Austrian Succession_ (London, 1906); Francis
Parkman, _A Half-Century of Conflict_ (1892).
(C. F. A.)
_Naval Operations._
The naval operations of this war were languid and confused. They are
complicated by the fact that they were entangled with the Spanish war,
which broke out in 1739 in consequence of the long disputes between England
and Spain over their conflicting claims in America. Until the closing years
they were conducted with small intelligence or spirit. The Spanish
government was nerveless, and sacrificed its true interest to the family
ambition of the king Philip V., who wished to establish his younger sons as
ruling princes in Italy. French administration was corrupt, and the
government was chiefly concerned in its political interests in Germany. The
British navy was at its lowest point of energy [v.03 p.0044] and efficiency
after the long administration of Sir Robert Walpole. Therefore, although
the war contained passages of vigour, it was neither interesting nor
decisive on the sea.
War on Spain was declared by Great Britain on the 23rd of October 1739. It
was universally believed that the Spanish colonies would fall at once
before attack. A plan was laid for combined operations against them from
east and west. One force, military and naval, was to assault them from the
West Indies under Admiral Edward Vernon. Another, to be commanded by
Commodore George Anson, afterwards Lord Anson, was to round Cape Horn and
to fall upon the Pacific coast. Delays, bad preparations, dockyard
corruption, and the unpatriotic squabbles of the naval and military
officers concerned caused the failure of a hopeful scheme. On the 21st of
November 1739 Admiral Vernon did indeed succeed in capturing the
ill-defended Spanish harbour of Porto Bello (in the present republic of
Panama)--a trifling success to boast of. But he did nothing to prevent the
Spanish convoys from reaching Europe. The Spanish privateers cruised with
destructive effect against British trade, both in the West Indies and in
European waters. When Vernon had been joined by Sir Chaloner Ogle with
naval reinforcements and a strong body of troops, an attack was made on
Cartagena in what is now Colombia (March 9-April 24, 1741). The delay had
given the Spanish admiral, Don Bias de Leso, time to prepare, and the siege
failed with a dreadful loss of life to the assailants. Want of success was
largely due to the incompetence of the military officers and the brutal
insolence of the admiral. The war in the West Indies, after two other
unsuccessful attacks had been made on Spanish territory, died down and did
not revive till 1748. The expedition under Anson sailed late, was very ill
provided, and less strong than had been intended. It consisted of six ships
and left England on the 18th of September 1740. Anson returned alone with
his flagship the "Centurion" on the 15th of June 1744. The other vessels
had either failed to round the Horn or had been lost. But Anson had harried
the coast of Chile and Peru and had captured a Spanish galleon of immense
value near the Philippines. His cruise was a great feat of resolution and
endurance.
While Anson was pursuing his voyage round the world, Spain was mainly
intent on the Italian policy of the king. A squadron was fitted out at
Cadiz to convey troops to Italy. It was watched by the British admiral
Nicholas Haddock. When the blockading squadron was forced off by want of
provisions, the Spanish admiral Don Jose Navarro put to sea. He was
followed, but when the British force came in sight of him Navarro had been
joined by a French squadron under M. de Court (December 1741). The French
admiral announced that he would support the Spaniards if they were attacked
and Haddock retired. France and Great Britain were not yet openly at war,
but both were engaged in the struggle in Germany--Great Britain as the ally
of the queen of Hungary, Maria Theresa; France as the supporter of the
Bavarian claimant of the empire. Navarro and M. de Court went on to Toulon,
where they remained till February 1744. A British fleet watched them, under
the command of admiral Richard Lestock, till Sir Thomas Mathews was sent
out as commander-in-chief, and as minister to the court of Turin. Partial
manifestations of hostility between the French and British took place in
different seas, but avowed war did not begin till the French government
issued its declaration of the 30th of March, to which Great Britain replied
on the 31st. This formality had been preceded by French preparations for
the invasion of England, and by a collision between the allies and Mathews
in the Mediterranean (see TOULON, BATTLE OF). On the 11th of February a
most confused battle was fought, in which the van and centre of the British
fleet was engaged with the rear and centre of the allies. Lestock, who was
on the worst possible terms with his superior, took no part in the action.
He endeavoured to excuse himself by alleging that the orders of Mathews
were contradictory. Mathews, a puzzle-headed and hot-tempered man, fought
with spirit but in a disorderly way, breaking the formation of his fleet,
and showing no power of direction. The mismanagement of the British fleet
in the battle, by arousing deep anger among the people, led to a drastic
reform of the British navy which bore its first fruits before the war
ended.
The French invasion scheme was arranged in combination with the Jacobite
leaders, and soldiers were to be transported from Dunkirk. But though the
British government showed itself wholly wanting in foresight, the plan
broke down. In February 1744, a French fleet of twenty sail of the line
entered the Channel under Jacques Aymar, comte de Roquefeuil, before the
British force under admiral John Norris was ready to oppose him. But the
French force was ill equipped, the admiral was nervous, his mind dwelt on
all the misfortunes which might possibly happen, and the weather was bad.
M. de Roquefeuil came up almost as far as the Downs, where he learnt that
Sir John Norris was at hand with twenty-five sail of the line, and
thereupon precipitately retreated. The military expedition prepared at
Dunkirk to cross under cover of Roquefeuil's fleet naturally did not start.
The utter weakness of the French at sea, due to long neglect of the fleet
and the bankrupt state of the treasury, was shown during the Jacobite
rising of 1745, when France made no attempt to profit by the distress of
the British government. The Dutch having by this time joined Great Britain,
made a serious addition to the naval power opposed to France, though
Holland was compelled by the necessity for maintaining an army in Flanders
to play a very subordinate part at sea. Not being stimulated by formidable
attack, and having immediate interests both at home and in Germany, the
British government was slow to make use of its latest naval strength.
Spain, which could do nothing of an offensive character, was almost
neglected. During 1745 the New England expedition which took Louisburg
(April 30-June 16) was covered by a British naval force, but the operations
were in a general way sporadic, subordinated to the supply of convoy, or to
unimportant particular ends. In the East Indies, Mahe de la Bourdonnais
made a vigorous use of a small squadron to which no effectual resistance
was offered by the British naval forces. He captured Madras (July
24-September 9, 1746), a set-off for Louisburg, for which it was exchanged
at the close of the war. In the same year a British combined naval and
military expedition to the coast of France--the first of a long series of
similar ventures which in the end were derided as "breaking windows with
guineas"--was carried out during August and October. The aim was the
capture of the French East India company's dockyard at L'Orient, but it was
not attained.
From 1747 till the close of the war in October 1748 the naval policy of the
British government, without reaching a high level, was yet more energetic
and coherent. A closer watch was kept on the French coast, and effectual
means were taken to intercept communication between France and her American
possessions. In the spring information was obtained that an important
convoy for the East and West Indies was to sail from L'Orient. In the
previous year the British government had allowed a French expedition under
M. d'Anville to fail mainly by its own weakness. In 1747 a more creditable
line was taken. An overwhelming force was employed under the command of
Anson to intercept the convoy in the Channel. It was met, crushed and
captured, or driven back, on the 3rd of May. On the 14th of October another
French convoy, protected by a strong squadron, was intercepted by a
well-appointed and well-directed squadron of superior numbers--the
squadrons were respectively eight French and fourteen British--in the Bay
of Biscay. The French admiral Desherbiers de l'Etenduere made a very
gallant resistance, and the fine quality of his ships enabled him to
counteract to some extent the superior numbers of Sir Edward Hawke, the
British admiral. While the war-ships were engaged, the merchant vessels,
with the small protection which Desherbiers could spare them, continued on
their way to the West Indies. Most of them were, however, intercepted and
captured in those waters. This disaster convinced the French government of
its helplessness at sea, and it made no further effort.
The last naval operations took place in the West Indies, where the
Spaniards, who had for a time been treated as a negligible quantity, were
attacked on the coast of Cuba by a British [v.03 p.0045] squadron under Sir
Charles Knowles. They had a naval force under Admiral Regio at Havana. Each
side was at once anxious to cover its own trade, and to intercept that of
the other. Capture was rendered particularly desirable to the British by
the fact that the Spanish homeward-bound convoy would be laden with the
bullion sent from the American mines. In the course of the movement of each
to protect its trade, the two squadrons met on the 1st of October 1748 in
the Bahama Channel. The action was indecisive when compared with the
successes of British fleets in later days, but the advantage lay with Sir
Charles Knowles. He was prevented from following it up by the speedy
receipt of the news that peace had been made in Europe by the powers, who
were all in various degrees exhausted. That it was arranged on the terms of
a mutual restoration of conquests shows that none of the combatants could
claim to have established a final superiority. The conquests of the French
in the Bay of Bengal, and their military successes in Flanders, enabled
them to treat on equal terms, and nothing had been taken from Spain.
The war was remarkable for the prominence of privateering on both sides. It
was carried on by the Spaniards in the West Indies with great success, and
actively at home. The French were no less active in all seas. Mahe de la
Bourdonnais's attack on Madras partook largely of the nature of a
privateering venture. The British retaliated with vigour. The total number
of captures by French and Spanish corsairs was in all probability larger
than the list of British--partly for the reason given by Voltaire, namely,
that more British merchants were taken because there were many more British
merchant ships to take, but partly also because the British government had
not yet begun to enforce the use of convoy so strictly as it did in later
times.
See Beatson's _Naval and Military Memoirs_ (London, 1804); _La Marine
militaire de la France sous le regne de Louis XV_, by G. Lacour-Gayet
(Paris, 1902); _The Royal Navy_, by Sir W. L. Clowes and others (London,
1891, &c.).
(D. H.)
AUTHENTIC (from Gr. [Greek: authentes], one who does a thing himself),
genuine, as opposed to counterfeit, true or original. In music it is one of
the terms used for the ecclesiastical modes. The title of _Authentics_ was
also used for Justinian's _Novells_.
AUTOCEPHALOUS (from Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: kephale] head),
of independent headship, a term used of certain ecclesiastical
functionaries and organizations.
AUTOCHTHONES (Gr. [Greek: autos], and [Greek: chthon], earth, _i.e._ people
sprung from earth itself; Lat. _terrigenae_; see also under ABORIGINES),
the original inhabitants of a country as opposed to settlers, and those of
their descendants who kept themselves free from an admixture of foreign
peoples. The practice in ancient Greece of describing legendary heroes and
men of ancient lineage as "earthborn" greatly strengthened the doctrine of
autochthony; for instance, the Athenians wore golden grasshoppers in their
hair in token that they were born from the soil and had always lived in
Attica (Thucydides i. 6; Plato, _Menexenus_, 245). In Thebes, the race of
Sparti were believed to have sprung from a field sown with dragons' teeth.
The Phrygian Corybantes had been forced out of the hill-side like trees by
Rhea, the great mother, and hence were called [Greek: dendrophueis]. It is
clear from Aeschylus (_Prometheus_, 447) that primitive men were supposed
to have at first lived like animals in caves and woods, till by the help of
the gods and heroes they were raised to a stage of civilization.
AUTOCLAVE, a strong closed vessel of metal in which liquids can be heated
above their boiling points under pressure. Etymologically the word
indicates a self-closing vessel ([Greek: autos], self, and _clavis_, key,
or _clavus_, nail), in which the tightness of the joints is maintained by
the internal pressure, but this characteristic is frequently wanting in the
actual apparatus to which the name is applied. The prototype of the
autoclave was the digester of Denis Papin, invented in 1681, which is still
used in cooking, but the appliance finds a much wider range of employment
in chemical industry, where it is utilized in various forms in the
manufacture of candles, coal-tar colours, &c. Frequently an agitator,
passing through a stuffing-box, is fitted so that the contents may be
stirred, and renewable linings are provided in cases where the substances
under treatment exert a corrosive action on metal.
AUTOCRACY (Gr. [Greek: autokrateia], absolute power), a term applied to
that form of government which is absolute or irresponsible, and vested in
one single person. It is a type of government usually found amongst eastern
peoples; amongst more civilized nations the only example is that of Russia,
where the sovereign assumes as a title "the autocrat of all the Russias."
AUTO-DA-FE, more correctly AUTO-DE-FE (act of faith), the name of the
ceremony during the course of which the sentences of the Spanish
inquisition were read and executed. The auto-da-fe was almost identical
with the _sermo generalis_ of the medieval inquisition. It never took place
on a feast day of the church, but on some famous anniversary: the accession
of a Spanish monarch, his marriage, the birth of an infant, &c. It was
public: the king, the royal family, the grand councils of the kingdom, the
court and the people being present. The ceremony comprised a procession in
which the members of the Holy Office, with its familiars and agents, the
condemned persons and the penitents took part; a solemn mass; an oath of
obedience to the inquisition, taken by the king and all the lay
functionaries; a sermon by the Grand Inquisitor; and the reading of the
sentences, either of condemnation or acquittal, delivered by the Holy
Office. The handing over of impenitent persons, and those who had relapsed,
to the secular power, and their punishment, did not usually take place on
the occasion of an auto-da-fe, properly so called. Sometimes those who were
condemned to the flames were burned on the night following the ceremony.
The first great auto-da-fes were celebrated when Thomas de Torquemada, was
at the head of the Spanish inquisition (Seville 1482, Toledo 1486, &c.).
The last, subsequent to the time of Charles III., were held in secret;
moreover, they dealt with only a very small number of sentences, of which
hardly any were capital. The isolated cases of the torturing of a
revolutionary priest in Mexico in 1816, and of a relapsed Jew and of a
Quaker in Spain during 1826, cannot really be considered as auto-da-fes.
(P. A.)
AUTOGAMY (from Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: gamia], marriage), a
botanical term for self-fertilization. (See ANGIOSPERMS.)
AUTOGENY, AUTOGENOUS (Gr. [Greek: autogenes]), spontaneous generation,
self-produced. Haeckel distinguished _autogeny_ and _plasmogeny_, applying
the former term when the formative fluid in which the first living matter
was supposed to arise was inorganic and the latter when it was organic,
_i.e._ contained the requisite fundamental substances dissolved in the form
of complicated and fluid combinations of carbon. In "autogenous soldering"
two pieces of metal are united by the melting of the opposing surfaces,
without the use of a separate fusible alloy or solder as a cementing
material.
AUTOGRAPHS. Autograph (Gr. [Greek: autos], self, [Greek: graphein], to
write) is a term applied by common usage either to a document signed by the
person from whom it emanates, or to one written entirely by the hand of
such person (which, however, is also more technically described as
_holograph_, from [Greek: holos], entire, [Greek: graphein], to write), or
simply to an independent signature.
The existence of autographs must necessarily have been coeval with the
invention of letters. Documents in the handwriting of their composers may
possibly exist among the early papyri of Egypt and the clay tablets of
Babylonia and Assyria, and among the early examples of writing in the East.
But the oriental practice of employing professional scribes in writing the
body of documents and of using seals for the purpose of "signing" (the
"signum" originally meaning the impression of the seal) almost precludes
the idea. When we are told (1 Kings xxi. 8) that Jezebel wrote letters in
Ahab's name and sealed them with his seal, we are, of course, to understand
that the letters were written by the professional scribes and that the
impression of the king's seal was the authentication, equivalent to the
signature of western nations; and again, when King Darius "signed" the
writing and the decree (Dan. vi. 9), he did so with his seal. To find
documents which we can [v.03 p.0046] recognize with certainty to be
autographs, we must descend to the Ptolemaic and Roman periods of Egyptian
history, which are represented by an abundance of papyrus documents of all
kinds, chiefly in Greek. Among them are not a few original letters and
personal documents, in which we may see the handwriting of many lettered
and unlettered individuals who lived during the 3rd century B.C. and in
succeeding times, and which prove how very widespread was the practice of
writing in those days. We owe it to the dry and even atmosphere of Egypt
that these written documents have been preserved in such numbers. On the
other hand, in Italy and Greece ancient writings have perished, save the
few charred papyrus rolls and waxen tablets which have been recovered from
the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii. These tablets, however, have a
special value, for many of them contain autograph signatures of principals
and witnesses to legal deeds to which they were attached, together with
impressions of seals, in compliance with the Roman law which required the
actual subscriptions, or attested marks, of the persons concerned.
But, when we now speak of autographs and autograph collections, we use such
terms in a restricted sense and imply documents or signatures written by
persons of some degree of eminence or notoriety in the various ranks and
professions of life; and naturally the only early autographs in this sense
which could be expected to survive are the subscriptions and signatures of
royal personages and great officials attached to important public deeds,
which from their nature have been more jealously cared for than mere
private documents.
Following the Roman practice, subscriptions and signatures were required in
legal documents in the early centuries of our era. Hence we find them in
the few Latin deeds on papyrus which have come to light in Egypt; we find
them on the well-known Dacian waxen tablets of the 2nd century; and we find
them in the series of papyrus deeds from Ravenna and other places in Italy
between the 5th and 10th centuries. The same practice obtained in the
Frankish empire. The Merovingian kings, or at least those of them who knew
how to write, subscribed their diplomas and great charters with their own
hands; and their great officers of state, chancellors and others,
countersigned in autograph. The unlettered Merovingian kings made use of
monograms composed of the letters of their names; and, curiously, the
illiterate monogram was destined to supersede the literate subscriptions.
For the monogram was adopted by Charlemagne and his successors as a
recognized symbol of their subscription. It was their _signum manuale_,
their sign manual. In courtly imitation of the royal practice, monograms
and other marks were adopted by official personages, even though they could
write. The notarial marks of modern times are a survival of the practice.
By the illiterate other signs, besides the monogram, came to be employed,
such as the cross, &c., as signs manual. The monogram was used by French
monarchs from the reign of Charlemagne to that of Philip the Fair, who died
in 1314. It is very doubtful, however, whether in any instance this sign
manual was actually traced by the monarch's own hand. At the most, the
earlier sovereigns appear to have drawn one or two strokes in their
monograms, which, so far, may be called their autographs. But in the later
period not even this was done; the monogram was entirely the work of the
scribe. (See DIPLOMATIC.)
The employment of marks or signs manual went out of general use after the
12th century, in the course of which the affixing or appending of seals
became the common method of executing deeds. But, as education became more
general and the practice of writing more widely diffused, the usage grew up
in the course of the 14th century of signing the name-signature as well as
of affixing the seal; and by the 15th century it had become established,
and it remains to the present time. Thus the _signum manuale_ had
disappeared, except among notaries; but the term survived, and by a natural
process it was transferred to the signature. In the present day it is used
to designate the "sign manual" or autograph signature of the sovereign.
The Anglo-Saxon kings of England did not sign their charters, their names
being invariably written by the official scribes. After the Norman
conquest, the sign manual, usually a cross, which sometimes accompanied the
name of the sovereign, may in some instances be autograph; but no royal
signature is to be found earlier than the reign of Richard II. Of the
signatures of this king there are two examples, of the years 1386 and 1389,
in the Public Record Office; and there is one, of 1397, in the British
Museum. Of his father, the Black Prince, there is in the Record Office a
motto-signature, _De par Homont_ (high courage), _Ich dene_, subscribed to
a writ of privy seal of 1370. The kings of the Lancastrian line were
apparently ready writers. Of the handwriting of both Henry IV. and Henry V.
there are specimens both in the Record Office and in the British Museum.
But by their time writing had become an ordinary accomplishment.
Apart from the autographs of sovereigns, those of famous men of the early
middle ages can hardly be said to exist, or, if they do exist, they are
difficult to identify. For example, there is a charter at Canterbury
bearing the statement that it was written by Dunstan; but, as there is a
duplicate in the British Museum with the same statement, it is probable
that both the one and the other are copies. The autograph MSS. of the
chronicles of Ordericus Vitalis, of Robert de Monte, and of Sigebert of
Gembloux are in existence; and among the Cottonian MSS. there are
undoubtedly autograph writings of Matthew of Paris, the English chronicler
of Henry III.'s reign. There are certain documents in the British Museum in
the hand of William of Wykeham; and among French archives there are
autograph writings of the historian Joinville. These are a few instances.
When we come to such a collection as the famous Paston Letters, the
correspondence of the Norfolk family of Paston of the 15th century, we find
therein numerous autographs of historical personages of the time.
From the 16th century onward, we enter the period of modern history, and
autograph documents of all kinds become plentiful. And yet in the midst of
this plenty, by a perverse fate, there is in certain instances a remarkable
dearth. The instance of Shakespeare is the most famous. But for three
signatures to the three sheets of his will, and two signatures to the
conveyances of property in Blackfriars, we should be without a vestige of
his handwriting. For certain other signatures, professing to be his,
inscribed in books, may be dismissed as imitations. Such forgeries come up
from time to time, as might be expected, and are placed upon the market.
The Shakespearean forgeries, however, of W. H. Ireland were perpetrated
rather with a literary intent than as an autographic venture.
Had autograph collecting been the fashion in Shakespeare's days, we should
not have had to deplore the loss of his and of other great writers'
autographs. But the taste had not then come into vogue, at least not in
England. The series of autograph documents which were gathered in such a
library as that of Sir Robert Cotton, now in the British Museum, found
their way thither on account of their literary or historic interest, and
not merely as specimens of the handwriting of distinguished men. Such a
series also as that formed by Philippe de Bethune, Comte de Selles et
Charost, and his son, in the reign of Louis XIV., consisting for the most
part of original letters and papers, now in the Bibliotheque Nationale,
might have been regarded as the result of autograph collecting did we not
know that it was brought together for historical purposes. It was in
Germany and the Low Countries that the practice appears to have originated,
chiefly among students and other members of the universities, of collecting
autograph inscriptions and signatures of one's friends in albums, _alba
amicorum_, little oblong pocket volumes of which a considerable number have
survived, a very fair collection being in the British Museum. The earliest
album in the latter series is the Egerton MS. 1178, beginning with an entry
of the year 1554. Once the taste was established, the collecting of
autographs of living persons was naturally extended to those of former
times; and many collections, famous in their day, have been formed, but in
most instances only to be dispersed again as the owners tired of their
fancy or as their heirs failed to inherit their tastes along with their
[v.03 p.0047] possessions. The most celebrated collection formed in England
in recent years is that of the late Mr Alfred Morrison, which still remains
intact, and which is well known by means of the sumptuous catalogue, with
its many facsimiles, compiled by the owner.
The rivalry of collectors and the high prices which rare or favourite
autographs realize have naturally given encouragement to the forger. False
letters of popular heroes and of popular authors, of Nelson, of Burns, of
Thackeray, and of others, appear from time to time in the market: in some
instances clever imitations, but more generally too palpably spurious to
deceive any one with experience. Like the Shakespearean forgeries of
Ireland, referred to above, the forgeries of Chatterton were literary
inventions; and both were poor performances. One of the cleverest frauds of
this nature in modern times was the fabrication, in the middle of the 19th
century, of a series of letters of Byron and Shelley, with postmarks and
seals complete, which were even published as _bona fide_ documents (Brit.
Mus., Add. MS. 19,377).
There are many published collections of facsimiles of autographs of
different nations. Among those published in England the following may be
named:--_British Autography_, by J. Thane (1788-1793, with supplement by
Daniell, 1854); _Autographs of Royal, Noble, Learned and Remarkable
Personages in English History_, by J. G. Nichols (1829); _Facsimiles of
Original Documents of Eminent Literary Characters_, by C. J. Smith (1852);
_Autographs of the Kings and Queens and Eminent Men of Great Britain_, by
J. Netherclift (1835); _One Hundred Characteristic Autograph Letters_, by
J. Netherclift and Son (1849); _The Autograph Miscellany_, by F.
Netherclift (1855); _The Autograph Souvenir_, by F. G. Netherclift and R.
Sims (1865); _The Autographic Mirror_ (1864-1866); _The Handbook of
Autographs_, by F. G. Netherclift (1862); _The Autograph Album_, by L. B.
Phillips (1866); _Facsimiles of Autographs_ (British Museum publication),
five series (1896-1900). Facsimiles of autographs also appear in the
official publications, _Facsimiles of National MSS., from William the
Conqueror to Queen Anne_ (Master of the Rolls), 1865-1868; _Facsimiles of
National MSS. of Scotland_ (Lord Clerk Register), 1867-1871; and
_Facsimiles of National MSS. of Ireland_ (Public Record Office, Ireland),
1874-1884.
(E. M. T.)
AUTOLYCUS, in Greek mythology, the son of Hermes and father of Anticleia,
mother of Odysseus. He lived at the foot of Mount Parnassus, and was famous
as a thief and swindler. On one occasion he met his match. Sisyphus, who
had lost some cattle, suspected Autolycus of being the thief, but was
unable to bring it home to him, since he possessed the power of changing
everything that was touched by his hands. Sisyphus accordingly burnt his
name into the hoofs of his cattle, and, during a visit to Autolycus,
recognized his property. It is said that on this occasion Sisyphus seduced
Autolycus's daughter Anticleia, and that Odysseus was really the son of
Sisyphus, not of Laertes, whom Anticleia afterwards married. The object of
the story is to establish the close connexion between Hermes, the god of
theft and cunning, and the three persons--Sisyphus, Odysseus,
Autolycus--who are the incarnate representations of these practices.
Autolycus is also said to have instructed Heracles in the art of wrestling,
and to have taken part in the Argonautic expedition.
_Iliad_, x. 267; _Odyssey_, xix. 395; Ovid, _Metam._ xi. 313; Apollodorus
i. 9; Hyginus, _Fab._ 201.
AUTOLYCUS OF PITANE, Greek mathematician and astronomer, probably
flourished in the second half of the 4th century B.C., since he is said to
have instructed Arcesilaus. His extant works consist of two treatises; the
one, [Greek: Peri kinoumenes sphairas], contains some simple propositions
on the motion of the sphere, the other, [Greek: Peri epitolon kai duseon],
in two books, discusses the rising and setting of the fixed stars. The
former treatise is historically interesting for the light it throws on the
development which the geometry of the sphere had already reached even
before Autolycus and Euclid (see THEODOSIUS OF TRIPOLIS).
There are several Latin versions of Autolycus, a French translation by
Forcadel (1572), and an admirable edition of the Greek text with Latin
translation by F. Hultsch (Leipzig, 1885).
AUTOMATIC WRITING, the name given by students of psychical research to
writing performed without the volition of the agent. The writing may also
take place without any consciousness of the words written; but some
automatists are aware of the word which they are actually writing, and
perhaps of two or three words on either side, though there is rarely any
clear perception of the meaning of the whole. Automatic writing may take
place when the agent is in a state of trance, spontaneous or induced, in
hystero-epilepsy or other morbid states; or in a condition not
distinguishable from normal wakefulness. Automatic writing has played an
important part in the history of modern spiritualism. The phenomenon first
appeared on a large scale in the early days (_c._ 1850-1860) of the
movement in America. Numerous writings are reported at that period, many of
considerable length, which purported for the most part to have been
produced under spirit guidance. Some of these were written in "unknown
tongues." Of those which were published the most notable are Andrew J.
Davis's _Great Harmonia_, Charles Linton's _The Healing of the Nations_,
and J. Murray Spear's _Messages from the Spirit Life_.
In England also the early spiritualist newspapers were filled with
"inspirational" writing,--_Pages of Ike Paraclete_, &c. The most notable
series of English automatic writings are the _Spirit Teachings_ of the Rev.
W. Stainton Moses. The phenomenon, of course, lends itself to deception,
but there seems no reason to doubt that in the great majority of the cases
recorded the writing was in reality produced without deliberate volition.
In the earlier years of the spiritualist movement, a "planchette," a little
heart-shaped board running on wheels, was employed to facilitate the
process of writing.
Of late years, whilst the theory of external inspiration as the cause of
the phenomenon has been generally discredited, automatic writing has been
largely employed as a method of experimentally investigating subconscious
mental processes. Knowledge which had lapsed from the primary consciousness
is frequently revealed by this means; _e.g._ forgotten fragments of poetry
or foreign languages are occasionally given. An experimental parallel to
this reproduction of forgotten knowledge was devised by Edmund Gurney. He
showed that information communicated to a subject in the hypnotic trance
could be subsequently reproduced through the handwriting, whilst the
attention of the subject was fully employed in conversing or reading aloud;
or an arithmetical problem which had been set during the trance could be
worked out under similar conditions without the apparent consciousness of
the subject.
Automatic writing for the most part, no doubt, brings to the surface only
the debris of lapsed memories and half-formed impressions which have never
reached the focus of consciousness--the stuff that dreams are made of. But
there are indications in some cases of something more than this. In some
spontaneous instances the writing produces anagrams, puns, nonsense verses
and occasional blasphemies or obscenities; and otherwise exhibits
characteristics markedly divergent from those of the normal consciousness.
In the well-known case recorded by Th. Flournoy (_Des Indes a la planete
Mars_) the automatist produced writing in an unknown character, which
purported to be the Martian language. The writing generally resembles the
ordinary handwriting of the agent, but there are sometimes marked
differences, and the same automatist may employ two or three distinct
handwritings. Occasionally imitations are produced of the handwriting of
other persons, living or dead. Not infrequently the writing is reversed, so
that it can be read only in a looking-glass (_Spiegelschrift_); the ability
to produce such writing is often associated with the liability to
spontaneous somnambulism. The hand and arm are often insensible in the act
of writing. There are some cases on record in which the automatist has
seemed to guide his hand not by sight, but by some special extension of the
muscular sense (Carpenter, _Mental Physiology_, s. 128; W. James,
_Proceedings American S.P.R_. p. 554).
Automatic writing frequently exhibits indications of telepathy. The most
remarkable series of automatic writings recorded in this connexion are
those executed by the American medium, Mrs Piper, in a state of trance
(_Proceedings S.P.R._). These writings appear to exhibit remarkable
telepathic powers, and are thought by some to indicate communication with
the spirits of the dead.
[v.03 p.0048] The opportunities afforded by automatic writing for
communicating with subconscious strata of the personality have been made
use of by Pierre Janet and others in cases of hystero-epilepsy, and other
forms of dissociation of consciousness. A patient in an attack of
hysterical convulsions, to whom oral appeals are made in vain, can
sometimes be induced to answer in writing questions addressed to the hand,
and thus to reveal the secret of the malady or to accept therapeutic
suggestions.
See Edmonds and Dexter, _Spiritualism_ (New York, 1853); Epes Sargent,
_Planchette, the Despair of Science_ (Boston, U.S.A., 1869); Mrs de Morgan,
_From Matter to Spirit_ (London, 1863); W. Stainton Moses, _Spirit
Teachings_ (London, 1883); _Proceedings S.P R. passim_; Th. Flournoy, _Des
Indes a la planete Mars_ (Geneva, 1900); F. Podmore, _Modern Spiritualism_
(London, 1902); F. W. H. Myers, _Human Personality_ (London, 1903); Pierre
Janet, _L'Automatisme psychologique_ (2nd ed., Paris, 1894); Morton Prince,
_The Dissociation of a Personality_ (London, 1906).
(F. P.)
AUTOMATISM. In philosophical terminology this word is used in two main
senses: (1) in ethics, for the view that man is not responsible for his
actions, which have, therefore, no moral value; (2) in psychology, for all
actions which are not the result of conation or conscious endeavour.
Certain actions being admittedly automatic, Descartes maintained that, in
regard of the lower animals, all action is purely mechanical. The same
theory has since been applied to man, with this difference that,
accompanying the mechanical phenomena of action, and entirely disconnected
with it, are the phenomena of consciousness. Thus certain physical changes
in the brain result in a given action; the concomitant mental desire or
volition is in no sense causally connected with, or prior to, the physical
change. This theory, which has been maintained by T. Huxley (_Science and
Culture_) and Shadworth Hodgson (_Metaphysic of Experience and Theory of
Practice_), must be distinguished from that of the psychophysical
parallelism, or the "double aspect theory" according to which both the
mental state and the physical phenomena result from a so-called "mind
stuff," or single substance, the material or cause of both.
Automatic acts are of two main kinds. Where the action goes on while the
attention is focused on entirely different subjects (_e.g._ in cycling), it
is purely automatic. On the other hand, if the attention is fixed on the
end or on any particular part of a given action, and the other component
parts of the action are performed unconsciously, the automatism may be
called relative.
See G. F. Stout, _Anal. Psych_, i. 258 foll.; Win. James, _Princ. of
Psych._ i. chap. 5; also the articles PSYCHOLOGY, SUGGESTION, &c.
_Sensory Automatism_ is the term given by students of psychical research to
a centrally initiated hallucination. Such hallucinations are commonly
provoked by crystal-gazing (_q.v._), but auditory hallucinations may be
caused by the use of a shell (shell-hearing), and the other senses are
occasionally affected.
_Motor Automatism_, on the other hand, is a non-reflex movement of a
voluntary muscle, executed in the waking state but not controlled by the
ordinary waking consciousness. Phenomena of this kind play a large part in
primitive ceremonies of divination (_q.v._) and in our own day furnish much
of the material of Psychical Research. At the lowest level we have vague
movements of large groups of muscles, as in "bier-divination," where the
murderer or his residence is inferred from the actions of the bearers; of a
similar character but combined with more specialized action are many kinds
of witch seeking. These more specialized actions are most typically seen in
the Divining Rod (_q.v._; see also TABLE-TURNING), which indicates the
presence of water and is used among the uncivilized to trace criminals. At
a higher stage still we have the delicate movements necessary for Automatic
Writing (_q.v._) or Drawing. A parallel case to Automatic Writing is the
action of the speech centres, resulting in the production of all kinds of
utterances from trance speeches in the ordinary language of the speaker to
mere unintelligible babblings. An interesting form of speech automatism is
known as Glossolalia; in the typical case of Helene Smith, Th. Flournoy has
shown that these utterances may reach a higher plane and form a real
language, which is, however, based on one already known to the speaker.
See _Man_ (1904), No. 68; _Folklore_, xiii. 134; Myers in _Proc. S.P.R._
ix. 26, xii. 277, xv. 403; Flournoy, _Des Indes a la planete Mars_ and in
_Arch. de Psychologie_; Myers, _Human Personality_.
(N. W. T.)
AUTOMATON (from [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: mao], to seize), a
self-moving machine, or one in which the principle of motion is contained
within the mechanism itself. According to this description, clocks, watches
and all machines of a similar kind, are automata, but the word is generally
applied to contrivances which simulate for a time the motions of animal
life. If the human figure and actions be represented, the automaton has
sometimes been called specially an _androides_. We have very early notices
of the construction of automata, _e.g._ the tripods of Vulcan, and the
moving figures of Daedalus. In 400 B.C., Archytas of Tarentum is said to
have made a wooden pigeon that could fly, and during the middle ages
numerous instances of the construction of automata are recorded.
Regiomontanus is said to have made of iron a fly, which would flutter round
the room and return to his hand, and also an eagle, which flew before the
emperor Maximilian when he was entering Nuremberg. Roger Bacon is said to
have forged a brazen head which spoke, and Albertus Magnus to have had an
androides, which acted as doorkeeper, and was broken to pieces by Aquinas.
Of these, as of some later instances, _e.g._ the figure constructed by
Descartes and the automata exhibited by Dr Camus, not much is accurately
known. But in the 18th century, Jacques de Vaucanson, the celebrated
mechanician, exhibited three admirable figures,--the flute-player, the
tambourine-player, and the duck, which was capable of eating, drinking, and
imitating exactly the natural voice of that fowl. The means by which these
results had been produced were clearly seen, and a great impulse was given
to the construction of similar figures. Knauss exhibited at Vienna an
automaton which wrote; a father and son named Droz constructed several
ingenious mechanical figures which wrote and played music; Frederick
Kaufmann and Leonard Maelzel made automatic trumpeters who could play
several marches. The Swiss have always been celebrated for their mechanical
ingenuity, and they construct most of the curious toys, such as flying and
singing birds, which are frequently met with in industrial exhibitions. The
greatest difficulty has generally been experienced in devising any
mechanism which shall successfully simulate the human voice (not to be
compared with the gramophone, which reproduces mechanically a real voice).
No attempt has been thoroughly successful, though many have been made. A
figure exhibited by Fabermann of Vienna remains the best. Kempelen's famous
chess-player for many years astonished and puzzled Europe. This figure,
however, was no true automaton, although the mechanical contrivances for
concealing the real performer and giving effect to his desired movements
were exceedingly ingenious. J. N. Maskelyne, in more recent times
(1875-1880), has been prominent in exhibiting his automata, Psycho (who
played cards) and Zoe (who drew pictures), at the Egyptian Hall, London,
but the secret of these contrivances was well kept. (See CONJURING.)
AUTOMORPHISM (from Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: morphe], form),
the conception and interpretation of other people's habits and ideas on the
analogy of one's own.
AUTONOMY (Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: nomos], law), in general,
freedom from external restraint, self-government. The term is usually
coupled with a qualifying adjective. Thus, political autonomy is
self-government in its widest sense, independence of all control from
without. Local autonomy is a freedom of self-government within a sphere
marked out by some superior authority; _e.g._ municipal corporations in
England have their administrative powers marked out for them by acts of
parliament, and in so far as they govern themselves within these limits
exercise local autonomy. Administrative or constitutional autonomy, such as
exists in the British colonies, implies an extent of self-government which
falls short only of complete independence. The term is used loosely even in
the case of _e.g._ religious bodies, individual churches and other
communities [v.03 p.0049] which enjoy a measure of self-government in
certain specified respects.
In philosophy, the term (with its antithesis "heteronomy") was applied by
Kant to that aspect of the rational will in which, _qua_ rational, it is a
law to itself, independently alike of any external authority, of the
results of experience and of the impulses of pleasure and pain. In the
sphere of morals, the ultimate and only authority which the mind can
recognize is the law which emerges from the pure moral consciousness. This
is the only sense in which moral freedom can be understood. (See ETHICS;
KANT.) Though the term "autonomy" in its fullest sense implies entire
freedom from causal necessity, it can also be used even in determinist
theories for relative independence of particular conditions, theological or
conventional.
AUTOPSY (Gr. [Greek: autos], self, and [Greek: opsis], sight,
investigation), a personal examination, specifically a _post-mortem_
("after death") examination of a dead body, to ascertain the cause of
death, &c. The term "necropsy" (Gr. [Greek: nekros], corpse) is sometimes
used in this sense. (See CORONER and MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE.)
AUTRAN, JOSEPH (1813-1877), French poet, was born at Marseilles on the 20th
of June 1813. In 1832 he addressed an ode to Lamartine, who was then at
Marseilles on his way to the East. The elder poet persuaded the young man's
father to allow him to follow his poetic bent, and Autran remained from
that time a faithful disciple of Lamartine. His best known work is _La Mer_
(1835), remodelled in 1852 as _Les Poemes de la mer. Ludibria ventis_
(1838) followed, and the success of these two volumes gained for Autran the
librarianship of his native town. His other most important work is his _Vie
rurale_ (1856), a series of pictures of peasant life. The Algerian
campaigns inspired him with verses in honour of the common soldier.
_Milianah_ (1842) describes the heroic defence of that town, and in the
same vein is his _Laboureurs et soldats_ (1854). Among his other works are
the _Paroles de Salomon_ (1868), _Epitres rustiques_ (1861), _Sonnets
capricieux_, and a tragedy played with great success at the Odeon in 1848,
_La Fille d'Eschyle_. A definitive edition of his works was brought out
between 1875 and 1881. He became a member of the French Academy in 1868,
and died at Marseilles on the 6th of March 1877.
AUTUN, a town of east-central France, capital of an arrondissement in the
department of Saone-et-Loire, 62 m. S.W. of Dijon on the Paris-Lyon railway
to Nevers. Pop. (1906) 11,927. Autun is pleasantly situated on the slope of
a hill at the foot of which runs the Arroux. Its former greatness is
attested by many Roman remains, the chief of which are two well-preserved
stone gateways, the Porte d' Arroux and the Porte St Andre, both pierced
with four archways and surmounted by arcades. There are also remains of the
old ramparts and aqueducts, of a square tower called the Temple of Janus,
of a theatre and of an amphitheatre. A pyramid in the neighbouring village
of Couhard was probably a sepulchral monument. The chapel of St Nicolas
(12th century) contains many of the remains discovered at Autun. The
cathedral of St Lazare, once the chapel attached to the residence of the
dukes of Burgundy, is in the highest part of the town. It belongs mainly to
the 12th century, but the Gothic central tower and the chapels were added
in the 15th century by Nicolas Rolin, chancellor of Burgundy, born at
Autun. The chief artistic features of the church are the group of the Last
Judgment sculptured on the tympanum above the west door, and the painting
by Ingres representing the martyrdom of St Symphorien, which took place at
Autun in 179. In the cathedral square stands the fountain of St Lazare, a
work of the Renaissance. The hotel Rolin, a house of the 15th century,
contains the collections of the "Aeduan literary and scientific society."
The hotel de ville, containing a museum of paintings, the law-court and the
theatre are modern buildings. Autun is the seat of a bishopric, of
tribunals of first instance and of commerce, and has an ecclesiastical
seminary, a communal college and a cavalry school. Among the industries of
the town are the extraction of oil from the bituminous schist obtained in
the neighbourhood, leather manufacture, metal-founding, marble-working, and
the manufacture of machinery and furniture. Autun is the commercial centre
for a large part of the Morvan, and has considerable trade in timber and
cattle.
Autun (_Augustodunum_) succeeded Bibracte as capital of the Aedui when Gaul
was reorganized by Augustus. Under the Romans, it was a flourishing town,
covering double its present extent and renowned for its schools of
rhetoric. In the succeeding centuries its prosperity drew upon it the
attacks of the barbarians, the Saracens and the Normans. The counts of
Autun in 880 became dukes of Burgundy, and the town was the residence of
the latter till 1276. It was ravaged by the English in 1379, and, in 1591,
owing to its support of the League, had to sustain a siege conducted by
Marshal Jean d'Aumont, general of Henry IV.
See H. de Fontenay, _Autun et ses monuments_ (Autun, 1889).
AUTUNITE, or CALCO-URANITE, a mineral which is one of the "uranium micas,"
differing from the more commonly occurring torbernite (_q.v._) or
cupro-uranite in containing calcium in place of copper. It is a hydrous
uranium and calcium phosphate, Ca(UO_2)_2(PO_4)_2 + 8(or 12)H_2O. Though
closely resembling the tetragonal torbernite in form, it crystallizes in
the orthorhombic system and is optically biaxial. The crystals have the
shape of thin plates with very nearly square outline (89deg 17' instead of
90deg). An important character is the perfect micaceous cleavage parallel
to the basal plane, on which plane the lustre is pearly. The colour is
sulphur-yellow, and this enables the mineral to be distinguished at a
glance from the emerald-green torbernite. Hardness 2-2 1/2; specific
gravity 3.05-3.19. Autunite is usually found with pitchblende and other
uranium minerals, or with ores of silver, tin and iron; it sometimes coats
joint-planes in gneiss and pegmatite. Falkenstein in Saxony, St Symphorien
near Autun (hence the name of the species), and St Day in Cornwall are
well-known localities for this mineral.
(L. J. S.)
AUVERGNE, formerly a province of France, corresponding to the departments
of Cantal and Puy-de-Dome, with the arrondissement of Brioude in
Haute-Loire. It contains many mountains volcanic in origin (Plomb du
Cantal, Puy de Dome, Mont Dore), fertile valleys such as that of Limagne,
vast pasture-lands, and numerous medicinal springs. Up to the present day
the population retains strongly-marked Celtic characteristics. In the time
of Caesar the _Arverni_ were a powerful confederation, the Arvernian
Vercingetorix being the most famous of the Gallic chieftains who fought
against the Romans. Under the empire _Arvernia_ formed part of _Prima
Aquitania_, and the district shared in the fortunes of Aquitaine during the
Merovingian and Carolingian periods. Auvergne was the seat of a separate
countship before the end of the 8th century; the first hereditary count was
William the Pious (886). By the marriage of Eleanor of Aquitaine with Henry
Plantagenet, the countship passed under the suzerainty of the kings of
England, but at the same time it was divided, William VII., called the
Young (1145-1168), having been despoiled of a portion of his domain by his
uncle William VIII., called the Old, who was supported by Henry II. of
England, so that he only retained the region bounded by the Allier and the
Coux. It is this district that from the end of the 13th century was called
the _Dauphine d'Auvergne_. This family quarrel occasioned the intervention
of Philip Augustus, king of France, who succeeded in possessing himself of
a large part of the country, which was annexed to the royal domains under
the name of _Terre d'Auvergne_. As the price of his concurrence with the
king in this matter, the bishop of Clermont, Robert I. (1195-1227), was
granted the lordship of the town of Clermont, which subsequently became a
countship. Such was the origin of the four great historic lordships of
Auvergne. The _Terre d'Auvergne_ was first an appanage of Count Alphonse of
Poitiers (1241-1271), and in 1360 was erected into a duchy in the peerage
of France (duche-pairie) by King John II. in favour of his son John,
through whose daughter the new title passed in 1416 to the house of
Bourbon. The last duke, the celebrated constable Charles of Bourbon, united
the domains of the _Dauphine_ to those of the [v.03 p.0050] duchy, but all
were confiscated by the crown in consequence of the sentence which punished
the constable's treason in 1527. The countship, however, had passed in 1422
to the house of La Tour, and was not annexed to the domain until 1615. The
administration of the royal province of Auvergne was organized under Louis
XIV. At the time of the revolution it formed what was called a
"government," with two divisions: Upper Auvergne (Aurillac), and Lower
Auvergne (Clermont).
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Baluze, _Histoire genealogique de la maison d'Auvergne_
(1708); Andre Imberdis, _Histoire generale de l'Auvergne_ (1867); J. B. M.
Bielawski, _Histoire de la comte d'Auvergne et de sa capitale Vic-le-Comte_
(1868); B. Gonot, _Catalogue des ouvrages imprimes et manuscrits concernant
l'Auvergne_ (1849). See further Chevalier, _Repertoire des sources hist.,
Topobibliographie_, s.v.
AUXANOMETER (Gr. [Greek: auxanein], to increase, [Greek: metron], measure),
an apparatus for measuring increase or rate of growth in plants.
AUXENTIUS (fl. _c._ 370), of Cappadocia, an Arian theologian of some
eminence (see ARIUS). When Constantine deposed the orthodox bishops who
resisted, Auxentius was installed into the seat of Dionysius, bishop of
Milan, and came to be regarded as the great opponent of the Nicene doctrine
in the West. So prominent did he become, that he was specially mentioned by
name in the condemnatory decree of the synod which Damasus, bishop of Rome,
urged by Athanasius, convened in defence of the Nicene doctrine (A.D. 369).
When the orthodox emperor Valentinian ascended the throne, Auxentius was
left undisturbed in his diocese, but his theological doctrines were
publicly attacked by Hilary of Poitiers.
The chief source of information about him is the _Liber contra Auxentium_
in the Benedictine edition of the works of Hilary.
AUXERRE, a town of central France, capital of the department of Yonne, 38
m. S.S.E. of Sens on the Paris-Lyon railway, between Laroche and Nevers.
Pop. (1906) 16,971. It is situated on the slopes and the summit of an
eminence on the left bank of the Yonne, which is crossed by two bridges
leading to suburbs on the right bank. The town is irregularly built and its
streets are steep and narrow, but it is surrounded by wide tree-lined
boulevards, which have replaced the ancient fortifications, and has some
fine churches. That of St Etienne, formerly the cathedral, is a majestic
Gothic building of the 13th to the 16th centuries. It is entered by three
richly sculptured portals, over the middle and largest of which is a rose
window; over the north portal rises a massive tower, but that which should
surmount the south portal is unfinished. The lateral entrances are
sheltered by tympana and arches profusely decorated with statuettes. The
plan consists of a nave, with aisles and lateral chapels, transept and
choir, with a deambulatory at a slightly lower level. Beneath the choir,
which is a fine example of early Gothic architecture, extends a crypt of
the 11th century with mural paintings of the 12th century. The church has
some fine stained glass and many pictures and other works of art. The
ancient episcopal palace, now used as prefecture, stands behind the
cathedral; it preserves a Romanesque gallery of the 12th century. The
church of St Eusebe belongs to the 12th, 13th and 16th centuries. Of the
abbey church of St Germain, built in the 13th and 14th centuries, most of
the nave has disappeared, so that its imposing Romanesque tower stands
apart from it; crypts of the 9th century contain the tombs of bishops of
Auxerre. The abbey was once fortified and a high wall and cylindrical tower
remain. The buildings (18th century) are partly occupied by a hospital and
a training college. The church of St Pierre, in the Renaissance style of
the 16th and 17th centuries, is conspicuous for the elaborate ornamentation
of its west facade. The old law-court contains the museum, with a
collection of antiquities and paintings, and a library. In the middle of
the town is a gateway surmounted by a belfry, dating from the 15th century.
Auxerre has statues of Marshal Davout, J. B. J. Fourier and Paul Bert, the
two latter natives of the town. The town is the seat of a court of assizes
and has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, and a branch of the
Bank of France. A lycee for girls, a communal college and training colleges
are among its educational establishments. Manufactures of ochre, of which
there are quarries in the vicinity, and of iron goods are carried on. The
canal of Nivernais reaches as far as Auxerre, which has a busy port and
carries on boat-building. Trade is principally in the choice wine of the
surrounding vineyards, and in timber and coal.
Auxerre (_Autessiodurum_) became the seat of a bishop and a civitas in the
3rd century. Under the Merovingian kings the abbey of St Germain, named
after the 6th bishop, was founded, and in the 9th century its schools had
made the town a seat of learning. The bishopric was suppressed in 1790.
The countship of Auxerre was granted by King Robert I. to his son-in-law
Renaud, count of Nevers. It remained in the house of Nevers until 1184,
when it passed by marriage to that of Courtenay. Other alliances
transferred it successively to the families of Donzy, Chatillon, Bourbon
and Burgundy. Alice of Burgundy, countess of Auxerre, married John of
Chalons (d. 1309), and several counts of Auxerre belonging to the house of
Chalons distinguished themselves in the wars against the English during the
14th century. John II., count of Auxerre, was killed at the battle of Crecy
(1346), and his grandson, John IV., sold his countship to King Charles V.
in 1370.
AUXILIARY (from Lat. _auxilium_, help), that which gives aid or support;
the term is used in grammar of a verb which completes the tense, mood or
voice of another verb; in engineering, _e.g._ of the low steam power used
to supplement the sail-power in sailing ships, still occasionally used in
yachts, sealers or whalers; and in military use, of foreign or allied
troops, more properly of any troops not permanently maintained under arms.
In the British army the term "Auxiliary Forces" was employed formerly to
include the Militia, the Imperial Yeomanry and the Volunteers.
AUXIMUM (mod. _Osimo_), an ancient town in Picenum, situated on an isolated
hill 8 m. from the Adriatic, on the road from Ancona to Nuceria. It was
selected by the Romans as a fortress to protect their settlements in
northern Picenum, and strongly fortified in 174 B.C. The walls erected at
that period, of large rectangular blocks of stone, still exist in great
part. Auximum became a colony at latest in 157 B.C. It often appears in the
history of the civil wars, owing to its strong position. Pompey was its
patron, and intended that Caesar should find resistance here in 49 B.C. It
appears to have been a place of some importance in imperial times, as
inscriptions and the monuments of its forum (the present piazza) show. In
the 6th century it is called by Procopius the chief town of Picenum, Ancona
being spoken of as its harbour.
(T. AS.)
AUXONNE, a town of eastern France, in the department of Cote d'Or, 19 m.
E.S.E. of Dijon on the Paris-Lyon railway to Belfort. Pop. (1906) 2766
(town); 6307 (commune). Auxonne is a quiet town situated in a wide plain on
the left bank of the Saone. It preserves remains of ramparts, a stronghold
of the 16th century flanked by cylindrical towers, and a sculptured gateway
of the 15th century. Vauban restored these works in the latter half of the
17th century, and built the arsenal now used as a market. The church of
Notre-Dame dates from the 14th century. Of the two towers surmounting its
triple porch only that to the south is finished. A lofty spire rises above
a third tower over the crossing. The hotel de ville (15th century) and some
houses of the Renaissance period are also of architectural interest. A
statue of Napoleon I. as a sub-lieutenant commemorates his sojourns in the
town from 1788 to 1791. Auxonne has a tribunal of commerce and a communal
college. Its industries are unimportant, but it has a large trade in the
vegetables produced by the numerous market gardens in the vicinity.
Auxonne, the name of which is derived from its position on the Saone (_ad
Sonam_), was in the middle ages chief place of a countship, which in the
first half of the 13th century passed to the dukes of Burgundy. The town
received a charter in 1229 and derived some importance from the mint which
the dukes of Burgundy founded in it. It was invested by the allies in 1814,
and surrendered to an Austrian force in the following year.
AVA, the ancient capital of the Burman empire, now a subdivision of the
Sagaing district in the Sagaing division of Upper Burma. It is situated on
the Irrawaddy on the opposite [v.03 p.0051] bank to Sagaing, with which it
was amalgamated in 1889. Amarapura, another ancient capital, lies 5 m. to
the north-east of Ava, and Mandalay, the present capital, 6 m. to the
north. The classical name of Ava is Yadanapura, "the city of precious
gems." It was founded by Thadomin Pay[=a] in A.D. 1364 as successor to
Pagan, and the religious buildings of Pagan were to a certain extent
reproduced here, although on nothing like the same scale as regards either
size or splendour. It remained the seat of government for about four
centuries with a succession of thirty kings. In 1782 a new capital,
Amarapura, was founded by Bodaw Pay[=a], but was deserted again in favour
of Ava by King Baggidaw in 1823. On his deposition by King Tharawaddi in
1837, the capital reverted to Amarapura; but finally in 1860 the last
capital of Mandalay was occupied by King Mind[=o]n. For picturesque beauty
Ava is unequalled in Burma, but it is now more like a park than the site of
an old capital. Traces of the great council chamber and various portions of
the royal palace are still visible, but otherwise the secular buildings are
completely destroyed; and most of the religious edifices are also
dilapidated.
AVAD[=A]NA, the name given to a type of Buddhist romance literature
represented by a large number of Sanskrit (Nepalese) collections, of which
the chief are the Avad[=a]nasataka (Century of Legends), and the
Divy[=a]vad[=a]na (The Heavenly Legend). Though of later date than most of
the canonical Buddhist books, they are held in veneration by the orthodox,
and occupy much the same position with regard to Buddhism that the
Pur[=a]nas do towards Brahminism.
AVAHI, the native name of a Malagasy lemur (_Avahis laniger_) nearly allied
to the indri (_q.v._), and the smallest representative of the subfamily
_Indrisinae_, characterized by its woolly coat, and measuring about 28 in.
in length, of which rather more than half is accounted for by the tail.
Unlike the other members of the group, the avahi is nocturnal, and does not
associate in small troops, but is met with either alone or in pairs. Very
slow in its movements, it rarely descends to the ground, but, when it does,
walks upright like the other members of the group. It is found throughout
the forests which clothe the mountains on the east coast of Madagascar, and
also in a limited district on the northwest coast, the specimens from the
latter locality being of smaller size and rather different in colour. The
eastern phase is generally rusty red above, with the inner sides of the
limbs white; while the predominant hue in the western form is usually
yellowish brown. (See PRIMATES.)
(R. L.*)
AVALANCHE (adopted from a French dialectic form, _avalance_, descent), a
mass of snow and ice mingled with earth and stones, which rushes down a
mountain side, carrying everything before it, and producing a strong wind
which uproots trees on each side of its course. Where the supply of snow
exceeds the loss by evaporation the surplus descends the mountain sides,
slowly in the form of glaciers, or suddenly in ice-falls or in avalanches.
A mass of snow may accumulate upon a steep slope and become compacted into
ice by pressure, or remain loosely aggregated. When the foundation gives
way, owing to the loosening effect of spring rains or from any other cause,
the whole mass slides downward. A very small cause will sometimes set a
mass of overloaded snow in motion. Thunder or even a loud shout is said to
produce this effect when the mass is just poised, and Swiss guides often
enjoin absolute silence when crossing dangerous spots.
AVALLON, a town of central France, capital of an arrondissement in the
department of Yonne, 34 m. S.S.E. of Auxerre on a branch of the Paris-Lyon
railway. Pop. (1906) 5197. The town, with wide streets and picturesque
promenades, is finely situated on a promontory, the base of which is washed
on the south by the Cousin, on the east and west by small streams. Its
chief building, the church of St Lazare, dates from the 12th century. The
two western portals are adorned with sculpture in the ornate Romanesque
style; the tower on the left of the facade was rebuilt in the 17th century.
The Tour de L'Horloge, pierced by a gateway through which passes the Grande
Rue, is a 15th century structure containing a museum on its second floor.
Remains of the ancient fortifications, including seven of the flanking
towers, are still to be seen. Avallon has a statue of Vauban, the military
engineer. The public institutions include the subprefecture, a tribunal of
first instance, and a communal college. The manufacture of biscuits and
gingerbread, and of leather and farm implements is carried on, and there is
considerable traffic in wood, wine, and the live-stock and agricultural
produce of the surrounding country.
Avallon (_Aballo_) was in the middle ages the seat of a viscounty dependent
on the duchy of Burgundy, and on the death of Charles the Bold passed under
the royal authority.
AVALON (also written AVALLON, AVOLLON, AVILION and AVELION), in Welsh
mythology the kingdom of the dead, afterwards an earthly paradise in the
western seas, and finally, in the Arthurian romances, the abode of heroes
to which King Arthur was conveyed after his last battle. In Welsh the name
is Ynys yr Afallon, usually interpreted "Isle of Apples," but possibly
connected with the Celtic tradition of a king over the dead named Avalloc
(in Welsh Afallach). If the traditional derivation is correct, the name is
derived from the Welsh _afal_, an apple, and, as no other large fruit was
well known to the races of northern Europe, is probably intended to
symbolize the feasting and enjoyments of elysium. Other forms of the name
are Ynysvitrin and Ynysgutrin, "Isle of Glass"--which appear to be
identical with Glasberg, the Teutonic kingdom of the dead. Perhaps owing to
a confusion between Glasberg or Ynysvitrin and the Anglo-Saxon
Glaestinga-burh, Glastonbury, the name "Isle of Avalon" was given to the
low ridge in central Somersetshire which culminates in Glastonbury Tor,
while Glastonbury itself came to be called Avalon. Attempts have also been
made to identify Avalon with other places in England and Wales.
See _Studies in the Arthurian Legend_, by J. Rhys (Oxford, 1891); also
ARTHUR (KING); ATLANTIS.
AVARAY, a French territorial title belonging to a family some of whose
members have been conspicuous in history. The Bearnaise family named
Besiade moved into the province of Orleanais in the 17th century, and there
acquired the estate of Avaray. In 1667 Theophile de Besiade, marquis
d'Avaray, obtained the office of grand bailiff of Orleans, which was held
by several of his descendants after him. Claude Antoine de Besiade, marquis
d'Avaray, was deputy for the bailliage of Orleans in the states-general of
1789, and proposed a _Declaration of the Duties of Man_ as a pendant to the
_Declaration of the Rights of Man_; he subsequently became a
lieutenant-general in 1814, a peer of France in 1815, and duc d'Avaray in
1818. Antoine Louis Francois, comte d'Avaray, son of the above,
distinguished himself during the Revolution by his devotion to the comte de
Provence, afterwards Louis XVIII., whose emigration he assisted. Having
nominally become king in 1799, that prince created the estate of
Ile-Jourdain a duchy, under the title of Avaray, in favour of the comte
d'Avaray, whom he termed his "liberator."
(M. P.*)
AVARS, or AVARI, an East Caucasian people, the most renowned of the
Lesghian tribes, inhabiting central Daghestan (see LESGHIANS). They are the
only Lesghian tribe who possess a written language, for which they make use
of the Arabic characters. They are often confused with the Avars whose
empire on the Danube was broken by Charlemagne; but Komarov asserts that
they are of more recent origin as a tribe, their name being Lowland Turki
for "vagrant" or "refugee."
AVATAR, a Sanskrit word meaning "descent," specially used in Hindu
mythology (and so in English) to express the incarnation of a deity
visiting the earth for any purpose. The ten Avatars of Vishnu are the most
famous. The Hindus believe he has appeared (1) as a fish, (2) as a
tortoise, (3) as a hog, (4) as a monster, half man half lion, to destroy
the giant Iranian, (5) as a dwarf, (6) as R[=a]ma, (7) again as R[=a]ma for
the purpose of killing the thousand-armed giant Cartasuciriargunan, (8) as
Krishna, (9) as Buddha. They allege that the tenth Avatar has yet to occur
and will be in the form of a white-winged horse (Kalki) who will destroy
the earth.
AVEBURY, JOHN LUBBOCK, 1ST BARON (1834- ), English banker, politician and
naturalist, was born in London [v.03 p.0052] on the 30th of April 1834, the
son of Sir John William Lubbock, 3rd baronet, himself a highly
distinguished man of science. John Lubbock was sent to Eton in 1845; but
three years later was taken into his father's bank, and became a partner at
twenty-two. In 1865 he succeeded to the baronetcy. His love of science kept
pace with his increasing participation in public affairs. He served on
commissions upon coinage and other financial questions; and at the same
time acted as president of the Entomological Society and of the
Anthropological Institute. Early in his career several banking reforms of
great importance were due to his initiative, while such works as
_Prehistoric Times_ (1865) and _The Origin of Civilization_ (1870) were
proceeding from his pen. In 1870, and again in 1874, he was elected a
member of parliament for Maidstone. He lost the seat at the election of
1880; but was at once elected member for London University, of which he had
been vice-chancellor since 1872. He carried numerous enactments in
parliament, including the Bank Holidays Act 1871, and bills dealing with
absconding debtors, shop hours regulations, public libraries, open spaces,
and the preservation of ancient monuments, and he proved himself an
indefatigable and influential member of the Unionist party. A prominent
supporter of the Statistical Society, he took an active part in criticizing
the encroachment of municipal trading and the increase of the municipal
debt. He was elected the first president of the Institute of Bankers in
1879; in 1881 he was president of the British Association, and from 1881 to
1886 president of the Linnaean Society. He received honorary degrees from
the universities of Oxford, Cambridge (where he was Rede lecturer in 1886),
Edinburgh, Dublin and Wuerzburg; and in 1878 was appointed a trustee of the
British Museum. From 1888 to 1892 he was president of the London Chamber of
Commerce; from 1889 to 1890 vice-chairman and from 1890 to 1892 chairman of
the London County Council. During the same period he served on royal
commissions on education and on gold and silver. In 1890 he was appointed a
privy councillor; and was chairman of the committee of design on the new
coinage in 1891. In 1900 he was raised to the peerage, under the title of
Baron Avebury, and he continued to play a leading part in public life, not
only by the weight of his authority on many subjects, but by the readiness
with which he lent his support to movements for the public benefit. Among
other matters he was a prominent advocate of proportional representation.
As an original author and a thoughtful popularizer of natural history and
philosophy he had few rivals in his day, as is evidenced by the number of
editions issued of many of his writings, among which the most widely-read
have been: _The Origin and Metamorphoses of Insects_ (1873), _British Wild
Flowers_ (1875), _Ants, Bees and Wasps_ (1882), _Flowers, Fruit and Leaves_
(1886), _The Pleasures of Life_ (1887), _The Senses, Instincts and
Intelligence of Animals_ (1888), _The Beauties of Nature_ (1892), _The Use
of Life_ (1894).
AVEBURY, a village in the Devizes parliamentary division of Wiltshire,
England, on the river Kennet, 8 m. by road from Marlborough. The fine
church of St James contains an early font with Norman carving, a rich
Norman doorway, a painted reredos, and a beautiful old roodstone in good
preservation. Avebury House is Elizabethan, with a curious stone dovecot.
The village has encroached upon the remains of a huge stone circle (not
quite circular), surrounded by a ditch and rampart of earth, and once
approached by two avenues of monoliths. Within the larger circle were two
smaller ones, placed not in the axis of the great one but on its
north-eastern side, each of which consisted of a double concentric ring of
stones; the centre being in one case a menhir or pillar, in the other a
dolmen or tablestone resting on two uprights. Few traces remain, as the
monoliths have been largely broken up for building purposes. The circle is
the largest specimen of primitive stone monuments in Britain, measuring on
the average 1200 ft. in diameter. The stones are all the native Sarsens
which occur everywhere in the district, and show no evidence of having been
hewn. Those still remaining vary in size from 5 to 20 ft. in height above
ground, and from 3 to 12 ft. in breadth. As in the case of Stonehenge, the
purpose for which the Avebury monument was erected has been the source of
much difference of opinion among antiquaries, Dr Stukely (_Stonehenge a
Temple restored to the British Druids_, 1740) regarding it as a Druidical
temple, while Fergusson (_Rude Stone Monuments_, 1872) believed that it, as
well as Silbury Hill, marks the site of the graves of those who fell in the
last Arthurian battle at Badon Hill (A.D. 520). The majority of
antiquaries, however, see no reason for dissociating its chronological
horizon from that of the numerous other analogous monuments found in Great
Britain, many of which have been shown to be burial places of the Bronze
Age. Excavations were carried out here in 1908, but without throwing any
important new light on the monument.
There are many barrows on the neighbouring downs, besides traces of a
double oval of monoliths on Hackpen hill, and the huge mound of Silbury
Hill. Waden Hill, to the south, has been, like Badbury, identified with
Badon Hill, which was the traditional scene of the twelfth and last great
battle of King Arthur in 520. The Roman road from Winchester to Bath skirts
the south side of Silbury Hill.
At the time of the Domesday Survey, the church of Avebury (Avreberie,
Abury), with two hides attached, was held in chief by Rainbold, a priest,
and was bestowed by Henry III. on the abbot and monks of Cirencester, who
continued to hold it until the reign of Henry VIII. The manor of Avebury
was granted in the reign of Henry I. to the Benedictine monks of St George
of Boucherville in Normandy, and a cell from that abbey was subsequently
established here. In consequence of the war with France in the reign of
Edward III., this manor was annexed by the crown, and was conferred on the
newly founded college of New College, Oxford, together with all the
possessions, spiritual and temporal, of the priory.
AVEIA, an ancient town of the Vestini, on the Via Claudia Nova, 6 m. S.E.
of Aquila, N.E. of the modern village of Fossa. Some remains of ancient
buildings still exist, and the name Aveia still clings to the place. The
identification was first made by V. M. Giovenazzi, _Della Citta di Aveia
ne' Vestini_ (Rome, 1773). Paintings in the church of S. Maria ad Cryptas,
of the 12th to 15th centuries, are important in the history of art. An
inscription of a _stationarius_ of the 3rd century, sent here on special
duty (no doubt for the suppression of brigandage), was found here in 1902
(A. von Domaszewski, _Roem. Mitt._, 1902, 330).
AVEIRO, a seaport, episcopal see, and the capital of an administrative
district, formerly included in the province of Beira, Portugal; on the
river Vouga, and the Lisbon-Oporto railway. Pop. (1900) 9979. Aveiro is
built on the southern shore of a marshy lagoon, containing many small
islands, and measuring about 15 m. from north to south, with an average
breadth of about 1 m. The Barra Nova, an artificial canal about 33 ft.
deep, was constructed between 1801 and 1808, and gives access to the
Atlantic ocean. The local industries include the preparation of sea-salt,
the catching and curing of fish, especially sardines and oysters, and the
gathering of aquatic plants (_molico_). There is also a brisk trade in
wine, oil and fruit; while the Aveiro district contains copper and lead
mines, besides much good pasture-land.
Aveiro is probably the Roman Talabriga. In the 16th century it was the
birthplace of Joao Affonso, one of the first navigators to visit the
fishing-grounds of Newfoundland; and it soon became famous for its fleet of
more than sixty vessels, which sailed yearly to that country, and returned
laden with dried codfish. During the same century the cathedral was built,
and the city was made a duchy. The title "duke of Aveiro" became extinct
when its last holder, Dom Jose Mascarenhas e Lancaster, was burned alive
for high treason, in 1759. The administrative district of Aveiro coincides
with the north-western part of the province of Beira; pop. (1900) 303,169;
area, 1065 sq. m.
AVELLA (anc. _Abella_), a city of Campania, Italy, in the province of
Avellino, 23 m. N.E. of Naples by rail. Pop. (1901) 4107. It is finely
situated in fertile territory and its nuts (_nuces Abellanae_) and fruit
were renowned in Roman days. About 2 m. to the north-east lies Avella
Vecchia, the ancient Abella, regarded [v.03 p.0053] by the ancients as a
Chalcidian colony. An important Oscan inscription relates to a treaty with
Nola, regarding a joint temple of Hercules, attributable to the 2nd century
B.C. Under the early empire it had already become a colony and had perhaps
been one since the time of Sulla. It has remains of the walls of the
citadel and of an amphitheatre, and lay on the road from Nola to Abellinum,
which was here perhaps joined by a branch from Suessula.
See J. Beloch, _Campanien_ (2nd ed., Breslau, 1890), 411 seq.
(T. AS.)
AVELLINO, a city and episcopal see of Campania, Italy, the capital of the
province of Avellino, 1150 ft. above sea-level, 28 m. direct and 59 m. by
rail E.N.E. of Naples, at the foot of Monte Vergine. Pop. (1901) 23,760.
There are ruins of the castle constructed in the 9th or 10th century, in
which the antipope Anacletus II. crowned Count Roger II. king of Sicily and
Apulia. Avellino is the junction of lines to Benevento and Rocchetta S.
Antonio. The name is derived from the ancient Abellinum, the ruins of which
lie 2-1/2 m. north-east, close to the village of Atripalda, and consist of
remains of city walls and an amphitheatre in _opus reticulatum_, _i.e._ of
the early imperial period, when Abellinum appears to have been the chief
place of a tribe, to which belonged also the independent communities of the
_Abellinates cognomine Protropi_ among the Hirpini, and the _Abellinates
cognominati Marsi_ among the Apulians (Nissen, _Italische Landeskunde_, ii.
822). It lay on the boundary of Campania and the territory of the Hirpini,
at the junction of the roads from Nola (and perhaps also from Suessula) and
Salernum to Beneventum.
The Monte Vergine (4165 ft.) lies 4 m. to the N.W. of Avellino; upon the
summit is a sanctuary of the Virgin, founded in 1119, which contains a
miraculous picture attributed to S. Luke (the greatest festival is on the
8th of September). The present church is baroque in style, but contains
some works of art of earlier periods. The important archives have been
transported to Naples.
(T. AS.)
AVEMPACE [Abu Bakr Mu[h.]ammad ibn Ya[h.]ya, known as Ibn B[=a]jja or Ibn
[S.]a'igh, _i.e._ son of the goldsmith, the name being corrupted by the
Latins into Avempace, Avenpace or Aben Pace], the earliest and one of the
most distinguished of the Arab philosophers of Spain. Little is known of
the details of his life. He was born probably at Saragossa towards the
close of the 11th century. According to Ibn Kh[=a]q[=a]n, a contemporary
writer, he became a student of the exact sciences and was also a musician
and a poet. But he was a philosopher as well, and apparently a sceptic. He
is said to have rejected the Koran, to have denied the return to God, and
to have regarded death as the end of existence. But even in that orthodox
age he became vizier to the amir of Murcia. Afterwards he went to Valencia,
then to Saragossa. After the fall of Saragossa (1119) he went to Seville,
then to Xativa, where he is said to have returned to Islam to save his
life. Finally he retired to the Almoravid court at Fez, where he was
poisoned in 1138. Ibn 'Usaibi'a gives a list of twenty-five of his works,
but few of these remain. He had a distinct influence upon Averroes (see
ARABIAN PHILOSOPHY).
For his life see McG. de Slane's trans. of Ibn Khallik[=a]n's _Biographical
Dictionary_ (Paris and London, 1842), vol. iii. pp. 130 ff., and Ibn
'Usaibi'a's biography translated in P. de Gayangos' edition of the _History
of the Mohammedan Dynasties in Spain_, by al-Maqqari (London, 1840), vol.
ii., appendix, p. xii. List of extant works in C. Brockelmann's _Geschichte
der arabischen Litteratur_, vol. i. p. 460. For his philosophy cf. T. J. de
Boer's _The History of Philosophy in Isl[=a]m_ (London, 1903), ch. vi.
(G. W. T.)
AVENARIUS, RICHARD HEINRICH LUDWIG (1843-1896), German philosopher, was
born in Paris on the 19th of November 1843. His education, begun in Zuerich
and Berlin, was completed at the university of Leipzig, where he graduated
in 1876. In 1877 he became professor of philosophy in Zuerich, where he
died on the 18th of August 1896. At Leipzig he was one of the founders of
the _Akademisch-philosophische Verein_, and was the first editor of the
_Vierteljahrsschrift fuer wissenschaftliche Philosophie_. In 1868 he
published an essay on the Pantheism of Spinoza. His chief works are
_Philosophie als Denken der Welt gemaess dem Princip des kleinsten
Kraftmasses_ (1876) and the _Kritik der reinen Erfahrung_ (1888-1890). In
these works he made an attempt to co-ordinate thought and action. Like
Mach, he started from the principle of economy of thinking, and in the
_Kritik_ endeavoured to explain pure experience in relation to knowledge
and environment. He discovers that statements dependent upon environment
constitute pure experience. This philosophy, called Empirio-criticism, is
not, however, a realistic but an idealistic dualism, nor can it be called
materialism.
See Wundt, _Philos. Stud._ xiii. (1897); Carstanjen and Willy in _Zeitsch.
f. wiss. Philos_. xx. (1896), 361 ff.; xx. 57 ff.; xxii. 53 ff.; J.
Petzoldt's _Einfuehrung in d. Philos. d. reinen Erfahrung_ (1900).
AVENGER OF BLOOD, the person, usually the nearest kinsman of the murdered
man, whose duty it was to avenge his death by killing the murderer. In
primitive societies, before the evolution of settled government, or the
uprise of a systematized criminal law, crimes of violence were regarded as
injuries of a personal character to be punished by the sufferer or his
kinsfolk. This right of vengeance was common to most countries, and in many
was the subject of strict regulations and limitations. It was prevented
from running into excesses by the law of sanctuary (_q.v._) and in many
lands the institution of blood-money, and the wergild offered the
wrong-doer a mode of escaping from his enemies' revenge. The Mosaic law
recognized the right of vengeance, but not the money-compensation. The
Koran, on the contrary, while sanctioning the vengeance, also permits
pecuniary commutation for murder.
AVENGERS, or VENDICATORI, a secret society formed about 1186 in Sicily to
avenge popular wrongs. The society was finally suppressed by King William
II., the Norman, who hanged the grand master and branded the members with
hot irons.
AVENTAIL, or AVANTAILLE (O. Fr. _esventail_, presumably from a Latin word
_exventaculum_, air-hole), the mouthpiece of an old-fashioned helmet,
movable to admit the air.
AVENTINUS (1477-1534), the name taken by JOHANN TURMAIR, author of the
_Annales Boiorum_, or _Annals of Bavaria_, from Aventinum, the Latin name
of the town of Abensberg, where he was born on the 4th of July 1477. Having
studied at Ingolstadt, Vienna, Cracow and Paris, he returned to Ingolstadt
in 1507, and in 1509 was appointed tutor to Louis and Ernest, the two
younger sons of Albert the Wise, the late duke of Bavaria-Munich. He
retained this position until 1517, wrote a Latin grammar, and other manuals
for the use of his pupils, and in 1515 travelled in Italy with Ernest.
Encouraged by William IV., duke of Bavaria, he began to write the _Annales
Boiorum_, about 1517, and finishing this book in 1521, undertook a German
version of it, entitled _Bayersche Chronik_, which he completed some years
later. He assisted to found the _Sodalitas litteraria Angilostadensis_,
under the auspices of which several old manuscripts were brought to light.
Although Aventinus did not definitely adopt the reformed faith, he
sympathized with the reformers and their teaching, and showed a strong
dislike for the monks. On this account he.was imprisoned in 1528, but his
friends soon effected his release. The remainder of his life was somewhat
unsettled, and he died at Regensburg on the 9th of January 1534. The
_Annales_, which are in seven books, deal with the history of Bavaria in
conjunction with general history from the earliest times to 1460, and the
author shows a strong sympathy for the Empire in its struggle with the
Papacy. He took immense pains with his work, and to some degree anticipated
the modern scientific method of writing history. The _Annales_ were first
published in 1554, but many important passages were omitted in this
edition, as they reflected on the Roman Catholics. A more complete edition
was published at Basel in 1580 by Nicholas Cisner. Aventinus, who has been
called the "Bavarian Herodotus," wrote other books of minor importance, and
a complete edition of his works was published at Munich (1881-1886). More
recently a new edition (six vols.) has appeared.
See T. Wiedemann, _Johann Turmair gen. Aventinus_ (Freising, 1858); W.
Dittmar, _Aventin_ (Noerdlingen, 1862); J. von Doellinger, _Aventin und
seine Zeit_ (Munich, 1877); S. Riezler, _Zum Schutze der neuesten Edition
von Aventins Annalen_ (Munich, 1886); F. X. von Wegele, _Aventin_ (Bamberg,
1890).
[v.03 p.0054] AVENTURINE, or AVANTURINE, a variety of quartz containing
spangles of mica or scales of iron-oxide, which confer brilliancy on the
stone. It is found chiefly in the Ural Mountains, and is cut for ornamental
purposes at Ekaterinburg. Some of the Siberian aventurine, like that of the
vase given by Nicholas I. to Sir R. Murchison, in 1843, is a micaceous
iron-stained quartz, of but little beauty. Most aventurine is of reddish
brown or yellow colour, but a green variety, containing scales of fuchsite
or chrome-mica, is also known. This green aventurine, highly valued by the
Chinese, is said to occur in the Bellary district in India.
Aventurine felspar, known also as Sun-stone (_q.v._) is found principally
at Tvedestrand in south Norway, and is a variety of oligoclase enclosing
micaceous scales of haematite. Other kinds of felspar, even orthoclase, may
however also show the aventurine appearance. Both plagioclastic and
orthoclastic aventurine occur at several localities in the United States.
The mineral aventurine takes its name from the well-known aventurine-glass
of Venice. This is a reddish brown glass with gold-like spangles, more
brilliant than most of the natural stone. The story runs that this kind of
glass was originally made accidentally at Murano by a workman, who let some
copper filings fall into the molten "metal," whence the product was called
_avventurino_. From the Murano glass the name passed to the mineral, which
displayed a rather similar appearance.
(F. W. R.*)
AVENUE (the past participle feminine of Fr. _avenir_, to come to), a way of
approach; more particularly, the chief entrance-road to a country house,
with rows of trees on each side; the trees themselves are said to form the
avenue. In modern times the word has been much used as a name for streets
in towns, whether with or without trees, such as Fifth Avenue in New York,
or Shaftesbury Avenue in London.
AVENZOAR, or ABUMERON [Ab[=u] Merw[=a]n 'Abdal-Malik ibn Zuhr], Arabian
physician, who flourished at the beginning of the 12th century, was born at
Seville, where he exercised his profession with great reputation. His
ancestors had been celebrated as physicians for several generations, and
his son was afterwards held by the Arabians to be even more eminent in his
profession than Avenzoar himself. He was a contemporary of Averroes, who,
according to Leo Africanus, heard his lectures, and learned physic of him.
He belonged, in many respects, to the _Dogmatists_ or _Rational School_,
rather than to the _Empirics_. He was a great admirer of Galen; and in his
writings he protests emphatically against quackery and the superstitious
remedies of the astrologers. He shows no inconsiderable knowledge of
anatomy in his remarkable description of inflammation and abscess of the
mediastinum in his own person, and its diagnosis from common pleuritis as
well as from abscess and dropsy of the pericardium. In cases of obstruction
or of palsy of the gullet, his three modes of treatment are ingenious. He
proposes to support the strength by placing the patient in a tepid bath of
nutritious liquids, that might enter by cutaneous imbibition, but does not
recommend this. He speaks more favourably of the introduction of food into
the stomach by a silver tube; and he strongly recommends the use of
nutritive enemata. From his writings it would appear that the offices of
physician, surgeon and apothecary were already considered as distinct
professions. He wrote a book entitled _The Method of Preparing Medicines
and Diet_, which was translated into Hebrew in the year 1280, and thence
into Latin by Paravicius, whose version, first printed at Venice, 1490, has
passed through several editions.
AVERAGE, a term found in two main senses. (1) The first, which occurs in
old law, is from a Law-Latin _averagium_, and is connected with the
Domesday Book _avera_, the "day's work which the king's tenants gave to the
sheriff"; it is supposed to be a form of the O. Fr. _ovre_ (_oeuvre_),
work, affected by _aver_, the O. Eng. word for cattle or property, but the
etymology is uncertain. As meaning some form of feudal service rendered by
tenants to their superiors, it survived for a long time in the Scottish
phrase "arriage and carriage," this form of the word being due to a
contraction into "arage." (2) The second word, which represents the modern
usages, is also uncertain in its derivation, but corresponded with the Fr.
_avarie_, and was early spelt "averays," recurring also as "avaria,"
"averia," and meaning a certain tax on goods, and then more precisely in
maritime law any charge additional to "freight" (see AFFREIGHTMENT),
payable by the owner of goods sent by ship. Hence the modern employment of
the term for _particular_ and _general_ average (see below) in marine
insurance. The essential of equitable distribution, involved in this sense,
was transferred to give the word "average" its more colloquial meaning of
an equalization of amount, or medium among various quantities, or nearest
common rate or figure. (For a discussion of the etymology, see the _New
English Dictionary_, especially the concluding note with reference to
authorities.)
_In Shipping._--Average, in modern law, is the term used in maritime
commerce to signify damages or expenses resulting from the accidents of
navigation. Average is either _general_ or _particular_. General average
arises when sacrifices have been made, or expenditures incurred, for the
preservation of the ship, cargo and freight, from some peril of the sea or
from its effects. It implies a subsequent contribution, from all the
parties concerned, rateably to the values of their respective interests, to
make good the loss thus occasioned. Particular average signifies the damage
or partial loss happening to the ship, goods, or freight by some fortuitous
or unavoidable accident. It is borne by the parties to whose property the
misfortune happens or by their insurers. The term average originally meant
what is now distinguished as general average; and the expression
"particular average," although not strictly accurate, came to be afterwards
used for the convenience of distinguishing those damages or partial losses
for which no general contribution could be claimed.
Although nothing can be more simple than the fundamental principle of
general average, that a loss incurred for the advantage of all the
coadventurers should be made good by them all in equitable proportion to
their stakes in the adventure, the application of this principle to the
varied and complicated cases which occur in the course of maritime commerce
has given rise to many diversities of usage at different periods and in
different countries. It is soon discovered that the principle cannot be
applied in any settled or consistent manner unless by the aid of rules of a
technical and sometimes of a seemingly arbitrary character. The difficulty,
which at one time seemed nearly insuperable, of bringing together the rules
in force in the several maritime countries, has been to a large extent
overcome--not by legislation but by framing a set of rules covering the
principal points of difference in such a manner as to satisfy, on the
whole, those who are practically concerned, and to lead them to adopt these
[Sidenote: History of the York-Antwerp rules.] rules in their contracts of
affreightment and contracts of insurance (see INSURANCE: _Marine_). The
honour of the achievement belongs to a small number of men who recognized
the need of uniformity. The work began in May 1860 at the congress held at
Glasgow, under the presidency of Lord Brougham, assisted by Lord Neaves.
Further congresses were held in London (1862), and at York (1864), when a
body of rules known as the "York Rules" was agreed to. There the matter
stood, until it was taken up by the "Association for the Reform and
Codification of the Law of Nations" at conferences held at the Hague
(1875), Bremen (1876) and Antwerp (1877). Some changes were made in the
"York Rules"; and so altered, the body of rules was adopted at the
last-named conference, and was styled the "York and Antwerp (or
York-Antwerp) Rules." The value of these rules was quickly perceived, and
practical use of them followed. But they proved to be insufficient, or
unsatisfactory, on some points; and again, in the autumn of 1890, a
conference on the subject was held, this time at Liverpool, by the same
Association, under the able presidency of Dr F. Sieveking, president of the
Hanseatic High Court of Appeal at Hamburg. Important changes were then
made, carrying further certain departures from English law, already
apparent in the earlier rules, in favour of views prevailing upon the
continent of Europe and in the United States. The new rules were styled the
[v.03 p.0055] York-Antwerp Rules 1890. In practice they quickly displaced
those of 1877; and in 1892, at a conference of the same Association held at
Genoa, it was formally declared that the only international rules of
general average having the sanction and authority of the association were
the York-Antwerp Rules as revised in 1890, and that the original rules were
rescinded. It is this later body of rules which is now known as the
York-Antwerp Rules. Reference is now to be found in most English contracts
of carriage and contracts of insurance, to these rules, as intended to
govern the adjustment of G.A. between the parties; with the result that (so
far as the rules cover the ground) adjustments do not depend upon the law
of the place of destination, and so do not vary according to the
destination, or the place at which the voyage may happen to be broken up,
as used formerly to be the case.
The rules are as follows:--
RULE I.--JETTISON OF DECK CARGO
No jettison of deck cargo shall be made good as G.A.
Every structure not built in with the frame of the vessel shall be
considered to be a part of the deck of the vessel.
RULE II.--DAMAGE BY JETTISON AND SACRIFICE FOR THE COMMON SAFETY
Damage done to a ship and cargo, or either of them, by or in consequence of
a sacrifice made for the common safety, and by water which goes down a
ship's hatches opened, or other opening made for the purpose of making a
jettison for the common safety, shall be made good as G.A.
RULE III.--EXTINGUISHING FIRE ON SHIPBOARD
Damage done to a ship and cargo, or either of them, by water or otherwise,
including damage by beaching or scuttling a burning ship, in extinguishing
a fire on board the ship, shall be made good as G.A.; except that no
compensation shall be made for damage to such portions of the ship and bulk
cargo, or to such separate packages of cargo, as have been on fire.
RULE IV.--CUTTING AWAY WRECK
Loss or damage caused by cutting away the wreck or remains of spars, or of
other things which have previously been carried away by sea-peril, shall
not be made good as G.A.
RULE V.--VOLUNTARY STRANDING
When a ship is intentionally run on shore, and the circumstances are such
that if that course were not adopted she would inevitably sink, or drive on
shore or on rocks, no loss or damage caused to the ship, cargo and freight,
or any of them, by such intentional running on shore, shall be made good as
G.A. But in all other cases where a ship is intentionally run on shore for
the common safety, the consequent loss or damage shall be allowed as G.A.
RULE VI.--CARRYING PRESS OF SAIL--DAMAGE TO OR LOSS OF SAILS
Damage to or loss of sails and spars, or either of them, caused by forcing
a ship off the ground or by driving her higher up the ground, for the
common safety, shall be made good as G.A.; but where a ship is afloat, no
loss or damage caused to the ship, cargo and freight, or any of them, by
carrying a press of sail, shall be made good as G.A.
RULE VII.--DAMAGE TO ENGINES IN REFLOATING A SHIP
Damage caused to machinery and boilers of a ship which is ashore and in a
position of peril, in endeavouring to refloat, shall be allowed in G.A.,
when shown to have arisen from an actual intention to float the ship for
the common safety at the risk of such damage.
RULE VIII.--EXPENSES OF LIGHTENING A SHIP WHEN ASHORE, AND CONSEQUENT
DAMAGE
When a ship is ashore, and, in order to float her, cargo, bunker coals and
ship's stores, or any of them, are discharged, the extra cost of
lightening, lighter hire, and reshipping (if incurred), and the loss or
damage sustained thereby, shall be admitted as G.A.
RULE IX.--CARGO, SHIP'S MATERIALS, AND STORES BURNT FOR FUEL
Cargo, ship's materials and stores, or any of them, necessarily burnt for
fuel for the common safety at a time of peril, shall be admitted as G.A.,
when and only when an ample supply of fuel had been provided; but the
estimated quantity of coals that would have been consumed, calculated at
the price current at the ship's last port of departure at the date of her
leaving, shall be charged to the shipowner and credited to the G.A.
RULE X.--EXPENSES AT PORT OF REFUGE, &c.
(a) When a ship shall have entered a port or place of refuge, or shall
have returned to her port or place of loading, in consequence of accident,
sacrifice, or other extraordinary circumstances, which render that
necessary for the common safety, the expenses of entering such port or
place shall be admitted as G.A.; and when she shall have sailed thence with
her original cargo, or a part of it, the corresponding expenses of leaving
such port or place, consequent upon such entry or return, shall likewise be
admitted as G.A.
(b) The cost of discharging cargo from a ship, whether at a port or place
of loading, call or refuge, shall be admitted as G.A., when the discharge
was necessary for the common safety or to enable damage to the ship, caused
by sacrifice or accident during the voyage, to be repaired, if the repairs
were necessary for the safe prosecution of the voyage.
(c) Whenever the cost of discharging cargo from a ship is admissible as
G.A., the cost of reloading and storing such cargo on board the said ship,
together with all storage charges on such cargo, shall likewise be so
admitted. But when the ship is condemned or does not proceed on her
original voyage, no storage expenses incurred after the date of the ship's
condemnation or of the abandonment of the voyage shall be admitted as G.A.
(d) If a ship under average be in a port or place at which it is
practicable to repair her, so as to enable her to carry on the whole cargo,
and if, in order to save expenses, either she is towed thence to some other
port or place of repair or to her destination, or the cargo or a portion of
it is transhipped by another ship, or otherwise forwarded, then the extra
cost of such towage, transhipment and forwarding, or any of them (up to the
amount of the extra expense saved), shall be payable by the several parties
to the adventure in proportion to the extraordinary expense saved.
RULE XI.--WAGES AND MAINTENANCE OF CREW IN PORT OF REFUGE, &c.
When a ship shall have entered or shall have been detained in any port or
place under the circumstances, or for the purposes of the repairs,
mentioned in Rule X., the wages payable to the master, officers and crew,
together with the cost of maintenance of the same, during the extra period
of detention in such port or place until the ship shall or should have been
made ready to proceed upon her voyage, shall be admitted as G.A. But when
this ship is condemned or does not proceed on her original voyage, the
wages and maintenance of the master, officers and crew, incurred after the
date of the ship's condemnation or of the abandonment of the voyage, shall
not be admitted as G.A.
RULE XII.--DAMAGE TO CARGO IN DISCHARGING, &c.
Damage done to or loss of cargo necessarily caused in the act of
discharging, storing, reloading and stowing shall be made good as G.A. when
and only when the cost of those measures respectively is admitted as G.A.
RULE XIII.--DEDUCTIONS FROM COST OF REPAIRS
In adjusting claims for G.A., repairs to be allowed in G.A. shall be
subject to the following deductions in respect of "new for old," viz.:--
In the case of _iron or steel ships_, from date of original register to the
date of accident:--
_Up to 1 year old (A.)_
All repairs to be allowed in full, except painting or coating of
bottom, from which one-third is to be deducted.
_Between 1 and 3 years (B.)_
One-third to be deducted off repairs to and renewal of woodwork of
hull, masts and spars, furniture, upholstery, crockery, metal and
glassware, also sails, rigging, ropes, sheets and hawsers (other than
wire and chain), awnings, covers and painting.
One-sixth to be deducted off wire rigging, wire ropes and wire hawsers,
chain cables and chains, donkey engines, steam winches and connexions,
steam cranes and connexions; other repairs in full.
_Between 3 and 6 years (C.)_
Deductions as above under clause B, except that one-sixth be deducted
off ironwork of masts and spars, and machinery (inclusive of boilers
and their mountings).
_Between 6 and 10 years (D.)_
Deductions as above under clause C, except that one-third be deducted
off ironwork of masts and spars, repairs to and renewal of all
machinery (inclusive of boilers and their mountings), and all hawsers,
ropes, sheets and rigging.
_Between 10 & 15 years (E.)_
One-third to be deducted off all repairs and renewals, except ironwork
of hull and cementing and chain cables, from which one-sixth to be
deducted. Anchors to be allowed in full.
_Over 15 years (F.)_
One-third to be deducted off all repairs and renewals. Anchors to be
allowed in full. One-sixth to be deducted off chain cables.
_Generally (G.)_
The deductions (except as to provisions and stores, machinery and
boilers) to be regulated by the age of the ship, and not the age of the
particular part of her to which they apply. No painting bottom to be
allowed if the bottom has not been painted within six months previous
to the date of accident. No deduction to be made in respect of old
material which is repaired without being replaced by new, and
provisions and stores which have not been in use.
[v.03 p.0056]
In the case of _wooden or composite ships_:--
When a ship is under one year old from date of original register, at
the time of accident, no deduction "new for old" shall be made. After
that period a deduction of one-third shall be made, with the following
exceptions:--
Anchors shall be allowed in full. Chain cables shall be subject to
a deduction of one-sixth only.
No deduction shall be made in respect of provisions and stores
which had not been in use.
Metal sheathing shall be dealt with, by allowing in full the cost
of a weight equal to the gross weight of metal sheathing stripped
off, minus the proceeds of the old metal. Nails, felt and labour
metalling are subject to a deduction of one-third.
In the case of _ships generally_:--
In the case of all ships, the expense of straightening bent ironwork,
including labour of taking out and replacing it, shall be allowed in
full.
Graving dock dues, including expenses of removals, cartages, use of
shears, stages and graving dock materials, shall be allowed in full.
RULE XIV.--TEMPORARY REPAIRS
No deductions "new for old" shall be made from the cost of temporary
repairs of damage allowable as G.A.
RULE XV.--LOSS OF FREIGHT
Loss of freight arising from damage to or loss of cargo shall be made good
as G.A., either when caused by a G.A. act or when the damage to or loss of
cargo is so made good.
RULE XVI.--AMOUNT TO BE MADE GOOD FOR CARGO LOST OR DAMAGED BY SACRIFICE
The amount to be made good as G.A. for damage or loss of goods sacrificed
shall be the loss which the owner of the goods has sustained thereby, based
on the market values at the date of the arrival of the vessel or at the
termination of the adventure.
RULE XVII.--CONTRIBUTORY VALUES
The contribution to a G.A. shall be made upon the actual values of the
property at the termination of the adventure, to which shall be added the
amount made good as G.A. for property sacrificed; deduction being made from
the shipowner's freight and passage-money at risk, of such port charges and
crew's wages as would not have been incurred had the ship and cargo been
totally lost at the date of the G.A. act or sacrifice, and have not been
allowed as G.A.; deduction being also made from the value of the property
of all charges incurred in respect thereof subsequently to the G.A. act,
except such charges as are allowed in G.A.
Passengers' luggage and personal effects, not shipped under bill of lading,
shall not contribute to G.A.
RULE XVIII.--ADJUSTMENT
Except as provided in the foregoing rules, the adjustment shall be drawn up
in accordance with the law and practice that would have governed the
adjustment had the contract of affreightment not contained a clause to pay
G.A. according to these rules.
The above rules differ in some important respects from English common law,
and from former English practice. They follow ideas upon the subject of
G.A. which have prevailed in practice in foreign countries (though often in
apparent opposition to the language of the codes), in preference to the
more strict principle of the common law applied by English courts. That
principle requires that, in order to have the character of G.A. a sacrifice
or expenditure must be made for the common _safety_ of the several
interests in the adventure and under the pressure of a common risk. It is
not enough that the sacrifice or expenditure is prudent, or even necessary
to enable the common adventure to be completed. G.A., on the English view,
only arises where the _safety_ of the several interests is at stake. "The
idea of a common commercial adventure, as distinguished from the common
safety from the sea," is not recognized. It is not sufficient "that an
expenditure should have been made to benefit both cargo owner and
shipowner."[1]
[Sidenote: Port of refuge expenses.]
Thus expenses incurred after ship and cargo are in safety, say at a port of
refuge, are not generally, by English law, to be treated as G.A.; although
the putting into port may have been for safety, and therefore a G.A. act.
If the putting into port has been necessitated by a G.A. sacrifice, as by
cutting away the ship's masts, the case is different; the port expenses,
the expenses of repairing the G.A. damage, and the incidental expenses of
unloading, storing and reloading the cargo are, in such a case, treated as
consequences of the original sacrifice, and therefore subjects for
contribution. But where the reason for putting in is to avoid some danger,
such as a storm or hostile cruiser, or to effect repairs necessitated by
some _accidental_ damage to the ship, the G.A. sacrifice is considered to
be at an end when the port has been reached, if the ship and cargo are then
in physical safety. The subsequent expenditure in the port is said not to
flow from that sacrifice, but from the necessity of completing the voyage,
and is incurred in performance of the shipowner's obligation under his
contract. The practice of English average adjusters has indeed modified
this strict view by treating the expense of _unloading_ as G.A.; but it may
well be doubted whether that practice can be legally supported. Moreover,
expenditure in the port which is incurred in protecting the cargo as in
warehousing it, is by English practice treated as a charge to be borne by
the cargo for whose benefit it was incurred.
If we turn now to York-Antwerp Rule X., it will be seen that a much broader
view is adopted. Whatever the reason for putting into the port of refuge,
provided it was necessary for the common safety, the expenses of going in,
and the consequent expenses of getting out (if she sails again with all or
part of her original cargo), are allowed as G.A., Rule X. (a). Further, the
cost of discharging the cargo to enable damage to the ship to be repaired,
whether caused by sacrifice or by accident during the voyage, is to be
allowed as G.A., "if the repairs were necessary for the safe prosecution of
the voyage," Rule X. (b). And that is to be so even where such repairs are
done at a port of _call_, as well as where done at a port of _refuge_.
Again, when the cost of discharging is treated as G.A., so also are to be
the expenses of storing the cargo on shore, and of reloading and stowing it
on board, after the repairs have been done (Rule X. (c)), together with any
damage or loss incidental to those operations (Rule XII.).
Further, by Rule XI. the wages of the master, officers and crew, and the
cost of their maintenance, during the detention of a ship under the
circumstances, or for the purpose of the repairs mentioned in Rule X., are
to be allowed in G.A. It is questionable whether English law allows the
wages and maintenance of the crew at a port of refuge in any case. Where
the detention is to repair _accidental_ damage it seems clear that they are
not allowed. And in practice under common law, the allowance is never made;
so that Rule XI. is an important concession to the shipowner. Like the
changes introduced by Rule X., it is a change towards the practice in
foreign countries.
It may be noted that the rules do not afford equal protection to a shipper
in the comparatively infrequent case of his being put to expense by the
delay at a port of refuge. Thus a shipper of cattle is not entitled to have
the extra wages and provisions of his cattlemen on board, nor the extra
fodder consumed by the cattle during the stay at a repairing port, made as
good as G.A. under Rules XI. and X. (_Anglo-Argentine &c. Agency_ v.
_Temperley Shipping Co._, 1899, 2 Q.B. 403).
[Sidenote: General average sacrifices.]
As to the acts which amount to G.A. sacrifices, as distinguished from
expenditures, the York-Antwerp Rules do not much alter English common law.
They do, however, make definite provisions upon some points on which
authority was scanty or doubtful. (See Rules I.-IX.) And in Rule I., as to
jettison of deck cargo, a change is made from the common law rule, for the
jettison is not allowed as G.A. even though the cargo be carried on deck in
accordance with an established custom of the particular trade.
Rule III. deals with damage done in extinguishing fire on board a ship.
Modern decisions have cleared away the old doubts whether such damage to
ship or cargo should, at law, be allowed in G.A. But recent cases in the
United States have raised the question whether the allowance should be made
where the fire occurs in port, and is extinguished, not by the master, but
by a public authority acting in the interests of the public. The Supreme
Court of the United States decided against the allowance in 1894 in a case
of _Ralli_ v. _Troup_ (157 U.S. 386). The ship had there been scuttled to
put out a fire on board, by the port authority, acting upon their own
judgment, but with the assent of the master. It was held that the damage
suffered by ship and cargo ought not to be made good by G.A. contributions;
for the sacrifice had not been made "by some one specially charged with the
control and safety of that adventure," but was the compulsory act of a
public authority. On the other hand, in the English case of _Papayanni_ v.
_Grampian S.S. Co._ (I. Com. Ca. 448), Mathew, J., held that the scuttling
of a ship at a port of refuge in Algeria, by orders of the captain of the
port, was a G.A. act. It had been done in the interest of ship and cargo,
and there was no evidence of any other motive.
Rule V. deals with the question whether, and under what conditions, a
voluntary stranding of the ship is a G.A. act, in a manner which will
probably be held to express the law in England when the matter comes up for
decision.
Rules VI. and VII. deal with the damage sustained by the ship, or her
appliances, in efforts to force her off the ground when she has stranded.
Such efforts involve an abnormal use which is likely to cause damage to
sails and spars, or to engines and boilers; and they are treated as acts of
sacrifice. The case of "The Bona," 1895 (P. 125) shows that the rules are
in accord with English law upon the point. The court of appeal held that
both the damage sustained by the engines while worked to get the ship off,
and the coal and stores consumed, were subjects for G.A. contribution at
common law.
[v.03 p.0057] Rule VIII. allows as G.A. any damage sustained by cargo when
discharged and, say, lightered for the purpose of getting the ship off a
strand. And the corresponding damage in the case of cargo discharged at a
port of refuge to enable repairs to be done to the ship is allowed by Rule
XII. But in the latter case the allowance does not expressly extend to
damage sustained while stored on land. Whether the law would require
contribution to a loss of goods, say, by thieves or by fire, while landed
for repairs, is not clear. Where the landing has been necessitated by a
G.A. act, as cutting away masts, it would seem that the loss ought to be
made good, as being a result of the special risks to which those goods have
thereby been exposed. The risks which they would have run if they had
remained on board throughout are taken into account, as will presently
appear, in estimating _how much_ of the damage is to be made good.
Where cattle were taken into a port of refuge in Brazil, owing to
accidental damage to the ship, with the result that they could not legally
be landed at their destination (Deptford), and had to be taken to another
port (Antwerp), at which they were of much less value, this loss of value
was allowed in G.A. (_Anglo-Argentine &c. Agency_ v. _Temperley Shipping
Co._, 1899, 2 Q.B. 403).
The case of a stranded ship and cargo often gives rise to difficulty as to
whether the cost of operations to lighten the ship, and afterwards to get
her floated, should be treated as G.A. expenditure, or as expenses
separately incurred in saving the separate interests. The true conclusion
seems to be that either the whole operation should be treated as one for
the common safety, and the whole expense be contributed to by all the
interests saved, or else the several parts of the operation should be kept
distinct, debiting the cost of each to the interests thereby saved. Which
of these two views should be adopted in any case seems to depend upon the
motives with which the earlier operations (usually the discharge of the
cargo) were presumably undertaken. It may, however, happen that this test
cannot be applied once for all. Take the case of a stranded ship carrying a
bulky cargo of hemp and grain, but carrying also some bullion. Suppose this
last to be rescued and taken to a place of safety at small expense in
comparison with its value. It may well be that that operation must be
regarded as done in the interest simply of the bullion itself, but that the
subsequent operations of lightening the ship and floating her can only be
properly regarded as undertaken in the common interest of ship, hemp, grain
and freight. In such a case there will be a G.A. contribution towards those
later operations by those interests. But the bullion will not contribute;
it will merely bear the expense of its own rescue (_Royal Mail S. P. Co._
v. _English Bank of Rio de Janeiro_, 1887, 19 Q.B.D. 362).
The York-Antwerp Rules have not only had the valuable result of introducing
uniformity where there had been great variety, and corresponding certainty
as to the principles which will be acted upon in adjusting any G.A. loss,
but also they have introduced greater clearness and definiteness on points
where there had been a want of definition. Thus Rule XIII. has laid down a
careful and definite scale to regulate the deductions from the cost of
repairs, in respect of "new for old," in place of the former somewhat
uncertain customary rules which varied according to the place of
adjustment; while at the same time the opportunity has been taken of
adapting the scale of deductions to modern conditions of shipbuilding. And
Rule XVII. lays down a rule as to contributory values in place of the
widely varying rules of different countries as to the amounts upon which
ship and freight shall contribute (cf. Gow, _Marine Insurance_, 305).
It may be of interest to refer briefly to one or two main principles which
govern the _adjustment_ (_q.v._) of general average, _i.e._ the calculation
of the amounts to be made good and paid by the several interests, which is
a complicated matter. The fundamental idea is that the several interests at
risk shall contribute in proportion to the benefits they have severally
received by the completion of the adventure. Contributions are not made in
proportion to the amounts at stake when the sacrifice was made, but in
proportion to the results when the adventure has come to an end. An
interest which has become lost after the sacrifice, during the subsequent
course of the voyage, will pay nothing; an interest which has become
depreciated will pay in proportion to the diminished value. The liability
to contribute is inchoate only when the sacrifice has been made. It becomes
complete when the adventure has come to an end, either by arrival at the
destination, or by having been broken up at some intermediate point, while
the interest in question still survives. To this there is one exception, in
the case of G.A. _expenditure_. Where such expenditure has been incurred by
the owner of one interest, generally by the shipowner, the repayment to him
by the other interests ought not to be wholly dependent upon the subsequent
safety of those interests at the ultimate destination. If those other
interests or some of them arrive, or are realized, as by being landed at an
intermediate port, the rule (as in the case of G.A. sacrifices) is that the
contributions are to be in proportion to the arrived or realized values.
But if all are lost the burden of the expenditure ought not to remain upon
the interest which at first bore it; and the proper rule seems to be that
contributions must be made by all the interests which were at stake when it
was made, in proportion to their _then_ values.
Again, the object of the law of G.A. is to put one whose property is
sacrificed upon an equal footing with the rest, not upon a better footing.
Thus, if goods to the value of L100 have been thrown overboard for the
general safety, the owner of those goods must not receive the full L100 in
contribution. He himself must bear a part of it, for those goods formed
part of the adventure for whose safety the jettison was made; and it is
owing to the partial safety of the adventure that any contribution at all
is received by him. He, therefore, is made to contribute with the other
saved interests towards his own loss, in respect of the amount "made good"
to him for that. The full L100 is treated as the amount to be made good,
but the owner of the goods is made to contribute towards that upon the sum
of L100 thus saved to him.
The same principle has a further consequence. The amount to be made good
will not necessarily be the value of the goods or other property in their
condition at the time they were sacrificed; so to calculate it would in
effect be to withdraw those goods from the subsequent risks of the voyage,
and thus to put them in a better position than those which were not
sacrificed. Hence, in estimating the amount to be made good, the value of
the goods or property sacrificed must be estimated _as on arrival_, with
reference to the condition in which they would probably have arrived had
they remained on board throughout the voyage.
The liability to pay G.A. contributions falls primarily upon the owner of
the contributing interest, ship, goods or freight. But in practice the
contributions are paid by the insurers of the several interests. Merchants
seldom have to concern themselves with the subject. And yet in an ordinary
policy of insurance there is no express provision requiring the underwriter
to indemnify the assured against this liability. The policy commonly
contains clauses which recognize such an obligation, _e.g._ a warranty
against average "unless general," or an agreement that G.A. shall be
payable "as per foreign statement," or "according to York-Antwerp Rules";
but it does not directly state the obligation. It assumes that. The
explanation seems to be that the practice of the underwriter to pay the
contribution has been so uniform, and his liability has been so fully
recognized, that express provisions were needless. But one result has been
that very differing views of the ground of the obligation have been held.
One view has been that it is covered by the sue and labour clause of an
ordinary policy, by which the insurer agrees to bear his proportion of
expenses voluntarily incurred "in and about the defence, safeguard and
recovery" of the insured subject. But that has been held to be mistaken by
the House of Lords (_Aitchison_ v. _Lohre_, 1879, 4 A.C. 755). Another view
is that the underwriter impliedly undertakes to repay sums which the law
may require the assured to pay towards averting losses which would, by the
contract, fall upon the underwriter. Expenses voluntarily incurred by the
assured with that object are expressly made repayable by the sue and labour
clause of the policy. It might well be implied that payments compulsorily
required from the assured by law for contributions to G.A., or as salvage
for services by salvors, will be undertaken or repaid by the underwriter,
the service being for his benefit. But the decision in _Aitchison_ v.
_Lohre_ negatives this ground also. The claim was against underwriters on a
ship which had been so damaged that the cost of repairs had exceeded her
insured value. A claim for the ship's contribution to certain salvage and
G.A. expenses which had been incurred, over and above the cost of repairs,
was disallowed. The view seems to have been that the insurer is liable for
salvage and G.A. payments as losses of the subject insured, and therefore
included in the sum insured, not as collateral payments made on his behalf.
This bases the claim against the insurer upon a fiction, for there has been
no loss of [v.03 p.0058] the subject insured; in fact, the payment has been
for averting such a loss. And it suggests that the insurer is not liable
for salvage where the policy is free of particular average, which does not
accord with practice.
An important question as to an insurer's liability for G.A. arose in the
case of the _Brigella_ (1893, P. 189), where a shipowner had incurred
expenses which would have been the subject of G.A. contributions, but that
he alone was interested in the voyage. There were no contributories. He
claimed from the insurers of the ship what would have been the ship's G.A.
contribution had there been other persons to contribute in respect of
freight or cargo. The claim was disallowed on the ground that there could
be no G.A. in such circumstances, and therefore no basis for a claim
against the insurer. The liability of the insurer was thus made to depend,
not upon the character of the loss, but upon the fact or possibility of
contribution. But this was not followed in _Montgomery_ v. _Indemnity
Mutual M. I. Co._ (1901, 1 K.B. 147). There ship, freight and cargo all
belonged to the same person. He had insured the cargo but not the ship. The
cargo underwriters were held liable to pay a contribution to damage done to
the ship by cutting away masts for the general safety. The loss was in
theory spread over all the interests at risk, and they had undertaken to
bear the cargo's share of such losses. Their liability did not depend upon
the accident of whether the interests all belonged to one person or not.
This agrees with the view taken in the United States.
As to _Particular Average_, see under INSURANCE: _Marine_.
AUTHORITIES.--Lowndes on _General Average_ (4th ed., London, 1888);
Abbott's _Merchant Ships and Seamen_ (14th ed., London, 1901); Arnould's
_Marine Insurance_ (7th ed., London, 1901); Carver's _Carriage by Sea_ (4th
ed., London, 1905).
(T. G. C.)
[1] Per Bowen, L.J., in _Svensden_ v. _Wallace_, 1883, 13 Q.B.D. at p. 84.
AVERNUS, a lake of Campania, Italy, about 1 1/2 m. N. of Baiae. It is an
old volcanic crater, nearly 2 m. in circumference, now, as in Roman times,
filled with water. Its depth is 213 ft., and its height above sea-level 3
1/2 ft.; it has no natural outlet. In ancient times it was surrounded by
dense forests, and was the centre of many legends. It was represented as
the entrance by which both Odysseus and Aeneas descended to the infernal
regions, and as the abode of the Cimmerii. Its Greek name, [Greek: Aornos],
was explained to mean that no bird could fly across it. Hannibal made a
pilgrimage to it in 214 B.C. Agrippa in 37 B.C. converted it into a naval
harbour, the _Portus Iulius_; joining it to the Lacus Lucrinus by a canal,
and connecting the latter with the sea, he reduced the distance to Cumae by
boring a tunnel over 1/2 m. in length, now called Grotta della Pace,
through the hill on the north-west side of Lake Avernus. After Sextus
Pompeius had been subdued, the chief naval harbour was transferred to
Misenum. Nero's works for his proposed canal from Baiae to the Tiber (A.D.
64) seem to have begun near Lake Avernus; indeed, according to one theory,
the Grotta della Pace would be a portion of this canal. On the east side of
the lake are remains of baths, including a great octagonal hall known as
the Temple of Apollo, built of brickwork, and belonging to the 1st century.
The so-called Grotto of the Cumaean Sibyl, on the south side, is a rock-cut
passage, ventilated by vertical apertures, possibly a part of the works
connected with the naval harbour. To the south-east of the lake is the
Monte Nuovo, a volcanic hill upheaved in 1538, with a deep extinct crater
in the centre. To the south is the Lacus Lucrinus.
See J. Beloch, _Campanien_ (2nd ed., Breslau, 1890), pp. 168 seq.
(T. AS.)
AVERROES [Ab[=u]l-Wal[=i]d Mu[h.]ammad ibn-A[h.]mad Ibn-Mu[h.]ammad
ibn-Rushd] (1126-1198), Arabian philosopher, was born at Cordova. His early
life was occupied in mastering the curriculum of theology, jurisprudence,
mathematics, medicine and philosophy, under the approved teachers of the
time. The years of his prime fell during the last period of Mahommedan rule
in Spain under the Almohades (_q.v._). It was Ibn-Tufail (Abubacer), the
philosophic vizier of Yusef, who introduced Averroes to that prince, and
Avenzoar (Ibn-Zuhr), the greatest of Moslem physicians, was his friend.
Averroes, who was versed in the Malekite system of law, was made cadi of
Seville (1169), and in similar appointments the next twenty-five years of
his life were passed. We find him at different periods in Seville, Cordova
and Morocco, probably as physician to Yusef al-Mansur, who took pleasure in
engaging him in discussions on the theories of philosophy and their
bearings on the faith of Islam. But science and free thought then, as now,
in Islam, depended almost solely on the tastes of the wealthy and the
favour of the monarch. The ignorant fanaticism of the multitude viewed
speculative studies with deep dislike and distrust, and deemed any one a
Zendik (infidel) who did not rest content with the natural science of the
Koran. These smouldering hatreds burst into open flame about the year 1195.
Averroes was accused of heretical opinions and pursuits, stripped of his
honours, and banished to a place near Cordova, where his actions were
closely watched. At the same time efforts were made to stamp out all
liberal culture in Andalusia, so far as it went beyond the little medicine,
arithmetic and astronomy required for practical life. But the storm soon
passed. Averroes was recalled to Morocco when the transient passion of the
people had been satisfied, and for a brief period survived his restoration
to honour. He died in the year before his patron, al-Mansur, with whom (in
1199) the political power of the Moslems came to an end, as did the culture
of liberal science with Averroes. The philosopher left several sons, some
of whom became jurists like his own grandfather. One of them has left an
essay, expounding his father's theory of the intellect. The personal
character of Averroes is known to us only in a general way, and as we can
gather it from his writings. His clear, exhaustive and dignified style of
treatment evidences the rectitude and nobility of the man. In the histories
of his own nation he has little place; the renown which spread in his
lifetime to the East ceased with his death, and he left no school. Yet,
from a note in a manuscript, we know that he had intelligent readers in
Spain more than a century afterwards. His historic fame came from the
Christian Schoolmen, whom he almost initiated into the system of Aristotle,
and who, but vaguely discerning the expositors who preceded, admired in his
commentaries the accumulated results of two centuries of labours.
The literary works of Averroes include treatises on jurisprudence, grammar,
astronomy, medicine and philosophy. In 1859 a work of Averroes was for the
first time published in Arabic by the Bavarian Academy, and a German
translation appeared in 1873 by the editor, J. Mueller. It is a treatise
entitled _Philosophy and Theology_, and, with the exception of a German
version of the essay on the conjunction of the intellect with man, is the
first translation which enables the non-Semitic scholar to form any
adequate idea of Averroes. The Latin translations of most of his works are
barbarous and obscure. A great part of his writings, particularly on
jurisprudence and astronomy, as well as essays on special logical subjects,
prolegomena to philosophy, criticisms on Avicenna and Alfarabius
(F[=a]r[=a]b[=i]), remain in manuscript in the Escorial and other
libraries. The Latin editions of his medical works include the _Colliget_
(_i.e._ _Kulliyyat_, or summary), a _resume_ of medical science, and a
commentary on Avicenna's poem on medicine; but Averroes, in medical renown,
always stood far below Avicenna. The Latin editions of his philosophical
works comprise the _Commentaries on Aristotle_, the _Destructio
Destructionis_ (against Ghaz[=a]li), the _De Substantia Orbis_ and a double
treatise _De Animae Beatitudine_. The Commentaries of Averroes fall under
three heads:--the larger commentaries, in which a paragraph is quoted at
large, and its clauses expounded one by one; the medium commentaries, which
cite only the first words of a section; and the paraphrases or analyses,
treatises on the subjects of the Aristotelian books. The larger commentary
was an innovation of Averroes; for Avicenna, copied by Albertus Magnus,
gave under the rubrics furnished by Aristotle works in which, though the
materials were borrowed, the grouping was his own. The great commentaries
exist only for the _Posterior Analytics_, _Physics_, _De Caelo_, _De Anima_
and _Metaphysics_. On the _History of Animals_ no commentary at all exists,
and Plato's _Republic_ is substituted for the then inaccessible _Politics_.
The Latin editions of these works between 1480 and 1580 number about 100.
The first [v.03 p.0059] appeared at Padua (1472); about fifty were
published at Venice, the best-known being that by the Juntas (1552-1553) in
ten volumes folio.
See E. Renan, _Averroes et l'Averroisme_ (2nd ed., Paris, 1861); S. Munk,
_Melanges_, 418-458; G. Stoeckl, _Phil. d. Mittelalters_, ii. 67-124;
_Averroes (Vater und Sohn), Drei Abhandl. ueber d. Conjunction d. separaten
Intellects mit d. Menschen_, trans. into German from the Arabic version of
Sam. Ben-Tibbon, by Dr J. Hercz (Berlin, 1869); T. J. de Boer, _History of
Philosophy in Islam_ (London, 1903), ch. vi.; A. F. M. Mehren in _Museon_,
vii. 613-627; viii. 1-20; Carl Brockelmann, _Geschichte der arabischen
Litteratur_ (Weimar, 1898), vol. i. pp. 461 f. See also ARABIAN PHILOSOPHY.
(W. W.; G. W. T.)
AVERRUNCATOR, a form of long shears used in arboriculture for
"averruncating" or pruning off the higher branches of trees, &c. The word
"averruncate" (from Lat. _averruncare_, to ward off, remove mischief)
glided into meaning to "weed the ground," "prune vines," &c., by a supposed
derivation from the Lat. _ab_, off, and _eruncare_, to weed out, and it was
spelt "aberuncate" to suit this; but the _New English Dictionary_ regards
such a derivation as impossible.
AVERSA, a town and episcopal see of Campania, Italy, in the province of
Caserta, 15-1/2 m. S.S.W. by rail from Caserta, and 12-1/2 m. N. by rail
from Naples, from which there is also an electric tramway. Pop. (1901)
23,477. Aversa was the first place in which the Normans settled, it being
granted to them in 1027 for the help which they had given to Duke Sergius
of Naples against Pandulf IV. of Capua. The Benedictine abbey of S. Lorenzo
preserves a portal of the 11th century. There is also a large lunatic
asylum, founded by Joachim Murat in 1813.
AVESNES, a town of northern France, capital of an arrondissement in the
department of Nord, on the Helpe, 28 m. S.E. of Valenciennes by rail. Pop.
(1906) 5076. The town is the seat of a sub-prefect, and has a tribunal of
first instance, a chamber of commerce and a communal college. Its church of
St Nicholas (16th century) has a tower 200 ft. high, with a fine chime of
bells. The chief industry of the town is wool-spinning, and there is trade
in wood. Avesnes was founded in the 11th century, and formed a countship
which in the 15th century passed to the house of Burgundy and afterwards to
that of Habsburg. In 1477 it was destroyed by Louis XI. By the treaty of
the Pyrenees (1659) it came into the possession of the French, and was
fortified by Vauban. It was captured by the Prussians in 1815.
AVEYRON, a department of southern France, bounded N. by Cantal, E. by
Lozere and Card, S.W. by Tarn and W. by Tarn-et-Garonne and Lot. Area, 3386
sq. m. Pop. (1906) 377,299. It corresponds nearly to the old district of
Rouergue, which gave its name to a countship established early in the 9th
century, and united with that of Toulouse towards the end of the 11th
century. The earliest known natives of this region were the Celtic Rutheni,
to whom the numerous megalithic monuments found in the department are
attributed. Aveyron lies on the southern border of the central plateau of
France. Its chief rivers are the Lot in the north, the Aveyron in the
centre and the Tarn in the south, all tributaries of the Garonne. They flow
from east to west, following the general slope of the department, and
divide it into four zones. In the north-east, between the Lot and its
tributary the Truyere, lies the lonely pastoral plateau of the Viadene,
dominated by the volcanic mountains of Aubrac, which form the north-eastern
limit of the department and include its highest summit (4760 ft.).
Entraygues, at the confluence of the Lot and the Truyere, is one of the
many picturesque towns of the department. Between the Lot and the Aveyron
is a belt of _causses_ or monotonous limestone table-lands, broken here and
there by profound and beautiful gorges--a type of scenery characteristic of
Aveyron. This zone is also watered by the Dourdou du Nord, a tributary of
the Lot. The salient feature of the region between the Tarn and the Aveyron
is the plateau of the Segala, bordered on the east by the heights of
Levezou and Palanges and traversed from east to west by the deep valley of
the Viaur, a tributary of the Aveyron. The country south of the Tarn is
occupied in great part by the huge plateau of Larzac, which lies between
the Causse Noir and the Causse St Affrique, the three forming the
south-western termination of the Cevennes. On the Causse Noir is found the
fantastic chaos of rocks and precipices known as Montpellier-le-Vieux,
resembling the ruins of a huge city. The climate of Aveyron varies from
extreme rigour in the mountains to mildness in the sheltered valleys; the
south wind is sometimes of great violence. Wheat, rye and oats are the
chief cereals cultivated, the soil of Aveyron being naturally poor. Other
crops are potatoes, colza, hemp and flax. The mainstay of the agriculture
of the department is the raising of live-stock, especially of cattle of the
Aubrac breed, for which Laguiole is an important market. The wines of
Entraygues, St Georges, Bouillac and Najac have some reputation; in the
Segala chestnuts form an important element in the food of the peasants, and
the walnut, cider-apple, mulberry (for the silk-worm industry), and plum
are among the fruit trees grown. The production of Roquefort cheeses is
prominent among the agricultural industries. They are made from the milk of
the large flocks of the plateau of Larzac, and the choicest are ripened in
the even temperature of the caves in the cliff which overhangs Roquefort.
The minerals found in the department include the coal of the basins of
Aubin and Rodez as well as iron, zinc and lead. Quarries of various kinds
of stone are also worked. The chief industrial centres are Decazeville,
which has metallurgical works, and Millau, where leather-dressing and the
manufacture of gloves have attained considerable importance. Wool-weaving
and the manufacture of woollen goods, machinery, chemicals and bricks are
among the other industries.
There are five arrondissements, of which the chief towns are Rodez, capital
of the department, Espalion, Millau, St Affrique and Villefranche, with 43
cantons and 304 communes. Rodez is the seat of a bishopric, the diocese of
which comprises the department. Aveyron belongs to the 16th military
region, and to the _academie_ or educational circumscription of Toulouse.
Its court of appeal is at Montpellier. The department is traversed by the
lines both of the Orleans and Southern railways. The more important towns
are Rodez, Millau, St Affrique, Villefranche-de-Rouergue and Decazeville.
The following are also of interest:--Sauveterre, founded in 1281, a
striking example of the bastide (_q.v._) of that period; Conques, which has
a remarkable abbey-church of the 11th century like St Sernin of Toulouse in
plan and possessing a rich treasury of reliquaries, &c.; Espalion, where
amongst other old buildings there are the remains of a feudal stronghold
and a church of the Romanesque period; Najac, which has the ruins of a
magnificent chateau of the 13th century; and Sylvanes, with a church of the
12th century, once attached to a Cistercian abbey.
AVEZZANO, a town of the Abruzzi, Italy, in the province of Aquila, 67 m. E.
of Rome by rail and 38 m. S. of Aquila by road. Pop. (1901) 9442. It has a
fine and well-preserved castle, built in 1490 by Gentile Virginio Orsini;
it is square, with round towers at the angles. Avezzano is on the main line
from Rome to Castellammare Adriatico; a branch railway diverges to
Roccasecca, on the line from Naples to Rome. The Lago Fucino lies 1-1/2 m.
to the east.
AVIANUS, a Latin writer of fables, placed by some critics in the age of the
Antonines, by others as late as the 6th century A.D. He appears to have
lived at Rome and to have been a heathen. The 42 fables which bear his name
are dedicated to a certain Theodosius, whose learning is spoken of in most
flattering terms. He may possibly be Macrobius Theodosius, the author of
the _Saturnalia_; some think he may be the emperor of that name. Nearly all
the fables are to be found in Babrius, who was probably Avianus's source of
inspiration, but as Babrius wrote in Greek, and Avianus speaks of having
made an elegiac version from a rough Latin copy, probably a prose
paraphrase, he was not indebted to the original. The language and metre are
on the whole correct, in spite of deviations from classical usage, chiefly
in the management of the pentameter. The fables soon became popular as a
school-book. Promythia and epimythia (introductions and morals) and
paraphrases, and imitations were frequent, such as the _Novus Avianus_ of
Alexander Neckam (12th century).
EDITIONS.--Cannegieter (1731), Lachmann (1845), Froehner (1862), [v.03
p.0060] Bahrens in _Poetae Latini Minores_, Ellis (1887). See Mueller, _De
Phaedri et Aviani Fabulis_ (1875); Unrein, _De Aviani Aetate_ (1885);
Hervieux, _Les Fabulistes latins_ (1894); _The Fables of Avian translated
into Englyshe ... by William Caxton at Westmynstre_ (1483).
AVIARY (from Lat. _avis_, a bird), called by older writers "volary," a
structure in which birds are kept in a state of captivity. While the habit
of keeping birds in cages dates from a very remote period, it is probable
that structures worthy of being termed aviaries were first used by the
ancient Romans, chiefly for the process of fattening birds for the table.
In Varro's time, 116-127 B.C., aviaries or "ornithones" (from Gr. [Greek:
ornis, ornithos], bird) were common. These consisted of two kinds, those
constructed for pleasure, in which were kept nightingales and other
song-birds, and those used entirely for keeping and fattening birds for
market or for the tables of their owners. Varro himself had an aviary for
song-birds exclusively, while Lucullus combined the two classes, keeping
birds both for pleasure and as delicacies for his table. The keeping of
birds for pleasure, however, was very rarely indulged in, while it was a
common practice with poulterers and others to have large ornithones either
in the city or at Sabinum for the fattening of thrushes and other birds for
food.
Ornithones consisted merely of four high walls and a roof, and were lighted
with a few very small windows, as the birds were considered to pine less if
they could not see their free companions outside. Water was introduced by
means of pipes, and conducted in narrow channels, and the birds were fed
chiefly upon dried figs, carefully peeled, and chewed into a pulp by
persons hired to perform this operation.
Turtle-doves were fattened in large numbers for the market on wheat and
millet, the latter being moistened with sweet wine; but thrushes were
chiefly in request, and Varro mentions one ornithon from which no less than
five thousand of these birds were sold for the table in one season.
The habit of keeping birds in aviaries, as we understand the term, for the
sake of the pleasure they afford their owners and for studying their habits
is, however, of comparatively recent date. The beginning of geographical
research in the 15th century brought with it the desire to keep and study
at home some of the beautiful forms of bird-life which the explorers came
across, and hence it became the custom to erect aviaries for the reception
of these creatures. In the 16th century, in the early part of which the
canary-bird was introduced into Europe, aviaries were not uncommon features
of the gardens of the wealthy, and Bacon refers to them in his essay on
gardening (1597). Elizabeth of Bohemia, the daughter of James I. of
England, when a child, had an outdoor aviary at Coombe Abbey near Coventry,
the back and roof of which were formed of natural rock, in which were kept
birds of many species from many countries.
Within recent years the method of keeping birds in large aviaries has
received considerable attention, and it is fully recognized that by so
doing, not only do we derive great pleasure, but our knowledge of avian
habits and mode of living can thereby be very considerably increased.
An aviary may be of almost any size, from the large cage known, on account
of its shape, as the "Crystal Palace aviary," to a structure as large as a
church; and the term is sometimes applied to the room of a house with the
windows covered with wire-netting; but as a rule it is used for outdoor
structures, composed principally of wire-netting supported on a framework
of either iron or woodwork. For quite hardy birds little more than this is
necessary, providing that protection is given in the form of growing trees
and shrubs, rock-work or rough wooden shelters. For many of the delicate
species, however, which hail from tropical countries, warmth must be
provided during the inclement months of the year, and thus a part at least
of an aviary designed for these birds must be in the form of a wooden or
brick house which can be shut up in cold weather and artificially warmed.
The ideal aviary, probably, is that which is constructed in two parts, viz.
a well-built house for the winter, opening out into a large wire enclosure
for use in the summer months. The doors between the two portions may be of
wood or glazed. The part intended as the winter home of the birds is best
built in brick or stone, as these materials are practically vermin-proof
and the temperature in such a building is less variable than that in a thin
wooden structure. The floor should be of concrete or brick, and the house
should be fitted with an efficient heating apparatus from which the heat is
distributed by means of hot-water pipes. Any arrangement which would permit
the escape into the aviary of smoke or noxious fumes is to be strongly
condemned. Such a house must be well lighted, preferably by means of
skylights; but it is a mistake to have the whole roof glazed, at least half
of it should be of wood, covered with slates or tiles. Perches consisting
of branches of trees with the bark adhering should be fixed up, and, if
small birds are to be kept, bundles of bushy twigs should be securely fixed
up in corners under the roofs.
The outer part, which will principally be used during the summer, though it
will do most birds good to be let out for a few hours on mild winter days
also, should be as large as possible, and constructed entirely of
wire-netting stretched on a framework of wood or iron. If the latter
material is selected, stout gas-piping is both stronger and more easily
fitted together than solid iron rods.
If the framework be of wood, this should be creosoted, preferably under
pressure, or painted with three coats of good lead paint, the latter
preservative also being used if iron is the material selected.
[Illustration: FIG. 1.]
The wire-netting used may be of almost any sized mesh, according to the
sized birds to be kept, but as a general rule the smallest mesh, such as
half or five-eighths of an inch, should be used, as it is practically
vermin-proof, and allows of birds of any size being kept. Wire-netting for
aviaries should be of the best quality, and well galvanized. The new
interlinked type is less durable than the old mesh type, though perhaps it
looks somewhat neater when fixed.
Provision must be made for the entire exclusion of such vermin as rats,
stoats and weasels, which, if they were to gain access, would commit great
havoc amongst the birds. The simplest and most effectual method of doing
this is by sinking the wire-netting some 2 ft. into the ground all round
the aviary, and then turning it outwards for a distance of another foot as
shown in the annexed cut (fig. 1).
The outer part of the aviary should be turfed and planted with evergreen
and deciduous shrubs, and be provided with some means of supplying an
abundance of pure water for the birds to drink and bathe in; a gravel path
should not be forgotten.
Perhaps the most useful type of aviary is that built as above described,
but with several compartments, and a passage at the back by which any
compartment may be visited without the necessity of passing through and
disturbing the birds in other compartments. Fig. 2 represents a ground plan
of an aviary of this type divided into four compartments, each with an
inner house 10 ft. square, and an outer flight of double that area. The
outer flights are intended to be turfed, and planted with shrubs, and the
gravel path has a glazed roof above it by which it is kept dry in wet
weather. Shallow water-basins are shown, which should be supplied by means
of an underground pipe and a cock which can be turned on from outside the
aviary; and they must be connected with a properly laid drain by means of a
waste plug and an overflow pipe.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Plan of 4-compartment Aviary for Foreign Birds.]
An aviary should always be built with a southern or southeastern aspect,
and, where possible, should be sheltered from the north, north-east and
north-west by a belt of fir-trees, high wall or bank, to protect the birds
from the biting winds from these quarters.
When parrots of any kind are to be kept it is useless to try [v.03 p.0061]
to grow any kind of vegetation except grass, and even this will be
demolished unless the aviary is of considerable size. The larger parrots
will, in fact, bite to pieces not only living trees but also the woodwork
of their abode, and the only really suitable materials for the construction
of an aviary for these birds are brick or stone and iron; and the
wire-netting used must be of the stoutest gauge or it will be torn to
pieces by their strong bills.
The feeding of birds in aviaries is, obviously, a matter of the utmost
importance, and, in order that they may have what is most suitable, the
aviculturist should find out as much as possible of the wild life of the
species he wishes to keep, or if little or nothing is known about their
mode of living, as is often the case with rare forms, of nearly related
species whose habits and food are probably much the same, and he should
endeavour to provide food as nearly as possible resembling that which would
be obtained by the birds when wild. It is often, however, impossible to
supply precisely the same food as would be obtained by the birds had they
their liberty, but a substitute which suits them well can generally be
obtained. The majority of the parrot tribe subsist principally upon various
nuts, seed and fruit, while some of the smaller parrakeets or paroquets
appear to feed almost exclusively upon the seeds of various grasses. Almost
all of these are comparatively easy to treat in captivity, the larger ones
being fed on maize, sunflower-seed, hemp, dari, oats, canary-seed, nuts and
various ripe fruits, while the grass-parrakeets thrive remarkably well on
little besides canary-seed and green food, the most suitable of which is
grass in flower, chickweed, groundsel and various seed-bearing weeds. But
there is another large group of parrots, the _Loriidae_ or brush-tongued
parrots, some of the most interesting and brightly coloured of the tribe,
which, when wild, subsist principally upon the pollen and nectar of
flowers, notably the various species of _Eucalyptus_, the filamented
tongues of these parrots being peculiarly adapted for obtaining this. In
captivity these birds have been found to live well upon sweetened milk-sop,
which is made by pouring boiling milk upon crumbled bread or biscuit. They
frequently learn to eat seed like other parrots, but, if fed exclusively
upon this, are apt, especially if deprived of abundance of exercise, to
suffer from fits which are usually fatal. Fruit is also readily eaten by
the lories and lorikeets, and should always be supplied.
The foreign doves and pigeons form a numerous and beautiful group which are
mostly hardy and easily kept and bred in captivity. They are for the most
part grain-feeders and require only small corn and seeds, though a certain
group, known as the fruit-pigeons, are fed in captivity upon soft fruits,
berries, boiled potato and soaked grain.
The various finches and finch-like birds form an exceedingly large group
and comprise perhaps the most popular of foreign aviary birds. The
weaver-birds of Africa are mostly quite hardy and very easily kept, their
food consisting, for the most part, of canary-seed. The males of these
birds are, as a rule, gorgeously attired in brilliant colours, some having
long flowing tail-feathers during the nuptial season, while in the winter
their showy dress is replaced by one of sparrow-like sombreness. The
grass-finches of Australasia contain some of the most brilliantly coloured
birds, the beautiful grass-finch (_Poephila mirabilis_) being resplendent
in crimson, green, mauve, blue and yellow. Most of these birds build their
nests, and many rear their young, successfully in outdoor aviaries, their
food consisting of canary and millet seeds, while flowering grasses provide
them with an endless source of pleasure and wholesome food. The same
treatment suits the African waxbills, many of which are extremely
beautiful, the crimson-eared waxbill or "cordon-bleu" being one of the most
lovely and frequently imported. These little birds are somewhat delicate,
especially when first imported, and during the winter months require
artificial warmth.
There is a very large group of insectivorous and fruit-eating birds very
suitable for aviculture, but their mode of living necessarily involves
considerable care on the part of the aviculturist in the preparation of
their food. Many birds are partially insectivorous, feeding upon insects
when these are plentiful, and upon various seeds at other times. Numbers of
species again which, when adult, feed almost entirely upon grain, feed
their young, especially during the early stages of their existence, upon
insects; while others are exclusively insect-eaters at all times of their
lives. All of these points must be considered by those who would succeed in
keeping and breeding birds in aviaries.
It would be almost an impossibility to keep the purely insectivorous
species, were it not for the fact that they can be gradually accustomed to
feed on what is known as "insectivorous" or "insectile" food, a composition
of which the principal ingredients generally consist of dried ants'
cocoons, dried flies, dried powdered meat, preserved yolk of egg,[1] and
crumb of bread or biscuit. This is moistened with water or mixed with
mashed boiled potato, and forms a diet upon which most of the insectivorous
birds thrive. The various ingredients, or the food ready made, can be
obtained at almost any bird-fancier's shop. Although it is a good staple
diet for these birds, the addition of mealworms, caterpillars, grubs,
spiders and so forth is often a necessity, especially for purely
insectivorous species.
The fruit-eating species, such as the tanagers and sugar-birds of the New
World, require ripe fruit in abundance in addition to a staple diet such as
that above described, while for such birds as feed largely upon
earth-worms, shredded raw meat is added with advantage.
Many of the waders make very interesting aviary birds, and require a diet
similar to that above recommended, with the addition of chopped raw meat,
mealworms and any insects that can be obtained.
Birds of prey naturally require a meat diet, which is best given in the
form of small, freshly killed mammals and birds, the fur or feathers of
which should not be removed, as they aid digestion.
The majority of wild birds, from whatever part of the world they may come,
will breed successfully in suitable aviaries providing proper nesting sites
are available. Large bundles of brushwood, fixed up in sheltered spots,
will afford accommodation for many kinds of birds, while some will readily
build in evergreen shrubs if these are grown in their enclosure. Small
boxes and baskets, securely fastened to the wall or roof of the [v.03
p.0062] sheltered part of an aviary, will be appropriated by such species
as naturally build in holes and crevices. Parrots, when wild, lay their
eggs in hollow trees, and occasionally in holes in rocks, making no
nest,[2] but merely scraping out a slight hollow in which to deposit the
eggs. For these birds hollow logs, with small entrance holes near the top,
or boxes, varying in size according to the size of the parrots which they
are intended for, should be supplied. In providing nesting accommodation
for his birds the aviculturist must endeavour to imitate their natural
surroundings and supply sites as nearly as possible similar to those which
the birds, to whatever order they may belong, would naturally select.
Aviculture is a delightful pastime, but it is also far more than this; it
is of considerable scientific importance, for it admits of the living birds
being studied in a way that would be quite impossible otherwise. There are
hundreds of species of birds, from all parts of the world, the habits of
which are almost unknown, but which may be kept without difficulty in
suitable aviaries. Many of these birds cannot be studied satisfactorily in
a wild state by reason of their shy nature and retiring habits, not to
mention their rarity and the impossibility, so far as most people are
concerned, of visiting their native haunts. In suitable large aviaries,
however, their nesting habits, courtship, display, incubation, moult and so
forth can be accurately observed and recorded. The keeping of birds in
aviaries is therefore a practice worthy of every encouragement, so long as
the aviaries are of sufficient size and suitable design to allow of the
birds exhibiting their natural habits; for in a large aviary they will
reveal the secrets of their nature as they never would do in a cage or
small aviary.
(D. S.-S.)
[1] It has recently been stated by certain medical men that egg-food in any
form is an undesirable diet for birds, owing to its being peculiarly
adapted to the multiplication of the bacillus of septicaemia, a disease
which is responsible for the death of many newly imported birds. It is a
significant fact, however, that insectivorous species, which are those
principally fed upon this substance, are not nearly so susceptible to this
disease as seed-eating birds which rarely taste egg; and in spite of what
has been written concerning its harmfulness, the large majority of
aviculturists use it, in both the fresh and the preserved state, with no
apparent ill effects, but rather the reverse.
[2] There is, however, one true nest-building parrot, the grey-breasted
parrakeet (_Myopsittacus monachus_), which constructs a huge nest of twigs.
The true love-birds (_Agapornis_) may also be said to build nests, for they
line their nest-hole with strips of pliant bark.
AVICENNA [Ab[=u] 'Al[=i] al-Husain ibn 'Abdall[=a]h ibn S[=i]n[=a]]
(980-1037), Arabian philosopher, was born at Afshena in the district of
Bokhara. His mother was a native of the place; his father, a Persian from
Balkh, filled the post of tax-collector in the neighbouring town of
Harmaitin, under N[=u]h II. ibn Mansur, the Samanid amir of Bokhara. On the
birth of Avicenna's younger brother the family migrated to Bokhara, then
one of the chief cities of the Moslem world, and famous for a culture which
was older than its conquest by the Saracens. Avicenna was put in charge of
a tutor, and his precocity soon made him the marvel of his neighbours,--as
a boy of ten who knew by rote the Koran and much Arabic poetry besides.
From a greengrocer he learnt arithmetic; and higher branches were begun
under one of those wandering scholars who gained a livelihood by cures for
the sick and lessons for the young. Under him Avicenna read the _Isagoge_
of Porphyry and the first propositions of Euclid. But the pupil soon found
his teacher to be but a charlatan, and betook himself, aided by
commentaries, to master logic, geometry and the Almagest. Before he was
sixteen he not merely knew medical theory, but by gratuitous attendance on
the sick had, according to his own account, discovered new methods of
treatment. For the next year and a half he worked at the higher philosophy,
in which he encountered greater obstacles. In such moments of baffled
inquiry he would leave his books, perform the requisite ablutions, then hie
to the mosque, and continue in prayer till light broke on his difficulties.
Deep into the night he would continue his studies, stimulating his senses
by occasional cups of wine, and even in his dreams problems would pursue
him and work out their solution. Forty times, it is said, he read through
the _Metaphysics_ of Aristotle, till the words were imprinted on his
memory; but their meaning was hopelessly obscure, until one day they found
illumination from the little commentary by F[=a]r[=a]b[=i] (_q.v._), which
he bought at a bookstall for the small sum of three dirhems. So great was
his joy at the discovery, thus made by help of a work from which he had
expected only mystery, that he hastened to return thanks to God, and
bestowed an alms upon the poor. Thus, by the end of his seventeenth year
his apprenticeship of study was concluded, and he went forth to find a
market for his accomplishments.
His first appointment was that of physician to the amir, who owed him his
recovery from a dangerous illness (997). Avicenna's chief reward for this
service was access to the royal library of the Samanids (_q.v._),
well-known patrons of scholarship and scholars. When the library was
destroyed by fire not long after, the enemies of Avicenna accused him of
burning it, in order for ever to conceal the sources of his knowledge.
Meanwhile, he assisted his father in his financial labours, but still found
time to write some of his earliest works.
At the age of twenty-two Avicenna lost his father. The Samanid dynasty came
to its end in December 1004. Avicenna seems to have declined the offers of
Mahm[=u]d the Ghaznevid, and proceeded westwards to Urjensh in the modern
Khiva, where the vizier, regarded as a friend of scholars, gave him a small
monthly stipend. But the pay was small, and Avicenna wandered from place to
place through the districts of Nishapur and Merv to the borders of
Khorasan, seeking an opening for his talents. Shams al-Ma'[=a]l[=i]
Q[=a]b[=u]s, the generous ruler of Dailam, himself a poet and a scholar,
with whom he had expected to find an asylum, was about that date (1012)
starved to death by his own revolted soldiery. Avicenna himself was at this
season stricken down by a severe illness. Finally, at Jorj[=a]n, near the
Caspian, he met with a friend, who bought near his own house a dwelling in
which Avicenna lectured on logic and astronomy. For this patron several of
his treatises were written; and the commencement of his _Canon of Medicine_
also dates from his stay in Hyrcania.
He subsequently settled at Rai, in the vicinity of the modern Teheran,
where a son of the last amir, Majd Addaula, was nominal ruler, under the
regency of his mother. At Rai about thirty of his shorter works are said to
have been composed. But the constant feuds which raged between the regent
and her second son, Shams Addaula, compelled the scholar to quit the place,
and after a brief sojourn at Kazw[=i]n, he passed southwards to Hamad[=a]n,
where that prince had established himself. At first he entered into the
service of a high-born lady; but ere long the amir, hearing of his arrival,
called him in as medical attendant, and sent him back with presents to his
dwelling. Avicenna was even raised to the office of vizier; but the
turbulent soldiery, composed of Kurds and Turks, mutinied against their
nominal sovereign, and demanded that the new vizier should be put to death.
Shams Addaula consented that he should be banished from the country.
Avicenna, however, remained hidden for forty days in a sheik's house, till
a fresh attack of illness induced the amir to restore him to his post. Even
during this perturbed time he prosecuted his studies and teaching. Every
evening extracts from his great works, the _Canon_ and the _Sanatio_, were
dictated and explained to his pupils; among whom, when the lesson was over,
he spent the rest of the night in festive enjoyment with a band of singers
and players. On the death of the amir Avicenna ceased to be vizier, and hid
himself in the house of an apothecary, where, with intense assiduity, he
continued the composition of his works. Meanwhile, he had written to Abu
Ya'far, the prefect of Isfahan, offering his services; but the new amir of
Hamad[=a]n getting to hear of this correspondence, and discovering the
place of Avicenna's concealment, incarcerated him in a fortress. War
meanwhile continued between the rulers of Isfahan and Hamad[=a]n; in 1024
the former captured Hamad[=a]n and its towns, and expelled the Turkish
mercenaries. When the storm had passed Avicenna returned with the amir to
Hamad[=a]n, and carried on his literary labours; but at length, accompanied
by his brother, a favourite pupil, and two slaves, made his escape out of
the city in the dress of a Sufite ascetic. After a perilous journey they
reached Isfahan, and received an honourable welcome from the prince. The
remaining ten or twelve years of Avicenna's life were spent in the service
of Abu Ya'far 'Al[=a] Addaula, whom he accompanied as physician and general
literary and scientific adviser, even in his numerous campaigns. During
these years he began to study literary matters and philology, instigated,
it is asserted, by [v.03 p.0063] criticisms on his style. But amid his
restless study Avicenna never forgot his love of enjoyment. Unusual bodily
vigour enabled him to combine severe devotion to work with facile
indulgence in sensual pleasures. His passion for wine and women was almost
as well known as his learning. Versatile, light-hearted, boastful and
pleasure-loving, he contrasts with the nobler and more intellectual
character of Averroes. His bouts of pleasure gradually weakened his
constitution; a severe colic, which seized him on the march of the army
against Hamad[=a]n, was checked by remedies so violent that Avicenna could
scarcely stand. On a similar occasion the disease returned; with difficulty
he reached Hamad[=a]n, where, finding the disease gaining ground, he
refused to keep up the regimen imposed, and resigned himself to his fate.
On his deathbed remorse seized him; he bestowed his goods on the poor,
restored unjust gains, freed his slaves, and every third day till his death
listened to the reading of the Koran. He died in June 1037, in his
fifty-eighth year, and was buried in Hamad[=a]n.
It was mainly accident which determined that from the 12th to the 17th
century Avicenna should be the guide of medical study in European
universities, and eclipse the names of Rhazes, Ali ibn al-Abbas and
Avenzoar. His work is not essentially different from that of his
predecessors Rhazes and Ali; all present the doctrine of Galen, and through
Galen the doctrine of Hippocrates, modified by the system of Aristotle. But
the _Canon_ of Avicenna is distinguished from the _Al-Hawi_ (_Continens_)
or _Summary_ of Rhazes by its greater method, due perhaps to the logical
studies of the former, and entitling him to his surname of Prince of the
Physicians. The work has been variously appreciated in subsequent ages,
some regarding it as a treasury of wisdom, and others, like Avenzoar,
holding it useful only as waste paper. In modern times it has been more
criticized than read. The vice of the book is excessive classification of
bodily faculties, and over-subtlety in the discrimination of diseases. It
includes five books; of which the first and second treat of physiology,
pathology and hygiene, the third and fourth deal with the methods of
treating disease, and the fifth describes the composition and preparation
of remedies. This last part contains some contingent of personal
observation. He is, like all his countrymen, ample in the enumeration of
symptoms, and is said to be inferior to Ali in practical medicine and
surgery. He introduced into medical theory the four causes of the
Peripatetic system. Of natural history and botany he pretends to no special
knowledge. Up to the year 1650, or thereabouts, the _Canon_ was still used
as a text-book in the universities of Louvain and Montpellier.
About 100 treatises are ascribed to Avicenna. Some of them are tracts of a
few pages, others are works extending through several volumes. The
best-known amongst them, and that to which Avicenna owed his European
reputation, is the _Canon of Medicine_; an Arabic edition of it appeared at
Rome in 1593, and a Hebrew version at Naples in 1491. Of the Latin version
there were about thirty editions, founded on the original translation by
Gerard of Cremona. The 15th century has the honour of composing the great
commentary on the text of the _Canon_, grouping around it all that theory
had imagined, and all that practice had observed. Other medical works
translated into Latin are the _Medicamenta Cordialia_, _Canticum de
Medicina_, _Tractatus de Syrupo Acetoso_. Scarcely any member of the
Arabian circle of the sciences, including theology, philology, mathematics,
astronomy, physics and music, was left untouched by the treatises of
Avicenna, many of which probably varied little, except in being
commissioned by a different patron and having a different form or extent.
He wrote at least one treatise on alchemy, but several others have been
falsely attributed to him. His book on animals was translated by Michael
Scot. His _Logic_, _Metaphysics_, _Physics_, _De Caelo_, are treatises
giving a synoptic view of Aristotelian doctrine. The _Logic_ and
_Metaphysics_ have been printed more than once, the latter, _e.g._, at
Venice in 1493, 1495 and 1546. Some of his shorter essays on medicine,
logic, &c., take a poetical form (the poem on logic was published by
Schmoelders in 1836). Two encyclopaedic treatises, dealing with philosophy,
are often mentioned. The larger, _Al-Shif[=a]'_ (_Sanatio_), exists nearly
complete in manuscript in the Bodleian library and elsewhere; part of it on
the _De Anima_ appeared at Pavia (1490) as the _Liber Sextus Naturalium_,
and the long account of Avicenna's philosophy given by Shahrastani seems to
be mainly an analysis, and in many places a reproduction, of the
_Al-Shif[=a]'_, A shorter form of the work is known as the _An-naj[=a]t_
(_Liberatio_). The Latin editions of part of these works have been modified
by the corrections which the monkish editors confess that they applied.
There is also a _Philosophia Orientalis_, mentioned by Roger Bacon, and now
lost, which according to Averroes was pantheistic in tone.
For Avicenna's life, see Ibn Khallikan's _Biographical Dictionary_,
translated by McG. de Slane (1842); F. Wuestenfeld's _Geschichte der
arabischen Aerzte und Naturforscher_ (Goettingen, 1840). For his medicine,
see Sprengel, _Histoire de la Medecine_; and for his philosophy, see
Shahrastani, German trans. vol. ii. 213-332; K. Prantl, _Geschichte der
Logik_, ii. 318-361; A. Stoeckl, _Phil. d. Mittelalters_, ii. 23-58; S.
Munk, _Melanges_, 352-366; B. Haneberg in the _Abhandlungen der
philos.-philolog. Class. der bayerischen Academie_ (1867); and Carra de
Vaux, _Avicenne_ (Paris, 1900). For list of extant works see C.
Brockelmann's _Geschichte der arabischen Litteratur_ (Weimar, 1898), vol.
i. pp. 452-458.
(W. W.; G. W. T.)
AVIENUS, RUFIUS FESTUS, a Roman aristocrat and poet, of Vulsinii in
Etruria, who flourished during the second half of the 4th century A.D. He
was probably proconsul of Africa (366) and of Achaia (372). Avienus was a
pagan and a staunch supporter of the old religion. He translated the
[Greek: Phainomena] of Aratus and paraphrased the [Greek: Periegesis] of
Dionysius under the title of _Descriptio Orbis Terrarum_, both in
hexameters. He also compiled a description, in iambic trimeters, of the
coasts of the Mediterranean, Caspian and Black Seas in several books, of
which only a fragment of the first is extant. He also epitomized Livy and
Virgil's _Aeneid_ in the same metre, but these works are lost. Some minor
poems are found under his name in anthologies, _e.g._ a humorous request to
one Favianus for some pomegranates for medicinal purposes.
AVIGLIANA, a town of Piedmont, Italy, in the province of Turin, 14 m. W. by
rail from the town of Turin. Pop. (1901) 4629. It has medieval buildings of
some interest, but is mainly remarkable for its large dynamite factory,
employing over 500 workman.
AVIGNON, a city of south-eastern France, capital of the department of
Vaucluse, 143 m. S. of Lyons on the railway between that city and
Marseilles. Pop. (1906) 35,356. Avignon, which lies on the left bank of the
Rhone, a few miles above its confluence with the Durance, occupies a large
oval-shaped area not fully populated, and covered in great part by parks
and gardens. A suspension bridge leads over the river to
Villeneuve-les-Avignon (_q.v._), and a little higher up, a picturesque
ruined bridge of the 12th century, the Pont Saint-Benezet, projects into
the stream. Only four of the eighteen piles are left; on one of them stands
the chapel of Saint-Benezet, a small Romanesque building. Avignon is still
encircled by the ramparts built by the popes in the 14th century, which
offer one of the finest examples of medieval fortification in existence.
The walls, which are of great strength, are surmounted by machicolated
battlements, flanked at intervals by thirty-nine massive towers and pierced
by several gateways, three of which date from the 14th century. The whole
is surrounded by a line of pleasant boulevards. The life of the town is
almost confined to the Place de l'Hotel de Ville and the Cours de la
Republique, which leads out of it and extends to the ramparts. Elsewhere
the streets are narrow, quiet, and, for the most part, badly paved. At the
northern extremity of the town a precipitous rock, the Rocher des Doms,
rises from the river's edge and forms a plateau stretching southwards
nearly to the Place de l'Hotel de Ville. Its summit is occupied by a public
garden and, to the south of this, by the cathedral of Notre-Dame des Doms
and the Palace of the Popes. The cathedral is a Romanesque building, mainly
of the 12th century, the most prominent feature of which is the gilded
statue of the Virgin which surmounts the western tower. Among the many
works of art in the interior, the most beautiful is the mausoleum of Pope
John XXII., a masterpiece of Gothic [v.03 p.0064] carving of the 14th
century. The cathedral is almost dwarfed by the Palace of the Popes, a
sombre assemblage of buildings, which rises at its side and covers a space
of more than 1 1/4 acres. Begun in 1316 by John XXII., it was continued by
succeeding popes until 1370, and is in the Gothic style; in its
construction everything has been sacrificed to strength, and though the
effect is imposing, the place has the aspect rather of a fortress than of a
palace. It was for long used as a barracks and prison, to the exigencies of
which the fine apartments were ruthlessly adapted, but it is now municipal
property. Among the minor churches of the town are St Pierre, which has a
graceful facade and richly carved doors, St Didier and St Agricol, all
three of Gothic architecture. The most notable of the civil buildings are
the hotel de ville, a modern building with a belfry of the 14th century,
and the old Hotel des Monnaies, the papal mint which was built in 1610 and
is now used as a music-school. The Calvet Museum, so named after F. Calvet,
physician, who in 1810 left his collections to the town, is rich in
inscriptions, bronzes, glass and other antiquities, and in sculptures and
paintings. The library has over 140,000 volumes. The town has a statue of a
Persian, Jean Althen, who in 1765 introduced the culture of the madder
plant, which long formed the staple and is still an important branch of
local trade. In 1873 John Stuart Mill died at Avignon, and is buried in the
cemetery. For the connexion of Petrarch with the town see PETRARCH.
Avignon is subject to violent winds, of which the most disastrous is the
_mistral_. The popular proverb is, however, somewhat exaggerated, _Avenio
ventosa, sine vento venenosa, cum vento fastidiosa_ (windy Avignon,
pest-ridden when there is no wind, wind-pestered when there is).
Avignon is the seat of an archbishop and has tribunals of first instance
and of commerce, a council of trade-arbitrators, a lycee, and training
college, a chamber of commerce and a branch of the Bank of France. It is in
the midst of a fertile district, in the products of which it has a large
trade, and has flour-mills, distilleries, oil-works and leather-works,
manufactures soap, chemicals and liquorice, and is well known for its
sarsanet and other fabrics.
Avignon (_Avenio_) was an important town of the Gallic tribe of the
Cavares, and under the Romans one of the leading cities of Gallia
Narbonensis. Severely harassed during the barbarian invasions and by the
Saracens, it was, in later times, attached successively to the kingdoms of
Burgundy and of Arles and to the domains of the counts of Provence and of
Toulouse and of Forcalquier. At the end of the 12th century it became a
republic, but in 1226 was taken and dismantled by Louis VIII. as punishment
for its support of the Albigenses, and in 1251 was forced to submit to the
counts of Toulouse and Provence. In 1309 the city was chosen by Clement V.
as his residence, and from that time till 1377 was the papal seat. In 1348
the city was sold by Joanna, countess of Provence, to Clement VI. After
Gregory XI. had migrated to Rome, two antipopes, Clement VII. and Benedict
XIII., resided at Avignon, from which the latter was expelled in 1408. The
town remained in the possession of the popes, who governed it by means of
legates, till its annexation by the National Assembly in 1791, though
during this interval several kings of France made efforts to unite it with
their dominions. In 1791 conflicts between the adherents of the Papacy and
the Republicans led to much bloodshed. In 1815 Marshal Brune was
assassinated in the town by the adherents of the royalist party. The
bishopric, founded in the 3rd century, became an archbishopric in 1475.
See Fantoni Castrucci, _Istoria della citta d'Avignone e del Contado
Venesino_ (Venice, 1678); J. B. Joudou, _Histoire des souverains pontifes
qui ont siege a Avignon_ (Avignon, 1855); A. Canron, _Guide de l'etranger
dans la ville d'Avignon et ses environs_ (Avignon, 1858); J. F. Andre,
_Histoire de la Papaute a Avignon_ (Avignon, 1887).
AVILA, GIL GONZALEZ DE (_c._ 1577-1658), Spanish biographer and antiquary,
was born and died at Avila. He was made historiographer of Castile in 1612,
and of the Indies in 1641. Of his numerous works, the most valuable are his
_Teatro de las Grandezas des Madrid_ (Madrid, 1623, sqq.), and his _Teatro
Eclesiastico_, descriptive of the metropolitan churches and cathedrals of
Castile, with lives of the prelates (Madrid, 1645-1653, 4 vols. 4to).
AVILA, a province of central Spain, one of the modern divisions of the
kingdom of Old Castile; bounded on the N. by Valladolid, E. by Segovia and
Madrid, S. by Toledo and Caceres, and W. by Salamanca. Pop. (1900) 200,457;
area, 2570 sq. m. Avila is naturally divided into two sections, differing
completely in soil, climate, productions and social economy. The northern
portion is generally level; the soil is of indifferent quality, strong and
marly in a few places, but rocky in all the valleys of the Sierra de Avila;
and the climate alternates from severe cold in winter to extreme heat in
summer. The population of this part is mainly agricultural. The southern
division is one mass of rugged granitic sierras, interspersed, however,
with sheltered and well-watered valleys, abounding with rich vegetation.
The winter here, especially in the elevated region of the Paramera and the
waste lands of Avila, is long and severe, but the climate is not unhealthy.
In this region stock-breeding is an important industry. The principal
mountain chains are the Guadarrama, separating this province from Madrid;
the Paramera and Sierra de Avila, west of the Guadarrama; and the vast wall
of the Sierra de Gredos along the southern frontier, where its outstanding
peaks rise to 6000 or even 8000 ft. The ridges which ramify from the
Paramera are covered with valuable forests of beeches, oaks and firs,
presenting a striking contrast to the bare peaks of the Sierra de Gredos.
The principal rivers are the Alberche and Tietar, belonging to the basin of
the Tagus, and the Tormes, Trabancos and Adaja, belonging to that of the
Douro. The mountains contain silver, copper, iron, lead and coal, but their
mineral wealth has been exaggerated, and at the beginning of the 20th
century mining had practically been abandoned. Quarries of fine marble and
jasper exist in the district of Arenas. The province declined in wealth and
population during the 18th and 19th centuries, a result due less to the
want of activity on the part of the inhabitants than to the oppressive
manorial and feudal rights and the strict laws of entail and mortmain,
which acted as barriers to progress.
Towards the close of this period many improvements were introduced,
although the want of irrigation is still keenly felt. Wide tracts of waste
land were planted with pinewoods by the ducal house of Medina Sidonia. The
main roads are fairly good; and Avila, the capital, is connected by rail
with Salamanca, Valladolid and Madrid; but in many parts of the province
the means of communication are defective. Except Avila there are no
important towns. The principal production is the wool of the merino sheep,
which at one time yielded an immense revenue. Game is plentiful, and the
rivers abound in fish, specially trout. Olives, chestnuts and grapes are
grown, and silk-worms are kept. There is little trade, and the manufactures
are few, consisting chiefly of copper utensils, lime, soap, cloth, paper
and combs. The state of elementary education is comparatively good, rather
more than two-thirds of the population being able to read and write, and
the ratio of crime is proportionately low.
AVILA (anc. _Abula_ or _Avela_), the capital of the province described
above; on the right bank of the river Adaja, 54 m. W. by N. of Madrid, by
the Madrid-Valladolid railway. Pop. (1900) 11,885. The city is built on the
flat summit of a rocky hill, which rises abruptly in the midst of a
veritable wilderness; a brown, arid, treeless table-land, strewn with
immense grey boulders, and shut in by lofty mountains. The ancient walls of
Avila, constructed of brown granite, and surmounted by a breastwork, with
eighty-six towers and nine gateways, are still in excellent repair; but a
large part of the city lies beyond their circuit. Avila is the seat of a
bishop, and contains several ecclesiastical buildings of high interest. The
Gothic cathedral, said by tradition to date from 1107, but probably of 13th
or 14th century workmanship, has the appearance of a fortress, with
embattled walls and two solid towers. It contains many interesting
sculptures and paintings, besides one especially fine silver pyx, the work
of Juan de Arphe, dating from 1571. The churches of San Vicente, San Pedro,
Santo Tomas and San [v.03 p.0065] Segundo are, in their main features,
Romanesque of the 15th century, although parts of the beautiful San
Vicente, and of San Pedro, may be as old as the 12th century. Especially
noteworthy is the marble monument in Santo Tomas, carved by the
15th-century Florentine sculptor Domenico Fancelli, over the tomb of Prince
John (d. 1497), the only son of Ferdinand and Isabella. The convent and
church of Santa Teresa mark the supposed birthplace of the saint whose name
they bear (c. 1515-1582) Avila also possesses an old Moorish castle
(_alcazar_) used as barracks, a foundling hospital, infirmary, military
academy, and training schools for teachers of both sexes. From 1482 to 1807
it was also the seat of a university. It has a considerable trade in
agricultural products, leather, pottery, hats, linen and cotton goods.
For the local history see V. Picatoste, _Tradiciones de Avila_ (Madrid,
1888); and L. Ariz, _Historia de las grandezas de ... Avila_ (Alcala de
Henares, 1607).
AVILA Y ZUNIGA, LUIS DE (_c._ 1490-_c._ 1560), Spanish historian, was born
at Placentia. He was probably of low origin, but married a wealthy heiress
of the family of Zuniga, whose name he added to his own. He rose rapidly in
the favour of the emperor Charles V., served as ambassador to Rome, and was
made grand commander of the order of the Knights of Alcantara. He
accompanied the emperor to Africa in 1541, and having served during the war
of the league of Schmalkalden, wrote a history of this war entitled
_Commentarios de la guerra de Alemana, hecha de Carlos V en el ano de 1546
y 1547._ This was first printed in 1548, and becoming very popular was
translated into French, Dutch, German, Italian and Latin. As may be
expected from the author's intimacy with Charles, the book is very partial
to the emperor, and its misrepresentations have been severely criticized.
AVILES, PEDRO MENENDEZ DE (1519-1574), Spanish seaman, founder of St
Augustine, Florida, was born at Aviles in Asturias on the 15th of February
1519. His family were gentry, and he was one of nineteen brothers and
sisters. At the age of fourteen he ran away to sea, and was engaged till he
was thirty in a life of adventure as a corsair. In 1549 during peace
between France and Spain he was commissioned by the emperor Charles V. to
clear the north coast of Spain and the Canaries of French pirates. In 1554
he was appointed captain-general of the "flota" or convoy which carried the
trade between Spain and America. The appointment was made by the emperor
over the head and against the will of the Casa de Contratacion, or
governing board of the American trade. In this year, and before he sailed
to America, Aviles accompanied the prince of Spain, afterwards Philip II.,
to England, where he had gone to marry Queen Mary. As commander of the
flota he displayed a diligence, and achieved a degree of success in
bringing back treasure, which earned him the hearty approval of the
emperor. But his devotion to the imperial service, and his steady refusal
to receive bribes as the reward for permitting breaches of the regulations,
made him unpopular with the merchants, while his high-handed ways offended
the Casa de Contratacion. Reappointed commander in 1557, and knowing the
hostility of the Casa, he applied for service elsewhere. The war with
France in which Spain and England were allies was then in progress, and
until the close of 1559 ample occupation was found for Aviles in bringing
money and recruits from Spain to Flanders. When peace was restored he
commanded the fleet which brought Philip II. back from the Low Countries to
Spain. In 1560 he was again appointed to command the flota, and he made a
most successful voyage to America and back, in that and the following year.
His relations with the Casa de Contratacion were, however, as strained as
ever. On his return from another voyage in 1563 he was arrested by order of
the Casa, and was detained in prison for twenty months. What the charges
brought against him were is not known. Aviles in a letter to the king avows
his innocence, and he was finally discharged by the judges, but not until
they had received two peremptory orders from the king to come to a
decision.
On his release he prepared to sail to the Bermudas to seek for his son
Juan, who had been shipwrecked in the previous year. At that time the
French Huguenots were engaged in endeavouring to plant a colony in Florida.
As the country had been explored by the Spaniards they claimed it as
theirs, and its position on the track of the home-coming trade of Mexico
rendered its possession by any other power highly dangerous. Philip II.
endeavoured to avert the peril by making an "_asiento_" or contract with
Aviles, by which he advanced 15,000 ducats to the seaman, and constituted
him proprietor of any colony which he could establish in Florida, on
condition that the money was repaid. The contract was signed on the 20th of
March 1565. Aviles sailed on the 28th of July of the same year with one
vessel of 600 tons, ten sloops and 1500 men. On the 28th of August he
entered and named the Bay of St Augustine, and began a fort there. He took
the French post of Fort Caroline on the 20th of September 1565, and in
October exterminated a body of Frenchmen who, under the Huguenot Jean
Ribault, had arrived on the coast of Florida to relieve their colony. The
Spanish commander, after slaying nearly all his prisoners, hung their
bodies on trees, with the inscription, "Not as Frenchmen but as Lutherans."
A French sea-captain named Dominique de Gourgues revenged the massacre by
capturing in 1568 Fort San Mateo (as the Spanish had renamed Fort
Caroline), and hanging the garrison, with the inscription, "Not as
Spaniards but as murderers." Till 1567 Aviles remained in Florida, busy
with his colony. In that year he returned to Spain. He made one more voyage
to Florida, and died on the 17th of September 1574. Aviles married Maria de
Solis, when very young, and left three daughters. His letters prove him to
have been a pious and high-minded officer, who never imagined that he could
be supposed by any honest man to have gone too far in massacring the
Frenchmen, whom he regarded as pirates and heretics.
See _The Spanish Settlements within the Present Limits of the United
States, Florida, 1562-1574_, by Woodbury Lowery (New York, 1905).
(D. H.)
AVILES, or SAN NICOLAS DE AVILES (the Roman _Flavionavia_), a seaport of
northern Spain, in the province of Oviedo; on the Bay of Aviles, a winding
inlet of the Bay of Biscay, 24 m. by rail W. of Gijon. Pop. (1900) 12,763.
Aviles is a picturesque and old-fashioned town, containing several ancient
palaces and Gothic churches. The bay, which is crossed by a fine bridge at
its narrow landward extremity, is the headquarters of a fishing fleet, and
a port of call for many coasting vessels. Coal from the Oviedo mines is
exported coastwise, and in 1904 the shipments from Aviles for the first
time exceeded those from Gijon, reaching a total of more than 290,000 tons.
Glass and coarse linen and woollen stuffs are manufactured; and there are
valuable stone quarries in the neighbourhood.
AVIZANDUM (from Late Lat. _avizare_, to consider), a Scots law term; the
judge "makes avizandum with a cause," _i.e._ takes time to consider his
judgment.
AVLONA (anc. _Aulon_; Ital. _Valona_; Alb. _Vliona_), a town and seaport of
Albania, Turkey, in the vilayet of Iannina. Pop. (1900) about 6000. Avlona
occupies an eminence near the Gulf of Avlona, an inlet of the Adriatic,
almost surrounded by mountains. The port is the best on the Albanian coast,
and the nearest to Italy. It is protected by the island of Saseno, the
ancient Saso, and by Cape Glossa, the northernmost headland of the
Acroceraunian mountains. It is regularly visited by steamers from Trieste,
Fiume, Brindisi, and other Austro-Hungarian and Italian ports, as well as
by many small Greek and Turkish coasters. The cable and telegraph line from
Otranto, in Italy, to Constantinople, has an important station here. The
town is about 1-1/2 m. from the sea, and has rather a pleasant appearance
with its minarets and its palace, surrounded with gardens and olive-groves.
Valonia, a material largely used by tanners, is the pericarp of an acorn
obtained in the neighbouring oak-woods, and derives its name from Valona.
The surrounding district is mainly agricultural and pastoral, producing
oats, maize, cotton, olive oil, cattle, sheep, skins, hides and butter. All
these commodities are exported in considerable quantities, besides bitumen,
which is obtained from a mine worked by a French [v.03 p.0066] company. The
imports are woollen and cotton piece-goods, metals and petroleum.
Avlona played an important part in the wars between the Normans and the
Byzantines, during the 11th and 12th centuries. In 1464 it was taken by the
Ottomans; and after being in Venetian possession in 1690, was restored to
them in 1691. In 1851 it suffered severely from an earthquake.
AVOCA, or OVOCA, VALE OF, a mountain glen of county Wicklow, Ireland, in
the south-eastern part of the county, formed by the junction of the small
rivers Avonmore and Avonbeg, which, rising in the central highlands of the
county, form with their united waters the Ovoca river, flowing south and
south-east to the Irish Sea at Arklow. The vale would doubtless rank only
as one among the many beautiful glens of the district, but that it has
obtained a lasting celebrity through one of the _Irish Melodies_ of the
poet Thomas Moore, in which its praises are sung. It is through this song
that the form "Avoca" is most familiar, although the name is locally spelt
"Ovoca." The glen is narrow and densely wooded. Its beauty is somewhat
marred by the presence of lead and copper mines, and by the main line of
the Dublin & South Eastern railway, on which Ovoca station, midway in the
vale, is 42-3/4 m. south of Dublin. Of the two "meetings of the waters"
(the upper, of the Avonmore and Avonbeg, and the lower, of the Aughrim with
the Ovoca) the upper, near the fine seat of Castle Howard, is that which
inspired the poet. At Avondale, above the upper "meeting," by the Avonmore,
Charles Stewart Parnell was born.
AVOCADO PEAR, the fruit of the tree _Persea gratissima_, which grows in the
West Indies and elsewhere; the flesh is of a soft and buttery consistency
and highly esteemed. The name _avocado_, the Spanish for "advocate," is a
sound-substitute for the Aztec _ahuacatl_; it is also corrupted into
"alligator-pear." _Avocato_, _avigato_, _abbogada_ are variants.
AVOGADRO, AMEDEO, CONTE DI QUAREGNA (1776-1856), Italian physicist, was
born at Turin on the 9th of June 1776, and died there on the 9th of July
1856. He was for many years professor of higher physics in Turin
University. He published many physical memoirs on electricity, the
dilatation of liquids by heat, specific heats, capillary attraction, atomic
volumes &c. as well as a treatise in 4 volumes on _Fisica di corpi
ponderabili_ (1837-1841). But he is chiefly remembered for his "Essai d'une
maniere de determiner les masses relatives des molecules elementaires des
corps, et les proportions selon lesquelles elles entrent dans les
combinaisons" (_Journ. de Phys._, 1811), in which he enunciated the
hypothesis known by his name (Avogadro's rule) that under the same
conditions of temperature and pressure equal volumes of all gases contain
the same number of smallest particles or molecules, whether those particles
consist of single atoms or are composed of two or more atoms of the same or
different kinds.
AVOIDANCE (from "avoid," properly to make empty or void, in current usage,
to keep away from, to shun; the word "avoid" is adapted from the O. Fr.
_esvuidier_ or _evider_, to empty out, _voide_, modern _vide_, empty,
connected with Lat. _vacuus_), the action of making empty, void or null,
hence, in law, invalidation, annulment (see CONFESSION AND AVOIDANCE); also
the becoming void or vacant, hence in ecclesiastical law a term signifying
the vacancy of a benefice--that it is _void_ of an incumbent. In general
use, the word means the action of keeping away from anything, shunning or
avoiding.
AVOIRDUPOIS, or AVERDUPOIS (from the French _avoir de pois_, goods of
weight), the name of a system of weights used in Great Britain and America
for all commodities except the precious metals, gems and medicines. The
foundation of the system is the grain. A cubic inch of water weighs 252.458
grains. Of this grain 7000 now (see WEIGHTS AND MEASURES) make a pound
avoirdupois. This pound is divided into 16 oz., and these ounces into 16
drachms.
_Avoirdupois Weight._
Drachm, 16=ounce, 16=pound, 14=stone 2=quarter, 4=hundred, 20=ton.
27.3 grains 437.5 7000 98,000 196,000 grs 112 lb 2240 lb.
AVON, the name of several rivers in England and elsewhere. The word is
Celtic, appearing in Welsh (very frequently) as _afon_, in Manx as _aon_,
and in Gaelic as _abhuinn_ (pronounced _avain_), and is radically identical
with the Sanskrit _ap_, water, and the Lat. _aqua_ and _amnis_. The root
appears more or less disguised in a vast number of river names all over the
Celtic area in Europe. Thus, besides such forms as _Evan_, _Aune_, _Anne_,
_Ive_, _Auney_, _Inney,_ &c., in the British Islands, _Aff_, _Aven_,
_Avon_, _Aune_ appear in Brittany and elsewhere in France, _Avenza_ and
_Avens_ in Italy, _Avia_ in Portugal, and _Avono_ in Spain; while the
terminal syllable of a large proportion of the Latinized names of French
rivers, such as the _Sequana_, the _Matrona_ and the _Garumna_, seems
originally to have been the same word. The names Punj_ab_, Do_ab_, &c.,
show the root in a clearer shape.
In England the following are the principal rivers of this name.
1. The EAST or HAMPSHIRE AVON rises in Wiltshire south of Marlborough, and
watering the Vale of Pewsey collects feeders from the high downs between
Marlborough and Devizes. Breaching the high ground of Salisbury Plain, it
passes Amesbury, and following a very sinuous course reaches Salisbury.
Here it receives on the east bank the waters of the Bourne, and on the west
those of the Wylye. With a more direct course, and in a widening, fertile
valley it continues past Downton, Fordingbridge and Ringwood, skirting the
New Forest on the west, to Christchurch, where it receives the Stour from
the west, and 2-1/2 m. lower enters the English Channel through the broad
but narrow-mouthed Christchurch harbour. The length, excluding lesser
sinuosities, is about 60 m., Salisbury being 35 m. above the mouth. The
total fall is rather over 500 ft., and that from Salisbury about 140 ft.
The river is of no commercial value for navigation. It abounds in loach,
and there are valuable salmon fisheries. The drainage area is 1132 sq. m.
2. The LOWER or BRISTOL AVON rises on the eastern slope of the Cotteswold
Hills in Gloucestershire, collecting the waters of several streams south of
Tetbury and east of Malmesbury. It flows east and south in a wide curve,
through a broad upper valley past Chippenham and Melksham, after which it
turns abruptly west to Bradford-on-Avon, receives the waters of the Frome
from the south, and enters the beautiful narrow valley in which lie Bath
and Bristol. Below Bristol the valley becomes the Clifton Gorge, famous for
its wooded cliffs and for the Clifton (_q.v._) suspension bridge which
bestrides it. The cliffs and woods have been so far disfigured by quarries
that public feeling was aroused, and in 1904 an "Avon Gorge Committee" was
appointed to report to the corporation of Bristol on the possibility of
preserving the beauties of the locality. The Avon finally enters the
estuary of the Severn at Avonmouth, though it can hardly be reckoned as a
tributary of that river. From Bristol downward the river is one of the most
important commercial waterways in England, as giving access to that great
port. The Kennet and Avon Canal, between Reading and the Avon, follows the
river closely from Bradford down to Bath, where it enters it by a descent
of seven locks. The length of the river, excluding minor sinuosities, is
about 75 m., the distance from Bradford to Bath being 10 m., thence to
Bristol 12 m., and thence to the mouth 8 m. The total fall is between 500
and 600 ft., but it is only 235 ft. from Malmesbury. The drainage area is
891 sq. miles.
3. The UPPER AVON, also called the Warwickshire, and sometimes the
"Shakespeare" Avon from its associations with the poet's town of Stratford
on its banks, is an eastern tributary of the Severn. It rises near Naseby
in Northamptonshire, and, with a course of about 100 m. joins the Severn
immediately below Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire. Its early course is
south-westerly to Rugby, thereafter it runs west and south-west to Warwick,
receiving the Leam on the east. Its general direction thereafter remains
south-westerly, and it flows past Stratford-on-Avon, receives the Stour on
the south and the Arrow on the north and thence past Evesham and Pershore
to Tewkesbury. The valley is always broad, and especially from Warwick
downward, through the Vale of Evesham, the scenery is very beautiful, the
rich valley being flanked by the bold Cotteswold Hills on [v.03 p.0067] the
south and by the wooded slopes of the Arden district of Warwickshire on the
north. The view of Warwick Castle, rising from the wooded banks of the
river, is unsurpassed, and the positions of Stratford and Evesham are
admirable. The river is locked, and carries a small trade up to Evesham, 28
m. from Tewkesbury; the locks from Evesham upward to Stratford (17 m.) are
decayed, but the weirs, and mill-dams still higher, afford many navigable
reaches to pleasure boats. The total fall of the river is about 500 ft.;
from Rugby about 230 ft., and from Warwick 120 ft. The river abounds in
coarse fish.
Among other occurrences of the name of Avon in Great Britain there may be
noted--in England, a stream flowing south-east from Dartmoor in Devonshire
to the English Channel; in South Wales, the stream which has its mouth at
Aberavon in Glamorganshire; in Scotland, tributaries of the Clyde, the Spey
and the Forth.
AVONIAN, in geology, the name proposed by Dr A. Vaughan in 1905 (_Q.J.G.S._
vol. lxi. p. 264) for the rocks of Lower Carboniferous age in the Avon
gorge at Bristol. The Avonian stage appears to embrace precisely the same
rocks and fossil-zones as the earlier designation "Dinantien" (see
CARBONIFEROUS SYSTEM); but its substages, being founded upon different
local conditions and a different interpretation of the zonal fossils, do
not correspond exactly with those of the French and Belgian geologists.
Substages. ZONES. Substages.
{ Kidwellian { _Dibunophyllum_ } }
{ { _Seminula_ } Viseen }
Avonian { } } Dinantien
{ { _Syringothyris_ } }
{ Clevedonian { }
{ { _Zaphrentis_ } Tournaisien }
{ { _Cleistopora_ } }
The upper Avonian (Kidwellian) is well developed about Kidwelly in
Carmarthenshire. The lower substage (Clevedonian) is well displayed near
Clevedon in Somerset.
See A. Vaughan, "The Carboniferous Limestone Series (Avonian) of the Avon
Gorge," _Proc. Bristol Naturalists' Soc._, 4th series, vol. i. pt. 2, 1906,
pp. 74-168 (many plates); and T. F. Sibley, "On the Carboniferous Limestone
(Avonian) of the Mendip area (Somerset)," _Q.J.G.S._ vol. lxii., 1906, pp.
324-380 (plates).
(J. A. H.)
AVONMORE, BARRY YELVERTON, 1ST VISCOUNT (1736-1805), Irish judge, was born
in 1736. He was the eldest son of Frank Yelverton of Blackwater, Co. Cork.
Educated at Trinity College, Dublin, he was for some years an assistant
master under Andrew Buck in the Hibernian Academy. In 1761 he married Miss
Mary Nugent, a lady of some fortune, and was then enabled to read for the
bar. He was called in 1764, his success was rapid, and he took silk eight
years afterwards. He sat in the Irish parliament as member successively for
the boroughs of Donegal and Carrickfergus, becoming attorney-general in
1782, but was elevated to the bench as chief baron of the exchequer in
1783. He was created (Irish) Baron Avonmore in 1795, and in 1800 (Irish)
viscount. Among his colleagues at the Irish bar Yelverton was a popular and
charming companion. Of insignificant appearance, he owed his early
successes to his remarkable eloquence, which made a great impression on his
contemporaries; as a judge, he was inclined to take the view of the
advocate rather than that of the impartial lawyer. He gave his support to
Grattan and the Whigs during the greater part of his parliamentary career,
but in his latter days became identified with the court party and voted for
the union, for which his viscounty was a reward. He had three sons and one
daughter, and the title has descended in the family.
AVRANCHES, a town of north-western France, capital of an arrondissement in
the department of Manche, 87 m. S. of Cherbourg on the Western railway.
Pop. (1906) 7186. It stands on a wooded hill, its botanical gardens
commanding a fine view westward of the bay and rock of St Michel. At the
foot of the hill flows the river See, which at high tide is navigable from
the sea. The town is surrounded by avenues, which occupy the site of the
ancient ramparts, remains of which are to be seen on the north side.
Avranches was from 511 to 1790 a bishop's see, held at the end of the 17th
century by the scholar Daniel Huet; and its cathedral, destroyed as
insecure in the time of the first French Revolution, was the finest in
Normandy. Its site is now occupied by an open square, one stone remaining
to mark the spot where Henry II. of England received absolution for the
murder of Thomas Becket. The churches of Notre-Dame des Champs and St
Saturnin are modern buildings in the Gothic style. The ancient episcopal
palace is now used as a court of justice; a public library is kept in the
hotel de ville. In the public gardens there is a statue of General Jean
Marie Valhubert, killed at Austerlitz. Avranches is seat of a sub-prefect
and has a tribunal of first instance and a communal college.
Leather-dressing is the chief industry; steam-sawing, brewing and dyeing
are also carried on, and horticulture flourishes in the environs. Trade is
in cider, cattle, butter, flowers and fruit, and there are salmon and other
fisheries.
Avranches, an important military station of the Romans, was in the middle
ages chief place of a county of the duchy of Normandy. It sustained several
sieges, the most noteworthy of which, in 1591, was the result of its
opposition to Henry IV. In 1639 Avranches was the focus of the peasant
revolt against the salt-tax, known as the revolt of the Nu-pieds.
AWADIA and FADNIA, two small nomad tribes of pure Arab blood living in the
Bayuda desert, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, between the wells of Jakdul and
Metemma. They are often incorrectly classed as Ja'alin. They own numbers of
horses and cattle, the former of the black Dongola breed. At the battle of
Abu Klea (17th of January 1885) they were conspicuous for their courage in
riding against the British square.
See _Anglo-Egyptian Sudan_, edited by Count Gleichen (London, 1905).
AWAJI, an island belonging to Japan, situated at the eastern entrance of
the Inland Sea, having a length of 32 m., an extreme breadth of 16 m., and
an area of 218 sq. m., with a population of about 190,000. It is separated
on the south from the island of Shikoku by the Naruto channel, through
which, in certain conditions of the tide, a remarkable torrential current
is set up. The island is celebrated for its exquisite scenery, and also for
the fact that it is traditionally reputed to have been the first of the
Japanese islands created by the deities Izanagi and Izanami. The loftiest
peak is Yuruuba-yama (1998 ft.), the most picturesque Sen-zan (1519 ft.).
Awaji is noted for a peculiar manufacture of pottery.
AWARD (from O. Fr. _ewart_, or _esguart_, cf. "reward"), the decision of an
arbitrator. (See ARBITRATION.)
AWE, LOCH, the longest freshwater lake in Scotland, situated in
mid-Argyllshire, 116 ft. above the sea, with an area of nearly 16 sq. m. It
has a N.E. to S.W. direction and is fully 23 m. long from Kilchurn Castle
to Ford, its breadth varying from 1/3 of a mile to 3 m. at its upper end,
where it takes the shape of a crescent, one arm of which runs towards Glen
Orchy, the other to the point where the river Awe leaves the lake. The two
ends of the loch are wholly dissimilar in character, the scenery of the
upper extremity being majestic, while that of the lower half is pastoral
and tame. Of its numerous islands the best-known is Inishail, containing
ruins of a church and convent, which was suppressed at the Reformation. At
the extreme north-eastern end of the lake, on an islet which, when the
water is low, becomes part of the mainland, stand the imposing ruins of
Kilchurn Castle. Its romantic surroundings have made this castle a
favourite subject of the landscape painter. Dalmally, about 2 m. from the
loch, is one of the pleasantest villages in the Highlands and has a great
vogue in midsummer. The river Awe, issuing from the north-western horn of
the loch, affords excellent trout and salmon fishing.
AWL (O. Eng. _ael_; at one time spelt _nawl_ by a confusion with the
indefinite article before it), a small hand-tool for piercing holes.
AXE (O. Eng. _aex_; a word common, in different forms, in the Teutonic
languages, and akin to the Greek [Greek: axine]; the _New English
Dictionary_ prefers the spelling "ax"), a tool or weapon, taking various
shapes, but, when not compounded with some distinguishing word (_e.g._ in
"pick-axe"), generally formed [v.03 p.0068] by an edged head fixed upon a
handle for striking. A "hatchet" is a small sort of axe.
AXHOLME, an island in the north-west part of Lincolnshire, England, lying
between the rivers Trent, Idle and Don, and isolated by drainage channels
connected with these rivers. It consists mainly of a plateau of slight
elevation, rarely exceeding 100 ft., and comprises the parishes of
Althorpe, Belton, Epworth, Haxey, Luddington, Owston and Crowle; the total
area being about 47,000 acres. At a very early period it would appear to
have been covered with forest; but this having been in great measure
destroyed, it became in great part a swamp. In 1627 King Charles I., who
was lord of the island, entered into a contract with Cornelius Vermuyden, a
Dutchman, for reclaiming the meres and marshes, and rendering them fit for
tillage. This undertaking led to the introduction of a large number of
Flemish workmen, who settled in the district, and, in spite of the violent
measures adopted by the English peasantry to expel them, retained their
ground in sufficient numbers to affect the physical appearance and the
accent of the inhabitants to this day. The principal towns in the isle are
Crowle (pop. 2769) and Epworth. The Axholme joint light railway runs north
and south through the isle, connecting Goole with Haxey junction; and the
Great Northern, Great Eastern and Great Central lines also afford
communications. The land is extremely fertile. The name, properly Axeyholm
(cf. Haxey), is hybrid, _Ax_ being the Celtic _uisg_, water; _ey_ the
Anglo-Saxon for island; and _holm_ the Norse word with the same
signification.
AXILE, or AXIAL, a term (= related to the axis) used technically in
science; in botany an embryo is called axile when it has the same direction
as the axis of the seed.
[Illustration]
AXINITE, a mineral consisting of a complex aluminium and calcium
boro-silicate with a small amount of basic hydrogen; the calcium is partly
replaced in varying amounts by ferrous iron and manganese, and the
aluminium by ferric iron: the formula is HCa_3BAl_2(SiO_4)_4. The mineral
was named (from [Greek: axine], an axe) by R. J. Hauy in 1799, on account
of the characteristic thin wedge-like form of its anorthic crystals. The
colour is usually clove-brown, but rarely it has a violet tinge (on this
account the mineral was named yanolite, meaning violet stone, by J. C.
Delametherie in 1792). The best specimens are afforded by the beautifully
developed transparent glassy crystals, found with albite, prehnite and
quartz, in a zone of amphibolite and chlorite-schists at Le Bourg d'Oisans
in Dauphine. It is found in the greenstone and hornblende-schists of
Batallack Head near St Just in Cornwall, and in diabase in the Harz; and
small ones in Maine and in Northampton county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Large
crystals have also been found in Japan. In its occurrence in basic rather
than in acid eruptive rocks, axinite differs from the boro-silicate
tourmaline, which is usually found in granite. The specific gravity is
3.28. The hardness of 6 1/2-7, combined with the colour and transparency,
renders axinite applicable for use as a gemstone, the Dauphine crystals
being occasionally cut for this purpose.
(L. J. S.)
AXIOM (Gr. [Greek: axioma]), a general proposition or principle accepted as
self-evident, either absolutely or within a particular sphere of thought.
Each special science has its own axioms (cf. the Aristotelian [Greek:
archai], "first principles") which, however, are sometimes susceptible of
proof in another wider science. The Greek word was probably confined by
Plato to mathematical axioms, but Aristotle (_Anal. Post._ i. 2) gave it
also the wider significance of the ultimate principles of thought which are
behind all special sciences (_e.g._ the principle of contradiction). These
are apprehended solely by the mind, which may, however, be led to them by
an inductive process. After Aristotle, the term was used by the Stoics and
the school of Ramus for a proposition simply, and Bacon (_Nov. Organ._ i.
7) used it of any general proposition. The word was reintroduced in modern
philosophy probably by Rene Descartes (or by his followers) who, in the
search for a definite self-evident principle as the basis of a new
philosophy, naturally turned to the familiar science of mathematics. The
axiom of Cartesianism is, therefore, the _Cogito ergo sum_. Kant still
further narrowed the meaning to include only self-evident (intuitive)
synthetic propositions, _i.e._ of space and time. The nature of axiomatic
certainty is part of the fundamental problem of logic and metaphysics.
Those who deny the possibility of all non-empirical knowledge naturally
hold that every axiom is ultimately based on observation. For the Euclidian
axioms see GEOMETRY.
AXIS (Lat. for "axle"), a word having the same meaning as axle, and also
used with many extensions of this primary meaning. It denotes the imaginary
line about which a body or system of bodies rotates, or a line about which
a body or action is symmetrically disposed. In geometry, and in geometrical
crystallography, the term denotes a line which serves to aid the
orientation of a figure. In anatomy, it is, among other uses, applied to
the second cervical vertebra, and in botany it means the stem.
AXLE (in Mid. Eng. _axel-tre_, from O. Norweg. _oxull-tre_, cognate with
the O. Eng. _aexe_ or _eaxe_, and connected with Sansk. _aksha_, Gr.
[Greek: axon], and Lat. _axis_), the pin or spindle on which a wheel turns.
In carriages the axle-tree is the bar on which the wheels are mounted, the
axles being strictly its thinner rounded prolongations on which they
actually turn. The pins which pass through the ends of the axles and keep
the wheels from slipping off are known as axle-pins or "linch-pins,"
"linch" being a corruption, due to confusion with "link," of the Old
English word for "axle," _lynis_, cf. Ger. _Luense_.
AX-LES-THERMES, a watering place of south-western France, in the department
of Ariege, at the confluence of the Ariege with three tributaries, 26 m.
S.S.E. of Foix by rail. Pop. (1906) 1179. Ax (Aquae), situated at a height
of 2300 ft., is well known for its warm sulphur springs (77deg-172deg F.),
of which there are about sixty. The waters, which were used by the Romans,
are efficacious in the treatment of rheumatism, skin diseases and other
maladies.
AXMINSTER, a market-town in the Honiton parliamentary division of
Devonshire, England, on the river Axe, 27 m. E. by N. of Exeter by the
London & South-Western railway. Pop. (1901) 2906. The minster, dedicated to
St Mary the Virgin, illustrates every style of architecture from Norman to
Perpendicular. There are in the chancel two freestone effigies, perhaps of
the 14th century, besides three sedilia, and a piscina under arches.
Axminster was long celebrated for the admirable quality of its carpets,
which were woven by hand, like tapestry. Their manufacture was established
in 1755. Their name is preserved, but since the seat of this industry was
removed to Wilton near Salisbury, the inhabitants of Axminster have found
employment in brush factories, corn mills, timber yards and an iron
foundry. Cloth, drugget, cotton, leather, gloves and tapes are also made.
Coaxdon House, the birthplace in 1602 of Sir Symonds d'Ewes, the Puritan
historian, is about 2 m. distant, and was formerly known as St Calyst.
Axminster (Axemystre) derives its name from the river Axe and from the old
abbey church or minster said to have been built by King Aethelstan. The
situation of Axminster at the intersection of the two great ancient roads,
Iknield Street and the Fosse Way, and also the numerous earthworks and
hill-fortresses in the neighbourhood indicate a very early settlement.
There is a tradition that the battle of Brunanburh was fought in the valley
of the Axe, and that the bodies of the Danish princes who perished in
action were buried in Axminster church. According to Domesday, Axminster
was held by the king. In 1246 Reginald de Mohun, then lord of the manor,
founded a Cistercian abbey at Newenham within the parish of Axminster,
granting it a Saturday market and a fair on Midsummer day, and the next
year made over to the monks from Beaulieu the manor and hundred of
Axminster. The abbey was dissolved in 1539. The midsummer fair established
by Reginald de Mohun is still held.
See _Victoria County History--Devon_; James Davidson, _British and Roman
Remains in the Vicinity of Axminster_ (London, 1833).
AXOLOTL, the Mexican name given to larvae salamanders of the genus
_Amblystoma_. It required the extraordinary acumen of the great Cuvier at
once to recognize, when the first specimens [v.03 p.0069] of the _Gyrinus
edulis_ or _Axolotl_ of Mexico were brought to him by Humboldt in the
beginning of the 19th century, that these Batrachians were not really
related to the Perennibranchiates, such as _Siren_ and _Proteus_, with
which he was well acquainted, but represented the larval form of some
air-breathing salamander. Little heed was paid to his opinion by most
systematists, and when, more than half a century later, the axolotl was
found to breed in its branchiferous condition, the question seemed to be
settled once for all against him, and the genus _Siredon_, as it was called
by J. Wagler, was unanimously maintained and placed among the permanent
gill-breathers.
It seemed impossible to admit that an animal which lives for years without
losing its gills, and is able to propagate in that state, could be anything
but a perfect form. And yet subsequent discoveries, which followed in rapid
succession, have established that _Siredon_ is but the larval form of the
salamander _Amblystoma_, a genus long known from various parts of North
America; and Cuvier's conclusions now read much better than they did half a
century after they were published. Before reviewing the history of these
discoveries, it is desirable to say a few words of the characters of the
axolotl (larval form) and of the _Amblystoma_ (perfect or imago form).
The axolotl has been known to the Mexicans from the remotest times, as an
article of food regularly brought from neighbouring lakes to the Mexico
market, its flesh being agreeable and wholesome. Francisco Hernandez
(1514-1578) has alluded to it as _Gyrinus edulis_ or _atolocatl_, and as
_lusus aquarum_, _piscis ludicrus_, or _axolotl_, which latter name has
remained in use, in Mexico and elsewhere, to the present day. But for its
large size--it grows to a length of eleven inches--it is a nearly exact
image of the British newt larvae. It has the same moderately long, plump
body, with a low dorsal crest, the continuation of the membrane bordering
the strongly compressed tail; a large thick head with small eyes without
lids and with a large pendent upper lip; two pairs of well-developed limbs,
with free digits; and above all, as the most characteristic feature, three
large appendages on each side of the back of the head, fringed with
filaments which, in their fullest development, remind one of black ostrich
feathers. These are the external gills, through which the animal breathes
the oxygen dissolved in the water. The jaws are provided with small teeth
in several rows, and there is an elongate patch of further teeth on each
side of the front of the palate (inserted on the vomerine and palatine
bones). The colour is blackish, or of a dark olive-grey or brownish grey
with round black spots or dots.
The genus _Amblystoma_ was established by J. J. Tschudi in 1838 for various
salamanders from North America, which had previously been described as
_Lacerta_ or _Salamandra_, and which, so far as general appearance is
concerned, differ little from the European salamanders. The body is smooth
and shiny, with vertical grooves on the sides, the tail is but feebly
compressed, the eye is moderately large and provided with movable lids, and
the upper lip is nearly straight. But the dentition of the palate is very
different; the small teeth, which are in a single row, as in the jaws, form
a long transverse, continuous or interrupted series behind the inner nares
or choanae. The animal leaves the water after completing its metamorphosis,
the last stage of which is marked by the loss of the gills. One of the
largest and most widely distributed species of this genus, which includes
about twenty, is the _Amblystoma tigrinum_, an inhabitant of both the east
and west of the United States and of a considerable part of the cooler
parts of Mexico. It varies much in colour, but it may be described as
usually brown or blackish, with more or less numerous yellow spots,
sometimes arranged in transverse bands. It rarely exceeds a length of nine
inches. This is the _Amblystoma_ into which the axolotl has been
ascertained to transform. It is generally admitted that the axolotls which
were kept alive in Europe and were particularly abundant between 1870 and
1880 are all the descendants of a stock bred in Paris and distributed
chiefly by dealers, originally, we believe, by the late P. Carbonnier.
Close in-breeding without the infusion of new blood is probably the cause
of the decrease in their numbers at the present day, specimens being more
difficult to procure and fetching much higher prices than they did
formerly, at least in England and in France.
The original axolotls, from the vicinity of Mexico City, it is believed,
arrived at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, Paris, late in 1863. They were
thirty-four in number, among which was an albino, and had been sent to that
institution, together with a few other animals, by order of Marshal Forey,
who was appointed commander-in-chief of the French expeditionary force to
Mexico after the defeat of General Lorencez at Puebla (May 5th, 1862), and
returned to France at the end of 1863, after having handed over the command
to Marshal (then General) Bazaine. Six specimens (five males and one
female) were given by the Societe d'Acclimatation to Professor A. Dumeril,
the administrator of the reptile collection of the Jardin des Plantes, the
living specimens of which were at that time housed in a very miserable
structure, situated at a short distance from the comparatively sumptuous
building which was erected some years later and opened to the public in
1874. Soon after their arrival at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, some of the
axolotls spawned, but the eggs, not having been removed from the aquarium,
were devoured by its occupants. At the same time, in the Jardin des
Plantes, the single female axolotl also spawned, twice in succession, and a
large number of young were successfully reared. This, it then seemed,
solved the often-discussed question of the perennibranchiate nature of
these Batrachians. But a year later, the second generation having reached
sexual maturity, new broods were produced, and out of these some
individuals lost their gills and dorsal crest, developed movable eyelids,
changed their dentition, and assumed yellow spots,--in fact, took on all
the characters of _Amblystoma tigrinum_. However, these transformed
salamanders, of which twenty-nine were obtained from 1865 to 1870, did not
breed, although their branchiate brethren continued to do so very freely.
It was not until 1876 that the axolotl in its _Amblystoma_ state, offspring
of several generations of perennibranchiates, was first observed to spawn,
and this again took place in the reptile house of the Jardin des Plantes,
as reported by Professor E. Blanchard.
The original six specimens received in 1864 at the Jardin des Plantes,
which had been carefully kept apart from their progeny, remained in the
branchiate condition, and bred eleven times from 1865 to 1868, and, after a
period of two years' rest, again in 1870. According to the report of Aug.
Dumeril, they and their offspring gave birth to 9000 or 10,000 larvae
during that period. So numerous were the axolotls that the Paris Museum was
able to distribute to other institutions, as well as to dealers and private
individuals, over a thousand examples, which found their way to all parts
of Europe, and numberless specimens have been kept in England from 1866 to
the present day. The first specimens exhibited in the London Zoological
Gardens, in August 1864, were probably part of the original stock received
from Mexico by the Societe d'Acclimatation but do not appear to have bred.
"White" axolotls, albinos of a pale flesh colour, with beautiful red gills,
have also been kept in great numbers in England and on the continent. They
are said to be all descendants of one albino male specimen received in the
Paris Museum menagerie in 1866, which, paired with normal specimens in 1867
and 1868, produced numerous white offspring, which by selection have been
fixed as a permanent race, without, according to L. Vaillant, showing any
tendency to reversion. We are not aware of any but two of these albinos
having ever turned into the perfect _Amblystoma_ form, as happened in Paris
in 1870, the albinism being retained.
Thus we see that in our aquariums most of the axolotls remain in the
branchiate condition, transformed individuals being on the whole very
exceptional. Now it has been stated that in the lakes near Mexico City,
where it was first discovered, the axolotl _never_ transforms into an
_Amblystoma_. This the present writer is inclined to doubt, considering
that he has received examples of the normal _Amblystoma tigrinum_ from
various parts of Mexico, and that Alfred Duges has described an
_Amblystoma_ from mountains near Mexico City; at the same time he feels
very [v.03 p.0070] suspicious of the various statements to that effect
which have appeared in so many works, and rather disposed to make light of
the ingenious theories launched by biological speculators who have never
set foot in Mexico, especially Weismann's picture of the dismal condition
of the salt-incrusted surroundings which were supposed to have hemmed in
the axolotl--the brackish Lago de Texcoco, the largest of the lakes near
Mexico, being evidently in the philosopher's mind.
Thanks to the enthusiasm of H. Gadow during his visit to Mexico in the
summer of 1902, we are now better informed on the conditions under which
the axolotl lives near Mexico City. First, he ascertained that there are no
axolotls at all in the Lago de Texcoco, thus disposing at once of the
Weismannian explanation; secondly, he confirmed A. Duges's statement that
there is a second species of _Amblystoma_, which is normal in its
metamorphosis, near Mexico but at a higher altitude, which may explain
Velasco's observation that regularly transforming _Amblystomas_ occur near
that city; and thirdly, he made a careful examination of the two lakes,
Chalco and Xochimilco, where the axolotls occur in abundance and are
procured for the market. The following is an abstract of Gadow's very
interesting account. "Lakes Chalco and Xochimilco are a paradise, situated
about 10 ft. higher than the Texcoco Lake and separated from it by several
hills. High mountains slope down to the southern shores, with a belt of
fertile pastures, with shrubs and trees and little streams, here and there
with rocks and ravines. In fact, there are thousands of inviting
opportunities for newts to leave the lake if they wanted to do so. Lake
Xochimilco contains powerful springs, but away from them the water appears
dark and muddy, full of suspended fresh and decomposing vegetable matter,
teeming with fish, larvae of insects, _Daphniae_, worms and axolotl. These
breed in the beginning of February. The native fishermen know all about
them; how the eggs are fastened to the water plants, how soon after the
little larvae swarm about in thousands, how fast they grow, until by the
month of June they are all grown into big, fat creatures ready for the
market; later in the summer the axolotls are said to take to the rushes, in
the autumn they become scarce, but none have ever been known to leave the
water or to metamorphose, nor are any perfect _Amblystomas_ found in the
vicinity of the two lakes."
In Gadow's opinion, the reason why there are only perennibranchiate
axolotls in these lakes is obvious. The constant abundance of food, stable
amount of water, innumerable hiding-places in the mud, under the banks,
amongst the reeds and roots of the floating islands which are scattered all
over them,--all these points are inducements or attractions so great that
the creatures remain in their paradise and consequently retain all those
larval features which are not directly connected with sexual maturity.
There is nothing whatever to prevent them from leaving these lakes, but
there is also nothing to induce them to do so. The same applies
occasionally to European larvae, as in the case observed in the Italian
Alps by F. de Filippi. Nevertheless, in the axolotl the latent tendency can
still be revived, as we have seen above and as is proved by the experiments
of Marie von Chauvin. When once sexually ripe the axolotl are apparently
incapable of changing, but their ancestral course of evolution is still
latent in them, and will, if favoured by circumstances, reappear in
following generations.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--G. Cuvier, _Mem. Instit. Nation._ (1807), p. 149, and in A.
Humboldt and A. Bompland, _Observ. zool._ i. (1811), p. 93; L. Calori,
_Mem. Acc. Bologna_, iii. (1851), p. 269; A. Dumeril, _Comptes rendus_, lx.
(1865), p. 765, and _N. Arch. Mus._ ii. (1866), p. 265; E. Blanchard,
_Comptes rendus_, lxxxii. (1876), p. 716; A. Weismann, _Z. wiss. Zool._
xxv. (Suppl. 1875), p. 297; M. von Chauvin, _Z. wiss. Zool._ xxvii. (1876),
p. 522; F. de Filippi, _Arch. p. la zool._ i. (1862), p. 206; G. Hahn,
_Rev. Quest. Sci._ Brussels (2), i. (1892), p. 178; H. Gadow, _Nature_,
lxvii. (1903), p. 330.
(G. A. B.)
AXUM, or AKSUM, an ancient city in the province of Tigre, Abyssinia (14deg
7' 52" N., 38deg 31' 10" E.; altitude, 7226 ft), 12 m. W. by S. of Adowa.
Many European travellers have given descriptions of its monuments, though
none of them has stayed there more than a few days. The name, written Aksm
and Aksum in the Sabaean and Ethiopic inscriptions in the place, is found
in classical and early Christian writers in the forms of Auxome, Axumis,
Axume, &c., the first mention being in the _Periplus Maris Erythraei_ (c.
A.D. 67), where it is said to be the seat of a kingdom, and the emporium
for the ivory brought from the west. For the history of this kingdom see
ETHIOPIA. J. T. Bent conjectured that the seat of government was
transferred to Axum from Jeha, which he identified with the ancient Ava;
and according to a document quoted by Achille Raffray the third Christian
monarch transferred it from Axum to Lalibela. This second transference
probably took place very much later; in spite of it, the custom of crowning
Abyssinian kings at Axum continued, and King John was crowned there as late
as 1871 or 1872. A. B. Wylde conjectures that it had become unsuitable for
a royal seat by having acquired the status of a sacred city, and thus
affording sanctuary to criminals and political offenders within the chief
church and a considerable area round it, where there are various houses in
which such persons can be lodged and entertained. This same sanctity makes
it serve as a depository for goods of all sorts in times of danger, the
chief church forming a sort of bank. The present town, containing less than
a thousand houses, is supposed to occupy only a small portion of the area
covered by the ancient city; it lies in a kloof or valley, but the old town
must have been built on the western ridge rather than in the valley, as the
traces of well-dressed stones are more numerous there than elsewhere.
Most of the antiquities of Axum still await excavation; those that have
been described consist mainly of obelisks, of which about fifty are still
standing, while many more are fallen. They form a consecutive series from
rude unhewn stones to highly finished obelisks, of which the tallest still
erect is 60 ft. in height, with 8 ft. 7 in. extreme front width; others
that are fallen may have been taller. The highly finished monoliths are all
representations of a many-storeyed castle, with an altar at the base of
each. They appear to be connected with Semitic sun-worship, and are
assigned by Bent to the same period as the temple at Baalbek, though some
antiquarians would place them much earlier; the representation of a castle
in a single stone seems to bear some relation to the idea worked out in the
monolith churches of Lalibela described by Raffray. The fall of many of the
monuments, according to Bent, was caused by the washing away of the
foundations by the stream called Mai Shum, and indeed the native tradition
states that "Gudert, queen of the Amhara," when she visited Axum, destroyed
the chief obelisk in this way by digging a trench from the river to its
foundation. Others attribute it to religious fanaticism, or to the result
of some barbaric invasion, such as Axum may have repeatedly endured before
it was sacked by Mahommed Gran, sultan of Harrar, about 1535.
LITERATURE.--Classical references to Axum are collected by Pietschmann in
Pauly's _Realencyclopaedie_ (2nd ed.); for the history as derived from the
inscriptions see D. H. Mueller, Appendix to J. T. Bent's _Sacred City of
the Ethiopians_ (London, 1893), and E. Glaser, _Die Abessinier in Arabien_
(Munich, 1895). For the antiquities, Bruce's _Travels_ (1790); Salt, in the
_Travels of Viscount Valentia_ (London, 1809), iii. 87-97 and 178-200;
J. T. Bent, _l.c._; and A. B. Wylde, _Modern Abyssinia_ (London, 1901). For
geology, Schimper, in the _Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft fuer Erdkunde_
(Berlin, 1869).
(D. S. M.*)
AY, AYE. The word "aye," meaning _always_ (and pronounced as in "day";
connected with Gr. [Greek: aei], always, and Lat. _aevum_, an age), is
often spelt "ay," and the _New English Dictionary_ prefers this. "Aye,"
meaning Yes (and pronounced almost like the word "eye"), though sometimes
identified with "yea," is probably the same word etymologically, though
differentiated by usage; the form "ay" for this is also common, but
inconvenient; at one time it was spelt simply _I_ (_e.g._ in Michael
Drayton's _Idea_, 57; published in 1593).
AYACUCHO, a city and department of central Peru, formerly known as Guamanga
or Huamanga, renamed from the small plain of Ayacucho (_Quichua_, "corner
of death"). This lies near the village of Quinua, in an elevated valley
11,600 ft. above sea-level, where a decisive battle was fought between
General Sucre and the Spanish viceroy La Serna in 1824, which resulted in
the defeat of the latter and the independence of Peru. The city of
Ayacucho, capital of the department of that name [v.03 p.0071] and of the
province of Guamanga, is situated on an elevated plateau, 8911 ft. above
sea-level, between the western and central Cordilleras, and on the main
road between Lima and Cuzco, 394 m. from the former by way of Jauja. Pop.
(1896) 20,000. It has an agreeable, temperate climate, is regularly built,
and has considerable commercial importance. It is the seat of a bishopric
and of a superior court of justice. It is distinguished for the number of
its churches and conventual establishments, although the latter have been
closed. The city was founded by Pizarro in 1539 and was known as Guamanga
down to 1825. It has been the scene of many notable events in the history
of Peru.
The department of AYACUCHO extends across the great plateau of central
Peru, between the departments of Huancavelica and Apurimac, with Cuzco on
the E. and Ica on the W. Area, 18,185 sq. m.; pop. (1896) 302,469. It is
divided into six provinces, and covers a broken, mountainous region,
partially barren in its higher elevations but traversed by deep, warm,
fertile valleys. It formed a part of the original home of the Incas and
once sustained a large population. It produces Indian corn and other
cereals and potatoes in the colder regions, and tropical fruits, sweet
potatoes and mandioca (_Jatropha manihot_, L.) in the low tropical valleys.
It is also an important mining region, having a large number of silver
mines in operation. Its name was changed from Guamanga to Ayacucho by a
decree of 1825.
AYAH, a Spanish word (_aya_) for children's nurse or maid, introduced by
the Portuguese into India and adopted by the English to denote their native
nurses.
AYALA, DON PEDRO LOPEZ DE (1332-1407), Spanish statesman, historian and
poet, was born at Vittoria in 1332. He first came into prominence at the
court of Peter the Cruel, whose cause he finally deserted; he greatly
distinguished himself in subsequent campaigns, during which he was twice
made prisoner, by the Black Prince at Najera (1367) and by the Portuguese
at Aljubarrota (1385). A favourite of Henry II. and John I. of Castile, he
was made grand chancellor of the realm by Henry III. in 1398. A brave
officer and an able diplomat, Ayala was one of the most cultivated
Spaniards of his time, at once historian, translator and poet. Of his many
works the most important are his chronicles of the four kings of Castile
during whose reigns he lived; they give a generally accurate account of
scenes and events, most of which he had witnessed; he also wrote a long
satirical and didactic poem, interesting as a picture of his personal
experiences and of contemporary morality. The first part of his chronicle,
covering only the reign of Peter the Cruel, was printed at Seville in 1495;
the first complete edition was printed in 1779-1780 in the collection of
_Cronicas Espanolas_, under the auspices of the Spanish Royal Academy of
History. Ayala died at Calahorra in 1407.
See Rafael Floranes, "Vida literaria de Pedro Lopez de Ayala," in the
_Documentos ineditos para la historia de Espana_, vols. xix. and xx.; F. W.
Schirrmacher, "Ueber die Glaubwurdigkeit der Chronik Ayalas," in
_Geschichte von Spanien_ (Berlin, 1902), vol. v. pp. 510-532.
AYALA Y HERRERA, ADELARDO LOPEZ DE (1828-1879), Spanish writer and
politician, was born at Guadalcanal on the 1st of May 1828, and at a very
early age began writing for the theatre of his native town. The titles of
these juvenile performances, which were played by amateurs, were _Salga por
donde saliere_, _Me voy a Sevilla_ and _La Corona y el Punal._ As
travelling companies never visited Guadalcanal, and as ladies took no part
in the representations, these three plays were written for men only. Ayala
persuaded his sister to appear as the heroine of his comedy, _La primera
Dama_, and the innovation, if it scandalized some of his townsmen,
permitted him to develop his talent more freely. In his twentieth year he
matriculated at the university of Seville, but his career as a student was
undistinguished. In Seville he made acquaintance with Garcia Gutierrez, who
is reported to have encouraged his dramatic ambitions and to have given him
the benefit of his own experience as a playwright. Early in 1850 Ayala
removed his name from the university books, and settled in Madrid with the
purpose of becoming a professional dramatist. Though he had no friends and
no influence, he speedily found an opening. A four-act play in verse, _Un
Hombre de Estado_, was accepted by the managers of the Teatro Espanol, was
given on the 25th of January 1851, and proved a remarkable success.
Henceforward Ayala's position and popularity were secure. Within a
twelvemonth he became more widely known by his _Castigo y Perdon_, and by a
more humorous effort, _Los dos Guzmanes_; and shortly afterwards he was
appointed by the _Moderado_ government to a post in the home office, which
he lost in 1854 on the accession to power of the Liberal party. In 1854 he
produced _Rioja_, perhaps the most admired and the most admirable of all
his works, and from 1854 to 1856 he took an active part in the political
campaign carried on in the journal _El Padre Cobos_. A _zarzuela_, entitled
_Guerta a muerte_, for which Emilio Arrieta composed the music, belongs to
1855, and to the same collaboration is due _El Agente de Matrimonios_. At
about this date Ayala passed over from the Moderates to the Progressives,
and this political manoeuvre had its effect upon the fate of his plays. The
performances of _Los Comuneros_ were attended by members of the different
parties; the utterances of the different characters were taken to represent
the author's personal opinions, and every speech which could be brought
into connexion with current politics was applauded by one half of the house
and derided by the other half. A _zarzuela_, named _El Conde de Castralla_,
was given amid much uproar on the 20th of February 1856, and, as the piece
seemed likely to cause serious disorder in the theatre, it was suppressed
by the government after the third performance. Ayala's rupture with the
Moderates was now complete, and in 1857, through the interest of O'Donnell,
he was elected as Liberal deputy for Badajoz. His political changes are
difficult to follow, or to explain, and they have been unsparingly
censured. So far as can be judged, Ayala had no strong political views, and
drifted with the current of the moment. He took part in the revolution of
1868, wrote the "Manifesto of Cadiz," took office as colonial minister,
favoured the candidature of the duc de Montpensier, resigned in 1871,
returned to his early Conservative principles, and was a member of Alfonso
XII.'s first cabinet. Meanwhile, however divided in opinion as to his
political conduct, his countrymen were practically unanimous in admiring
his dramatic work; and his reputation, if it gained little by _El Nuevo Don
Juan_, was greatly increased by _El Tanto por Ciento_ and _El Tejado de
Vidrio_. His last play, _Consuelo_, was given on the 30th of March 1878.
Ayala was nominated to the post of president of congress shortly before his
death, which occurred unexpectedly on the 30th of January 1879. The best of
his lyrical work, excellent for finish and intense sincerity, is his
_Epistola_ to Emilio Arrieta, and had he chosen to dedicate himself to
lyric poetry, he might possibly have ranked with the best of Spain's modern
singers; as it is, he is a very considerable poet who affects the dramatic
form. In his later writings he deals with modern society, its vices, ideals
and perils; yet in many essentials he is a manifest disciple of Calderon.
He has the familiar Calderonian limitations; the substitution of types for
characters, of eloquence for vital dialogue. Nor can he equal the sublime
lyrism of his model; but he is little inferior in poetic conception, in
dignified idealization, and in picturesque imagery. And it may be fairly
claimed for him that in _El Tejado de Vidrio_ and _El Tanto par Ciento_ he
displays a very exceptional combination of satiric intention with romantic
inspiration. By these plays and by _Rioja_ and _Consuelo_ he is entitled to
be judged. They will at least ensure for him an honourable place in the
history of the modern Spanish theatre.
A complete edition of his dramatic works, edited by his friend and rival
Tamayo y Baus, has been published in seven volumes (Madrid, 1881-1885).
(J. F.-K.)
AYE-AYE, a word of uncertain signification (perhaps only an exclamation),
but universally accepted as the designation of the most remarkable and
aberrant of all the Malagasy lemurs (see PRIMATES). The aye-aye, _Chiromys_
(or _Daubentonia_) _madagascariensis_, is an animal with a superficial
resemblance to a long-haired and dusky-coloured cat with unusually large
eyes. It has a broad rounded head, short face, large naked eyes, large
hands, and long thin fingers with pointed claws, of which the [v.03 p.0072]
third is remarkable for its extreme slenderness. The foot resembles that of
the other lemurs in its large opposable great toe with a flat nail; but all
the other toes have pointed compressed claws. Tail long and bushy. General
colour dark brown, the outer fur being long and rather loose, with a woolly
under-coat. Teats two, inguinal in position. The aye-aye was discovered by
Pierre Sonnerat in 1780, the specimen brought to Paris by that traveller
being the only one known until 1860. Since then many others have been
obtained, and one lived for several years in the gardens of the Zoological
Society of London. Like so many lemurs, it is completely nocturnal in its
habits, living either alone or in pairs, chiefly in the bamboo forests.
Observations upon captive specimens have led to the conclusion that it
feeds principally on juices, especially of the sugar-cane, which it obtains
by tearing open the hard woody circumference of the stalk with its strong
incisor teeth; but it is said also to devour certain species of wood-boring
caterpillars, which it obtains by first cutting down with its teeth upon
their burrows, and then picking them out of their retreat with the claw of
its attenuated middle finger. It constructs large ball-like nests of dried
leaves, lodged in a fork of the branches of a large tree, and with the
opening on one side.
Till recently the aye-aye was regarded as representing a family by
itself--the _Chiromyidae_; but the discovery that it resembles the other
lemurs of Madagascar in the structure of the inner ear, and thus differs
from all other members of the group, has led to the conclusion that it is
best classed as a subfamily (_Chiromyinae_) of the _Lemuridae_.
(R. L.*)
AYLESBURY, a market-town in the Aylesbury parliamentary division of
Buckinghamshire, England, 38 m. N.W. by W. of London; served by the Great
Central, Metropolitan and Great Western railways (which use a common
station) and by a branch of the London & North-Western railway. Pop. of
urban district (1901) 9243. It has connexion by a branch with the Grand
Junction canal. It lies on a slight eminence in a fertile tract called the
Vale of Aylesbury, which extends northward from the foot of the Chiltern
Hills. Its streets are mostly narrow and irregular, but picturesque. The
church of St Mary, a large cruciform building, is primarily Early English,
but has numerous additions of later dates. The font is transitional Norman,
a good example; and a small pre-Norman crypt remains beneath part of the
church. There are some Decorated canopied tombs, and the chancel stalls are
of the 15th century. The central tower is surmounted by an ornate
clock-turret dating from the second half of the 17th century. The
county-hall and town-hall, overlooking a broad market-place, are the
principal public buildings. The grammar school was founded in 1611.
Aylesbury is the assize town for the county, though Buckingham is the
county town. There is a large agricultural trade, the locality being
especially noted for the rearing of ducks; straw-plaiting and the
manufacture of condensed milk are carried on, and there are printing works.
The Jacobean mansion of Hartwell in the neighbourhood of Aylesbury was the
residence of the French king Louis XVIII. during his exile (1810-1814).
Aylesbury (Aeylesburge, Eilesberia, Aillesbir) was famous in Saxon times as
the supposed burial-place of St Osith. In A.D. 571 it was one of the towns
captured by Cuthwulf, brother of Ceawlin, king of the Saxons. At the time
of the Domesday survey the king owned the manor. In 1554, by a charter from
Queen Mary, bestowed as a reward for fidelity during the rebellion of the
duke of Northumberland, Aylesbury was constituted a free borough corporate,
with a common council consisting of a bailiff, 10 aldermen and 12 chief
burgesses. The borough returned two members to parliament from this date
until the Redistribution Act of 1885, but the other privileges appear to
have lapsed in the reign of Elizabeth. Aylesbury evidently had a
considerable market from very early times, the tolls being assessed at the
time of Edward the Confessor at L25 and at the time of the Domesday survey
at L10. In 1239 Henry III. made a grant to John, son of Geoffrey FitzPeter
of an annual fair at the feast of St Osith (June 3rd), which was confirmed
by Henry VI. in 1440. Queen Mary's charter instituted a Wednesday market
and fairs at the feasts of the Annunciation and the Invention of the Holy
Cross. In 1579 John Pakington obtained a grant of two annual fairs to be
held on the day before Palm Sunday and on the feast of the Invention of the
Holy Cross, and a Monday market for the sale of horses and other animals,
grain and merchandise.
AYLESFORD, HENEAGE FINCH, 1st EARL OF (_c._ 1640-1719), 2nd son of Heneage
Finch, 1st earl of Nottingham, was educated at Westminster school and at
Christ Church, Oxford, where he matriculated on the 18th of November 1664.
In 1673 he became a barrister of the Inner Temple; king's counsel and
bencher in 1677; and in 1679, during the chancellorship of his father, was
appointed solicitor-general, being returned to parliament for Oxford
University, and in 1685 for Guildford. In 1682 he represented the crown in
the attack upon the corporation of London, and next year in the prosecution
of Lord Russell, when, according to Burnet, "and in several other trials
afterwards, he showed more of a vicious eloquence in turning matters with
some subtlety against the prisoners than of strict or sincere
reasoning."[1] He does not, however, appear to have exceeded the duties of
prosecutor for the crown as they were then understood. In 1684, in the
trial of Algernon Sidney, he argued that the unpublished treatise of the
accused was an overt act, and supported the opinion of Jeffreys that
_scribere est agere_.[2] The same year he was counsel for James in his
successful action against Titus Oates for libel, and in 1685 prosecuted
Oates for the crown for perjury. Finch, however, though a Tory and a crown
lawyer, was a staunch churchman, and on his refusal in 1686 to defend the
royal dispensing power he was summarily dismissed by James, He was the
leading counsel in June 1688 for the seven bishops, when he "strangely
exposed and very boldly ran down"[3] the dispensing power, but his mistaken
tactics were nearly the cause of his clients losing their case.[4] He sat
again for Oxford University in the convention parliament, which
constituency he represented in all the following assemblies except that of
1698, till his elevation to the peerage. He was, however, no supporter of
the House of Orange, advocated a regency in James's name, and was one of
the few who in the House of Commons opposed the famous vote that James had
broken the contract between king and people and left the throne vacant. He
held no office during William's reign, and is described by Macky as "always
a great opposer" of the administration. In 1689 he joined in voting for the
reversal of Lord Russell's attainder, and endeavoured to defend his conduct
in the trial, but was refused a hearing by the House. He opposed the
Triennial Bill of 1692, but in 1696 spoke against the bill of association
and test, which was voted for the king's protection, on the ground that
though William was to be obeyed as sovereign he could not be acknowledged
"rightful and lawful king." In 1694 he argued against the crown in the
bankers' case. In 1703 he was created baron of Guernsey and a privy
councillor, and after the accession of George I. on the 19th of October
1714, earl of Aylesford, being reappointed a privy councillor and made
chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, which office he retained till
February 1716. He died on the 22nd of July 1719. According to John Macky
(_Memoirs_, p. 71; published by Roxburghe Club, 1895) he was accounted "one
of the greatest orators in England and a good common lawyer; a firm
asserter of the prerogative of the crown and jurisdiction of the church; a
tall, thin, black man, splenatick." He married Elizabeth, daughter and
co-heiress of Sir John Banks of Aylesford, by whom, besides six daughters,
he had three sons, of whom the eldest, Heneage, succeeded him as 2nd earl
of Aylesford. The 2nd earl died in 1757, and since this date the earldom
has been held by his direct descendants, six of whom in succession have
borne the Christian name of Heneage.
Many of his legal arguments are printed in _State Trials_ (see esp. viii.
694, 1087, ix. 625, 880, 996, x. 126, 319, 405, 1199, xii. 183, 353, 365).
Wood attributes to him on the faith of common rumour the authorship of _An
Antidote against Poison ... Remarks upon a Paper printed by Lady (Rachel)
Russel_ (1683), ascribed in _State Trials_ (ix. 710) to Sir Bartholomew
Shower; but see the latter's allusion to it on p. 753.
[1] _Hist. of His Own Times_, i. 556. Swift has appended a note, "an arrant
rascal," but Finch's great offence with the dean was probably his
advancement by George I. rather than his conduct of state trials as here
described.
[2] _Ibid_. 572, and Speaker Onslow's note.
[3] N. Luttrell's _Relation_, i. 447.
[4] _State Trials_, xii. 353.
[v.03 p.0073] AYLESFORD, a town in the Medway parliamentary division of
Kent, England, 3-1/2 m. N.W. of Maidstone on the South-Eastern & Chatham
railway. Pop. (1901) 2678. It stands at the base of a hill on the right
bank of the Medway. The ancient church of St. Peter (restored in 1878) is
principally Perpendicular, but contains some Norman and Decorated portions.
It has interesting brasses of the 15th and 16th centuries and an early
embattled tower. At a short distance west, a residence occupying part of
the site, are remains of a Carmelite friary, founded here in 1240. It is
claimed for this foundation (but not with certainty) that it was the first
house of Carmelites established in England, and the first general chapter
of the order was held here in 1245. Several remains of antiquity exist in
the neighbourhood, among them a cromlech called Kit's Coty House, about a
mile north-east from the village. (See STONE MONUMENTS, Plate, fig. 2.) In
accordance with tradition this has been thought to mark the burial-place of
Catigern, who was slain here in a battle between the Britons and Saxons in
A.D. 455; the name has also been derived from Celtic _Ked-coit_, that is,
the tomb in the wood. The name of the larger group of monuments close by,
called the Countless Stones, is due to the popular belief, which occurs
elsewhere, that they are not to be counted. Large numbers of British coins
have been found in the neighbourhood. The supposed tomb of Horsa, who fell
in the same battle, is situated at Horsted, about 2 m. to the north.
AYLLON, LUCAS VASQUEZ DE (_c._ 1475-1526), Spanish adventurer and colonizer
in America, was born probably in Toledo, Spain, about 1475. He accompanied
Nicolas Ovando to Hispaniola (Santo Domingo) in 1502, and there became a
magistrate of La Concepcion and other towns, and a member of the superior
court of Hispaniola. He engaged with great profit in various commercial
enterprises, became interested in a plan for the extension of the Spanish
settlements to the North American mainland, and in 1521 sent Francisco
Gordillo on an exploring expedition which touched on the coast of the
Florida peninsula and coasted for some distance northward. Gordillo's
report of the region was so favourable that Ayllon in 1523 obtained from
Charles V. a rather indefinite charter giving him the right to plant
colonies. He sent another reconnoitring expedition in 1525, and early in
1526 he himself set out with 500 colonists and about 100 African slaves. He
touched at several places along the coast, at one time stopping long enough
to replace a wrecked ship with a new one, this being considered the first
instance of shipbuilding on the North American continent. Sailing northward
to about latitude 33deg 40', he began the construction of a town which he
called San Miguel. The exact location of this town is in dispute, some
writers holding that it was on the exact spot upon which Jamestown, Va.,
was later built; more probably, however, as Lowery contends, it was near
the mouth of the Pedee river. The employment of negro slaves here was
undoubtedly the first instance of the sort in what later became the United
States. The spot was unhealthy and fever carried off many of the colonists,
including Ayllon himself, who died on the 18th of October 1526. After the
death of their leader dissensions broke out among the colonists, some of
the slaves rebelled and escaped into the forest, and in December the town
was abandoned and the remnant of the colonists embarked for Hispaniola,
less than 150 arriving in safety.
See Woodbury Lowery, _Spanish Settlements within the Present Limits of the
United States_ (2 vols., New York, 1903-1905).
AYLMER, JOHN (1521-1594), English divine, was born in the year 1521 at
Aylmer Hall, Tivetshall St Mary, Norfolk. While still a boy, his precocity
was noticed by Henry Grey, marquis of Dorset, afterwards duke of Suffolk,
who sent him to Cambridge, where he seems to have become a fellow of
Queens' College. About 1541 he was made chaplain to the duke, and tutor to
his daughter, Lady Jane Grey. His first preferment was to the archdeaconry
of Stow, in the diocese of Lincoln, but his opposition in convocation to
the doctrine of transubstantiation led to his deprivation and to his flight
into Switzerland. While there he wrote a reply to John Knox's famous _Blast
against the Monstrous Regiment of Women_, under the title of _An Harborowe
for Faithfull and Trewe Subjects, &c._, and assisted John Foxe in
translating the _Acts of the Martyrs_ into Latin. On the accession of
Elizabeth he returned to England. In 1559 he resumed the Stow archdeaconry,
and in 1562 he obtained that of Lincoln. He was a member of the famous
convocation of 1562, which reformed and settled the doctrine and discipline
of the Church of England. In 1576 he was consecrated bishop of London, and
while in that position made himself notorious by his harsh treatment of all
who differed from him on ecclesiastical questions, whether Puritan or
Papist. Various efforts were made to remove him to another see. He is
frequently assailed in the famous _Marprelate Tracts_, and is characterized
as "Morrell," the bad shepherd, in Spenser's _Shepheard's Calendar_ (July).
His reputation as a scholar hardly balances his inadequacy as a bishop in
the transition time in which he lived. He died in June 1594. His Life was
written by John Strype (1701).
AYMARA (anc. _Colla_), a tribe of South American Indians, formerly
inhabiting the country around Lake Titicaca and the neighbouring valleys of
the Andes. They form now the chief ethnical element in Bolivia, but are of
very mixed blood. In early days the home of the Aymaras by Lake Titicaca
was a "holy land" for the Incas themselves, whose national legends
attributed the origin of all Quichua (Inca) civilization to that region.
The Aymaras, indeed, seem to have possessed a very considerable culture
before their conquest by the Incas in the 13th and 14th centuries, evidence
of which remains in the megalithic ruins of Tiahuanaco. When the Spaniards
arrived the Aymaras had been long under the Inca domination, and were in a
decadent state. They, however, retained certain privileges, such as the use
of their own language; and their treatment by their conquerors generally
suggested that the latter believed themselves of Aymara blood. Physically,
the pure Aymara is short and thick-set, with a great chest development, and
with the same reddish complexion, broad face, black eyes and rounded
forehead which distinguish the Quichuas. Like the latter, too, the Aymaras
are sullen and apathetic in disposition. They number now, including
half-breeds, about half a million in Bolivia. Some few are also found in
southern Peru.
See _Journal Ethnol. Society_ (1870), "The Aymara Indians of Bolivia and
Peru."
AYMER, or AETHELMAR, OF VALENCE (d. 1260), bishop of Winchester, was a
half-brother of Henry III. His mother was Isabelle of Angouleme, the second
wife of King John, his father was Hugo of Lusignan, the count of La Marche,
whom Isabelle married in 1220. The children of this marriage came to
England in 1247 in the hope of obtaining court preferment. In 1250 the
king, by putting strong pressure upon the electors, succeeded in obtaining
the see of Winchester for Aymer. The appointment was in every way
unsuitable. Aymer was illiterate, ignorant of the English language, and
wholly secular in his mode of life. Upon his head was concentrated the
whole of the popular indignation against the foreign favourites; and he
seems to have deserved this unenviable distinction. At the parliament of
Oxford (1258) he and his brothers repudiated the new constitution prepared
by the barons. He was pursued to Winchester, besieged in Wolvesey castle,
and finally compelled to surrender and leave the kingdom. He had never been
consecrated; accordingly in 1259 the chapter of Winchester proceeded to a
new election. Aymer, however, gained the support of the pope; he was on his
way back to England when he was overtaken by a fatal illness at Paris.
See W. Stubbs' _Constitutional History_, vol. ii. (1896); G. W. Prothero's
_Simon de Montfort_ (1877); W. H. Blaauw's _Barons' War_ (1871).
AYMESTRY LIMESTONE, an inconstant limestone which occurs locally in the
Ludlow series of Silurian rocks, between the Upper and Lower Ludlow shales.
It derives its name from Aymestry in Herefordshire, where it may be seen on
both sides of the river Lugg. It is well developed in the neighbourhood of
Ludlow (it is sometimes called the Ludlow limestone) and occupies a similar
position in the Ludlow shales at Woolhope, [v.03 p.0074] the Abberley
Hills, May Hill and the Malvern Hills. In lithological character it varies
greatly; in one place it is a dark grey, somewhat crystalline limestone,
elsewhere it passes into a flaggy, earthy or shaly condition, or even into
a mere layer of nodules. When well developed it may reach 50 ft. in
thickness in beds of from 1 to 5 ft.; in this condition it naturally forms
a conspicuous feature in the landscape because it stands out by its
superior hardness from the soft shales above and below.
The most common fossil is _Pentamerus Knightii_, which is extremely
abundant in places. Other brachiopods, corals and trilobites are present,
and are similar to those found in the Wenlock limestone. (See SILURIAN.)
AYR, a royal, municipal and police burgh and seaport, and county town of
Ayrshire, Scotland, at the mouth of the river Ayr, 41-1/2 m. S.S.W. of
Glasgow by the Glasgow & South-Western railway. Pop. (1891) 24,944; (1901)
29,101. It is situated on a fine bay and its beautiful sands attract
thousands of summer visitors. Ayr proper lies on the south bank of the
river, which is crossed by three bridges, besides the railway viaduct--the
Victoria Bridge (erected in 1898) and the famous "Twa Brigs" of Burns. The
Auld Brig is said to date from the reign of Alexander III. (d. 1286). The
New Brig was built in 1788, mainly owing to the efforts of Provost
Ballantyne. The prophecy which Burns put into the mouth of the venerable
structure came true in 1877, when the newer bridge yielded to floods and
had to be rebuilt (1879); and the older structure itself was closed for
public safety in 1904. The town has extended greatly on the southern side
of the stream, where, in the direction of the racecourse, there are now
numerous fine villas. The county buildings, designed after the temple of
Isis in Rome, accommodate the circuit and provincial courts and various
local authorities. The handsome town buildings, surmounted by a fine spire
226 ft. high, contain assembly and reading rooms. Of the schools the most
notable is the Academy (rebuilt in 1880), which in 1764 superseded the
grammar school of the burgh, which existed in the 13th century. The Gothic
Wallace Tower in High Street stands on the site of an old building of the
same name taken down in 1835, from which were transferred the clock and
bells of the Dungeon steeple. A niche in front is filled by a statue of the
Scottish hero by James Thorn (1802-1850), a self-taught sculptor. There are
statues of Burns, the 13th earl of Eglinton, General Smith Neill and Sir
William Wallace. The Carnegie free library was established in 1893. The
charitable institutions include the county hospital, district asylum, a
deaf and dumb home, the Kyle combination poor-house, St John's refuge and
industrial schools for boys and girls. The _Ayr Advertiser_ first appeared
on 5th of August 1803, and was the earliest newspaper published in
Ayrshire. In the suburbs is a racecourse where the Western Meeting is held
in September of every year. The principal manufactures include leather,
carpets, woollen goods, flannels, blankets, lace, boots and shoes; and
fisheries and shipbuilding are also carried on. There are several
foundries, engineering establishments and saw mills. Large quantities of
timber are imported from Canada and Norway; coal, iron, manufactured goods
and agricultural produce are the chief exports. The harbour, with wet and
slip dock, occupies both sides of the river from the New Bridge to the sea,
and is protected on the south by a pier projecting some distance into the
sea, and on the north by a breakwater with a commodious dry dock. There are
esplanades to the south and north of the harbour. The town is governed by a
provost and council, and unites with Irvine, Inveraray, Campbeltown and
Oban in returning one member to parliament.
In 1873 the municipal boundary was extended northwards beyond the river so
as to include Newton-upon-Ayr and Wallace Town, formerly separate. Newton
is a burgh or barony of very ancient creation, the charter of which is
traditionally said to have been granted by Robert Bruce in favour of
forty-eight of the inhabitants who had distinguished themselves at
Bannockburn. The suburb is now almost wholly occupied with manufactures,
the chief of which are chemicals, boots and shoes, carpets and lace. It is
on the Glasgow & South-Western railway, and has a harbour and dock from
which coal and goods are the main exports. About 3 m. north of Ayr is
Prestwick, a popular watering-place and the headquarters of one of the most
flourishing golf clubs in Scotland. The outstanding attraction of Ayr,
however, is the pleasant suburb of Alloway, 2-1/2 m. to the south, with
which there is frequent communication by electric cars. The "auld clay
biggin" in which Robert Burns was born on the 25th of January 1759, has
been completely repaired and is now the property of the Ayr Burns's
Monument trustees. In the kitchen is the box bed in which the poet was
born, and many of the articles of furniture belonged to his family.
Adjoining the cottage is a museum of Burnsiana. The "auld haunted kirk,"
though roofless, is otherwise in a fair state of preservation, despite
relic-hunters who have removed all the woodwork. In the churchyard is the
grave of William Burness, the poet's father. Not far distant, on a
conspicuous position close by the banks of the Doon, stands the Grecian
monument to Burns, in the grounds of which is the grotto containing Thorn's
figures of Tam o' Shanter and Souter Johnnie.
Nothing is known of the history of Ayr till the close of the 12th century,
when it was made a royal residence, and soon afterwards a royal burgh, by
William the Lion. During the wars of Scottish independence the possession
of Ayr and its castle was an object of importance to both the contending
parties, and the town was the scene of many of Wallace's exploits. In 1315
the Scottish parliament met in the church of St John to confirm the
succession of Edward Bruce to the throne. Early in the 16th century it was
a place of considerable influence and trade. The liberality of William the
Lion had bestowed upon the corporation an extensive grant of lands; while
in addition to the well-endowed church of St John, it had two monasteries,
each possessed of a fair revenue. When Scotland was overrun by Cromwell,
Ayr was selected as the site of one of the forts which he built to command
the country. This fortification, termed the citadel, enclosed an area of
ten or twelve acres, and included within its limits the church of St John,
which was converted into a storehouse, the Protector partly indemnifying
the inhabitants by contributing L150 towards the erection of a new place of
worship, now known as the Old Church. A portion of the tower of St John's
church remains, but has been completely modernized. The site of the fort is
now nearly covered with houses, the barracks being in Fort Green.
AYRER, JAKOB (?-1605), German dramatist, of whose life little is known. He
seems to have come to Nuremberg as a boy and worked his way up to the
position of imperial notary. He died at Nuremberg on the 26th of March
1605. Besides a rhymed _Chronik der Stadt Bamberg_ (edited by J. Heller,
Bamberg, 1838), and an unpublished translation of the Psalms, Ayrer has
left a large number of dramas which were printed at Nuremberg under the
title _Opus Theatricum_ in 1618. This collection contains thirty tragedies
and comedies and thirty-six _Fastnachtsspiele_ (Shrovetide plays) and
_Singspiele_. As a dramatist, Ayrer is virtually the successor of Hans
Sachs (_q.v._), but he came under the influence of the so-called _Englische
Komoedianten_, that is, troupes of English actors, who, at the close of the
16th century and during the 17th, repeatedly visited the continent,
bringing with them the repertory of the Elizabethan theatre. From those
actors Ayrer learned how to enliven his dramas with sensational incidents
and spectacular effects, and from them he borrowed the character of the
clown. His plays, however, are in spite of his foreign models, hardly more
dramatic, in the true sense of the word, than those of Hans Sachs, and they
are inferior to the latter in poetic qualities. The plots of two of his
comedies, _Von der schoenen Phoenicia_ and _Von der schoenen Sidea_, were
evidently drawn from the same sources as those of Shakespeare's _Much Ado
about Nothing_ and _Tempest_.
_Ayrers Dramen_, edited by A. von Keller, have been published by the
Stuttgart Lit. Verein (1864-1865). See also L. Tieck, _Deutsches Theater_
(1817); A. Cohn, _Shakespeare in Germany_ (1885), which contains a
translation of the two plays mentioned above; J. Tittmann, _Schauspiele des
sechzehnten Jahrhunderts_ (1888).
AYRSHIRE, a south-western county of Scotland, bounded N. by Renfrewshire,
E. by Lanarkshire and Dumfriesshire, S.E. by [v.03 p.0075]
Kirkcudbrightshire, S. by Wigtownshire and W. by the Firth of Clyde. It
includes off its coast the conspicuous rock of Ailsa Craig, 10 m. W. of
Girvan, Lady Island, 3 m. S.W. of Troon, and Horse Island, off Ardrossan.
Its area is 724,523 acres or 1142 sq. m., its coast-line being 70 m. long.
In former times the shire was divided into the districts of Cunninghame (N.
of the Irvine), Kyle (between the Irvine and the Boon), and Carrick (S. of
the Doon), and these terms are still occasionally used. Kyle was further
divided by the Ayr into King's Kyle on the north and Kyle Stewart. Robert
Bruce was earl of Carrick, a title now borne by the prince of Wales. The
county is politically divided into North and South Ayrshire, the former
comprising Cunninghame and the latter Kyle and Carrick. The surface is
generally undulating with a small mountainous tract in the north and a
larger one in the south and south-east. The principal hills are Black Craig
(2298 ft.), 5 m. south-east of New Cumnock; Enoch (1865 ft.), 5 m. east of
Dalmellington; Polmaddie (1750 ft.) 2 m. south-east of Barr; Stake on the
confines of Ayrshire and Renfrewshire, and Corsancone (1547 ft.), 3 m.
north-east of New Cumnock. None of the rivers is navigable, but their
varied and tranquil beauty has made them better known than many more
important streams. The six most noted are the Stinchar (_c_ soft), Girvan,
Doon, Ayr, Irvine and Garnock. Of these the Ayr is the longest. It rises at
Glenbuck, on the border of Lanarkshire, and after a course of some 38 m.
falls into the Firth of Clyde at the county town which, with the county, is
named from it. The scenery along its banks from Sorn downwards--passing
Catrine, Ballochmyle, Barskimming, Sundrum, Auchencruive and Craigie--is
remarkably picturesque. The lesser streams are numerous, but Burns's verse
has given preeminence to the Afton, the Cessnock and the Lugar. There are
many lochs, the largest of which is Loch Doon, 5-1/2 m. long, the source of
the river of the same name. From Loch Finlas, about 20 m. south-east of
Ayr, the town derives its water-supply. The Nith rises in Ayrshire and a
few miles of its early course belong to the county.
_Geology._--The greater portion of the hilly region in the south of the
county forms part of the Silurian tableland of the south of Scotland. Along
its north margin there is a belt of elevated ground consisting mainly of
Old Red Sandstone strata, while the tract of fertile low ground is chiefly
occupied by younger Palaeozoic rocks. The Silurian belt stretching
eastwards from the mouth of Loch Ryan to the Merrick range is composed of
grits, greywackes and shales with thin leaves of black shales, containing
graptolites of Upper Llandeilo age which are repeated by folding and cover
a broad area. Near their northern limit Radiolarian cherts, mudstones and
lavas of Arenig age rise from underneath the former along anticlines
striking north-east and south-west. In the Ballantrae region there is a
remarkable development of volcanic rocks--lavas, tuffs and agglomerates--of
Arenig age, their horizon being defined by graptolites occurring in cherty
mudstones and black shales interleaved in lavas and agglomerates. These
volcanic materials are pierced by serpentine, gabbro and granite. The
serpentine forms two belts running inland from near Bennane Head and from
Burnfoot, being typically developed on Balhamie Hill near Colmonell. Gabbro
appears on the shore north of Lendalfoot, while on the Byne and Grey Hills
south of Girvan there are patches of granite and quartz-diorite which seem
to pass into more basic varieties. These volcanic and plutonic rocks and
Radiolarian cherts are covered unconformably by conglomerates (Bennan Hill
near Straiton and Kennedy's Pass) which are associated with limestones of
Upper Llandeilo age that have been wrought in the Stinchar valley and at
Craighead. South of the river Girvan there is a sequence from
Llandeilo--Caradoc to Llandovery--Tarannon strata, excellent sections of
which are seen on the shore north of Kennedy's Pass and in Penwhapple Glen
near Girvan. Llandovery strata again appear north of the Girvan at Dailly,
where they form an inlier surrounded by the Old Red Sandstone and
Carboniferous formations. Representatives of Wenlock rocks form a narrow
belt near the village of Straiton. Some of the Silurian sediments of the
Girvan province are highly fossiliferous, but the order of succession is
determined by the graptolites. Near Muirkirk and in the Douglas Water there
are inliers of Wenlock, Ludlow and Downtonian rocks, coming to the surface
along anticlines truncated by faults and surrounded by Old Red Sandstone
and Carboniferous strata. In the south-east of the county there is a part
of the large granite mass that stretches from Loch Doon south to Loch Dee,
giving rise to wild scenery and bounded by the high ground near the head of
the Girvan Water, boulders of which have been distributed over a wide area
during the glacial period. Along the northern margin of the uplands the
Lower Old Red Sandstone is usually faulted against the Silurian strata, but
on Hadyard Hill south of the Girvan valley they rest on the folded and
denuded members of the latter system. The three divisions of this formation
are well represented. The lower group of conglomerates and sandstones are
well displayed on Hadyard Hill and on the tract near Maybole; the middle
volcanic series on the shore south of the Heads of Ayr and from the
Stinchar valley along the Old Red belt towards Dalmellington and New
Cumnock; while the upper group, comprising conglomerates and sandstones,
form a well-marked synclinal ford at Corsancone north-east of New Cumnock.
The Upper Old Red Sandstone appears as a fringe round the south-west margin
of the Carboniferous rocks of the county, and it rises from beneath them on
the shore of the Firth of Clyde south of Wemyss Bay. The Carboniferous
strata of the central low ground form a great basin traversed by faults,
all the subdivisions of the system being represented save the Millstone
Grit. Round the north and north-east margin there is a great development of
volcanic rocks--lavas, tuffs and agglomerates--belonging to the Calciferous
Sandstone series, and passing upwards into the Carboniferous Limestone. The
lower limestones of the latter division are typically represented near
Dalry and Beith, where in one instance they reach a thickness of over 100
ft. They are followed by the coal-bearing group (Edge coals of Midlothian)
which have been wrought in the Dalry and Patna districts and at Dailly. The
position of the Millstone Grit is occupied by lavas and tuffs, extending
almost continually as a narrow fringe round the northern margin of the Coal
Measures from Saltcoats by Kilmaurs to the Crawfordland Water. The workable
coals of the true Coal Measures have a wide distribution from Kilwinning by
Kilmarnock to Galston and again in the districts of Coylton, Dalmellington,
Lugar and Cumnock. These members are overlaid by a set of upper barren red
sandstones, probably the equivalents of the red beds of Uddingston,
Dalkeith and Wemyss in Fife, visible in the ravines of Lugar near Ochiltree
and of Ayr at Catrine. In various parts of the Ayrshire coalfield the
coal-seams are rendered useless by intrusive sheets of dolerite as near
Kilmarnock and Dalmellington. In the central part of the field there is an
oval-shaped area of red sandstones now grouped with the Trias, extending
from near Tarbolton to Mauchline, where they are largely worked for
building stone. They are underlaid by a volcanic series which forms a
continuous belt between the underlying red sandstones of the Coal Measures
and the overlying Trias. In the north part of the county, as near Wemyss
Bay, the strata are traversed by dykes of dolerite and basalt trending in a
north-west direction and probably of Tertiary age.
_Agriculture._--There has been no lack of agricultural enterprise. With a
moist climate, and, generally, a rather heavy soil, drainage was necessary
for the successful growth of green crops. Up to about 1840, a green crop in
the rotation was seldom seen, except on porous river-side land, or on the
lighter farms of the lower districts. In the early part of the 19th century
lime was a powerful auxiliary in the inland districts, but with repeated
applications it gradually became of little avail. Thorough draining gave
the next great impetus. Enough had been done to test its efficacy before
the announcement of Sir Robert Peel's drainage loan, after which it was
rapidly extended throughout the county. Green-crop husbandry, and the
liberal use of guano and other manures, made a wonderful change in the
county, and immensely increased the amount of produce. Potatoes are now
extensively grown, the coast-lands supplying the markets of Scotland and
the north of England. Of roots, turnips, carrots and mangolds are widely
cultivated, heavy crops being obtained by early sowing and rich manuring.
Oats form the bulk of the cereal crop, but wheat and barley are also grown.
High farming has developed the land enormously. Dairying has received
particular attention. Dunlop cheese was once a well-known product. Part of
it was very good; but it was unequal in its general character, and
unsaleable in English markets. Dissatisfied with the inferior commercial
value of their cheese in comparison with some English varieties, the
Ayrshire Agricultural Association brought a Somerset farmer and his wife in
1855 to teach the Cheddar method, and their effort was most successful.
Cheddar cheese of first-rate quality is now made in Ayrshire, and the
annual cheese show at Kilmarnock is the most important in Scotland. The
Ayrshire breed of cows are famous for the quantity and excellence of their
milk. Great numbers of cattle, sheep and pigs are raised for the market,
and the Ayrshire horse is in high repute.
_Other Industries._--Ayrshire is the principal mining county in Scotland
and has the second largest coalfield. There is a heavy annual output also
of iron ore, pig iron and fire-clay. The chief coal districts are Ayr,
Dalmellington, Patna, Maybole, Drongan, Irvine, Coylton, Stevenston, Beith,
Kilwinning, [v.03 p.0076] Dalry, Kilbirnie, Dreghorn, Kilmarnock, Galston,
Hurlford, Muirkirk, Cumnock and New Cumnock. Ironstone occurs chiefly at
Patna, Coylton, Dalry, Kilbirnie, Dreghorn and Cumnock, and there are blast
furnaces at most of these towns. A valuable whetstone is quarried at Bridge
of Stair on the Ayr--the Water-of-Ayr stone. The leading manufactures are
important. At Catrine are cotton factories and bleachfields, and at Ayr and
Kilmarnock extensive engineering works, and carpet, blanket and woollens,
boot and shoe factories. Cotton, woollens, and other fabrics and hosiery
are also manufactured at Dalry, Kilbirnie, Kilmaurs, Beith and Stewarton.
An extensive trade in chemicals is carried on at Irvine. Near Stevenston
works have been erected in the sandhills for the making of dynamite and
other explosives. There are large lace curtain factories at Galston,
Newmilns and Darvel, and at Beith cabinet-making is a considerable
industry. Shipbuilding is conducted at Troon, Ayr, Irvine and Fairlie,
which is famous for its yachts. The leading ports are Ardrossan, Ayr,
Girvan, Irvine and Troon. Fishing is carried on in the harbours and creeks,
which are divided between the fishery districts of Greenock and Ballantrae.
_Communications_.--The Glasgow & South-Western railway owns most of the
lines within the shire, its system serving all the industrial towns, ports
and seaside resorts. Its trunk line via Girvan to Stranraer commands the
shortest sea passage to Belfast and the north of Ireland, and its main line
via Kilmarnock communicates with Dumfries and Carlisle and so with England.
The Lanarkshire & Ayrshire branch of the Caledonian railway company also
serves a part of the county. For passenger steamer traffic Ardrossan is the
principal port, there being services to Arran and Belfast and, during the
season, to Douglas in the Isle of Man. Millport, on Great Cumbrae, is
reached by steamer from Fairlie.
_Population and Administration_.--The population of Ayrshire in 1891 was
226,386, and in 1901, 254,468, or 223 to the sq. m. In 1901 the number of
persons speaking Gaelic only was 17. The chief towns, with populations in
1901 are: Ardrossan (6077), Auchinleck (2168), Ayr (29,101), Beith (4963),
Cumnock (3088), Dalry (5316), Darvel (3070), Galston (4876), Girvan (4024),
Hurlford (4601), Irvine (9618), Kilbirnie (4571), Kilmarnock (35,091),
Kilwinning (4440), Largs (3246), Maybole (5892), Muirkirk (3892), Newmilns
(4467), Saltcoats (8120), Stevenston (6554), Stewarton (2858), Troon
(4764). The county returns two members to parliament, who represent North
and South Ayrshire respectively. Ayr (the county town) and Irvine are royal
burghs and belong to the Ayr group of parliamentary burghs, and Kilmarnock
is a parliamentary burgh of the Kilmarnock group. Under the county council
special water districts, drainage districts, and lighting and scavenging
districts have been formed. The county forms a sheriffdom, and there are
resident sheriffs-substitute at Ayr and Kilmarnock, who sit also at Irvine,
Beith, Cumnock and Girvan. The shire is under school-board jurisdiction,
but there are a considerable number of voluntary schools, besides secondary
schools at Ayr, Irvine, Kilmarnock and Beith, while Kilmarnock Dairy School
is a part of the West of Scotland Agricultural College established in 1899.
In addition to grants earned by the schools, the county and borough
councils expend a good deal of money upon secondary and technical
education, towards which contributions are also made by the Glasgow and
West of Scotland Technical College and the Kilmarnock Dairy School. The
technical classes, subsidized at various local centres, embrace instruction
in agriculture, mining, engineering, plumbing, gardening, and various
science and art subjects.
_History_.--Traces of Roman occupation are found in Ayrshire. At the time
of Agricola's campaigns the country was held by the Damnonii, and their
town of Vandogara has been identified with a site at Loudoun Hill near
Darvel, where a serious encounter with the Scots took place. On the
withdrawal of the Romans, Ayrshire formed part of the kingdom of
Strathclyde and ultimately passed under the sway of the Northumbrian kings.
Save for occasional intertribal troubles, as that in which the Scottish
king Alpin was slain at Dalmellington in the 9th century, the annals are
silent until the battle of Largs in 1263, when the pretensions of Haakon of
Norway to the sovereignty of the Isles were crushed by the Scots under
Alexander III. A generation later William Wallace conducted a vigorous
campaign in the shire. He surprised the English garrison at Ardrossan, and
burned the barns of Ayr in which the forces of Edward I were lodged. Robert
Bruce is alleged to have been born at Turnberry Castle, some 12 m. S.W. of
Ayr. In 1307 he defeated the English at Loudoun Hill. Cromwell paid the
county a hurried visit, during which he demolished the castle of Ardrossan
and is said to have utilized the stones in rearing a fort at Ayr. Between
1660 and 1688 the sympathies of the county were almost wholly with the
Covenanters, who suffered one of their heaviest reverses at Airds Moss--a
morass between the Ayr and Lugar,--their leader, Richard Cameron, being
killed (20th of July 1680). The county was dragooned and the Highland host
ravaged wherever it went. The Hanoverian succession excited no active
hostility if it evoked no enthusiasm. Antiquarian remains include cairns in
Galston, Sorn and other localities; a road supposed to be a work of the
Romans, which extended from Ayr, through Dalrymple and Dalmellington,
towards the Solway; camps attributed to the Norwegians or Danes on the
hills of Knockgeorgan and Dundonald; and the castles of Loch Doon,
Turnberry, Dundonald, Portencross, Ardrossan and Dunure. There are ruins of
celebrated abbeys at Kilwinning and Crossraguel, and of Alloway's haunted
church, famous from their associations.
See James Paterson, "History of the County of Ayr." _Transactions of
Ayrshire and Galloway Archaeological Associations_, Edinburgh, 1879-1900;
John Smith, _Prehistoric Man in Ayrshire_ (London, 1895); William
Robertson, _History of Ayrshire_ (Edinburgh, 1894); Archibald Sturrock, "On
the Agriculture of Ayrshire," _Transactions of Highland and Agricultural
Society_; D. Landsborough, _Contributions to Local History_ (Kilmarnock,
1878).
AYRTON, WILLIAM EDWARD (1847-1908), English physicist, was born in London
on the 14th of September 1847. He was educated at University College,
London, and in 1868 went out to Bengal in the service of the Indian
Government Telegraph department. In 1873 he was appointed professor of
physics and telegraphy at the Imperial College of Engineering, Tokio. On
his return to London six years later he became professor of applied physics
at the Finsbury College of the City and Guilds of London Technical
Institute, and in 1884 he was chosen professor of electrical engineering at
the Central Technical College, South Kensington. He published, both alone
and jointly with others, a large number of papers on physical, and in
particular electrical, subjects, and his name was especially associated,
together with that of Professor John Perry, with the invention of a long
series of electrical measuring instruments. He died in London on the 8th of
November 1908. His wife, Mrs Hertha Ayrton, whom he married in 1885,
assisted him in his researches, and became known for her scientific work on
the electric arc and other subjects. The Royal Society awarded her one of
its Royal medals in 1906.
AYSCOUGH, SAMUEL (1745-1804), English librarian and index-maker, was born
at Nottingham in 1745. His father, a printer and stationer, having ruined
himself by speculation, Samuel Ayscough left Nottingham for London, where
he obtained an engagement in the cataloguing department of the British
Museum. In 1782 he published a two-volume catalogue of the then undescribed
manuscripts in the museum. About 1785 he was appointed assistant librarian
at the museum, and soon afterwards took holy orders. In 1786 he published
an index to the first seventy volumes of the _Monthly Review_, and in 1796
indexed the remaining volumes. Both this index and his catalogue of the
undescribed manuscripts in the museum were private ventures. His first
official work was a third share in the British Museum catalogue of 1787,
and he subsequently catalogued the ancient rolls and charters, 16,000 in
all. In 1789 he produced the first two volumes of the index to the
_Gentleman's Magazine_, and in 1790 the first index-concordance to
Shakespeare. He was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and has been
called [v.03 p.0077] "The Prince of Indexers." He died at the British
Museum on the 30th of October 1804.
AYSCUE (erroneously ASKEW or AYSCOUGH), SIR GEORGE (d. 1671), British
admiral, came of an old Lincolnshire family. Beyond the fact that he was
knighted by Charles I., nothing is known of his career until in 1646 he
received a naval command. Through the latter years of the first civil war,
Ayscue seems to have acted as one of the senior officers of the fleet. In
1648, when Sir William Batten went over to Holland with a portion of his
squadron, Ayscue's influence kept a large part of the fleet loyal to the
Parliament, and in reward for this service he was appointed the following
year admiral of the Irish Seas. For his conduct at the relief of Dublin he
received the thanks of Parliament, and in 1651 he was employed under Blake
in the operations for the reduction of Scilly. He was next sent to the West
Indies in charge of a squadron destined for the Conquest of Barbadoes and
the other islands still under royalist control. This task successfully
accomplished, he returned to take part in the first Dutch War. In this he
played a prominent part, but the indecisive battle off Plymouth (August
16th, 1652) cost him his command, though an annuity was assigned him. For
some years Sir George Ayscue lived in retirement, but the later years of
the Commonwealth he spent in Sweden, Cromwell having despatched him thither
as naval adviser. At the Restoration he returned, and became one of the
commissioners of the navy, but on the outbreak of the second Dutch War in
1664 he once more hoisted his flag as rear-admiral of the Blue, and took
part in the battle of Lowestoft (June 3rd, 1665). In the great Four Days'
Battle (June 11th-14th, 1666) he served with Monck as admiral of the White.
His flagship, the "Prince Royal," was taken on the third day, and he
himself remained a prisoner in Holland till the peace. It seems doubtful
whether he ever again flew his flag at sea, and the date of his death is
supposed to be 1671. Lely's portrait of Sir George Ayscue is in the Painted
Hall at Greenwich.
AYTOUN, or AYTON, SIR ROBERT (1570-1638), Scottish poet, son of Andrew
Aytoun of Kinaldie, Fifeshire, was born in 1570. He was educated at the
university of St Andrews, where he was incorporated as a student of St
Leonard's College in 1584 and graduated M.A. in 1588. He lived for some
years in France, and on the accession of James VI. to the English throne he
wrote in Paris a Latin panegyric, which brought him into immediate favour
at court. He was knighted in 1612. He held various lucrative offices, and
was private secretary to the queens of James I. and Charles I. He died in
London and was buried in Westminster Abbey on the 28th of February 1638.
His reputation with his contemporaries was high, both personally and as a
writer, though he had no ambition to be known as the latter.
Aytoun's remains are in Latin and English. In respect of the latter he is
one of the earliest Scots to use the southern standard as a literary
medium. The Latin poems include the panegyric already referred to, an
_Epicedium in obitum Thoma Rhodi_; _Basia, sive Strena ad Jacobum Hayum_;
_Lessus in funere Raphaelis Thorei_; _Carina Caro_; and minor pieces,
occasional and epitaphic. His first English poem was _Diophantus and
Charidora_ (to which he refers in his Latin panegyric to James). He has
left a number of pieces on amatory subjects, including songs and sonnets.
Aytoun's Latin poems are printed in _Delitiae Poetarum Scotorum_
(Amsterdam, 1637), i. pp. 40-75. His English poems are preserved in a MS.
in the British Museum (_Add. MSS._ 10,308), which was prepared by his
nephew, Sir John Aytoun. Both were collected by Charles Rogers in _The
Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun_ (London, privately printed, 1871). This edition
is unsatisfactory, though it is better than the first issue by the same
editor in 1844. Additional poems are included which cannot be ascribed to
Aytoun, and which in some cases have been identified as the work of others.
The poem "I do confess thou'rt smooth and fair" may be suspected, and the
old version of "Auld Lang Syne" and "Sweet Empress" are certainly not
Aytoun's. Some of the English poems are printed in Watson's _Collection_
(1706-1711) and in the _Bannatyne Miscellany_, i. p. 299 (1827). There is a
memoir of Aytoun in Rogers's edition, and another by Grosart in the _Dict.
of Nat. Biog._ Particulars of his public career will be found in the
printed _Calendars of State Papers_ and _Register of the Privy Council_ of
the period.
AYTOUN, WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE (1813-1865), Scottish poet, humorist and
miscellaneous writer, was born at Edinburgh on the 21st of June 1813. He
was the only son of Roger Aytoun, a writer to the signet, and the family
was of the same stock as Sir Robert Aytoun noticed above. From his mother,
a woman of marked originality of character and considerable culture, he
derived his distinctive qualities, his early tastes in literature, and his
political sympathies, his love for ballad poetry, and his admiration for
the Stuarts. At the age of eleven he was sent to the Edinburgh Academy,
passing in due time to the university. In 1833 he spent a few months in
London for the purpose of studying law; but in September of that year he
went to study German at Aschaffenburg, where he remained till April 1834.
He then resumed his legal pursuits in his father's chambers, was admitted a
writer to the signet in 1835, and five years later was called to the
Scottish bar. But, by his own confession, though he "followed the law, he
never could overtake it." His first publication--a volume entitled _Poland,
Homer, and other Poems_, in which he gave expression to his eager interest
in the state of Poland--had appeared in 1832. While in Germany he made a
translation in blank verse of the first part of _Faust_; but, forestalled
by other translations, it was never published. In 1836 he made his earliest
contributions to _Blackwood's Magazine_, in translations from Uhland; and
from 1839 till his death he remained on the staff of _Blackwood_. About
1841 he became acquainted with Mr (afterwards Sir) Theodore Martin, and in
association with him wrote a series of light humorous papers on the tastes
and follies of the day, in which were interspersed the verses which
afterwards became popular as the _Ban Gaultier Ballads_ (1855). The work on
which his reputation as a poet chiefly rests is the _Lays of the Scottish
Cavaliers_ (1848; 29th ed. 1883). In 1845 he was appointed professor of
rhetoric and _belles lettres_ at Edinburgh University. His lectures were
very attractive, and the number of students increased correspondingly. His
services in support of the Tory party, especially during the Anti-Corn-Law
struggle, received official recognition in his appointment (1852) as
sheriff of Orkney and Zetland. In 1854 appeared _Firmilian, a Spasmodic
Tragedy_, in which he attacked and parodied the writings of Philip James
Bailey, Sydney Dobell and Alexander Smith; and two years later he published
his _Bothwell, a Poem_. Among his other literary works are a _Collection of
the Ballads of Scotland_ (1858), a translation of the _Poems and Ballads of
Goethe_, executed in co-operation with his friend Theodore Martin (1858), a
small volume on the _Life and Times of Richard I._ (1840), written for the
_Family Library_, and a novel entitled _Norman Sinclair_ (1861), many of
the details in which are taken from incidents in his own experience. In
1860 Aytoun was elected honorary president of the Associated Societies of
Edinburgh University. In 1859 he lost his first wife, a daughter of John
Wilson (Christopher North), to whom he was married in 1849, and this was a
great blow to him. His mother died in November 1861, and his own health
began to fail. In December 1863 he married Miss Kinnear. He died at
Blackhills, near Elgin, on the 4th of August 1865.
See _Memoir of W. E. Aytoun_ (1867), by Sir Theodore Martin, with an
appendix containing some of his prose essays.
AYUB KHAN (1855- ), Afghan prince, son of Shere Ali (formerly amir of
Afghanistan), and cousin of the amir Abdur Rahman, was born about 1855.
During his father's reign little is recorded of him, but after Shere Ali's
expulsion from Kabul by the English, and his death in January 1879, Ayub
took possession of Herat, and maintained himself there until June 1881,
when he invaded Afghanistan with the view of asserting his claims to the
sovereignty, and in particular of gaining possession of Kandahar, still in
the occupation of the British. He encountered the British force commanded
by General Burrows at Maiwand on the 27th of July, and was able to gain one
of the very few pitched battles that have been won by Asiatic leaders over
an army under European direction. His triumph, however, was short-lived;
while he hesitated to assault Kandahar he was attacked by Sir Frederick
(afterwards Lord) Roberts, at the close of the latter's memorable march
from Kabul, and utterly discomfited, [v.03 p.0078] 20th of September 1880.
He made his way back to Herat, where he remained for some time unmolested.
In the summer of 1881 he again invaded Afghanistan, and on the anniversary
of the battle of Maiwand obtained a signal victory over Abdur Rahman's
lieutenants, mainly through the defection of a Durani regiment. Kandahar
fell into his hands, but Abdur Rahman now took the field in person, totally
defeated Ayub, and expelled him from Herat. He took refuge in Persia, and
for some time lived quietly in receipt of an allowance from the Persian
government. In 1887 internal troubles in Afghanistan tempted him to make
another endeavour to seize the throne. Defeated and driven into exile, he
wandered for some time about Persia, and in November gave himself up to the
British agent at Meshed. He was sent to India to live as a state prisoner.
AYUNTAMIENTO, the Spanish name for the district over which a town council
has administrative authority; it is used also for a town council, and for
the town-hall. The word is derived from the Latin _adjungere_, and
originally meant "meeting." In some parts of Spain and in Spanish America
the town council was called the _cabildo_ or chapter, from the Latin
_capitulum_. The ayuntamiento consisted of the official members, and of
_regidores_ or _regulators_, who were chosen in varying proportions from
the "hidalgos" or nobles (_hijos de algo_, sons of somebody) and the
"pecheros," or commoners, who paid the _pecho_, or personal tax; pecho
(Lat. _pectus_) is in Spanish the breast, and then by extension the person.
The regidores of the ayuntamientos, or lay cabildos, were checked by the
royal judge or _corregidor_, who was in fact the permanent chairman or
president. The distinction between hidalgo and pechero has been abolished
in modern Spain, but the powers and the constitution of ayuntamientos have
been subject to many modifications.
AYUTHIA, a city of Siam, now known to the Siamese as _Krung Kao_ or "the
Old Capital," situated in 100deg 32' E., 14deg 21' N. Pop. about 10,000.
The river Me Nam, broken up into a network of creeks, here surrounds a
large island upon which stand the ruins of the famous city which was for
more than four centuries the capital of Siam. The bulk of the inhabitants
live in the floating houses characteristic of lower Siam, using as
thoroughfares the creeks to the edges of which the houses are moored. The
ruins of the old city are of great archaeological interest, as are the
relics, of which a large collection is housed in the local museum. Outside
the town is an ancient masonry enclosure for the capture of elephants,
which is still periodically used. Ayuthia is on the northern main line of
the state railways, 42 m. from Bangkok. Great quantities of paddi are
annually sent by river and rail to Bangkok, in return for which cloth and
other goods are imported to supply the wants of the agriculturist
peasantry. There is no other trade. Ayuthia is the chief town of one of the
richest agricultural provincial divisions of Siam and is the headquarters
of a high commissioner. The government offices occupy spacious buildings,
once a royal summer retreat; the government is that of an ordinary
provincial division (_Monton_).
Historically Ayuthia is the most interesting spot in Siam. Among the
innumerable ruins may be seen those of palaces, pagodas, churches and
fortifications, the departed glories of which are recorded in the writings
of the early European travellers who first brought Siam within the
knowledge of the West, and laid the foundations of the present foreign
intercourse and trade. The town was twice destroyed by the Burmese, once in
1555 and again in 1767, and from the date of the second destruction it
ceased to be the capital of the country.
AZAIS, PIERRE HYACINTHE (1766-1845), French philosopher, was born at Soreze
and died at Paris. He spent his early years as a teacher and a village
organist. At the outbreak of the Revolution he viewed it with favour, but
was soon disgusted at the violence of its methods. A critical pamphlet drew
upon him the hatred of the revolutionists, and it was not until 1806 that
he was able to settle in Paris. In 1809 he published his great work, _Des
Compensations dans les destinees humaines_ (5th ed. 1846), which pleased
Napoleon so much that he made its author professor at St Cyr. In 1811 he
became inspector of the public library at Avignon, and from 1812 to 1815 he
held the same position at Nancy. The Restoration government at first
suspected him as a Bonapartist, but at length granted him a pension. From
that time he occupied himself in lecturing and the publication of
philosophical works. In the _Compensations_ he sought to prove that, on the
whole, happiness and misery are equally balanced, and therefore that men
should accept the government which is given them rather than risk the
horrors of revolution. "Le principe de l'inegalite naturelle et essentielle
dans les destinees humaines conduit inevitablement au fanatisme
revolutionnaire ou au fanatisme religieux." The principles of compensation
and equilibrium are found also in the physical universe, the product of
matter and force, whose cause is God. Force, naturally expansive and
operating on the homogeneous atoms which constitute elemental matter, is
subject to the law of equilibrium, or equivalence of action and reaction.
The development of phenomena under this law may be divided into three
stages--the physical, the physiological, the intellectual and moral. The
immaterial in man is the expansive force inherent in him. Moral and
political phenomena are the result of the opposing forces of progress and
preservation, and their perfection lies in the fulfilment of the law of
equilibrium or universal harmony. This may be achieved in seven thousand
years, when man will vanish from the world. In an additional five thousand,
a similar equilibrium will obtain in the physical sphere, which will then
itself pass away. In addition to his philosophical work, Azais studied
music under his father, Pierre Hyacinthe Azais (1743-1796), professor of
music at Soreze and Toulouse, and composer of sacred music in the style of
Gossec. He wrote for the _Revue musicale_ a series of articles entitled
_Acoustique fondamentale_ (1831), containing an ingenious, but now
exploded, theory of the vibration of the air. His other works are: _Systeme
universel_ (8 vols., 1812); _Du Sort de l'homme_ (3 vols., 1820); _Cours de
philosophie_ (8 vols., 1824), reproduced as _Explication universelle_ (3
vols., 1826-1828); _Jeunesse, maturite, religion, philosophie_ (1837), _De
la phrenologie, du magnetisme, et de la folie_ (1843).
AZALEA, a genus of popular hardy or greenhouse plants, belonging to the
heath order (Ericaceae), and scarcely separable botanically from
_Rhododendron_. The beautiful varieties now in cultivation have been bred
from a few originals, natives of the hilly regions of China and Japan, Asia
Minor, and the United States. They are perhaps unequalled as indoor
decorative plants. They are usually increased by grafting the half-ripened
shoots on the stronger-growing kinds, the shoots of the stock and the
grafts being in a similarly half-ripened condition, and the plants being
placed in a moist heat of 65deg. Large plants of inferior kinds, if
healthy, may be grafted all over with the choicer sorts, so as to obtain a
large specimen in a short time. They require a rich and fibrous peat soil,
with a mixture of sand to prevent its getting water-logged. The best time
to pot azaleas is three or four weeks after the blooming is over. The soil
should be made quite solid to prevent its retaining too much water. To
produce handsome plants, they must while young be stopped as required.
Specimens that have got leggy may be cut back just before growth commences.
The lowest temperature for them during the winter is about 35deg, and
during their season of growth from 55deg to 65deg at night, and 75deg by
day, the atmosphere being at the same time well charged with moisture. They
are liable to the attacks of thrips and red spider, which do great mischief
if not promptly destroyed.
The following are some well-known species:--_A. arborescens_
(Pennsylvania), a deciduous shrub 10-20 ft. high; _A. calendulacea_
(Carolina to Pennsylvania), a beautiful deciduous shrub 2-6 ft. high, with
yellow, red, orange and copper-coloured flowers; _A. hispida_, a North
American shrub, 10-15 ft. high, flowers white edged with red; _A. indica_
(China), the so-called Indian azalea, a shrub 3-6 ft. or more high, the
original of numerous single and double varieties, many of the more vigorous
of which are hardy in southern England and Ireland; _A. nudiflora_, a North
American shrub, 3-4 ft. high, which hybridizes freely with _A.
calendulacea_, _A. pontica_ and others, to produce single and [v.03 p.0079]
double forms of a great variety of shades; _A. pontica_ (Levant, Caucasus,
&c.), 4-6 ft. high, with numerous varieties differing in the colour of the
flowers and the tint of the leaves; _A. sinensis_ (China and Japan), a
beautiful shrub, 3-4 ft. high, with orange-red or yellow bell-shaped
flowers, hardy in the southern half of England, large numbers of varieties
being in cultivation under the name of Japanese azaleas.
AZAMGARH, or AZIMGARH, a city and district of British India, in the
Gorakhpur division of the United Provinces. The town is situated on the
river Tons, and has a railway station. It is said to have been founded
about 1665 by a powerful landholder named Azim Khan, who owned large
estates in this part of the country. Pop. (1901) 18,835.
The area of the district is 2207 sq. m. It is bounded on the N. by the
river Gogra, separating it from Gorakhpur district; on the E. by Ghazipur
district and the river Ganges; on the S. by the districts of Jaunpur and
Ghazipur; and on the W. by Jaunpur and Fyzabad. The portion of the district
lying along the banks of the Gogra is a low-lying tract, varying
considerably in width; south of this, however, the ground takes a slight
rise. The slope of the land is from north-west to south-east, but the
general drainage is very inadequate. Roughly speaking, the district
consists of a series of parallel ridges, whose summits are depressed into
beds or hollows, along which the rivers flow; while between the ridges are
low-lying rice lands, interspersed with numerous natural reservoirs. The
soil is fertile, and very highly cultivated, bearing magnificent crops of
rice, sugar-cane and indigo. There are several indigo factories. A branch
of the Bengal & North-Western railway to Azamgarh town was opened in 1898.
In 1901 the population was 1,529,785, showing a decrease of 11% in the
decade. The district was ceded to the Company in 1801 by the wazirs of
Lucknow. In 1857 it became a centre of mutiny. On the 3rd of June 1857 the
17th Regiment of Native Infantry mutinied at Azamgarh, murdered some of
their officers, and carried off the government treasure to Fyzabad. The
district became a centre of the fighting between the Gurkhas and the
rebels, and was not finally cleared until October 1858 by Colonel Kelly.
A[Z.][=A]N (Arabic for "announcement"), the call or summons to public
prayers proclaimed by the Muezzin (crier) from the mosque twice daily in
all Mahommedan countries. In small mosques the Muezzin at A[z.][=a]n stands
at the door or at the side of the building; in large ones he takes up his
position in the minaret. The call translated runs: "God is most great!"
(four times), "I testify there is no God but God!" (twice), "I testify that
Mahomet is the apostle of God!" (twice), "Come to prayer!" (twice), "Come
to salvation!" (twice), "God is most great!" (twice), "There is no God but
God!" To the morning A[z.][=a]n are added the words, "Prayer is better than
sleep!" (twice). The devout Moslem has to make a set response to each
phrase of the Muezzin. At first these are mere repetitions of A[z.][=a]n,
but to the cry "Come to prayer!" the listener must answer, "I have no power
nor strength but from God the most High and Great." To that of "Come to
salvation!" the formal response is, "What God willeth will be: what He
willeth not will not be." The recital of the A[z.][=a]n must be listened to
with the utmost reverence. The passers in the streets must stand still, all
those at work must cease from their labours, and those in bed must sit up.
The Muezzin, who is a paid servant of the mosque, must stand with his face
towards Mecca and with the points of his forefingers in his ears while
reciting A[z.][=a]n. He is specially chosen for good character, and
A[z.][=a]n must not be recited by any one unclean, by a drunkard, by the
insane, or by a woman. The summons to prayers was at first simply "Come to
prayer!" Mahomet, anxious to invest the call with the dignity of a
ceremony, took counsel of his followers. Some suggested the Jewish trumpet,
others the Christian bell, but according to legend the matter was finally
settled by a dream:--"While the matter was under discussion, Abdallah, a
Khazrajite, dreamed that he met a man clad in green raiment, carrying a
bell. Abdallah sought to buy it, saying that it would do well for bringing
together the assembly of the faithful. 'I will show thee a better way,'
replied the stranger; 'let a crier cry aloud "God is most great, &c."' On
awaking, Abdallah went to Mahomet and told him his dream," and A[z.][=a]n
was thereupon instituted.
AZARA, DON JOSE NICHOLAS DE (1731-1804), Spanish diplomatist, was born in
1731 at Barbunales, Aragon, and was appointed in 1765 Spanish agent and
procurator-general, and in 1785 ambassador at Rome. During his long
residence there he distinguished himself as a collector of Italian
antiquities and as a patron of art. He was also an able and active
diplomatist, took a leading share in the difficult and hazardous task of
the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain, and was instrumental in securing
the election of Pius VI. He withdrew to Florence when the French took
possession of Rome in 1798, but acted on behalf of the pope during his
exile and after his death at Valence in 1799. He was afterwards Spanish
ambassador in Paris. In that post it was his misfortune to be forced by his
government to conduct the negotiations which led to the treaty of San
Ildefonso, by which Spain was wholly subjected to Napoleon. Azara was
friendly to a French alliance, but his experience showed him that his
country was being sacrificed to Napoleon. The First Consul liked him
personally, and found him easy to influence. Azara died, worn out, in Paris
in 1804. His end was undoubtedly embittered by his discovery of the ills
which the French alliance must produce for Spain.
Several sympathetic notices of Azara will be found in Thiers, _Consulat et
Empire_. See also _Reinado de Carlos IV_, by Gen. J. Gomez de Arteche, in
the _Historia General de Espana_, published by the R. Acad. de la Historia,
Madrid, 1892, &c. There is a _Notice historique sur le Chevalier d'Azara_
by Bourgoing (1804).
His younger brother, DON FELIX DE AZARA (1746-1811), spent twenty years in
South America as a commissioner for delimiting the boundary between the
Spanish and Portuguese territories. He made many observations on the
natural history of the country, which, together with an account of the
discovery and history of Paraguay and Rio de la Plata, were incorporated in
his principal work, _Voyage dans l'Amerique meridionale depuis 1781
jusqu'en 1801_, published at Paris in 1809 in French from his MS. by C. A.
Walckenaer.
AZARIAH, the name of several persons mentioned in the Old Testament. (1)
One of Solomon's "princes," son of Zadok the priest (1 Kings iv. 2), was
one of several Azariahs among the descendants of Levi (1 Chron. vi. 9, 10,
13, 36; 2 Chron. xxvi. 17). (2) The son of Nathan, a high official under
King Solomon (1 Kings iv. 5). (3) King of Judah, son of Amaziah by his wife
Jecholiah (2 Kings xv. 1, 2), also called Uzziah (2 Chron. xxvi. 1). (4)
Son of Ethan and great-grandson of Judah (1 Chron. ii. 8). (5) Son of Jehu,
of the posterity of Judah (1 Chron. ii. 38). (6) A prophet in the reign of
Asa, king of Judah (2 Chron. xv. 1). (7) Two sons of Jehoshaphat, king of
Judah (2 Chron. xxi. 2). (8) King of Judah, also called Ahaziah and
Jehoahaz, son of Jehoram (2 Chron. xxi. 17; xxii. 1, 6). (9) The son of
Jeroham, and (10) the son of Obed, were made "captains of hundreds" by
Jehoiada the priest (2 Chron. xxiii. 1). (11) Son of Hilkiah and
grandfather of Ezra the Scribe (Ezra vii. 1; Neh. vii. 7, viii. 7, x. 2).
(12) Son of Maaseiah, one of those who under the commission of Artaxerxes
restored the wall of Jerusalem (Neh. iii. 23). (13) Son of Hoshaiah, an
opponent of the prophet Jeremiah (Jer. xliii. 2). (14) One of the
companions in captivity of the prophet Daniel, called Abednego by
Nebuchadrezzar, by whom with two companions he was cast into a "burning
fiery furnace" for refusing to worship the golden image set up by that
monarch (Dan. i. 6, iii. 8-30).
AZAY-LE-RIDEAU, a town of western France, in the department of
Indre-et-Loire, on the Indre, 16 m. S.W. of Tours by rail. Pop. (1906)
1453. The town has a fine Renaissance chateau, well restored in modern
times, with good collections of furniture and pictures.
AZEGLIO, MASSIMO TAPARELLI, MARQUIS D' (1798-1866), Italian statesman and
author, was born at Turin in October 1798, descended from an ancient and
noble Piedmontese family. His father, Cesare d'Azeglio, was an officer in
the Piedmontese army and held a high position at court; on the return of
Pope [v.03 p.0080] Pius VII. to Rome after the fall of Napoleon, Cesare
d'Azeglio was sent as special envoy to the Vatican, and he took his son,
then sixteen years of age, with him as an extra attache. Young Massimo was
given a commission in a cavalry regiment, which he soon relinquished on
account of his health. During his residence in Rome he had acquired a love
for art and music, and he now determined to become a painter, to the horror
of his family, who belonged to the stiff and narrow Piedmontese
aristocracy. His father reluctantly consented, and Massimo settled in Rome,
devoting himself to art. He led an abstemious life, maintaining himself by
his painting for several years. But he was constantly meditating on the
political state of Italy. In 1830 he returned to Turin, and after his
father's death in 1831 removed to Milan. There he remained for twelve
years, moving in the literary and artistic circles of the city. He became
the intimate of Alessandro Manzoni the novelist, whose daughter he married;
thenceforth literature became his chief occupation instead of art, and he
produced two historical novels, _Niccolo dei Lapi_ and _Ettore Fieramosca_,
in imitation of Manzoni, and with pronounced political tendencies, his
object being to point out the evils of foreign domination in Italy and to
reawaken national feeling. In 1845 he visited Romagna as an unauthorized
political envoy, to report on its conditions and the troubles which he
foresaw would break out on the death of Pope Gregory XVI. The following
year he published his famous pamphlet _Degli ultimi casi di Romagna_ at
Florence, in consequence of which he was expelled from Tuscany. He spent
the next few months in Rome, sharing the general enthusiasm over the
supposed liberalism of the new pope, Pius IX.; like V. Gioberti and Balbo
he believed in an Italian confederation under papal auspices, and was
opposed to the Radical wing of the Liberal party. His political activity
increased, and he wrote various other pamphlets, among which was _I lutti
di Lombardia_ (1848).
On the outbreak of the first war of independence, d'Azeglio donned the
papal uniform and took part under General Durando in the defence of
Vicenza, where he was severely wounded. He retired to Florence to recover,
but as he opposed the democrats who ruled in Tuscany, he was expelled from
that country for the second time. He was now a famous man, and early in
1849 Charles Albert, king of Sardinia, invited him to form a cabinet. But
realizing how impossible it was to renew the campaign, and "not having the
heart to sign, in such wretched internal and external conditions, a treaty
of peace with Austria" (_Correspondance politique_, by E. Rendu), he
refused. After the defeat of Novara (23rd of March 1849), Charles Albert
abdicated and was succeeded by Victor Emmanuel II. D'Azeglio was again
called on to form a cabinet, and this time, although the situation was even
more difficult, he accepted, concluded a treaty of peace, dissolved the
Chamber, and summoned a new one to ratify it. The treaty was accepted, and
d'Azeglio continued in office for the next three years. While all the rest
of Italy was a prey to despotism, in Piedmont the king maintained the
constitution intact in the face of the general wave of reaction. D'Azeglio
conducted the affairs of the country with tact and ability, improving its
diplomatic relations, and opposing the claims of the Roman Curia. He
invited Count Cavour, then a rising young politician, to enter the ministry
in 1850. Cavour and Farini, also a member of the cabinet, made certain
declarations in the Chamber (May 1852) which led the ministry in the
direction of an alliance with Rattazzi and the Left. Of this d'Azeglio
disapproved, and therefore resigned office, but on the king's request he
formed a new ministry, excluding both Cavour and Farini. In October,
however, owing to ill-health and dissatisfaction with some of his
colleagues, as well as for other reasons not quite clear, he resigned once
more and retired into private life, suggesting Cavour to the king as his
successor.
For the next four years he lived modestly at Turin, devoting himself once
more to art, although he also continued to take an active interest in
politics, Cavour always consulting him on matters of moment. In 1855 he was
appointed director of the Turin art gallery. In 1859 he was given various
political missions, including one to Paris and London to prepare the basis
for a general congress of the powers on the Italian question. When war
between Piedmont and Austria appeared inevitable he returned to Italy, and
was sent as royal commissioner by Cavour to Romagna, whence the papal
troops had been expelled. After the peace of Villafranca, d'Azeglio was
recalled with orders to withdraw the Piedmontese garrisons; but he saw the
danger of allowing the papal troops to reoccupy the province, and after a
severe inner struggle left Bologna without the troops, and interviewed the
king. The latter approved of his action, and said that his orders had not
been accurately expressed; thus Romagna was saved. That same year he
published a pamphlet in French entitled _De la Politique et du droit
chretien au point de vue de la question italienne_, with the object of
inducing Napoleon III. to continue his pro-Italian policy. Early in 1860
Cavour appointed him governor of Milan, evacuated by the Austrians after
the battle of Magenta, a position which he held with great ability. But,
disapproving of the government's policy with regard to Garibaldi's Sicilian
expedition and the occupation by Piedmont of the kingdom of Naples as
inopportune, he resigned office.
The death of his two brothers in 1862 and of Cavour in 1861 caused Massimo
great grief, and he subsequently led a comparatively retired life. But he
took part in politics, both as a deputy and a writer, his two chief
subjects of interest being the Roman question and the relations of Piedmont
(now the kingdom of Italy) with Mazzini and the other revolutionists. In
his opinion Italy must be unified by means of the Franco-Piedmontese army
alone, all connexion with the conspirators being eschewed, while the pope
should enjoy nominal sovereignty over Rome, with full spiritual
independence, the capital of Italy being established elsewhere, but the
Romans being Italian citizens (see his letters to E. Rendu and his pamphlet
_Le questioni urgenti_). He strongly disapproved of the convention of 1864
between the Italian government and the pope. The last few years of
d'Azeglio's life were spent chiefly at his villa of Cannero, where he set
to work to write his own memoirs. He died of fever on the 15th of January
1866.
Massimo d'Azeglio was a very attractive personality, as well as an
absolutely honest patriot, and a characteristic example of the best type of
Piedmontese aristocrat. He was cautious and conservative; in his general
ideas on the liberation of Italy he was wrong, and to some extent he was an
amateur in politics, but of his sincerity there is no doubt. As an author
his political writings are trenchant and clear, but his novels are somewhat
heavy and old-fashioned, and are interesting only if one reads the
political allusions between the lines.
Besides a variety of newspaper articles and pamphlets, d'Azeglio's chief
works are the two novels _Ettore Fieramosca_ (1833) and _Niccolo dei Lapi_
(1841), and a volume of autobiographical memoirs entitled _I Miei Ricordi_,
a most charming work published after his death, in 1866, but unfortunately
incomplete. See in addition to the _Ricordi_, L. Carpi's _Il Risorgimento
Italiano_, vol. i. pp. 288 sq. and the _Souvenirs historiques_ of Constance
d'Azeglio, Massimo's niece (Turin, 1884).
(L. V.*)
AZERB[=A]IJ[=A]N (also spelt ADERBIJAN; the _Azerb[=a]deg[=a]n_ of medieval
writers, the _Athropatakan_ and _Atropatene_ of the ancients), the
north-western and most important province of Persia. It is separated from
Russian territory on the N. by the river Aras (Araxes), while it has the
Caspian Sea, Gilan and Khamseh (Zenj[=a]n) on the E., Kurdistan on the S.,
and Asiatic Turkey on the W. Its area is estimated at 32,000 sq. m.; its
population at 1-1/2 to 2 millions, comprising various races, as Persians
proper, Turks, Kurds, Syrians, Armenians, &c. The country is superior in
fertility to most provinces of Persia, and consists of a regular succession
of undulating eminences, partially cultivated and opening into extensive
plains. Near the centre of the province the mountains of Sahand rise in an
accumulated mass to the height of 12,000 ft. above the sea. The highest
mountain of the province is in its eastern part, Mount Savelan, with an
elevation of 15,792 ft., and the Talish Mountains, which run from north to
south, parallel to and at no great distance from the Caspian, have an
altitude of 9000 ft. The principal rivers are the Aras and Kizil Uzain,
both receiving numerous tributaries and flowing into the Caspian, and the
Jaghatu, Tatava, Murdi, Aji and others, which [v.03 p.0081] drain into the
Urmia lake. The country to the west of the lake, with the districts of
Selmas and Urmia, is the most prosperous part of Azerb[=a]ij[=a]n, yet even
here the intelligent traveller laments the want of enterprise among the
inhabitants. Azerb[=a]ij[=a]n is one of the most productive provinces of
Persia. The orchards and gardens in which many villages are embosomed yield
delicious fruits of almost every description, and great quantities, dried,
are exported, principally to Russia. Provisions are cheap and abundant, but
there is a lack of forests and timber trees. Lead, copper, sulphur,
orpiment, also lignite, have been found within the confines of the
province; also a kind of beautiful, variegated, translucent marble, which
takes a high polish, is used in the construction of palatial buildings,
tanks, baths, &c., and is known as Maragha, or Tabriz marble. The climate
is healthy, not hot in summer, and cold in winter. The cold sometimes is
severely felt by the poor classes owing to want of proper fuel, for which a
great part of the population has no substitute except dried cow-dung. Snow
lies on the mountains for about eight months in the year, and water is
everywhere abundant. The best soils when abundantly irrigated yield from
50- to 60-fold, and the water for this purpose is supplied by the
innumerable streams which intersect the province. The natives of
Azerb[=a]ij[=a]n make excellent soldiers, and about a third of the Persian
army is composed of them. The province is divided into a number of
administrative sub-provinces or districts, each with a _h[=a]kim_, governor
or sub-governor, under the governor-general, who under the Kajar dynasty
has always been the heir-apparent to the throne of Persia, assisted by a
responsible minister appointed by the shah. The administrative divisions
are as follows:--Tabriz and environs; Uskuh; Deh-Kharegan; Maragha;
Miandoab; Sa[=u]jbulagh; Sulduz; Urmia; Selmas; Khoi; Maku; Gerger; Merend;
Karadagh; Arvanek; Talish; Ardebil; Mishkin; Khalkh[=a]l; Hashtrud;
Garmrud; Afshar; Sain Kaleh; Ujan; Sarab. The revenue amounts to about
L200,000 per annum in cash and kind, and nearly all of it is expended in
the province for the maintenance of the court of the heir-apparent, the
salaries and pay to government officials, troops, pensions, &c.
(A. H.-S.)
AZIMUTH (from the Arabic), in astronomy, the angular distance from the
north or south point of the horizon to the foot of the vertical circle
through a heavenly body. In the case of a horizontal line the azimuth is
its deviation from the north or south direction.
AZO (_c._ 1150-1230), Italian jurist. This Azo, whose name is sometimes
written Azzo and Azzolenus, and who is occasionally described as Azo
Soldanus, from the surname of his father, is to be distinguished from two
other famous Italians of the same name, viz. Azo Lambertaccius, a canonist
of the 13th century, professor of canon law at the university of Bologna,
author of _Questiones in jus canonicum_, and Azo de Ramenghis, a canonist
of the 14th century, also a professor of canon law at Bologna, and author
of _Repetitiones super libro Decretorum_. Few particulars are known as to
the life of Azo, further than that he was born at Bologna about the middle
of the 12th century, and was a pupil of Joannes Bassianus, and afterwards
became professor of civil law in the university of his native town. He also
took an active part in municipal life, Bologna, with the other Lombard
republics, having gained its municipal independence. Azo occupied a very
important position amongst the glossators, and his _Readings on the Code_,
which were collected by his pupil, Alessandro de Santo Aegidio, and
completed by the additions of Hugolinus and Odofredus, form a methodical
exposition of Roman law, and were of such weight before the tribunals that
it used to be said, "Chi non ha Azzo, non vada a palazzo." Azo gained a
great reputation as a professor, and numbered amongst his pupils Accursius
and Jacobus Balduinus. He died about 1230.
AZO COMPOUNDS, organic substances of the type R.N:N.R' (where R = an aryl
radical and R' = a substituted alkyl, or aryl radical). They may be
prepared by the reduction of nitro compounds in alkaline solution (using
zinc dust and alkali, or a solution of an alkaline stannite as a reducing
agent); by oxidation of hydrazo compounds; or by the coupling of a
diazotized amine and any compound of a phenolic or aminic type, provided
that there is a free para position in the amine or phenol. They may also be
obtained by the molecular rearrangement of the diazoamines, when these are
warmed with the parent base and its hydrochloride. This latter method of
formation has been studied by H. Goldschmidt and R. U. Reinders (_Ber_.,
1896, 29, p. 1369), who found that the reaction is monomolecular, and that
the velocity constant of the reaction is proportional to the amount of the
hydrochloride of the base present and also to the temperature, but is
independent of the concentration of the diazoamine. The azo compounds are
intensely coloured, but are not capable of being used as dyestuffs unless
they contain salt-forming, acid or basic groups (see DYEING). By oxidizing
agents they are converted into azoxy compounds, and by reducing agents into
hydrazo compounds or amines.
_Azo-benzene_, C_6H_5N:NC_6H_5, discovered by E. Mitscherlich in 1834, may
be prepared by reducing nitrobenzene in alcoholic solution with zinc dust
and caustic soda; by the condensation of nitrosobenzene with aniline in hot
glacial acetic acid solution; or by the oxidation of aniline with sodium
hypobromite. It crystallizes from alcohol in orange red plates which melt
at 68deg C. and boil at 293deg C. It does not react with acids or alkalis,
but on reduction with zinc dust in acetic acid solution yields aniline.
_Amino-azo Compounds_ may be prepared as shown above. They are usually
yellowish brown or red in colour, the presence of more amino groups leading
to browner shades, whilst the introduction of alkylated amino groups gives
redder shades. They usually crystallize well and are readily reduced. When
heated with aniline and aniline hydrochloride they yield indulines
(_q.v._). Amino-azo-benzene, C_6H_5.N_2.C_6H_4NH_2, crystallizes in yellow
plates or needles and melts at 126deg C. Its constitution is determined by
the facts that it may be prepared by reducing nitro-azo-benzene by ammonium
sulphide and that by reduction with stannous chloride it yields aniline and
meta-phenylene diamine. Diamino-azo-benzene (chrysoidine),
C_6H_5.N_2.C_6H_3(NH_2)_2, first prepared by O. Witt (_Ber._, 1877, 10, p.
656), is obtained by coupling phenyl diazonium chloride with meta-phenylene
diamine. It crystallizes in red octahedra and dyes silk and wool yellow.
Triamino-azo-benzene (meta-aminobenzene-azo-meta-phenylene diamine or
Bismarck brown, phenylene brown, vesuvine, Manchester brown),
NH_2.C_6H_4.N_2.C_6H_3(NH_2)_2, is prepared by the action of nitrous acid
on meta-phenylene diamine. It forms brown crystals which are readily
soluble in hot water, and it dyes mordanted cotton a dark brown. On the
composition of the commercial Bismarck brown see E. Tauber and F. Walder
(_Ber_., 1897, 30, pp. 2111, 2899; 1900, 33, p. 2116). Alkylated
amino-azo-benzenes are also known, and are formed by the coupling of
diazonium salts with alkylated amines, provided they contain a free para
position with respect to the amino group. In these cases it has been shown
by H. Goldschmidt and A. Merz (_Ber_., 1897, 30, p. 670) that the velocity
of formation of the amino-azo compound depends only on the nature of the
reagents and not on the concentration, and that in coupling the
hydrochloride of a tertiary amine with diazobenzene sulphonic acid the
reaction takes place between the acid and the base set free by the
hydrolytic dissociation of its salt, for the formation of the amino-azo
compound, when carried out in the presence of different acids, takes place
most rapidly with the weakest acid (H. Goldschmidt and F. Buss, _Ber_.,
1897, 30, p. 2075).
_Methyl orange_ (helianthin, gold orange, Mandarin orange),
(CH_3)_2N.C_6H_4.N_2.C_6H_4SO_3Na, is the sodium salt of
para-dimethylaminobenzene-azo-benzene sulphonic acid. It is an orange
crystalline powder which is soluble in water, forming a yellow solution.
The free acid is intensely red in colour. Methyl orange is used largely as
an indicator. The constitution of methyl orange follows from the fact that
on reduction by stannous chloride in hydrochloric acid solution it yields
sulphanilic acid and para-aminodimethyl aniline.
_Oxyazo Compounds_.--The oxyazo compounds are prepared by adding a solution
of a diazonium salt to a cold slightly alkaline solution of a phenol. The
diazo group takes up the para position [v.03 p.0082] with regard to the
hydroxyl group, and if this be prevented it then goes into the ortho
position. It never goes directly into the meta position.
The constitution of the oxyazo compounds has attracted much attention, some
chemists holding that they are true azophenols of the type R.N_2.R_1.OH,
while others look upon them as having a quinonoid structure, _i.e._ as
being quinone hydrazones, type R.NH.N:R_1:O. The first to attack the purely
chemical side were Th. Zincke (_Ber._, 1883,16, p. 2929; 1884, 17, p. 3026;
1887, 20, p. 3171) and R. Meldola (_Jour. Chem. Soc._, 1889, 55, pp. 114,
603). Th. Zincke found that the products obtained by coupling a diazonium
salt with [alpha]-naphthol, and by condensing phenyl-hydrazine with
[alpha]-naphthoquinone, were identical; whilst Meldola acetylated the
azophenols, and split the acetyl products by reduction in acid solution,
but obtained no satisfactory results. K. Auwers (_Zeit. f. phys. Chem._,
1896, 21, p. 355; _Ber._, 1900, 33, p. 1302) examined the question from the
physico-chemical standpoint by determining the freezing-point depressions,
the result being that the para-oxyazo compounds give abnormal depressions
and the ortho-oxyazo compounds give normal depressions; Auwers then
concluded that the para compounds are phenolic and the ortho compounds are
quinone hydrazones or act as such. A. Hantzsch (_Ber._, 1899, 32, pp. 590,
3089) considers that the oxyazo compounds are to be classed as
pseudo-acids, possessing in the free condition the configuration of quinone
hydrazones, their salts, however, being of the normal phenolic type. J. T.
Hewitt (_Jour. Chem. Soc._, 1900, 77, pp. 99 et seq.) nitrated
para-oxyazobenzene with dilute nitric acid and found that it gave a benzene
azo-ortho-nitrophenol, whereas quinones are not attacked by dilute nitric
acid. Hewitt has also attacked the problem by brominating the
oxyazobenzenes, and has shown that when the hydrobromic acid produced in
the reaction is allowed to remain in the system, a brombenzene-azo-phenol
is formed, whilst if it be removed (by the addition of sodium acetate)
bromination takes place in the phenolic nucleus; consequently the presence
of the mineral acid gives the azo compound a pseudo-quinonoid character,
which it does not possess if the mineral acid be removed from the sphere of
the reaction.
Para-oxyazobenzene (benzene-azo-phenol), C_6H_5N:N(1).C_6H_4.OH(4), is
prepared by coupling diazotized aniline with phenol in alkaline solution.
It is an orange-red crystalline compound which melts at 154deg C.
Ortho-oxyazobenzene, C_6H_5N:N(1)C_6H_4.OH(2), was obtained in small
quantity by E. Bamberger (_Ber._, 1900, 33, p. 3189) simultaneously with
the para compound, from which it may be separated by distillation in a
current of steam, the ortho compound passing over with the steam. It
crystallizes in orange-red needles which melt at 82.5-83deg C. On reduction
with zinc dust in dilute sal-ammoniac solution, it yields ortho-aminophenol
and aniline. Meta-oxyazobenzene, C_6H_5N:N(1)C_6H_4.OH(3), was obtained in
1903 by P. Jacobson (_Ber._, 1903, 36, p. 4093) by condensing
ortho-anisidine with diazo benzene, the resulting compound being then
diazotized and reduced by alcohol to benzene-azo-meta-anisole, from which
meta-oxyazobenzene was obtained by hydrolysis with aluminium chloride. It
melts at 112-114deg C. and is easily reduced to the corresponding hydrazo
compound.
_Diazo-Amines._--The diazo-amines, R.N:N.NHR_1, are obtained by the action
of primary amines on diazonium salts; by the action of nitrous acid on a
free primary amine, an iso-diazohydroxide being formed as an intermediate
product which then condenses with the amine; and by the action of
nitrosamines on primary amines. They are crystalline solids, usually of a
yellow colour, which do not unite with acids; they are readily converted
into amino-azo compounds (see above) and are decomposed by the concentrated
halogen acids, yielding haloid benzenes, nitrogen and an amine. Acid
anhydrides replace the imino-hydrogen atom by acidyl radicals, and boiling
with water converts them into phenols. They combine with phenyl isocyanate
to form urea derivatives (H. Goldschmidt, _Ber._, 1888, 21, p. 2578), and
on reduction with zinc dust (preferably in alcoholic acetic acid solution)
they yield usually a hydrazine and an amine. Diazoamino benzene,
C_6H_5.N:N.NHC_6H_5, was first obtained by P. Griess (_Ann._, 1862, 121, p.
258). It crystallizes in yellow laminae, which melt at 96deg C. and explode
at slightly higher temperatures. It is readily soluble in alcohol, ether
and benzene.
_Diazoimino benzene_, C_6H_5N_3, is also known. It may be prepared by the
action of ammonia on diazobenzene perbromide; by the action of
hydroxylamine on a diazonium sulphate (K. Heumann and L. Oeconomides,
_Ber._, 1887, 20, p. 372); and by the action of phenylhydrazine on a
diazonium sulphate. It is a yellow oil which boils at 59deg C. (12 mm.),
and possesses a stupefying odour. It explodes when heated. Hydrochloric
acid converts it into chloraniline, nitrogen being eliminated; whilst
boiling sulphuric acid converts it into aminophenol.
_Azoxy Compounds_, R.[=N.O.N].R', are usually yellow or red crystalline
solids which result from the reduction of nitro or nitroso compounds by
heating them with alcoholic potash (preferably using methyl alcohol). They
may also be obtained by the oxidation of azo compounds. When reduced (in
acid solution) they yield amines; distillation with reduced iron gives azo
compounds, and warming with ammonium sulphide gives hydrazo compounds.
Concentrated sulphuric acid converts azoxybenzene into oxyazobenzene (O.
Wallach, _Ber._, 1880, 13, p. 525). Azoxybenzene, (C_6H_5N)_2O,
crystallizes from alcohol in yellow needles, which melt at 36deg C. On
distillation, it yields aniline and azobenzene. Azoxybenzene is also found
among the electro-reduction products of nitrobenzene, when the reduction is
carried out in alcoholic-alkaline solution.
The mixed azo compounds are those in which the azo group .N:N. is united
with an aromatic radical on the one hand, and with a radical of the
aliphatic series on the other. The most easily obtained mixed azo compounds
are those formed by the union of a diazonium salt with the potassium or
sodium salt of a nitroparaffin (V. Meyer, _Ber._, 1876, 9, p. 384):
C_6H_5N_2.NO_3 + CH_3.CH(NO_2)K = KNO_3 + C_6H_5N_2.CH(NO_2)CH_3.
Benzene-azo-nitro-ethane.
Those not containing a nitro group may be prepared by the oxidation of the
corresponding mixed hydrazo compounds with mercuric oxide. E. Bamberger
(_Ber._, 1898, 31, p. 455) has shown that the nitro-alkyl derivatives
behave as though they possess the constitution of hydrazones, for on
heating with dilute alkalies they split more or less readily into an
alkaline nitrite and an acid hydrazide:
C_6H_5NH.N:C(NO_2)CH_3 + NaOH = NaNO_2 + C_6H_5NH.NH.CO.CH_3.
Benzene-azo-methane, C_6H_5.N_2.CH_3, is a yellow oil which boils at 150deg
C. and is readily volatile in steam. Benzene-azo-ethane, C_6H_5.N_2.C_2H_5,
is a yellow oil which boils at about 180deg C. with more or less
decomposition. On standing with 60% sulphuric acid for some time, it is
converted into the isomeric acetaldehyde-phenylhydrazone,
C_6H_5NH.N:CH.CH_3 (_Ber._, 1896, 29, p. 794).
The diazo cyanides, C_6H_5N_2.CN, and carboxylic acids, C_6H_5.N_2.COOH,
may also be considered as mixed azo derivatives. Diazobenzenecyanide,
C_6H_5N_2.CN, is an unstable oil, formed when potassium cyanide is added to
a solution of a diazonium salt. Phenyl-azo-carboxylic acid,
C_6H_5.N_2.COOH, is obtained in the form of its potassium salt when
phenylsemicarbazide is oxidized with potassium permanganate in alkaline
solution (J. Thiele, _Ber._, 1895, 28, p. 2600). It crystallizes in
orange-red needles and is decomposed by water. The corresponding amide,
phenyl-azo-carbonamide, C_6H_5N_2.CONH_2, also results from the oxidation
of phenylsemicarbazide (Thiele, _loc. cit._), and forms reddish-yellow
needles which melt at 114deg C. When heated with benzaldehyde to 120deg C.
it yields diphenyloxytriazole, (C_6H_5)_2CN_3C(OH).
AZOIMIDE, or HYDRAZOIC ACID, N_3H, a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen,
first isolated in 1890 by Th. Curtius (_Berichte_, 1890, 23, p. 3023). It
is the hydrogen compound corresponding to P. Greiss' diazoimino benzene,
C_6H_5N_3, which is prepared by the addition of ammonia to diazobenzene
perbromide.
Curtius found that benzoyl glycollic acid gave benzoyl hydrazine with
hydrazine hydrate:
C_6H_5OCO.CH_2COOH + 2N_2H_4.H_2O = H_2O + C_6H_5CONH.NH_2 +
NH_2.NH.CH_2.COOH.
[v.03 p.0083] (Ethyl benzoate may be employed instead of benzoyl glycollic
acid for this reaction.) This compound gave a nitroso compound with nitrous
acid, which changed spontaneously into benzoylazoimide by loss of water:
C_6H_5CO.NH.NH_2 + HONO = H_2O + C_6H_5CO.N(NO).NH_2.
C_6H_5CO.N(NO).NH_2 = H_2O + C_6H_5CO.N_3.
The resulting benzoylazoimide is easily hydrolysed by boiling with
alcoholic solutions of caustic alkalis, a benzoate of the alkali metal and
an alkali salt of the new acid being obtained; the latter is precipitated
in crystalline condition on standing.
An improved method of preparation was found in the use of hippuric acid,
which reacts with hydrazine hydrate to form hippuryl hydrazine,
C_6H_5CONH.CH_2CONH.NH_2, and this substance is converted by nitrous acid
into diazo-hippuramide, C_6H_5CONH.CH_2.CO.NH.N_2.OH, which is hydrolysed
by the action of caustic alkalis with the production of salts of hydrazoic
acid. To obtain the free acid it is best to dissolve the diazo-hippuramide
in dilute soda, warm the solution to ensure the formation of the sodium
salt, and distil the resulting liquid with dilute sulphuric acid. The pure
acid may be obtained by fractional distillation as a colourless liquid of
very unpleasant smell, boiling at 30deg C., and extremely explosive. It is
soluble in water, and the solution dissolves many metals (zinc, iron, &c.)
with liberation of hydrogen and formation of salts (azoimides, azides or
hydrazoates). All the salts are explosive and readily interact with the
alkyl iodides. In its properties it shows some analogy to the halogen
acids, since it forms difficultly soluble lead, silver and mercurous salts.
The metallic salts all crystallize in the anhydrous condition and decompose
on heating, leaving a residue of the pure metal. The acid is a "weak" acid,
being ionized only to a very slight extent in dilute aqueous solution.
E. Noelting and E. Grandmougin (_Berichte_, 1891, 24, p. 2546) obtained
azoimide from dinitraniline, C_6H_3(NO_2)_2.NH_2, by diazotization and
conversion of the diazo compound into the perbromide,
(NO_2)_2C_6H_3.N_2.Br_3. This compound is then decomposed by ammonia,
dinitrophenylhydrazoate being formed, which on hydrolysis with alcoholic
potash gives potassium hydrazoate (azide) and dinitrophenol. The solution
is then acidified and distilled, when azoimide passes over. Somewhat later,
they found that it could be prepared from diazobenzene imide, provided a
nitro group were present in the ortho or para position to the diazo group.
The para-nitro compound is dropped slowly into a cold solution of one part
of caustic potash in ten parts of absolute alcohol; the solution becomes
dark red in colour and is then warmed for two days on the water bath. After
the greater portion of the alcohol has distilled off, the solution is
acidified with sulphuric acid and the azoimide distilled over. The yield
obtained is only about 40% of that required by theory, on account of
secondary reactions taking place. Ortho-nitro-diazobenzene imide only
yields 30%.
W. Wislicenus (_Berichte_, 1892, 25, p. 2084) has prepared the sodium salt
by passing nitrous oxide over sodamide at high temperatures. The acid can
also be obtained by the action of nitrous acid on hydrazine sulphate; by
the oxidation of hydrazine by hydrogen peroxide and sulphuric acid (A. W.
Browne, _J. Amer. Chem. Soc._, 1905, 25, p. 251), or by ammonium
metavanadate (A. W. Browne and F. F. Shetterly, _Abst. J.C.S._, 1907, ii.
p. 863).
_Ammonium azoimide_, N_3.NH_4, may be prepared by boiling diazohippuramide
with alcoholic ammonia, until no more ammonia escapes, the following
reaction taking place:
C_6H_5CO.NHCH_2CONH.N_2.OH + 2NH_3 = N_3.NH_4 + H_2O +
C_6H_5CO.NH.CH_2.CO.NH_2.
The liquid is then allowed to stand for twelve hours, and the clear
alcoholic solution is decanted from the precipitated hippuramide. To the
alcoholic solution, four times its volume of ether is added, when the
ammonium salt is precipitated. It is then filtered, washed with ether, and
air-dried. The salt is readily soluble in water, and is only feebly
alkaline. It is extremely explosive. _Hydrazine azoimide_, N_5H_5, is also
known.
_Chloroazoimide_, Cl.N_3, the chloride corresponding to azoimide, was
obtained by F. Raschig (_Ber._, 1908, 41, p. 4194) as a highly explosive
colourless gas on acidifying a mixture of sodium azide and hypochlorite
with acetic or boric acid.
AZORES (_Acores_), or WESTERN ISLANDS, an archipelago in the Atlantic
Ocean, belonging to the kingdom of Portugal. Pop. (1900) 256,291; area, 922
sq. m. The Azores extend in an oblique line from N.W. to S.E., between
36deg 55' and 39deg 55' N., and between 25deg and 31deg 16' W. They are
divided into three widely severed groups, rising from a depth of more than
2-1/2 m. The south-eastern group consists of St Michael's (Sao Miguel) and
St Mary (Santa Maria), with Formigas; the central, of Fayal (Faial), Pico,
St George (Sao Jorge), Terceira and Graciosa; the north-western, of Flores
and Corvo.
[Illustration]
The nearest continental land is Cape da Roca on the Portuguese coast, which
lies 830 m. E. of St Michael's; while Cape Cantin, the nearest point on the
African mainland, is more than 900 m. distant, and Cape Race in
Newfoundland, the nearest American headland, is more than 1000 m. Thus the
Azores are the farthest from any continent of all the island groups in the
Atlantic; but they are usually regarded as belonging to Europe, as their
climate and flora are European in character.
_Physical Description._--The aspect of all the islands is very similar in
general characteristics, presenting an elevated and [v.03 p.0084]
undulating outline, with little or no tableland, and rising into peaks, of
which the lowest, that of Corvo, is 350 ft., and the highest that of Pico,
7612 ft. above sea-level. The lines of sea-coast are, with few exceptions,
high and precipitous, with bases of accumulated masses of fallen rock, in
which open bays, or scarcely more enclosed inlets, form the harbours of the
trading towns. The volcanic character of the whole archipelago is obvious,
and has been abundantly confirmed by the numerous earthquakes and eruptions
which have taken place since its discovery. Basalt and scoria are the chief
erupted materials. Hitherto Flores, Corvo and Graciosa have been quite
exempt, and Fayal has only suffered from one eruption (1672). The centre of
activity has for the most part been St Michael's, while the neighbouring
island of St Mary has altogether escaped. In 1444-1445 there was a great
eruption at St Michael's, of which, however, the accounts that have been
preserved exaggerate the importance. In 1522 the town of Villa Franca, at
that time the capital of the island, was buried, with all its 6000
inhabitants, during a violent convulsion. In 1572 an eruption took place in
Pico; in 1580 St George was the scene of numerous outbursts; and in 1614 a
little town in Terceira was destroyed. In 1630, 1652, 1656, 1755, 1852,
&c., St Michael's was visited with successive eruptions and earthquakes,
several of them of great violence. On various occasions, as in 1638, 1720,
1811 and 1867, subterranean eruptions have taken place, which have
sometimes been accompanied by the appearance of temporary islands. Of these
the most remarkable was thrown up in June 1811, about half a league from
the western extremity of St Michael's. It was called Sabrina by the
commander of the British man-of-war of that name, who witnessed the
phenomenon.
_Climate._--The climate is particularly temperate, but the extremes of
sensible heat and cold are increased by the humidity. The range of the
thermometer is from 45deg Fahr., the lowest known extreme, or 48deg, the
ordinary lowest extreme of January, to 82deg, the ordinary, or 86deg, the
highest known extreme of July, near the level of the sea. Between these two
points (both taken in the shade) there is from month to month a pretty
regular gradation of increase or decrease, amounting to somewhat less than
four degrees. In winter the prevailing winds are from the north-west, west
and south; in summer the most frequent are the north, north-east and east.
The weather is often extremely stormy, and the winds from the west and
south-west render the navigation of the coasts very dangerous.
_Fauna._--The mammalia of the Azores are limited to the rabbit, weasel,
ferret, rat (brown and black), mouse and bat, in addition to domestic
animals. The game includes the woodcock, red partridge (introduced in the
16th century), quail and snipe. Owing to the damage inflicted on the crops
by the multitude of blackbirds, bullfinches, chaffinches and green
canaries, a reward was formerly paid for the destruction of birds in St
Michael's, and it is said that over 400,000 were destroyed in several
successive years between 1875 and 1885. There are valuable fisheries of
tunny, mullet and bonito. The porpoise, dolphin and whale are also common.
Whale-fishing is a profitable industry, with its headquarters at Fayal,
whence the sperm-oil is exported. Eels are found in the rivers. The only
indigenous reptile is the lizard. Fresh-water molluscs are unknown, and
near the coast the marine fauna is not rich; but terrestrial molluscs
abound, several species being peculiar to the Azores.
_Flora._--The general character of the flora is decidedly European, no
fewer than 400 out of the 478 species generally considered as indigenous
belonging likewise to that continent, while only four are found in America,
and forty are peculiar to the archipelago. Vegetation in most of the
islands is remarkably rich, especially in grasses, mosses, and ferns,
heath, juniper, and a variety of shrubs. Of tall-growing trees there was,
till the 19th century, an almost total lack; but the Bordeaux pine,
European poplar, African palm-tree, Australian eucalyptus, chestnut,
tulip-tree, elm, oak, and many others, were then successfully introduced.
The orange, apricot, banana, lemon, citron, Japanese medlar, and
pomegranate are the common fruits, and various other varieties are more or
less cultivated. At one time much attention was given to the growing of
sugar-cane, but it has now for the most part been abandoned. The culture of
indigo, introduced in the 16th century, also belongs to the past. A kind of
fern (_Dicksonia culcita_), called by the natives _cabellinho_, furnishes a
silky material for the stuffing of mattresses and is exported to Brazil and
Portugal.
_Population._--The inhabitants of the islands are mostly of Portuguese
origin, with a well-marked strain of Moorish and Flemish blood. There is a
high birth-rate and a low average of infant mortality. A large proportion
of the poorer classes, especially among the older men and women, are
totally illiterate, but education tends to spread more rapidly than in
Portugal itself, owing to the custom of sending children to the United
States, where they are taught in the state schools. Negroes, mulattoes,
English, Scottish and Irish immigrants are present in considerable numbers,
especially in Fayal and St Michael's. The total number of resident
foreigners in 1900 was 1490.
_Government._--The Azores are subdivided into three administrative
districts named after their chief towns, _i.e._ Ponta Delgada, the capital
of St Michael's; Angra, or Angra do Heroismo, the capital of Terceira; and
Horta, the capital of Fayal. St Michael's and St Mary are included in the
district of Ponta Delgada; Terceira, St George and Graciosa, in that of
Angra; Pico, Fayal, Flores and Corvo, in that of Horta. Four members are
returned by Ponta Delgada to the parliament in Lisbon, while each of the
other districts returns two members. Roman Catholicism is the creed of the
majority, and Angra is an episcopal see. For purposes of military
administration the islands form two commands, with their respective
headquarters at Angra and Ponta Delgada. Besides the frequent and regular
services of mails which connect the Azores with Portugal and other
countries, there is a cable from Lisbon to Villa Franca do Campo, in St
Michael's, and thence to Pico, Fayal, St George and Graciosa. Fayal is
connected with Waterville, in Ireland, by a cable laid in 1901. At Angra
and Ponta Delgada there are meteorological stations. The principal seaports
are Angra (pop. 1900, 10,788), Ponta Delgada (17,620), and Horta (6574).
_Trade._--The trade of the Azores, long a Portuguese monopoly, is now to a
great extent shared by the United Kingdom and Germany, and is chiefly
carried in British vessels. Textiles are imported from Portugal; coal from
Great Britain; sugar from Germany, Madeira and the United States;
stationery, hardware, chemicals, paints, oils, &c., from the United Kingdom
and Germany. The exports consist chiefly of fruit, wine, natural mineral
waters and provisions. The trade in pineapples is especially important. No
fewer than 940,000 pineapples were exported in 1902 and 1903, going in
almost equal quantities to London and Hamburg. The fruit is raised under
glass. Pottery, cotton fabrics, spirits, straw hats and tea are produced in
the district of Ponta Delgada; linen and woollen goods, cheese, butter,
soap, bricks and tiles, in that of Angra; baskets, mats, and various
ornamental articles made from straw, osier, and the pith of dried fig-wood,
in that of Horta.
The largest and most populous of the Azores is St Michael's, which has an
area of 297 sq. m., and in 1900 had 121,340 inhabitants. Graciosa (pop.
8385; area, 17 sq. m.) and St George (16,177; 40 sq. m.) form part of the
central group. Graciosa is noteworthy for the beauty of its scenery. Its
chief towns are Santa Cruz de Graciosa (2185) and Guadalupe (2717). The
chief towns of St George are Ribeira Seca (2817) and Velas (2009).
_History._--It does not appear that the ancient Greeks and Romans had any
knowledge of the Azores, but from the number of Carthaginian coins
discovered in Corvo it has been supposed that the islands must have been
visited by that adventurous people. The Arabian geographers, Edrisi in the
12th century, and Ibn-al-Wardi in the 14th, describe, after the Canaries,
nine other islands in the Western Ocean, which are in all probability the
Azores. This identification is supported by various considerations. The
number of islands is the same; the climate under which they are placed by
the Arabians makes them north of the Canaries; and special mention is made
of the hawks or buzzards, which were sufficiently numerous at a later
period to [v.03 p.0085] give rise to the present name (Port. _Acor_, a
hawk). The Arabian writers represent them as having been populous, and as
having contained cities of some magnitude; but they state that the
inhabitants had been greatly reduced by intestine warfare. The Azores are
first found distinctly marked in a map of 1351, the southern group being
named the Goat Islands (_Cabreras_); the middle group, the Wind or Dove
Islands (_De Ventura sive de Columbis_); and the western, the Brazil Island
(_De Brazi_)--the word Brazil at that time being employed for any red
dye-stuff. In a Catalan map of the year 1375 Corvo is found as _Corvi
Marini_, and Flores as _Li Conigi_; while St George is already designated
_San Zorze_. It has been conjectured that the discoverers were Genoese, but
of this there is not sufficient evidence. It is plain, however, that the
so-called Flemish discovery by van der Berg is only worthy of the name in a
very secondary sense. According to the usual account, he was driven on the
islands in 1432, and the news excited considerable interest at the court of
Lisbon. The navigator, Gonzalo Velho Cabral--not to be confounded with his
greater namesake, Pedro Alvarez Cabral--was sent to prosecute the
discovery. Another version relates that Prince Henry the Navigator of
Portugal had in his possession a map in which the islands were laid down,
and that he sent out Cabral through confidence in its accuracy. The map had
been presented to him by his brother, Dom Pedro, who had travelled as far
as Babylon. Be this as it may, Cabral reached the island, which he named
_Santa Maria_, in 1432, and in 1444 took possession of St Michael's. The
other islands were all discovered by 1457. Colonization had meanwhile been
going on prosperously; and in 1466 Fayal was presented by Alphonso V. to
his aunt, Isabella, the duchess of Burgundy. An influx of Flemish settlers
followed, and the islands became known for a time as the Flemish Islands.
From 1580 to 1640 they were subject, like the rest of the Portuguese
kingdom, to Spain. At that time the Azores were the grand rendezvous for
the fleets on their voyage home from the Indies; and hence they became a
theatre of that maritime warfare which was carried on by the English under
Queen Elizabeth against the Peninsular powers. One such expedition, which
took place in 1591, led to the famous sea-fight off Flores, between the
English ship "Revenge," commanded by Sir Richard Grenville, and a Spanish
fleet of fifty-three vessels. Under the active administration of the
marquis de Pombal (1690-1782), considerable efforts were made for the
improvement of the Azores, but the stupid and bigoted government which
followed rather tended to destroy these benefits. Towards the beginning of
the 19th century, the possession of the islands, was contested by the
claimants for the crown of Portugal. The adherents of the constitution, who
supported against Miguel the rights of Maria (II.) da Gloria, obtained
possession of Terceira in 1829, where they succeeded in maintaining
themselves, and after various struggles, Queen Maria's authority was
established over all the islands. She resided at Angra from 1830 to 1833.
For a general account of the islands, see _The Azores_, by W. F. Walker
(London, 1886), and _Madeira and the Canary Islands, with the Azores_, by
A. S. Brown (London, 1901). On the fauna and flora of the islands, the
following books by H. Drouet are useful:--_Elements de la faune acoreenne_
(Paris, 1861); _Mollusques marins des iles Acores_ (1858), _Lettres
acoreennes_ (1862), and _Catalogue de la flore des iles Acores, precede de
l'itineraire d'une voyage dans cet archipel_ (1866). The progress of
Azorian commerce is best shown in the British and American consular
reports. For history, see _La Conquista de las Azores en 1583_, by C.
Fernandez Duro (Madrid, 1886), and _Histoire de la decouverte des iles
Azores et de l'origine de leur denomination d'iles flamandes_, by J. Mees
(Ghent, 1901).
AZOTH, the name given by the alchemists to mercury, and by Paracelsus to
his universal remedy.
AZOTUS, the name given by Greek and Roman writers to Ashdod, an ancient
city of Palestine, now represented by a few remains in the little village
of _'Esdud_, in the governmental district of Acre. It was situated about 3
m. inland from the Mediterranean, on the famous military route between
Syria and Egypt, about equidistant (18 m.) from Joppa and Gaza. As one of
the five chief cities of the Philistines and the seat of the worship of
Dagon (1 Sam. v.; cf. 1 Macc. x. 83), it maintained, down even to the days
of the Maccabees, a vigorous though somewhat intermittent independence
against the power of the Israelites, by whom it was nominally assigned to
the territory of Judah. In 711 B.C. it was captured by the Assyrians (Is.
xx. 1), but soon regained its power, and was strong enough in the next
century to resist the assaults of Psammetichus, king of Egypt, for
twenty-nine years (Herod. ii. 157). Restored by the Roman Gabinius from the
ruins to which it had been reduced by the Jewish wars (1 Macc. v. 68, x.
77, xvi. 10), it was presented by Augustus to Salome, the sister of Herod.
The only New Testament reference is in Acts viii. 40. Ashdod became the
seat of a bishop early in the Christian era, but seems never to have
attained any importance as a town. The Mount Azotus of 1 Macc. ix. 15,
where Judas Maccabeus fell, is possibly the rising ground on which the
village stands. A fine Saracenic kh[=a]n is the principal relic of
antiquity at 'Esdud.
AZOV, or Asov (in Turkish, _Asak_), a town of Russia, in the government of
the Don Cossacks, on the left bank of the southern arm of the Don, about 20
m. from its mouth. The ancient Tanais lay some 10 m. to the north. In the
13th century the Genoese had a factory here which they called Tana. Azov
was long a place of great military and commercial importance. Peter the
Great obtained possession of it after a protracted siege in 1696, but in
1711 restored it to the Turks; in 1739 it was finally united to the Russian
empire. Since then it has greatly declined, owing to the silting up of its
harbour and the competition of Taganrog. Its population, principally
engaged in the fisheries, numbered 25,124 in 1900.
AZOV, SEA OF an inland sea of southern Europe, communicating with the Black
Sea by the Strait of Yenikale, or Kerch, the ancient _Bosporus Cimmerius_.
To the Romans it was known as the _Palus Maeotis_, from the name of the
neighbouring people, who called it in their native language _Temarenda_, or
Mother of Waters. It was long supposed to possess direct communication with
the Northern Ocean. In prehistoric times a connexion with the Caspian Sea
existed; but since the earliest historical times no great change has taken
place in regard to the character or relations of the Sea of Azov. It lies
between 45deg 20' and 47deg 18' N. lat, and between 35deg and 39deg E.
long., its length from south-west to north-east being 230 m., and its
greatest breadth 110. The area runs to 14,515 sq. m. It generally freezes
from November to the middle of April. The Don is its largest and, indeed,
its only very important affluent. Near the mouth of that river the depth of
the sea varies from 3 to 10 ft., and the greatest depth does not exceed 45
ft. Of recent years, too, the level has been constantly dropping, for the
surface lies 4-3/4 ft. higher than the surface of the Black Sea. Fierce and
continuous winds from the east prevail during July and August, and in the
latter part of the year those from the north-east and south-east are not
unusual; a great variety of currents is thus produced. The water is for the
most part comparatively fresh, but differs considerably in this respect
according to locality and current. Fish are so abundant that the Turks
describe it as _Baluk-deniz_, or Fish Sea. To the west, separated from the
main basin by the long narrow sand-spit of Arabat, lie the remarkable
lagoons and marshes known as the Sivash, or Putrid Sea; here the water is
intensely salt. The Sea of Azov is of great importance to Russian commerce;
along its shores stand the cities of Taganrog, Berdyansk, Mariupol and
Yenikale.
AZOXIMES (furo [a.b.] diazoles), a class of organic compounds which contain
the ring system
<math>HC = N N = CH[|]\/[|]O.<math>
They may be prepared by converting nitriles into amidoximes by the action
of hydroxylamine, the amidoximes so formed being then acylated by acid
chlorides or anhydrides. From these acyl derivatives the elements of water
are removed, either by simple heating or by boiling their aqueous solution;
this elimination is accompanied by the formation of the azoxime ring. Thus
NH_2OH // N.OH boil with
C_6H_5CN --------> C_6H_5.C -------->
\ NH_2 propionic anhydride
[ //N.O.COC_2H_5 ] // N.O \
[ C_6H_5C ] --> C_6H_5.C C.C_2H_5.
[ \ NH_2 ] \ N //
[v.03 p.0086] Azoximes can also be produced from [alpha]-benzil dioxime by
the "Beckmann" change. Most of the azoximes are very volatile substances,
sublime readily, and are easily soluble in water, alcohol and benzene.
For detailed descriptions, see F. Tiemann (_Ber._, 1885, 18, p. 1059), O.
Schulz (_Ber._, 1885, 18, pp. 1084, 2459), and G. Mueller (_Ber._, 1886,
19, p. 1492); also _Annual Reports_ of the Chemical Society).
AZTECS (from the Nahuatl word _aztlan_, "place of the Heron," or "Heron"
people), the native name of one of the tribes that occupied the tableland
of Mexico on the arrival of the Spaniards in America. It has been very
frequently employed as equivalent to the collective national title of
Nahuatlecas or Mexicans. The Aztecs came, according to native tradition,
from a country to which they gave the name of Aztlan, usually supposed to
lie towards the north-west, but the satisfactory localization of it is one
of the greatest difficulties in Mexican history. The date of the exodus
from Aztlan is equally undetermined, being fixed by various authorities in
the 11th and by others in the 12th century. One Mexican manuscript gives a
date equivalent to A.D. 1164. They gradually increased their influence
among other tribes, until, by union with the Toltecs, who occupied the
tableland before them, they extended their empire to an area of from 18,000
to 20,000 square leagues. The researches of Humboldt gave the first clear
insight into the early periods of their history. See MEXICO; NAHUATLAN
STOCK.
AZUAGA, a town of western Spain, in the province of Badajoz, on the
Belmez-Fuente del Arco railway. Pop. (1900) 14,192. Azuaga is the central
market for the live-stock of the broad upland pastures watered by the
Matachel, a left-hand tributary of the Guadiana, and by the Bembezar, a
right-hand tributary of the Guadalquivir. Coarse woollen goods and pottery
are manufactured in the town.
AZUAY (sometimes written ASSUAY), a province of Ecuador, bounded N. by the
province of Canar, E. by Oriente, S. by Loja, and W. by El Oro. It was
formerly called Cuenca, and formed part of the department of Azuay, which
also included the province of Loja. Azuay is an elevated mountainous
district with a great variety of climates and products; among the latter
are silver, quicksilver, wheat, Indian corn, barley, cattle, wool, cinchona
and straw hats. The capital is Cuenca.
AZUNI, DOMENICO ALBERTO (1749-1827), Italian jurist, was born at Sassar, in
Sardinia, in 1749. He studied law at Sassari and Turin, and in 1782 was
made judge of the consulate at Nice. In 1786-1788 he published his
_Dizionario Universale Ragionato della Giurisprudenza Mercantile_. In 1795
appeared his systematic work on the maritime law of Europe, _Sistema
Universale dei Principii del Diritto Maritimo dell' Europa_, which he
afterwards recast and translated into French. In 1806 he was appointed one
of the French commission engaged in drawing up a general code of commercial
law, and in the following year he proceeded to Genoa as president of the
court of appeal. After the fall of Napoleon in 1814, Azuni lived for a time
in retirement at Genoa, till he was invited to Sardinia by Victor Emmanuel
I., and appointed judge of the consulate at Cagliari, and director of the
university library. He died at Cagliari in 1827. Azuni also wrote numerous
pamphlets and minor works, chiefly on maritime law, an important treatise
on the origin and progress of maritime law (Paris, 1810), and an
historical, geographical and political account of Sardinia (1799, enlarged
1802).
AZURARA, GOMES EANNES DE (?-1474), the second notable Portuguese chronicler
in order of date. He adopted the career of letters in middle life. He
probably entered the royal library as assistant to Fernao Lopes (_q.v._)
during the reign of King Duarte (1433-1438), and he had sole charge of it
in 1452. His _Chronicle of the Siege and Capture of Ceuta_, a supplement to
the _Chronicle of King John I._, by Lopes, dates from 1450, and three years
later he completed the first draft of the _Chronicle of the Discovery and
Conquest of Guinea_, our authority for the early Portuguese voyages of
discovery down the African coast and in the ocean, more especially for
those undertaken under the auspices of Prince Henry the Navigator. It
contains some account of the life work of that prince, and has a
biographical as well as a geographical interest. On the 6th of June 1454
Azurara became chief keeper of the archives and royal chronicler in
succession to Fernao Lopes. In 1456 King Alphonso V. commissioned him to
write the history of Ceuta, "the land-gate of the East," under the
governorship of D. Pedro de Menezes, from its capture in 1415 until 1437,
and he had it ready in 1463. A year afterwards the king charged him with a
history of the deeds of D. Duarte de Menezes, captain of Alcacer, and,
proceeding to Africa, he spent a twelvemonth in the town collecting
materials and studying the scenes of the events he was to describe, and in
1468 he completed the chronicle. Alphonso corresponded with Azurara on
terms of affectionate intimacy, and no less than three _commendas_ of the
order of Christ rewarded his literary services. He has little of the
picturesque ingenuousness of Lopes, and loved to display his erudition by
quotations and philosophical reflections, showing that he wrote under the
influence of the first Renaissance. Nearly all the leading classical, early
Christian and medieval writers figure in his pages, and he was acquainted
with the notable chronicles and romances of Europe and had studied the best
Italian and Spanish authors. In addition, he had mastered the geographical
system of the ancients and their astrology. As an historian he is
laborious, accurate and conscientious, though his position did not allow
him to tell the whole truth about his hero, Prince Henry.
His works include: (1) _Chronica del Rei D. Joam I. Terceira parte em que
se contem a tomada de Ceuta_ (Lisbon, 1644); (2) _Chronica do Descobrimento
e Conquista de Guine_ (Paris, 1841; Eng. version in 2 vols. issued by the
Hakluyt Society, London, 1896-1899); (3) _Chronica do Conde D. Pedro (de
Menezes)_, printed in the _Ineditos de Historia Portugueza_, vol. ii.
(Lisbon, 1792); (4) _Chronica do Conde D. Duarte de Menezes_, printed in
the _Ineditos_, vol. iii. (Lisbon, 1793). The preface to the English
version of the _Chronicle of Guinea_ contains a full account of the life
and writings of Azurara and cites all the authorities.
(E. PR.)
AZURE (derived, through the Romance languages, from the Arabic
_al-lazward_, for the precious stone _lapis lazuli_, the initial _l_ having
dropped), the lapis lazuli; and so its colour, blue.
[Illustration]
AZURITE, or CHESSYLITE, a mineral which is a basic copper carbonate,
2CuCO_3.Cu(OH)_2. In its vivid blue colour it contrasts strikingly with the
emerald-green malachite, also a basic copper carbonate, but containing
rather more water and less carbon dioxide. It was known to Pliny under the
name _caeruleum_, and the modern name azurite (given by F. S. Beudant in
1824) also has reference to the azure-blue colour; the name chessylite,
also in common use, is of later date (1852), and is from the locality,
Chessy near Lyons, which has supplied the best crystallized specimens of
the mineral. Crystals of azurite belong to the monoclinic system; they have
a vitreous lustre and are translucent. The streak is blue, but lighter than
the colour of the mineral in mass. Hardness 3-1/2--4; sp. gr. 3.8.
Azurite occurs with malachite in the upper portions of deposits of copper
ore, and owes its origin to the alteration of the sulphide or of native
copper by water containing carbon dioxide and oxygen. It is thus a common
mineral in all copper mines, and sometimes occurs in large masses, as in
Arizona and in South Australia, where it has been worked as an ore of
copper, of which element it contains 55%. Being less hydrated than
malachite it is itself liable to alteration into this mineral, and
pseudomorphs of malachite after azurite are not uncommon. Occasionally the
massive material is cut and polished for decorative purposes, though the
application in this direction is far less extensive than that of malachite.
(L. J. S.)
AZYMITES (Gr. [Greek: a-], without; [Greek: zume], leaven), a name given by
the Orthodox Eastern to the Western or Latin Church, because of the
latter's use of unleavened bread in the Eucharist, a practice which arose
in the 9th century and is also observed by Armenians and Maronites
following the Jewish passover custom. The Orthodox Church strenuously
maintains its point, arguing that the very name bread, the holiness of the
mystery, and the example of Jesus and the early church alike, testify
against the use of unleavened bread in this connexion.
[v.03 p.0087]
B This letter corresponds to the second symbol in the Phoenician alphabet,
and appears in the same position in all the European alphabets, except
those derived, like the Russian, from medieval Greek, in which the
pronunciation of this symbol had changed from _b_ to _v_. A new form had
therefore to be invented for the genuine _b_ in Slavonic, to which there
was, at the period when the alphabet was adopted, no corresponding sound in
Greek. The new symbol, which occupies the second position, was made by
removing the upper loop of B, thus producing a symbol somewhat resembling
an ordinary lowercase b. The old B retained the numerical value of the
Greek [beta] as 2, and no numerical value was given to the new symbol. In
the Phoenician alphabet the earliest forms are [Two Bs] or more rounded
[1]. The rounded form appears also in the earliest Aramaic (see ALPHABET).
Like some other alphabetic symbols it was not borrowed by Greek in its
original form. In the very early rock inscriptions of Thera (700-600 B.C.),
written from right to left; it appears in a form resembling the ordinary
Greek [lambda]; this form apparently arose from writing the Semitic symbol
upside down. Its form in inscriptions of Melos, Selinus, Syracuse and
elsewhere in the 6th and 5th centuries suggests the influence of Aramaic
forms in which the head of the letter is opened, [2]. The Corinthian [3],
[4] and [5] (also at Corcyra) and the [Two Bs] of Byzantine coins are other
adaptations of the same symbol. The form [6] which it takes in the
alphabets of Naxos, Delos and other Ionic islands at the same period is
difficult to explain. Otherwise its only variation is between pointed and
rounded loops ([7] and [8]). The sound which the symbol represents is the
voiced stop made by closing the lips and vibrating the vocal chords (see
PHONETICS). It differs from _p_ by the presence of vibration of the vocal
chords and from _m_ because the nasal passage as well as the lips is
closed. When an audible emission of breath attends its production the
aspirate _bh_ is formed. This sound was frequent in the pro-ethnic period
of the Indo-European languages and survived into the Indo-Aryan languages.
According to the system of phonetic changes generally known as "Grimm's
law," an original _b_ appears in English as _p_, an original _bh_ as b. An
original medial _p_ preceding the chief accent of the word also appears as
_b_ in English and the other members of the same group. It is not certain
that any English word is descended from an original word beginning with
_b_, though it has been suggested that _peg_ is of the same origin as the
Latin _baculum_ and the Greek [Greek: baktron]. When the lips are not
tightly closed the sound produced is not a stop, but a spirant like the
English _w_. In Late Latin there was a tendency to this spirant
pronunciation which appears as early as the beginning of the 2nd century
A.D.; by the 3rd century _b_ and consonantal _u_ are inextricably confused.
When this consonantal _u_ (English _w_ as seen in words borrowed very early
from Latin like _wall_ and _wine_) passed into the sound of English _v_
(labio-dental) is not certain, but Germanic words borrowed into Latin in
the 5th century A.D. have in their Latin representation _gu_- for Germanic
_w_-, _guisa_ corresponding to English _wise_ and reborrowed indirectly as
_guise_.
The earliest form of the name of the symbol which we can reach is the
Hebrew _beth_, to which the Phoenician must have been closely akin, as is
shown by the Greek [Greek: beta], which is borrowed from it with a vowel
affixed.
(P. GI.)
BAADER, FRANZ XAVER VON (1765-1841), German philosopher and theologian,
born on the 27th of March 1765 at Munich, was the third son of F. P.
Baader, court physician to the elector of Bavaria. His brothers were both
distinguished--the elder, Clemens, as an author; the second, Joseph
(1763-1835), as an engineer. Franz studied medicine at Ingolstadt and
Vienna, and for a short time assisted his father in his practice. This life
he soon found uncongenial, and decided on becoming a mining engineer. He
studied under Abraham Gottlob Werner at Freiberg, travelled through several
of the mining districts in north Germany, and for four years, 1792-1796,
resided in England. There he became acquainted with the works of Jakob
Boehme, and with the ideas of Hume, Hartley and Godwin, which were
extremely distasteful to him. The mystical speculations of Meister Eckhart,
Saint Martin, and above all those of Boehme, were more in harmony with his
mode of thought. In 1796 he returned from England, and in Hamburg became
acquainted with F. H. Jacobi, with whom he was for years on terms of
friendship. He now learned something of Schelling, and the works he
published during this period were manifestly influenced by that
philosopher. Yet Baader is no disciple of Schelling, and probably gave out
more than he received. Their friendship continued till about the year 1822,
when Baader's denunciation of modern philosophy in his letter to the
emperor Alexander I. of Russia entirely alienated Schelling.
All this time Baader continued to apply himself to his profession of
engineer. He gained a prize of 12,000 gulden (about L1000) for his new
method of employing Glauber's salts instead of potash in the making of
glass. From 1817 to 1820 he held the post of superintendent of mines, and
was raised to the rank of nobility for his services. He retired in 1820,
and soon after published one of the best of his works, _Fermenta
Cognitionis_, 6 parts, 1822-1825, in which he combats modern philosophy and
recommends the study of Boehme. In 1826, when the new university was opened
at Munich, he was appointed professor of philosophy and speculative
theology. Some of the lectures delivered there he published under the
title, _Spekulative Dogmatik_, 4 parts, 1827-1836. In 1838 he opposed the
interference in civil matters of the Roman Catholic Church, to which he
belonged, and in consequence was, during the last three years of his life,
interdicted from lecturing on the philosophy of religion. He died on the
23rd of May 1841.
It is difficult to summarize Baader's philosophy, for he himself generally
gave expression to his deepest thoughts in obscure aphorisms, or mystical
symbols and analogies (see Ed. Zeller's _Ges. d. deut. Phil._ 732, 736).
Further, he has no systematic works; his doctrines exist for the most part
in short detached essays, in comments on the writings of Boehme and Saint
Martin, or in his extensive correspondence and journals. At the same time
there are salient points which mark the outline of his thought. Baader
starts from the position that human reason by itself can never reach the
end it aims at, and maintains that we cannot throw aside the
presuppositions of faith, church and tradition. His point of view may be
described as Scholasticism; for, like the scholastic doctors, he believes
that theology and philosophy are not opposed sciences, but that reason has
to make clear the truths given by authority and revelation. But in his
attempt to draw still closer the realms of faith and knowledge he
approaches more nearly to the mysticism of Eckhart, Paracelsus and Boehme.
Our existence depends on the fact that we are cognized by God (_cogitor
ergo cogito et sum_). All self-consciousness is at the same time
God-consciousness; our knowledge is never mere _scientia_, it is invariably
_con-scientia_--a knowing with, consciousness of, or participation in God.
Baader's philosophy is thus essentially a theosophy. God is not to be
conceived as mere abstract Being (_substantia_), but as everlasting
process, activity (_actus_). Of this process, this self-generation of God,
we may distinguish two aspects--the immanent or esoteric, and the emanent
or exoteric. God has reality only in so far as He is absolute spirit, and
only in so far as the primitive will is conscious of itself can it become
spirit at all. But in this very cognition of self is involved the
distinction of knower and known, from which proceeds the power to become
spirit. This immanent process of self-consciousness, wherein indeed a
trinity of persons is not given but only rendered possible, is mirrored in,
and takes place through, the eternal and impersonal idea or wisdom of God,
which exists beside, though not distinct from, the primitive will. Concrete
reality or personality is given to this divine _Ternar_, as Baader calls
it, through _nature_, the principle of self-hood, of individual being,
which is eternally and necessarily produced by God. Only in nature is the
trinity of _persons_ attained. These processes, it must be noticed, are not
to be conceived as successive, or as taking place in time; they are to be
looked at _sub specie aeternitatis_, as the necessary elements or moments
in the self-evolution of the divine Being. Nor is _nature_ to be confounded
with created substance, or with matter as it exists in space and time; it
is pure non-being, the mere otherness (_alteritas_) of God-his shadow,
desire, want, or _desiderium sui_, as it is called by mystical writers.
Creation, itself a free and non-temporal act of God's love and will, cannot
be speculatively deduced, but must be accepted as an historic [v.03 p.0088]
fact. Created beings were originally of three orders--the intelligent or
angels; the non-intelligent natural existences; and man, who mediated
between these two orders. Intelligent beings are endowed with freedom; it
is possible, but not necessary, that they should fall. Hence the fact of
the fall is not a speculative but an historic truth. The angels fell
through pride--through desire to raise themselves to equality with God; man
fell by lowering himself to the level of nature. Only after the fall of man
begins the creation of space, time and matter, or of the world as we now
know it; and the motive of this creation was the desire to afford man an
opportunity for taking advantage of the scheme of redemption, for bringing
forth in purity the image of God according to which he has been fashioned.
The physical philosophy and anthropology which Baader, in connexion with
this, unfolds in various works, is but little instructive, and coincides in
the main with the utterances of Boehme. In nature and in man he finds
traces of the dire effects of sin, which has corrupted both and has
destroyed their natural harmony. As regards ethics, Baader rejects the
Kantian or any autonomic system of morals. Not obedience to a moral law,
but realization in ourselves of the divine life is the true ethical end.
But man has lost the power to effect this by himself; he has alienated
himself from God, and therefore no ethical theory which neglects the facts
of sin and redemption is satisfactory or even possible. The history of man
and of humanity is the history of the redeeming love of God. The means
whereby we put ourselves so in relation with Christ as to receive from Him
his healing virtue are chiefly prayer and the sacraments of the church;
mere works are never sufficient. Man in his social relations is under two
great institutions. One is temporal, natural and limited--the state; the
other is eternal, cosmopolitan and universal--the church. In the state two
things are requisite: first, common submission to the ruler, which can be
secured or given only when the state is Christian, for God alone is the
true ruler of men; and, secondly, inequality of rank, without which there
can be no organization. A despotism of mere power and liberalism, which
naturally produces socialism, are equally objectionable. The ideal state is
a civil community ruled by a universal or Catholic church, the principles
of which are equally distinct from mere passive pietism, or faith which
will know nothing, and from the Protestant doctrine, which is the very
radicalism of reason.
Baader is, without doubt, among the greatest speculative theologians of
modern Catholicism, and his influence has extended itself even beyond the
precincts of his own church. Among those whom he influenced were R. Rothe,
Julius Mueller and Hans L. Markensen.
His works were collected and published by a number of his adherents--F.
Hoffman, J. Hamberger, E. v. Schaden, Lutterbeck, von Osten-Sacken and
Schlueter--_Baader's saemmtliche Werke_ (16 vols., 1851-1860). Valuable
introductions by the editors are prefixed to the several volumes. Vol. xv.
contains a full biography; vol. xvi. an index, and an able sketch of the
whole system by Lutterbeck. See F. Hoffmann, _Vorhalle zur spekulativen
Lehre Baader's_ (1836); _Grundzuege der Societaets-Philosophie Franz
Baader's_ (1837); _Philosophische Schriften_ (3 vols., 1868-1872); _Die
Weltalter_ (1868); _Biographie und Briefwechsel_ (Leipzig, 1887); J.
Hamberger, _Cardinalpunkte der Baaderschen Philosophie_ (1855);
_Fundamentalbegriffe von F. B.'s Ethik, Politik, u. Religions-Philosophie_
(1858); J. A. B. Lutterbeck, _Philosophische Standpunkte Baaders_ (1854);
_Baaders Lehre vom Weltgebaeude_ (1866). The most satisfactory surveys are
those given by Erdmann, _Versuch einer Gesch. d. neuern Phil._ iii. 2, pp.
583-636; J. Claassen, _Franz von Baaders Leben und theosophische Werke_
(Stuttgart, 1886-1887), and _Franz von Baaders Gedanken ueber Staat und
Gesellschaft_ (Guetersloh, 1890); Otto Pfleiderer, _Philosophy of Religion_
(vol. ii., Eng. trans. 1887); R. Falckenberg, _History of Philosophy_, pp.
472-475 (trans. A. C. Armstrong, New York, 1893); Reichel, _Die
Sozietaetsphilosophie Franz v. Baaders_ (Tuebingen, 1901); Kuno Fischer,
_Zur hundertjaehrigen Geburtstagfeier Baaders_ (Erlangen, 1865).
BAAL, a Semitic word, which primarily signifies lord, owner or
inhabitant,[9] and then, in accordance with the Semitic way of looking at
family and religious relations, is specially appropriated to express the
relation of a husband to his wife and of the deity to his worshipper. In
the latter usage it indicated not that the god was the lord of the
worshipper, but rather the possessor of, or ruler in, some place or
district. In the Old Testament it is regularly written with the article,
_i.e._ "_the_ Baal"; and the baals of different tribes or sanctuaries were
not necessarily conceived as identical, so that we find frequent mention of
Baalim, or rather "_the_ Baalim" in the plural. That the Israelites even
applied the title of Baal to Yahweh himself is proved by the occurrence of
such names as Jerubbaal (Gideon), Eshbaal (one of Saul's sons) and Beeliada
(a son of David, 1 Chron. xiv. 7). The last name appears in 2 Sam. v. 16 as
Eliada, showing that El (God) was regarded as equivalent to Baal; cf. also
the name Be'aliah, "Yahweh is _baal_ or lord," which survives in 1 Chron.
xii. 5. However, when the name Baal was exclusively appropriated to
idolatrous worship (cf. Hos. ii. 16 seq.), abhorrence for the unholy word
was marked by writing _b[=o]sheth_ (shameful thing) for _baal_ in compound
proper names, and thus we get the usual forms Ishbosheth, Mephibosheth.
The great difficulty which has been felt by investigators in determining
the character and attributes of the god Baal mainly arises from the
original appellative sense of the word, and many obscure points become
clear if we remember that when a title becomes a proper name it may be
appropriated by different peoples to quite distinct deities. Baal being
originally a title, and not a proper name, the innumerable baals could be
distinguished by the addition of the name of a place or of some special
attribute.[10] Accordingly, the baals are not to be regarded necessarily as
local variations of one and the same god, like the many Virgins or Madonnas
of Catholic lands, but as distinct _numina_. Each community could speak of
its own baal, although a collection of allied communities might share the
same cult, and naturally, since the attributes ascribed to the individual
baals were very similar, subsequent syncretism was facilitated.
The Baal, as the head of each worshipping group, is the source of all the
gifts of nature (cf. Hos. ii. 8 seq., Ezek. xvi. 19); as the god of
fertility all the produce of the soil is his, and his adherents bring to
him their tribute of first-fruits. He is the patron of all growth and
fertility, and, by the "uncontrolled use of analogy characteristic of early
thought," the Baal is the god of the productive element in its widest
sense. Originating probably, in the observation of the fertilizing effect
of rains and streams upon the receptive and reproductive soil, baalism
becomes identical with the grossest nature-worship. Joined with the baals
there are naturally found corresponding female figures known as
Asht[=a]r[=o]th, embodiments of Asht[=o]reth (see ASTARTE; ISHTAR). In
accordance with primitive notions of analogy,[11] which assume that it is
possible to control or aid the powers of nature by the practice of
"sympathetic magic" (see MAGIC), the cult of the baals and Asht[=a]r[=o]th
was characterized by gross sensuality and licentiousness.
The fragmentary allusions to the cult of Baal Peor (Num. xxv., Hos. ix. 10,
Ps. cvi. 28 seq.) exemplify the typical species of Dionysiac orgies that
prevailed.[12] On the summits of hills and mountains flourished the cult of
the givers of increase, and "under every green tree" was practised the
licentiousness which in primitive thought was held to secure abundance of
crops (see Frazer, _Golden Bough_, 2nd ed. vol. ii. pp. 204 sqq.). Human
sacrifice (Jer. xix. 5), the burning of incense (Jer. vii. 9), violent and
ecstatic exercises, ceremonial acts of bowing and kissing, the preparing of
sacred mystic cakes, appear among the offences denounced by the Israelite
prophets, and show that the cult of Baal (and Astarte) included the
characteristic features of heathen worship which recur in various parts of
the Semitic world, although attached to other names.[13]
By an easy transition the local gods of the streams and springs which
fertilized the increase of the fields became identified with [v.03 p.0089]
the common source of all streams, and proceeding along this line it was
possible for the numerous baals to be regarded eventually as mere forms of
one absolute deity. Consequently, the Baal could be identified with some
supreme power of nature, _e.g._ the heavens, the sun, the weather or some
planet. The particular line of development would vary in different places,
but the change from an association of the Baal with earthly objects to
heavenly is characteristic of a higher type of belief and appears to be
relatively later. The idea which has long prevailed that Baal was properly
a sky-god affords no explanation of the local character of the many baals;
on the other hand, on the theory of a higher development where the gods
become heavenly or astral beings, the fact that ruder conceptions of nature
were still retained (often in the unofficial but more popular forms of
cult) is more intelligible.
A specific Baal of the heavens appears to have been known among the
Hittites in the time of Rameses II., and considerably later, at the
beginning of the 7th century, it was the title of one of the gods of
Phoenicia. In Babylonia, from a very early period, Baal became a definite
individual deity, and was identified with the planet Jupiter. This
development is a mark of superior culture and may have been spread through
Babylonian influence. Both Baal and Astarte were venerated in Egypt at
Thebes and Memphis in the XIXth Dynasty, and the former, through the
influence of the Aramaeans who borrowed the Babylonian spelling Bel,
ultimately became known as the Greek Belos who was identified with Zeus.
Of the worship of the Tyrian Baal, who is also called Melkart (king of the
city), and is often identified with the Greek Heracles, but sometimes with
the Olympian Zeus, we have many accounts in ancient writers, from Herodotus
downwards. He had a magnificent temple in insular Tyre, founded by Hiram,
to which gifts streamed from all countries, especially at the great feasts.
The solar character of this deity appears especially in the annual feast of
his awakening shortly after the winter solstice (Joseph. _C. Apion._ i.
18). At Tyre, as among the Hebrews, Baal had his symbolical pillars, one of
gold and one of smaragdus, which, transported by phantasy to the farthest
west, are still familiar to us as the Pillars of Hercules. The worship of
the Tyrian Baal was carried to all the Phoenician colonies.[14] His name
occurs as an element in Carthaginian proper names (Hanni_bal_, Hasdru_bal_,
&c.), and a tablet found at Marseilles still survives to inform us of the
charges made by the priests of the temple of Baal for offering sacrifices.
The history of Baalism among the Hebrews is obscured by the difficulty of
determining whether the false worship which the prophets stigmatize is the
heathen worship of Yahweh under a conception, and often with rites, which
treated him as a local nature god; or whether Baalism was consciously
recognized to be distinct from Yahwism from the first. Later religious
practice was undoubtedly opposed to that of earlier times, and attempts
were made to correct narratives containing views which had come to be
regarded as contrary to the true worship of Yahweh. The Old Testament
depicts the history of the people as a series of acts of apostasy
alternating with subsequent penitence and return to Yahweh, and the
question whether this gives effect to actual conditions depends upon the
precise character of the elements of Yahweh worship brought by the
Israelites into Palestine. This is still under dispute. There is strong
evidence at all events that many of the conceptions are contrary to
historical fact, and the points of similarity between native Canaanite cult
and Israelite worship are so striking that only the persistent traditions
of Israel's origin and of the work of Moses compel the conclusion that the
germs of specific Yahweh worship existed from his day. The earliest certain
reaction against Baalism is ascribed to the reign of Ahab, whose marriage
with Jezebel gave the impulse to the introduction of a particular form of
the cult. In honour of his wife's god, the king, following the example of
Solomon, erected a temple to the Tyrian Baal (see above). This, however,
did not prevent him from remaining a follower of Yahweh, whose prophets he
still consulted, and whose protection he still cherished when he named his
sons Ahaziah and Jehoram ("Yah[weh] holds," "Y. is high"). The antagonism
of Elijah was not against Baalism in general, but against the introduction
of a rival deity. But by the time of Hosea (ii. 16 seq.) a further advance
was marked, and the use of the term "Baal" was felt to be dangerous to true
religion. Thus there gradually grew up a tendency to avoid the term, and in
accordance with the idea of Ex. xxiii. 13, it was replaced by the
contemptuous _b[=o]sheth_, "shame" (see above). However, the books of
Deuteronomy and Jeremiah (cf. also Zeph. i. 4) afford complete testimony
for the prevalence of Baalism as late as the exile, but prove that the
clearest distinction was then drawn between the pure worship of Yahweh the
god of Israel and the inveterate and debased cults of the gods of the land.
(See further HEBREW RELIGION; PROPHET.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--W. Robertson Smith, _Relig. Semites_, 2nd ed. pp. 93-113
(against his theory of the introduction of Baal among the Arabs see M. J.
Lagrange, _Etudes d. relig. sem._ pp. 83-98). For the reading "Baal" in the
Amarna tablets (Palestine, about 1400 B.C.) see Knudtzon, _Beitr. z.
Assyriol._ (1901), pp. 320 seq., 415; other cuneiform evidence in E.
Schrader's _Keilinsch. u. Alte Test._ 3rd ed. p. 357 (by H. Zimmern; see
also his _Index_, sub voce). On _Baal-Shamem_ (B. of the heavens) M.
Lidzbarski's monograph (_Ephemeris_, i. 243-260, ii. 120) is invaluable,
and this work, with his _Handbuch d. nordsemit. Epigraphik_, contains full
account of the epigraphical material. See Baethgen, _Beitr. z. semit.
Religionsgesch._ pp. 17-32; also the articles on Baal by E. Meyer in
Roscher's _Lexikon_, and G. F. Moore in _Ency. Bib._ (On _Beltane_ fires
and other apparent points of connexion with Baal it may suffice to refer to
Aug. Fick, _Vergleich. Worterbuch_, who derives the element _bel_ from an
old Celtic root meaning shining, &c.)
(W. R. S.; S. A. C.)
[1] Cf. its use as a noun of relation _e.g._ a _ba'al_ of hair, "a hairy
man" (2 Kings i. 8), _b._ of wings, "a winged creature," and in the plural,
_b._ of arrows, "archers" (Gen. xlix. 23), _b._ of oath, "conspirators"
(Neh. vi. 18).
[2] Compounds with geographical terms (towns, mountains), _e.g._ Baal of
Tyre, of Lebanon, &c., are frequent; see G. B. Gray, _Heb. Proper Names,_
pp. 124-126. Baal-berith or El-berith of Shechem (Judg. ix. 4, 46) is
usually interpreted to be the Baal or God of the covenant, but whether of
covenants in general or of a particular covenant concluded at Shechem is
disputed. The [Greek: Balmarkos] (near Beirut) apparently presided over
dancing; another compound (in Cyprus) seems to represent a Baal of healing.
On the "Baal of flies" see BEELZEBUB.
[3] The general analogy shows itself further in the idea of the deity as
the husband (_ba'al_) of his worshippers or of the land in which they
dwell. The Astarte of Gabal (Byblus) was regularly known as the _ba'alath_
(fem. of _baal_), her real name not being pronounced (perhaps out of
reverence).
[4] See further Clermont-Ganneau, _Pal. Explor. Fund Quart. Stat._, 1901,
pp. 239, 369 sqq.; Buechler, _Rev. d'etudes juives_, 1901, pp. 125 seq.
[5] The extent to which elements of heathen cult entered into purer types
of religion is illustrated in the worship of Yahweh. The sacred cakes of
Astarte and old holy wells associated with her cult were later even
transferred to the worship of the Virgin (_Ency. Bib._ col. 3993; Rouvier,
in _Bull. Archeol._, 1900, p. 170).
[6] The sanctuary of Heracles at Daphne near Antioch was properly that of
the Semitic Baal, and at Amathus Jupiter Hospes takes the place of Heracles
or Malika, in which the Tyrian Melkart is to be recognized (W. R. Smith,
_Rel. Sem._ 2nd ed. pp. 178, 376). See further PHOENICIA.
BAALBEK (anc. _Heliopolis_), a town of the Buka'a (Coelesyria), altitude
3850 ft., situated E. of the Litani and near the parting between its waters
and those of the Asi. Pop. about 5000, including 2000 Metawali and 1000
Christians (Maronite and Orthodox). Since 1902 Baalbek has been connected
by railway with Rayak (Rejak) on the Beirut-Damascus line, and since 1907
with Aleppo. It is famous for its temple ruins of the Roman period, before
which we have no record of it, certain though it be that Heliopolis is a
translation of an earlier native name, in which Baal was an element. It has
been suggested, but without good reason, that this name was the Baalgad of
Josh. xi. 17.
Heliopolis was made a _colonia_ probably by Octavian (coins of 1st century
A.D.), and there must have been a Baal temple there in which Trajan
consulted the oracle. The foundation of the present buildings, however,
dates from Antoninus Pius, and their dedication from Septimius Severus,
whose coins first show the two temples. The great courts of approach were
not finished before the reigns of Caracalla and Philip. In commemoration,
no doubt, of the dedication of the new sanctuaries, Severus conferred the
_jus Italicum_ on the city. The greater of the two temples was sacred to
Jupiter (Baal), identified with the Sun, with whom were associated Venus
and Mercury as [Greek: sumbomoi theoi]. The lesser temple was built in
honour of Bacchus (not the Sun, as formerly believed). Jupiter-Baal was
represented locally as a beardless god in long scaly drapery, holding a
whip in his right hand and lightning and ears of corn in his left. Two
bulls supported him. In this guise he passed into European worship in the
3rd and 4th centuries A.D. The extreme licence of the Heliopolitan worship
is often animadverted upon by early Christian writers, and Constantine,
making an effort to curb the Venus cult, built a basilica. Theodosius
erected another, with western apse, in the main court of the Jupiter
temple.
When Abu Ubaida (or Obaida) attacked the place after the Moslem capture of
Damascus (A.D. 635), it was still an opulent city and yielded a rich booty.
It became a bone of contention between the various Syrian dynasties and the
caliphs first of Damascus, then of Egypt, and in 748 was sacked with great
slaughter. In 1090 it passed to the Seljuks, and in 1134 to Jenghiz Khan;
but after 1145 it remained attached to Damascus and was captured by Saladin
in 1175. The Crusaders raided its valley more than once, but never took the
city. Three times shaken by earthquake in the 12th century, it was
dismantled by Hulagu in 1260. But it revived, and most of its fine Moslem
mosque and fortress architecture, still extant, belongs to the [v.03
p.0090] reign of Sultan Kala[=u]n (1282) and the succeeding century, during
which Abulfeda describes it as a very strong place. In 1400 Timur pillaged
it, and in 1517 it passed, with the rest of Syria, to the Ottoman dominion.
But Ottoman jurisdiction was merely nominal in the Lebanon district, and
Baalbek was really in the hands of the Metawali (see LEBANON), who retained
it against other Lebanon tribes, until "Jezzar" Pasha, the rebel governor
of the Acre province, broke their power in the last half of the 18th
century. The anarchy which succeeded his death in 1804 was only ended by
the Egyptian occupation (1832). With the treaty of London (1840) Baalbek
became really Ottoman, and since the settlement of the Lebanon (1864) has
attracted great numbers of tourists.
[Illustration]
The ruins were brought to European notice by Pierre Belon in 1555, though
previously visited, in 1507, by Martin von Baumgarten. Much damaged by the
earthquake of 1759, they remained a wilderness of fallen blocks till 1901,
when their clearance was undertaken by the German Archaeological Institute
and entrusted to the direction of Prof. O. Puchstein. They lie mainly on
the ancient Acropolis, which has been shored up with huge walls to form a
terrace raised on vaults and measuring about 1100 ft. from E. to W. The
_Propylaea_ lie at the E. end, and were approached by a flight of steps now
quarried away. These propylaea formed a covered hall, or vestibule, about
35 ft. deep, flanked with towers richly decorated within and without (much
damaged by Arab reconstruction). Columns stood in front, whose bases still
exist and bear the names of Antoninus Pius and Julia Domna. Hence, through
a triple gateway in a richly ornamented screen, access is gained to the
first or Hexagonal Court, which measures about 250 ft. from angle to angle.
It is now razed almost to foundation level; but it can be seen that it was
flanked with halls each having four columns in front. A portal on the W.,
50 ft. wide, flanked by lesser ones 10 ft. wide (that on the N. is alone
preserved), admitted to the Main Court, in whose centre was the High Altar
of Burnt Sacrifice. This altar and a great tank on the N. were covered by
the foundations of Theodosius' basilica and not seen till the recent German
clearance. The Main Court measures about 440 ft. from E. to W. and 370 ft.
from N. to S., thus covering about 3-1/2 acres. It had a continuous fringe
of covered halls of various dimensions and shapes, once richly adorned with
statues and columnar screens. Some of these halls are in fair preservation.
Stairs on the W. led up to the temple of Jupiter-Baal, now much ruined,
having only 6 of the 54 columns of its peristyle erect. Three fell in the
earthquake of 1759. Those still standing are Nos. 11 to 16 in the southern
rank. Their bases and shafts are not finished, though the capitals and rich
entablature seem completely worked. They have a height of 60 ft. and
diameter of 7-1/2 ft., and are mostly formed of three blocks. The
architrave is threefold and bears a frieze with lion-heads, on which rest a
moulding and cornice.
The temple of Bacchus stood on a platform of its own formed by a southern
projection of the Acropolis. It was much smaller than the Jupiter temple,
but is better preserved. The steps of the E. approach were intact up to
1688. The temple was peripteral with 46 columns in its peristyle. These
were over 52 ft. in height and of the Corinthian order, and supported an
entablature 7 ft. high with double frieze, connected with the cella walls
by a coffered ceiling, which contained slabs with heads of gods and
emperors. Richard Burton, when consul-general at Damascus in 1870, cleared
an Arab screen out of the vestibule, and in consequence the exquisite
doorway leading into the cella can now be well seen. On either side of it
staircases constructed within columns lead to the roof. The cracked
door-lintel, which shows an eagle on the soffit, was propped up first by
Burton, and lately, more securely, by the Germans. The cella, now ruinous,
had inner wall-reliefs and engaged columns, which supported rich
entablatures.
The vaults below the Great Court of the Jupiter Temple, together with the
supporting walls of the terrace, are noticeable. In the W. wall of the
latter occur the three famous megaliths, which gave the name _Trilithon_ to
the Jupiter temple in Byzantine times. These measure from 63 to 64 ft. in
length and 13 ft. in height and breadth, and have been raised 20 ft. above
the ground. They are the largest blocks known to have been used in actual
construction, but are excelled by another block still attached to its bed
in the quarries half a mile S.W. This is 68 ft. long by 14 ft. high and
weighs about 1500 tons. For long these blocks were supposed, even by
European visitors, to be relics of a primeval race of giant builders.
In the town, below the Acropolis, on the S.E. is a small temple of the late
imperial age, consisting of a semicircular cella with a peristyle of eight
Corinthian columns, supporting a projecting entablature. The cella is
decorated without with a frieze, and within with pillars and arcading. This
temple owes its preservation to its use as a church of St Barbara, a local
martyr, also claimed by the Egyptian Heliopolis. Hence the building is
known as Barbarat al-atika. Considerable remains of the N. gate of the city
have also been exposed.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--These vast ruins, more imposing from their immensity than
pleasing in detail, have been described by scores of travellers and
tourists; but it will be sufficient here to refer to the following
works:--(First discoverers) M. von Baumgarten, _Peregrinatio in ... Syriam_
(1594); P. Belon, _De admirabili operum antiquorum praestantia_ (1553); and
_Observations_, &c. (1555). (Before earthquake of 1759) R. Wood, _Ruins of
Baalbec_ (1757). (Before excavation) H. Frauberger, _Die Akropolis von
Baalbek_ (1892). (After excavation) O. Puchstein, _Fuehrer durch die Ruinen
v. Baalbek_ (1905), (with Th. v. Luepke) _Ansichten_, &c. (1905). See also
R. Phene Spiers, _Quart. Stat. Pal. Exp. Fund_, 1904, pp. 58-64, and the
_Builder_, 11 Feb. 1905.
(D. G. H.)
BAARN, a small town in the province of Utrecht, Holland, 5 m. by rail E. of
Hilversum, at the junction of a branch line to Utrecht. Like Hilversum it
is situated in the midst of picturesque and wooded surroundings, and is a
favourite summer resort of people from Amsterdam. The Baarnsche Bosch, or
wood, stretches southward to Soestdyk, where there is a royal [v.03 p.0091]
country-seat, originally acquired by the state in 1795. Louis Bonaparte,
king of Holland, who was very fond of the spot, formed a zoological
collection here which was removed to Amsterdam in 1809. In 1816 the estate
was presented by the nation to the prince of Orange (afterwards King
William II.) in recognition of his services at the battle of Quatre Bras.
Since then the palace and grounds have been considerably enlarged and
beautified. Close to Baarn in the south-west were formerly situated the
ancient castles of Drakenburg and Drakenstein, and at Vuursche there is a
remarkable dolmen.
BABADAG, or BABATAG, a town in the department of Tulcea, Rumania; situated
on a small lake formed by the river Taitza among the densely wooded
highlands of the northern Dobrudja. Pop. (1900) about 3500. The Taitza lake
is divided only by a strip of marshland from Lake Razim, a broad landlocked
sheet of water which opens on the Black Sea. Babadag is a market for the
wool and mutton of the Dobrudja. It was founded by Bayezid I., sultan of
the Turks from 1389 to 1403. It occasionally served as the winter
headquarters of the Turks in their wars with Russia, and was bombarded by
the Russians in 1854.
BABBAGE, CHARLES (1792-1871), English mathematician and mechanician, was
born on the 26th of December 1792 at Teignmouth in Devonshire. He was
educated at a private school, and afterwards entered St Peter's College,
Cambridge, where he graduated in 1814. Though he did not compete in the
mathematical tripos, he acquired a great reputation at the university. In
the years 1815-1817 he contributed three papers on the "Calculus of
Functions" to the _Philosophical Transactions_, and in 1816 was made a
fellow of the Royal Society. Along with Sir John Herschel and George
Peacock he laboured to raise the standard of mathematical instruction in
England, and especially endeavoured to supersede the Newtonian by the
Leibnitzian notation in the infinitesimal calculus. Babbage's attention
seems to have been very early drawn to the number and importance of the
errors introduced into astronomical and other calculations through
inaccuracies in the computation of tables. He contributed to the Royal
Society some notices on the relation between notation and mechanism; and in
1822, in a letter to Sir H. Davy on the application of machinery to the
calculation and printing of mathematical tables, he discussed the
principles of a calculating engine, to the construction of which he devoted
many years of his life. Government was induced to grant its aid, and the
inventor himself spent a portion of his private fortune in the prosecution
of his undertaking. He travelled through several of the countries of
Europe, examining different systems of machinery; and some of the results
of his investigations were published in the admirable little work, _Economy
of Machines and Manufactures_ (1834). The great calculating engine was
never completed; the constructor apparently desired to adopt a new
principle when the first specimen was nearly complete, to make it not a
difference but an analytical engine, and the government declined to accept
the further risk (see CALCULATING MACHINES). From 1828 to 1839 Babbage was
Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge. He contributed largely to
several scientific periodicals, and was instrumental in founding the
Astronomical (1820) and Statistical (1834) Societies. He only once
endeavoured to enter public life, when, in 1832, he stood unsuccessfully
for the borough of Finsbury. During the later years of his life he resided
in London, devoting himself to the construction of machines capable of
performing arithmetical and even algebraical calculations. He died at
London on the 18th of October 1871. He gives a few biographical details in
his _Passages from the Life of a Philosopher_ (1864), a work which throws
considerable light upon his somewhat peculiar character. His works,
pamphlets and papers were very numerous; in the _Passages_ he enumerates
eighty separate writings. Of these the most important, besides the few
already mentioned, are _Tables of Logarithms_ (1826); _Comparative View of
the Various Institutions for the Assurance of Lives_ (1826); _Decline of
Science in England_ (1830); _Ninth Bridgewater Treatise_ (1837); _The
Exposition of 1851_ (1851).
See _Monthly Notices, Royal Astronomical Society_, vol. 32.
BABEL, the native name of the city called Babylon (_q.v._) by the Greeks,
the modern _Hillah_. It means "gate of the god," not "gate of the gods,"
corresponding to the Assyrian _B[=a]b-ili_. According to Gen. xi 1-9 (J),
mankind, after the deluge, travelled from the mountain of the East, where
the ark had rested, and settled in Shinar. Here they attempted to build a
city and a tower whose top might reach unto heaven, but were miraculously
prevented by their language being confounded. In this way the diversity of
human speech and the dispersion of mankind were accounted for; and in Gen.
xi. 9 (J) an etymology was found for the name of Babylon in the Hebrew verb
_b[=a]lal_, "to confuse or confound," Babel being regarded as a contraction
of Balbel. In Gen. x. 10 it is said to have formed part of the kingdom of
Nimrod.
The origin of the story has not been found in Babylonia. The tower was no
doubt suggested by one of the temple towers of Babylon. W. A. Bennet
(_Genesis_, p. 169; cf. Hommel in Hastings' _Dictionary of the Bible_)
suggests E-Saggila, the great temple of Merodach (Marduk). The variety of
languages and the dispersion of mankind were regarded as a curse, and it is
probable that, as Prof. Cheyne (_Encyclopaedia Biblica_, col. 411) says,
there was an ancient North Semitic myth to explain it. The event was
afterwards localized in Babylon. The myth, as it appears in Genesis, is
quite polytheistic and anthropomorphic. According to Cornelius Alexander
(frag. 10) and Abydenus (frags. 5 and 6) the tower was overthrown by the
winds; according to Yaqut (i. 448 f.) and the Lisan el-'Arab (xiii. 72)
mankind were swept together by winds into the plain afterwards called
"Babil," and were scattered again in the same way (see further D. B.
Macdonald in the _Jewish Encyclopaedia_). A tradition similar to that of
the tower of Babel is found in Central America. Xelhua, one of the seven
giants rescued from the deluge, built the great pyramid of Cholula in order
to storm heaven. The gods, however, destroyed it with fire and confounded
the language of the builders. Traces of a somewhat similar story have also
been met with among the Mongolian Tharus in northern India (_Report of the
Census of Bengal_, 1872, p. 160), and, according to Dr Livingstone, among
the Africans of Lake Ngami. The Esthonian myth of "the Cooking of
Languages" (Kohl, _Reisen in die Ostseeprovinzen_, ii. 251-255) may also be
compared, as well as the Australian legend of the origin of the diversity
of speech (Gerstaecker, _Reisen_, vol. iv. pp. 381 seq.).
BAB-EL-MANDEB (Arab, for "The Gate of Tears"), the strait between Arabia
and Africa which connects the Red Sea (_q.v._) with the Indian Ocean. It
derives its name from the dangers attending its navigation, or, according
to an Arabic legend, from the numbers who were drowned by the earthquake
which separated Asia and Africa. The distance across is about 20 m. from
Ras Menheli on the Arabian coast to Ras Siyan on the African. The island of
Perim (_q.v._), a British possession, divides the strait into two channels,
of which the eastern, known as the Bab Iskender (Alexander's Strait), is 2
m. wide and 16 fathoms deep, while the western, or Dact-el-Mayun, has a
width of about 16 m. and a depth of 170 fathoms. Near the African coast
lies a group of smaller islands known as the "Seven Brothers." There is a
surface current inwards in the eastern channel, but a strong under-current
outwards in the western channel.
BABENBERG, the name of a Franconian family which held the duchy of Austria
before the rise of the house of Habsburg. Its earliest known ancestor was
one Poppo, who early in the 9th century was count in Grapfeld. One of his
sons, Henry, called margrave and duke in Franconia, fell fighting against
the Normans in 886; another, Poppo, was margrave in Thuringia from 880 to
892, when he was deposed by the German king Arnulf. The family had been
favoured by the emperor Charles the Fat, but Arnulf reversed this policy in
favour of the rival family of the Conradines. The leaders of the Babenbergs
were the three sons of Duke Henry, who called themselves after their castle
of Babenberg on the upper Main, round which their possessions centred. The
rivalry between the two families was intensified by their efforts to extend
their authority in the region of the middle Main, and this quarrel, known
as the "Babenberg feud," came to a head at the beginning of the 10th
century during the [v.03 p.0092] troubled reign of the German king, Louis
the Child. Two of the Babenberg brothers were killed, and the survivor
Adalbert was summoned before the imperial court by the regent Hatto I.,
archbishop of Mainz, a partisan of the Conradines. He refused to appear,
held his own for a time in his castle at Theres against the king's forces,
but surrendered in 906, and in spite of a promise of safe-conduct was
beheaded. From this time the Babenbergs lost their influence in Franconia;
but in 976 Leopold, a member of the family who was a count in the Donnegau,
is described as margrave of the East Mark, a district not more than 60 m.
in breadth on the eastern frontier of Bavaria which grew into the duchy of
Austria. Leopold, who probably received the mark as a reward for his
fidelity to the emperor Otto II. during the Bavarian rising in 976,
extended its area at the expense of the Hungarians, and was succeeded in
994 by his son Henry I. Henry, who continued his father's policy, was
followed in 1018 by his brother Adalbert and in 1055 by his nephew Ernest,
whose marked loyalty to the emperors Henry III. and Henry IV. was rewarded
by many tokens of favour. The succeeding margrave, Leopold II., quarrelled
with Henry IV., who was unable to oust him from the mark or to prevent the
succession of his son Leopold III. in 1096. Leopold supported Henry, son of
Henry IV., in his rising against his father, but was soon drawn over to the
emperor's side, and in 1106 married his daughter Agnes, widow of Frederick
I., duke of Swabia. He declined the imperial crown in 1125. His zeal in
founding monasteries earned for him his surname "the Pious," and
canonization by Pope Innocent VIII. in 1485. He is regarded as the patron
saint of Austria. One of Leopold's sons was Otto, bishop of Freising
(_q.v._). His eldest son, Leopold IV., became margrave in 1136, and in 1139
received from the German king Conrad III. the duchy of Bavaria, which had
been forfeited by Duke Henry the Proud. Leopold's brother Henry (surnamed
Jasomirgott from his favourite oath, "So help me God!") was made count
palatine of the Rhine in 1140, and became margrave of Austria on Leopold's
death in 1141. Having married Gertrude, the widow of Henry the Proud, he
was invested in 1143 with the duchy of Bavaria, and resigned his office as
count palatine. In 1147 he went on crusade, and after his return renounced
Bavaria at the instance of the new king Frederick I. As compensation for
this, Austria, the capital of which had been transferred to Vienna in 1146,
was erected into a duchy. The second duke was Henry's son Leopold I., who
succeeded him in 1177 and took part in the crusades of 1182 and 1190. In
Palestine he quarrelled with Richard I., king of England, captured him on
his homeward journey and handed him over to the emperor Henry VI. Leopold
increased the territories of the Babenbergs by acquiring Styria in 1192
under the will of his kinsman Duke Ottakar IV. He died in 1194, and Austria
fell to one son, Frederick, and Styria to another, Leopold; but on
Frederick's death in 1198 they were again united by Duke Leopold II.,
surnamed "the Glorious." The new duke fought against the infidel in Spain,
Egypt and Palestine, but is more celebrated as a lawgiver, a patron of
letters and a founder of towns. Under him Vienna became the centre of
culture in Germany and the great school of Minnesingers (_q.v._). His later
years were spent in strife with his son Frederick, and he died in 1230 at
San Germano, whither he had gone to arrange the peace between the emperor
Frederick II. and Pope Gregory IX. His son Frederick II. followed as duke,
and earned the name of "Quarrelsome" by constant struggles with the kings
of Hungary and Bohemia and with the emperor. He deprived his mother and
sisters of their possessions, was hated by his subjects on account of his
oppressions, and in 1236 was placed under the imperial ban and driven from
Austria. Restored when the emperor was excommunicated, he treated in vain
with Frederick for the erection of Austria into a kingdom. He was killed in
battle in 1246, when the male line of the Babenbergs became extinct. The
city of Bamberg grew up around the ancestral castle of the family.
See G. Juritsch, _Geschichte der Babenberger und ihrer Laender_ (Innsbruck,
1894); M. Schmitz, _Oesterreichs Scheyern-Wittelsbacher oder die Dynastie
der Babenberger_ (Munich, 1880).
BABER, or BABAR (1483-1530), a famous conqueror of India and founder of the
so-called Mogul dynasty. His name was Zahir ud-din-Mahomet, and he was
given the surname of Baber, meaning the tiger. Born on the 14th of February
1483, he was a descendant of Timur, and his father, Omar Sheik, was king of
Ferghana, a district of what is now Russian Turkestan. Omar died in 1495,
and Baber, though only twelve years of age, succeeded to the throne. An
attempt made by his uncles to dislodge him proved unsuccessful, and no
sooner was the young sovereign firmly settled than he began to meditate an
extension of his own dominions. In 1497 he attacked and gained possession
of Samarkand, to which he always seems to have thought he had a natural and
hereditary right. A rebellion among his nobles robbed him of his native
kingdom, and while marching to recover it his troops deserted him, and he
lost Samarkand also. After some reverses he regained both these places, but
in 1501 his most formidable enemy, Shaibani (Sheibani) Khan, ruler of the
Uzbegs, defeated him in a great engagement and drove him from Samarkand.
For three years he wandered about trying in vain to recover his lost
possessions; at last, in 1504, he gathered some troops, and crossing the
snowy Hindu Kush besieged and captured the strong city of Kabul. By this
dexterous stroke he gained a new and wealthy kingdom, and completely
re-established his fortunes. In the following year he united with Hussain
Mirza of Herat against Shaibani. The death of Hussain put a stop to this
expedition, but Baber spent a year at Herat, enjoying the pleasures of that
capital. He returned to Kabul in time to quell a formidable rebellion, but
two years later a revolt among some of the leading Moguls drove him from
his city. He was compelled to take to flight with very few companions, but
his great personal courage and daring struck the army of his opponents with
such dismay that they again returned to their allegiance and Baber regained
his kingdom. Once again, in 1510, after the death of Shaibani, he
endeavoured to obtain possession of his native country. He received
considerable aid from Shah Ismael of Persia, and in 1511 made a triumphal
entry into Samarkand. But in 1514 he was utterly defeated by the Uzbegs and
with difficulty reached Kabul. He seems now to have resigned all hopes of
recovering Ferghana, and as he at the same time dreaded an invasion of the
Uzbegs from the west, his attention was more and more drawn towards India.
Several preliminary incursions had been already made, when in 1521 an
opportunity presented itself for a more extended expedition. Ibrahim,
emperor of Delhi, had made himself detested, even by his Afghan nobles,
several of whom called upon Baber for assistance. He at once assembled his
forces, 12,000 strong, with some pieces of artillery and marched into
India. Ibrahim, with 100,000 soldiers and numerous elephants, advanced
against him. The great battle was fought at Panipat on the 21st of April
1526, when Ibrahim was slain and his army routed. Baber at once took
possession of Agra. A still more formidable enemy awaited him; the Rana
Sanga of Mewar collected the enormous force of 210,000 men, with which he
moved against the invaders. On all sides there was danger and revolt, even
Baber's own soldiers, worn out with the heat of this new climate, longed
for Kabul. By vigorous measures and inspiriting speeches he restored their
courage, though his own heart was nearly failing him, and in his distress
he abjured the use of wine, to which he had been addicted. At Kanwaha, on
the 10th of March 1527, he won a great victory and made himself absolute
master of northern India. The remaining years of his life he spent in
arranging the affairs and revenues of his new empire and in improving his
capital, Agra. He died on the 26th of December 1530 in his forty-eighth
year. Baber was above the middle height, of great strength and an admirable
archer and swordsman. His mind was as well cultivated as his bodily powers;
he wrote well, and his observations are generally acute and accurate; he
was brave, kindly and generous.
Full materials for his life are found in his _Memoirs_, written by himself
(translated into English by Leyden and Erskine (London, 1826); abridged in
Caldecott, _Life of Baber_ (London, 1844). See also Lane-Poole, _Baber_
(Rulers of India Series), 1899.
[v.03 p.0093] BABEUF, FRANCOIS NOEL (1760-1797), known as GRACCHUS BABEUF,
French political agitator and journalist, was born at Saint Quentin on the
23rd of November 1760. His father, Claude Babeuf, had deserted the French
army in 1738 and taken service under Maria Theresa, rising, it is said, to
the rank of major. Amnestied in 1755 he returned to France, but soon sank
into dire poverty, being forced to earn a pittance for his wife and family
as a day labourer. The hardships endured by Babeuf during early years do
much to explain his later opinions. He had received from his father the
smatterings of a liberal education, but until the outbreak of the
Revolution he was a domestic servant, and from 1785 occupied the invidious
office of _commissaire a terrier_, his function being to assist the nobles
and priests in the assertion of their feudal rights as against the
unfortunate peasants. On the eve of the Revolution Babeuf was in the employ
of a land surveyor at Roye. His father had died in 1780, and he was now the
sole support, not only of his wife and two children, but of his mother,
brothers and sisters. In the circumstances it is not surprising that he was
the life and soul of the malcontents of the place. He was an indefatigable
writer, and the first germ of his future socialism is contained in a letter
of the 21st of March 1787, one of a series--mainly on literature--addressed
to the secretary of the Academy of Arras. In 1789 he drew up the first
article of the _cahier_ of the electors of the _bailliage_ of Roye,
demanding the abolition of feudal rights. Then, from July to October, he
was in Paris superintending the publication of his first work: _Cadastre
perpetuel, dedie a l'assemblee nationale, l'an 1789 et le premier de la
liberte francaise_, which was written in 1787 and issued in 1790. The same
year he published a pamphlet against feudal aids and the _gabelle_, for
which he was denounced and arrested, but provisionally released. In
October, on his return to Roye, he founded the _Correspondant picard_, the
violent character of which cost him another arrest. In November he was
elected a member of the municipality of Roye, but was expelled. In March
1791 he was appointed commissioner to report on the national property
(_biens nationaux_) in the town, and in September 1792 was elected a member
of the council-general of the department of the Somme. Here, as everywhere,
the violence of his attitude made his position intolerable to himself and
others, and he was soon transferred to the post of administrator of the
district of Montdidier. Here he was accused of fraud for having substituted
one name for another in a deed of transfer of national lands. It is
probable that his fault was one of negligence only; but, distrusting the
impartiality of the judges of the Somme, he fled to Paris, and on the 23rd
of August 1793 was condemned _in contumaciam_ to twenty years'
imprisonment. Meanwhile he had been appointed secretary to the relief
committee (_comite des subsistances_) of the commune of Paris. The judges
of Amiens, however, pursued him with a warrant for his arrest, which took
place in Brumaire of the year II. (1794). The court of cassation quashed
the sentence, through defect of form, but sent Babeuf for a new trial
before the Aisne tribunal, by which he was acquitted on the 18th of July.
Babeuf now returned to Paris, and on the 3rd of September 1794 published
the first number of his _Journal de la liberte de la presse_, the title of
which was altered on the 5th of October to _Le Tribun du peuple_. The
execution of Robespierre on the 28th of July had ended the Terror, and
Babeuf--now self-styled "Gracchus" Babeuf--defended the men of Thermidor
and attacked the fallen terrorists with his usual violence. But he also
attacked, from the point of view of his own socialistic theories, the
economic outcome of the Revolution. This was an attitude which had few
supporters, even in the Jacobin club, and in October Babeuf was arrested
and sent to prison at Arras. Here he came under the influence of certain
terrorist prisoners, notably of Lebois, editor of the _Journal de
l'egalite_, afterwards of the _Ami du peuple_, papers which carried on the
traditions of Marat. He emerged from prison a confirmed terrorist and
convinced that his Utopia, fully proclaimed to the world in No. 33 of his
_Tribun_, could only be realized through the restoration of the
constitution of 1793. He was now in open conflict with the whole trend of
public opinion. In February 1795 he was again arrested, and the _Tribun du
peuple_ was solemnly burnt in the Theatre des Bergeres by the _jeunesse
doree_, the young men whose mission it was to bludgeon Jacobinism out of
the streets and cafes. But for the appalling economic conditions produced
by the fall in the value of _assignats_, Babeuf might have shared the fate
of other agitators who were whipped into obscurity.
It was the attempts of the Directory to deal with this economic crisis that
gave Babeuf his real historic importance. The new government was pledged to
abolish the vicious system by which Paris was fed at the expense of all
France, and the cessation of the distribution of bread and meat at nominal
prices was fixed for the 20th of February 1796. The announcement caused the
most wide-spread consternation. Not only the workmen and the large class of
idlers attracted to Paris by the system, but _rentiers_ and government
officials, whose incomes were paid in _assignats_ on a scale arbitrarily
fixed by the government, saw themselves threatened with actual starvation.
The government yielded to the outcry that arose; but the expedients by
which it sought to mitigate the evil, notably the division of those
entitled to relief into classes, only increased the alarm and the
discontent. The universal misery gave point to the virulent attacks of
Babeuf on the existing order, and at last gained him a hearing. He gathered
round him a small circle of his immediate followers known as the _Societe
des Egaux_, soon merged with the rump of the Jacobins, who met at the
Pantheon; and in November 1795 he was reported by the police to be openly
preaching "insurrection, revolt and the constitution of 1793."
For a time the government, while keeping itself informed of his activities,
left him alone; for it suited the Directory to let the socialist agitation
continue, in order to frighten the people from joining in any royalist
movement for the overthrow of the existing regime. Moreover the mass of the
_ouvriers_, even of extreme views, were repelled by Babeuf's
bloodthirstiness; and the police agents reported that his agitation was
making many converts--for the government. The Jacobin club of the Faubourg
Saint-Antoine refused to admit Babeuf and Lebois, on the ground that they
were "_egorgeurs_." With the development of the economic crisis, however,
Babeuf's influence increased. After the club of the Pantheon was closed by
Bonaparte, on the 27th of February 1796, his aggressive activity redoubled.
In Ventose and Germinal he published, under the _nom de plume_ of "Lalande,
soldat de la patrie," a new paper, the _Eclaireur du peuple, ou le
defenseur de vingt-cinq millions d'opprimes_, which was hawked
clandestinely from group to group in the streets of Paris. At the same time
No. 40 of the _Tribun_ excited an immense sensation. In this he praised the
authors of the September massacres as "deserving well of their country,"
and declared that a more complete "September 2nd" was needed to annihilate
the actual government, which consisted of "starvers, bloodsuckers, tyrants,
hangmen, rogues and mountebanks." The distress among all classes continued
to be appalling; and in March the attempt of the Directory to replace the
_assignats_ (_q.v._) by a new issue of _mandats_ created fresh
dissatisfaction after the breakdown of the hopes first raised. A cry went
up that national bankruptcy had been declared, and thousands of the lower
class of _ouvrier_ began to rally to Babeuf's flag. On the 4th of April it
was reported to the government that 500,000 people in Paris were in need of
relief. From the 11th Paris was placarded with posters headed _Analyse de
la doctrine de Baboeuf_ (sic), _tribun du peuple_, of which the opening
sentence ran: "Nature has given to every man the right to the enjoyment of
an equal share in all property," and which ended with a call to restore the
constitution of 1793. Babeuf's song _Mourant de faim, mourant de froid_
(Dying of hunger, dying of cold), set to a popular air, began to be sung in
the cafes, with immense applause; and reports were current that the
disaffected troops in the camp of Grenelle were ready to join an _emeute_
against the government. The Directory thought it time to act; the _bureau
central_ had accumulated through its agents, notably the ex-captain Georges
[v.03 p.0094] Grisel, who had been initiated into Babeuf's society,
complete evidence of a conspiracy for an armed rising fixed for Floreal 22,
year IV. (11th of May 1796), in which Jacobins and socialists were
combined. On the 10th of May Babeuf was arrested with many of his
associates, among whom were A. Darthe and P. M. Buonarroti, the ex-members
of the Convention, Robert Lindet, J. A. B. Amar, M. G. A. Vadier and Jean
Baptiste Drouet, famous as the postmaster of Saint-Menehould who had
arrested Louis XVI., and now a member of the Council of Five Hundred.
The _coup_ was perfectly successful. The last number of the _Tribun_
appeared on the 24th of April, but Lebois in the _Ami du peuple_ tried to
incite the soldiers to revolt, and for a while there were rumours of a
military rising. The trial of Babeuf and his accomplices was fixed to take
place before the newly constituted high court of justice at Vendome. On
Fructidor 10 and 11 (27th and 28th of August), when the prisoners were
removed from Paris, there were tentative efforts at a riot with a view to
rescue, but these were easily suppressed. The attempt of five or six
hundred Jacobins (7th of September) to rouse the soldiers at Grenelle met
with no better success. The trial of Babeuf and the others, begun at
Vendome on the 20th of February 1797, lasted two months. The government for
reasons of their own made the socialist Babeuf the leader of the
conspiracy, though more important people than he were implicated; and his
own vanity played admirably into their hands. On Prairial 7 (26th of April
1797) Babeuf and Darthe were condemned to death; some of the prisoners,
including Buonarroti, were exiled; the rest, including Vadier and his
fellow-conventionals, were acquitted. Drouet had succeeded in making his
escape, according to Barras, with the connivance of the Directory. Babeuf
and Darthe were executed at Vendome on Prairial 8 (1797).
Babeuf's character has perhaps been sufficiently indicated above. He was a
type of the French revolutionists, excitable, warm-hearted, half-educated,
who lost their mental and moral balance in the chaos of the revolutionary
period. Historically, his importance lies in the fact that he was the first
to propound socialism as a practical policy, and the father of the
movements which played so conspicuous a part in the revolutions of 1848 and
1871.
See V. Advielle, _Hist. de Gracchus Babeuf et de Babouvisme_ (2 vols.,
Paris, 1884); P. M. Buonarroti, _Conspiration pour l'egalite, dite de
Babeuf_ (2 vols., Brussels, 1828; later editions, 1850 and 1869), English
translation by Bronterre O'Brien (London, 1836); _Cambridge Modern
History_, vol. viii.; Adolf Schmidt, _Pariser Zustaende wahrend der
Revolutionszeit von 1789-1800_ (Jena, 1874). French trans. by P. Viollet,
_Paris pendant la Revolution d'apres les rapports de la police secrete,
1789-1800_ (4 vols., 1880-1894); A. Schmidt, _Tableaux de la Revolution
francaise, &c._ (Leipzig, 1867-1870), a collection of reports of the secret
police on which the above work is based. A full report of the trial at
Vendome was published in four volumes at Paris in 1797, _Debats du proces,
&c._
(W. A. P.)
BABIISM, the religion founded in Persia in A.D. 1844-1845 by Mirza 'Ali
Muhammad of Shiraz, a young Sayyid who was at that time not twenty-five
years of age. Before his "manifestation" (_zuhur_), of which he gives in
the Persian _Bayan_ a date corresponding to 23rd May 1844, he was a
disciple of Sayyid Kazim of Rasht, the leader of the Shaykhis, a sect of
extreme Shi'ites characterized by the doctrine (called by them
_Rukn-i-rabi'_, "the fourth support") that at all times there must exist an
intermediary between the twelfth Imam and his faithful followers. This
intermediary they called "the perfect Shi'ite," and his prototype is to be
found in the four successive _Babs_ or "gates" through whom alone the
twelfth Imam, during the period of his "minor occultation"
(_Ghaybat-i-sughra_, A.D. 874-940), held communication with his partisans.
It was in this sense, and not, as has been often asserted, in the sense of
"Gate of God" or "Gate of Religion," that the title _Bab_ was understood
and assumed by Mirza 'Ali Muhammad; but, though still generally thus styled
by non-Babis, he soon assumed the higher title of _Nuqta_ ("Point"), and
the title _Bab_, thus left vacant, was conferred on his ardent disciple,
Mulla Husayn of Bushrawayh.
The history of the Babis, though covering a comparatively short period, is
so full of incident and the particulars now available are so numerous, that
the following account purports to be only the briefest sketch. The Bab
himself was in captivity first at Shiraz, then at Maku, and lastly at
Chihriq, during the greater part of the six years (May 1844 until July
1850) of his brief career, but an active propaganda was carried on by his
disciples, which resulted in several serious revolts against the
government, especially after the death of Muhammad Shah in September 1848.
Of these risings the first (December 1848-July 1849) took place in
Mazandaran, at the ruined shrine of Shaykh Tabarsi, near Barfurush, where
the Babis, led by Mulla Muhammad 'Ali of Barfurush and Mulla Husayn of
Bushrawayh ("the first who believed"), defied the shah's troops for seven
months before they were finally subdued and put to death. The revolt at
Zanjan in the north-west of Persia, headed by Mulla Muhammad 'Ali Zanjani,
also lasted seven or eight months (May-December 1850), while a serious but
less protracted struggle was waged against the government at Niriz in Fars
by Aga Sayyid Yahya of Niriz. Both revolts were in progress when the Bab,
with one of his devoted disciples, was brought from his prison at Chihriq
to Tabriz and publicly shot in front of the _arg_ or citadel. The body,
after being exposed for some days, was recovered by the Babis and conveyed
to a shrine near Tehran, whence it was ultimately removed to Acre in Syria,
where it is now buried. For the next two years comparatively little was
heard of the Babis, but on the 15th of August 1852 three of them, acting on
their own initiative, attempted to assassinate Nasiru'd-Din Shah as he was
returning from the chase to his palace at Niyavaran. The attempt failed,
but was the cause of a fresh persecution, and on the 31st of August 1852
some thirty Babis, including the beautiful and talented poetess
Qurratu'l-'Ayn, were put to death in Tehran with atrocious cruelty. Another
of the victims of that day was Hajji Mirza Jani of Kashan, the author of
the oldest history of the movement from the Babi point of view. Only one
complete MS. of his invaluable work (obtained by Count Gobineau in Persia)
exists in any public library, the Bibliotheque Nationale at Paris. The
so-called "New History" (of which an English translation was published at
Cambridge in 1893 by E. G. Browne) is based on Mirza Jani's work, but many
important passages which did not accord with later Babi doctrine or policy
have been suppressed or modified, while some additions have been made. The
Bab was succeeded on his death by Mirza Yahya of Nur (at that time only
about twenty years of age), who escaped to Bagdad, and, under the title of
_Subh-i-Ezel_ ("the Morning of Eternity"), became the pontiff of the sect.
He lived, however, in great seclusion, leaving the direction of affairs
almost entirely in the hands of his elder half-brother (born 12th November
1817), Mirza Husayn 'Ali, entitled _Baha' u'llah_ ("the Splendour of God"),
who thus gradually became the most conspicuous and most influential member
of the sect, though in the _Iqan_, one of the most important polemical
works of the Babis, composed in 1858-1859, he still implicitly recognized
the supremacy of _Subh-i-Ezel_. In 1863, however, Baha declared himself to
be "He whom God shall manifest" (_Man Yuz-hiruhu'llah_, with prophecies of
whose advent the works of the Bab are filled), and called on all the Babis
to recognize his claim. The majority responded, but _Subh-i-Ezel_ and some
of his faithful adherents refused. After that date the Babis divided into
two sects, Ezelis and Baha'is, of which the former steadily lost and the
latter gained ground, so that in 1908 there were probably from half a
million to a million of the latter, and at most only a hundred or two of
the former. In 1863 the Babis were, at the instance of the Persian
government, removed from Bagdad to Constantinople, whence they were shortly
afterwards transferred to Adrianople. In 1868 Baha and his followers were
exiled to Acre in Syria, and _Subh-i-Ezel_ with his few adherents to
Famagusta in Cyprus, where he was still living in 1908. Baha'u'llah died at
Acre on the 16th of May 1892. His son 'Abbas Efendi (also called
'Abdu'l-Baha, "the servant of Baha") was generally recognized as his
successor, but another of his four sons, Muhammad 'Ali, put forward a rival
claim. This caused a fresh and bitter schism, but 'Abbas Efendi steadily
gained ground, and there could be little doubt as to his eventual [v.03
p.0095] triumph. The controversial literature connected with this latest
schism is abundant, not only in Persian, but in English, for since 1900
many Americans have adopted the religion of Baha. The original apostle of
America was Ibrahim George Khayru'llah, who began his propaganda at the
Chicago Exhibition and later supported the claims of Muhammad 'Ali. Several
Persian missionaries, including the aged and learned Mirza Abu'l-Fazl of
Gulpayagan, were thereupon despatched to America by 'Abbas Efendi, who was
generally accepted by the American Baha'is as "the Master." The American
press contained many notices of the propaganda and its success. An
interesting article on the subject, by Stoyan Krstoff Vatralsky of Boston,
Mass., entitled "Mohammedan Gnosticism in America," appeared in the
_American Journal of Theology_ for January 1902, pp. 57-58.
A correct understanding of the doctrines of the early Babis (now
represented by the Ezelis) is hardly possible save to one who is conversant
with the theology of Islam and its developments, and especially the tenets
of the Shi'a. The Babis are Muhammadans only in the sense that the
Muhammadans are Christians or the Christians Jews; that is to say, they
recognize Muhammad (Mahomet) as a true prophet and the Qur'an (Koran) as a
revelation, but deny their finality. Revelation, according to their view,
is progressive, and no revelation is final, for, as the human race
progresses, a fuller measure of truth, and ordinances more suitable to the
age, are vouchsafed. The Divine Unity is incomprehensible, and can be known
only through its Manifestations; to recognize the Manifestation of the
cycle in which he lives is the supreme duty of man. Owing to the enormous
volume and unsystematic character of the Babi scriptures, and the absence
of anything resembling church councils, the doctrine on many important
points (such as the future life) is undetermined and vague. The
resurrection of the body is denied, but some form of personal immortality
is generally, though not universally, accepted. Great importance was
attached to the mystical values of letters and numbers, especially the
numbers 18 and 19 ("the number of the unity") and 19^2 = 361 ("the number
of all things"). In general, the Bab's doctrines most closely resembled
those of the Isma'ilis and Hurufis. In the hands of Baha the aims of the
sect became much more practical and ethical, and the wilder pantheistic
tendencies and metaphysical hair-splittings of the early Babis almost
disappeared. The intelligence, integrity and morality of the Babis are
high, but their efforts to improve the social position of woman have been
much exaggerated. They were in no way concerned (as was at the time falsely
alleged) in the assassination of Nasiru'd-Din Shah in May 1896. Of recent
persecutions of the sect the two most notable took place at Yazd, one in
May 1891, and another of greater ferocity in June 1903. Some account of the
latter is given by Napier Malcolm in his book _Five Years in a Persian
Town_ (London, 1905), pp. 87-89 and 186. In the constitutional movement in
Persia (1907) the Babis, though their sympathies are undoubtedly with the
reformers, wisely refrained from outwardly identifying themselves with that
party, to whom their open support, by alienating the orthodox _mujtahids_
and _mullas_, would have proved fatal. Here, as in all their actions, they
clearly obeyed orders issued from headquarters.
LITERATURE.--The literature of the sect is very voluminous, but mostly in
manuscript. The most valuable public collections in Europe are at St
Petersburg, London (British Museum) and Paris (Bibliotheque Nationale),
where two or three very rare MSS. collected by Gobineau, including the
precious history of the Bab's contemporary, Hajji Mirza Jani of Kashan, are
preserved. For the bibliography up to 1889, see vol. ii. pp. 173-211 of the
_Traveller's Narrative, written to illustrate the Episode of the Bab_, a
Persian work composed by Baha's son, 'Abbas Efendi, edited, translated and
annotated by E. G. Browne (Cambridge, 1891). More recent works
are:--Browne, _The New History of the Bab_ (Cambridge, 1893); and
"Catalogue and Description of the 27 Babi Manuscripts," _Journal of R.
Asiat. Soc._ (July and October 1892); Andreas, _Die Babi's in Persien_
(1896); Baron Victor Rosen, _Collections scientifiques de l'Institut des
Langues orientales_, vol. i. (1877), pp. 179-212; vol. iii. (1886), pp.
1-51; vol. vi. (1891), pp. 141-255; "Manuscrits Babys"; and other important
articles in Russian by the same scholar; and by Captain A. G. Toumansky in
the _Zapiski vostochnava otdyeleniya Imperatorskava Russkava
Archeologicheskava Obshchestva_ (vols. iv.-xii., St Petersburg, 1890-1900);
also an excellent edition by Toumansky, with Russian translation, notes and
introduction, of the _Kitab-i-Aqdas_ (the most important of Baha's works),
&c. (St Petersburg, 1899). Mention should also be made of an Arabic history
of the Babis (unsympathetic but well-informed) written by a Persian, Mirza
Muhammad Mahdi Khan, _Za'imu'd-Duwla_, printed in Cairo in A.H. 1321 (=
A.D. 1903-1904). Of the works composed in English for the American converts
the most important are:--_Baha'u'llah_ (The Glory of God), by Ibrahim
Khayru'llah, assisted by Howard MacNutt (Chicago, 1900); _The Three
Questions_ (n.d.) and _Facts for Bahaists_ (1901), by the same; _Life and
Teachings of 'Abbas Efendi_, by Myron H. Phelps, with preface by E. G.
Browne (New York, 1903); Isabella Brittingham, _The Revelations of
Baha'u'llah, in a Sequence of Four Lessons_ (1902); Laura Clifford Burney,
_Some Answered Questions Collected_ [in Acre, 1904-1906] _and Translated
from the Persian of 'Abdu'l-Baha_ [_i.e._ 'Abbas Efendi] (London, 1908). In
French, A. L. M. Nicolas (first dragoman at the French legation at Tehran)
has published several important translations, viz. _Le Livre des sept
preuves de la mission du Bab_ (Paris, 1902); _Le Livre de la certitude_
(1904); and _Le Beyan arabe_ (1905); and there are other notable works by
H. Dreyfus, an adherent of the Babi faith. Lastly, mention should be made
of a remarkable but scarce little tract by Gabriel Sacy, printed at Cairo
in June 1902, and entitled _Du regne de Dieu et de l'Agneau, connu sous le
nom de Babysme_.
(E. G. B.)
BABINGTON, ANTHONY (1561-1586), English conspirator, son of Henry Babington
of Dethick in Derbyshire, and of Mary, daughter of George, Lord Darcy, was
born in October 1561, and was brought up secretly a Roman Catholic. As a
youth he served at Sheffield as page to Mary queen of Scots, for whom he
early felt an ardent devotion. In 1580 he came to London, attended the
court of Elizabeth, and joined the secret society formed that year
supporting the Jesuit missionaries. In 1582 after the execution of Father
Campion he withdrew to Dethick, and attaining his majority occupied himself
for a short time with the management of his estates. Later he went abroad
and became associated at Paris with Mary's supporters who were planning her
release with the help of Spain, and on his return he was entrusted with
letters for her. In April 1586 he became, with the priest John Ballard,
leader of a plot to murder Elizabeth and her ministers, and organize a
general Roman Catholic rising in England and liberate Mary. The conspiracy
was regarded by Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador, one of its chief
instigators, and also by Walsingham, as the most dangerous of recent years;
it included, in its general purpose of destroying the government, a large
number of Roman Catholics, and had ramifications all over the country.
Philip II. of Spain, who ardently desired the success of an enterprise "so
Christian, just and advantageous to the holy Catholic faith,"[1] promised
to assist with an expedition directly the assassination of the queen was
effected. Babington's conduct was marked by open folly and vanity. Desirous
of some token of appreciation from Mary for his services, he entered into a
long correspondence with her, which was intercepted by the spies of
Walsingham. On the 4th of August Ballard was seized and betrayed his
comrades, probably under torture. Babington then applied for a passport
abroad, for the ostensible purpose of spying upon the refugees, but in
reality to organize the foreign expedition and secure his own safety. The
passport being delayed, he offered to reveal to Walsingham a dangerous
conspiracy, but the latter sent no reply, and meanwhile the ports were
closed and none allowed to leave the kingdom for some days. He was still
allowed his liberty, but one night while supping with Walsingham's servant
he observed a memorandum of the minister's concerning himself, fled to St
John's Wood, where he was joined by some of his companions, and after
disguising himself succeeded in reaching Harrow, where he was sheltered by
a recent convert to Romanism. Towards the end of August he was discovered
and imprisoned in the Tower. On the 13th and 14th of September he was tried
with Ballard and five others by a special commission, when he confessed his
guilt, but strove to place all the blame upon Ballard. All were condemned
to death for high treason. On the 19th he wrote to Elizabeth praying for
mercy, and the same day offered L1000 for procuring his pardon; and on the
20th, having disclosed the cipher used in the correspondence between
himself and Mary, he was executed [v.03 p.0096] with the usual barbarities
in Lincoln's Inn Fields. The detection of the plot led to Mary's own
destruction. There is no positive documentary proof in Mary's own hand that
she had knowledge of the intended assassination of Elizabeth, but her
circumstances, together with the tenour of her correspondence with
Babington, place her complicity beyond all reasonable doubt.
[1] _Cata. of State Papers Simancas_, iii. 606, Mendoza to Philip.
BABINGTON, CHURCHILL (1821-1889), English classical scholar and
archaeologist, was born at Roecliffe, in Leicestershire, on the 11th of
March 1821. He was educated by his father till he was seventeen, when he
was placed under the tuition of Charles Wycliffe Goodwin, the orientalist
and archaeologist. He entered St John's College, Cambridge, in 1839, and
graduated B.A. in 1843, being seventh in the first class of the classical
tripos and a senior optime. In 1845 he obtained the Hulsean Prize for his
essay _The Influence of Christianity in promoting the Abolition of Slavery
in Europe_. In 1846 he was elected to a fellowship and took orders. He
proceeded to the degree of M.A. in 1846 and D.D. in 1879. From 1848 to 1861
he was vicar of Horningsea, near Cambridge, and from 1866 to his death on
the 12th of January 1889, vicar of Cockfield in Suffolk. From 1865 to 1880
he held the Disney professorship of archaeology at Cambridge. In his
lectures, illustrated from his own collections of coins and vases, he dealt
chiefly with Greek and Roman pottery and numismatics.
Dr Babington was a many-sided man and wrote on a variety of subjects. His
early familiarity with country life gave him a taste for natural history,
especially botany and ornithology. He was also an authority on conchology.
He was the author of the appendices on botany (in part) and ornithology in
Potter's _History and Antiquities of Charnwood Forest_ (1842); _Mr
Macaulay's Character of the Clergy ... considered_ (1849), a defence of the
clergy of the 17th century, which received the approval of Mr Gladstone,
against the strictures of Macaulay. He also brought out the _editio
princeps_ of the speeches of Hypereides _Against Demosthenes_ (1850), _On
Behalf of Lycophron and Euxenippus_ (1853), and his _Funeral Oration_
(1858). It was by his edition of these speeches from the papyri discovered
at Thebes (Egypt) in 1847 and 1856 that Babington's fame as a Greek scholar
was made. In 1855 he published an edition of _Benefizio della Morte di
Cristo_, a remarkable book of the Reformation period, attributed to
Paleario, of which nearly all the copies had been destroyed by the
Inquisition. Babington's edition was a facsimile of the _editio princeps_
published at Venice in 1543, with Introduction and French and English
versions. He also edited the first two volumes of Higden's _Polychronicon_
(1858) and Bishop Pecock's _Repressor of Overmuch Blaming of the Clergy_
(1860), undertaken at the request of the Master of the Rolls; _Introductory
Lecture on Archaeology_ (1865); _Roman Antiquities found at Rougham_
[1872]; _Catalogue of Birds of Suffolk_ (1884-1886); _Flora of Suffolk_
(with W. M. Hind, 1889), and (1855, 1865) some inscriptions found in Crete
by T. A. B. Spratt, the explorer of the island. In addition to contributing
to various classical and scientific journals, he catalogued the classical
MSS. in the University Library and the Greek and English coins in the
Fitzwilliam museum.
[Illustration: Old Male Babirusa (_Babirusa alfurus_).]
BABIRUSA ("pig-deer"), the Malay name of the wild swine of Celebes and
Buru, which has been adopted in zoology as the scientific designation of
this remarkable animal (the only representative of its genus), in the form
of _Babirusa alfurus_. The skin is nearly naked, and very rough and rugged.
The total number of teeth is 34, with the formula _i.2/3. c.1/1. p.2/3.
m.3/3._ The molars, and more especially the last, are smaller and simpler
than in the pigs of the genus _Sus_, but the peculiarity of this genus is
the extraordinary development of the canines, or tusks, of the male. These
teeth are ever-growing, long, slender and curved, and without enamel. Those
of the upper jaw are directed upwards from their bases, so that they never
enter the mouth, but pierce the skin of the face, thus resembling horns
rather than teeth; they curve backwards, downwards, and finally often
forwards again, almost or quite touching the forehead. Dr A. R. Wallace
remarks that "it is difficult to understand what can be the use of these
horn-like teeth. Some of the old writers supposed that they served as hooks
by which the creature could rest its head on a branch. But the way in which
they usually diverge just over and in front of the eye has suggested the
more probable idea, that they serve to guard these organs from thorns and
spines while hunting for fallen fruits among the tangled thickets of
rattans and other spiny plants. Even this, however, is not satisfactory,
for the female, who must seek her food in the same way, does not possess
them. I should be inclined to believe rather that these tusks were once
useful, and were then worn down as fast as they grew, but that changed
conditions of life have rendered them unnecessary, and they now develop
into a monstrous form, just as the incisors of the beaver and rabbit will
go on growing if the opposite teeth do not wear them away. In old animals
they reach an enormous size, and are generally broken off as if by
fighting." On this latter view we may regard the tusks of the male babirusa
as examples of redundant development, analogous to that of the single pair
of lower teeth in some of the beaked whales. Unlike ordinary wild pigs, the
babirusa produces uniformly coloured young. (See SWINE.)
(R. L.*)
BABOON (from the Fr. _babuin_, which is itself derived from _Babon_, the
Egyptian deity to whom it was sacred), properly the designation of the
long-muzzled, medium-tailed Egyptian monkey, scientifically known as _Papio
anubis_; in a wider sense applied to all the members of the genus _Papio_
(formerly known as _Cynocephalus_) now confined to Africa and Arabia,
although in past times extending into India. Baboons are for the most part
large terrestrial monkeys with short or medium-sized tails, and long naked
dog-like muzzles, in the truncated extremity of which are pierced the
nostrils. As a rule, they frequent barren rocky districts in large droves,
and are exceedingly fierce and dangerous to approach. They have large
cheek-pouches, large naked callosities, often brightly coloured, on the
buttocks, and short thick limbs, adapted rather to walking than to
climbing. Their diet includes practically everything eatable they can
capture or kill. The typical representative of the genus is the yellow
baboon (_P. cynocephalus_, or _babuin_), distinguished by its small size
and grooved muzzle, and ranging from Abyssinia to the Zambezi. The
above-mentioned anubis baboon, _P. anubis_ (with the subspecies _neumanni_,
_pruinosus_, _heuglini_ and _doguera_), ranging from Egypt all through
tropical Africa, together with _P. sphinx_, _P. olivaceus_, the Abyssinian
_P. lydekkeri_, and the chacma, _P. porcarius_ of the Cape, represent the
subgenus _Choeropithecus_. The named Arabian baboon, _P. hamadryas_ of
North Africa and Arabia, dedicated by the ancient Egyptians to the god
Thoth, and the South Arabian _P. arabicus_, typify _Hamadryas_; while the
drill and mandrill of the west coast, _P. leucophaeus_ and _P. maimon_,
constitute the subgenus _Maimon_. The anubis baboons, as shown by the
frescoes, were tamed by the ancient Egyptians and trained to pluck
sycamore-figs from the trees. (See PRIMATES; CHACMA; DRILL; GELADA and
MANDRILL).
(R. L.*)
BABRIUS, author of a collection of fables written in Greek. Practically
nothing is known of him. He is supposed to have been a Roman, whose gentile
name was possibly Valerius, living in the East, probably in Syria, where
the fables seem first [v.03 p.0097] to have gained popularity. The address
to "a son of King Alexander" has caused much speculation, with the result
that dates varying between the 3rd century B.C. and the 3rd century A.D.
have been assigned to Babrius. The Alexander referred to may have been
Alexander Severus (A.D. 222-235), who was fond of having literary men of
all kinds about his court. "The son of Alexander" has further been
identified with a certain Branchus mentioned in the fables, and it is
suggested that Babrius may have been his tutor; probably, however, Branchus
is a purely fictitious name. There is no mention of Babrius in ancient
writers before the beginning of the 3rd century A.D., and his language and
style seem to show that he belonged to that period. The first critic who
made Babrius more than a mere name was Richard Bentley, in his
_Dissertation on the Fables of Aesop_. In a careful examination of these
prose Aesopian fables, which had been handed down in various collections
from the time of Maximus Planudes, Bentley discovered traces of
versification, and was able to extract a number of verses which he assigned
to Babrius. Tyrwhitt (_De Babrio_, 1776) followed up the researches of
Bentley, and for some time the efforts of scholars were directed towards
reconstructing the metrical original of the prose fables. In 1842 M. Minas,
a Greek, the discoverer of the _Philosophoumena_ of Hippolytus, came upon a
MS. of Babrius in the convent of St Laura on Mount Athos, now in the
British Museum. This MS. contained 123 fables out of the supposed original
number, 160. They are arranged alphabetically, but break off at the letter
O. The fables are written in choliambic, _i.e._ limping or imperfect iambic
verse, having a spondee as the last foot, a metre originally appropriated
to satire. The style is extremely good, the expression being terse and
pointed, the versification correct and elegant, and the construction of the
stories is fully equal to that in the prose versions. The genuineness of
this collection of the fables was generally admitted by scholars. In 1857
Minas professed to have discovered at Mount Athos another MS. containing 94
fables and a preface. As the monks refused to sell this MS., he made a copy
of it, which was sold to the British Museum, and was published in 1859 by
Sir G. Cornewall Lewis. This, however, was soon proved to be a forgery. Six
more fables were brought to light by P. Knoell from a Vatican MS. (edited
by A. Eberhard, _Analecta Babriana_, 1879).
EDITIONS.--Boissonade (1844); Lachmann (1845); Schneider (1853); Eberhard
(1876); Gitlbauer (1882); Rutherford (1883); Knoell, _Fabularum Babrianarum
Paraphrasis Bodleiana_ (1877); Feuillet (1890); Desrousseaux (1890);
Passerat (1892); Croiset (1892); Crusius (1897). See also Mantels, _Ueber
die Fabeln des B._ (1840); Crusius, _De Babrii Aetate_ (1879); Ficus, _De
Babrii Vita_ (1889); J. Weiner, _Quaestiones Babrianae_ (1891); Conington,
_Miscellaneous Writings_, ii. 460-491; Marchiano, _Babrio_ (1899); Fusci,
_Babrio_ (1901); Christoffersson, _Studia de Fabulis Babrianis_ (1901).
There are translations in English by Davies (1860) and in French by Leveque
(1890), and in many other languages.
BABU, a native Indian clerk. The word is really a term of respect attached
to a proper name, like "master" or "Mr," and _Babu-ji_ is still used in
many parts of India, meaning "sir"; but without the suffix the word itself
is now generally used contemptuously as signifying a semi-literate native,
with a mere veneer of modern education.
BABY-FARMING,[1] a term meaning generally the taking in of infants to nurse
for payment, but usually with an implication of improper treatment.
Previous to the year 1871 the abuse of the practice of baby-farming in
England had grown to an alarming extent, while the trials of Margaret
Waters and Mary Hall called attention to the infamous relations between the
lying-in houses and the baby-farming houses of London. The evil was, no
doubt, largely connected with the question of illegitimacy, for there was a
wide-spread existence of baby-farms where children were received without
question on payment of a lump sum. Such children were nearly all
illegitimate, and in these cases it was to the pecuniary advantage of the
baby-farmer to hasten the death of the child. It had become also the
practice for factory operatives and mill-hands to place out their children
by the day, and since in many cases the children were looked upon as a
burden and a drain on their parents' resources, too particular inquiry was
not always made as to the mode in which the children were cared for. The
form was gone through too of paying a ridiculously insufficient sum for the
maintenance of the child. In 1871 the House of Commons found it necessary
to appoint a select committee "to inquire as to the best means of
preventing the destruction of the lives of infants put out to nurse for
hire by their parents." "Improper and insufficient food," said the
committee, "opiates, drugs, crowded rooms, bad air, want of cleanliness,
and wilful neglect are sure to be followed in a few months by diarrhoea,
convulsions and wasting away." These unfortunate children were nearly all
illegitimate, and the mere fact of their being hand-nursed, and not
breast-nursed, goes some way (according to the experience of the Foundling
hospital and the Magdalene home) to explain the great mortality among them.
Such children, when nursed by their mothers in the workhouse, generally
live. The practical result of the committee of 1871 was the act of 1872,
which provided for the compulsory registration of all houses in which more
than one child under the age of one year were received for a longer period
than twenty-four hours. No licence was granted by the justices of the
peace, unless the house was suitable for the purpose, and its owner a
person of good character and able to maintain the children. Offences
against the act, including wilful neglect of the children even in a
suitable house, were punishable by a fine of L5 or six months' imprisonment
with or without hard labour. In 1896 a select committee of the House of
Lords sat and reported on the working of this act. In consequence of this
report the act of 1872 was repealed and superseded by the Infant Life
Protection Act 1897, which did away with the system of registration and
substituted for it one of notice to a supervening authority. By the act all
persons retaining or receiving for hire more than one infant under the age
of _five_ had to give written notice of the fact to the local authority.
The local authorities were empowered to appoint inspectors, and required to
arrange for the periodical inspection of infants so taken in, while they
could also fix the number of infants which might be retained. By a special
clause any person receiving an infant under the age of two years for a sum
of money not exceeding twenty pounds had to give notice of the fact to the
local authority. If any infants were improperly kept, the inspector might
obtain an order for their removal to a work-house or place of safety until
restored to their parents or guardians, or otherwise legally disposed of.
The act of 1897 was repealed and amended by the Children Act 1908, which
codified the law relating to children, and added many new provisions. This
act is dealt with in the article CHILDREN, LAW RELATING TO.
In the United States the law is noticeably strict in most states. In
Massachusetts, a law of 1891 directs that "every person who receives for
board, or for the purpose of procuring adoption, an infant under the age of
three years shall use diligence to ascertain whether or not such infant is
illegitimate, and if he knows or has reason to believe it to be
illegitimate shall forthwith notify the State Board of Charity of the fact
of such reception; and said board and its officers or agents may enter and
inspect any building where they may have reason to believe that any such
illegitimate infant is boarded, and remove such infant when, in their
judgment, such removal is necessary by reason of neglect, abuse or other
causes, in order to preserve the infant's life, and such infant so removed
shall be in the custody of said Board of Charity, which shall make
provision therefor according to law." The penal code of the state of New
York requires a licence for baby-farming to be issued by the board of
health of the city or town where such children are boarded or kept, and
"every person so licensed must keep a register wherein he shall enter the
names and ages of all such children, and of all children born on such
premises, and the names and residences of their parents, as far as known,
the time of reception and the discharge of such children, and the reasons
therefor, and also a correct register of every child under five years of
age who is given out, adopted, taken away, or indentured from such place
[v.03 p.0098] to or by any one, together with the name and residence of the
person so adopting" (Pen. Code, s. 288, subsec. 4).
Persons neglecting children may be prosecuted under s. 289 of the N.Y.
penal code, which provides that any person who "wilfully causes or permits
the life or limb of any child, actually or apparently under the age of
sixteen years, to be endangered, or its health to be injured, or its morals
to become depraved ... is guilty of a misdemeanour."
In Australia particular care has been taken by most of the states to
prevent the evils of baby-farming. In South Australia there is a State
Children's Council, which, under the State Children Act of 1895, has large
powers with respect to the oversight of infants under two years boarded out
by their mother. "Foster-mothers," as the women who take in infants as
boarders are called, must be licensed, while the number of children
authorized to be kept by the foster-mother is fixed by licence; every
licensed foster-mother must keep a register containing the name, age and
place of birth of every child received by her, the names, addresses and
description of the parents, or of any person other than the parents from or
to whom the child was received or delivered over, the date of receipt or
delivery over, particulars of any accident to or illness of the child, and
the name of the medical practitioner (if any) by whom attended. In New
South Wales the Children's Protection Act of 1892, with the amendments of
1902, requires the same state supervision over the homes in which children
are boarded out, with licensing of foster-mothers. In Victoria an act was
passed in 1890 for "making better provision for the protection of infant
life." In New Zealand, there is legislation to the same effect by the
"Adoption of Children Act 1895" and the "Infant Life Protection Act 1896."
[1] Baby is a diminutive or pet form of "babe," now chiefly used in poetry
or scriptural language. "Babe" is probably a form of the earlier _baban_, a
reduplicated form of the infant sound _ba_.
BABYLON (mod. _Hillah_), an ancient city on the left bank of the Euphrates,
about 70 m. S. of Bagdad. "Babylon" is the Greek form of Babel or Bab-ili,
"the gate of the god" (sometimes incorrectly written "of the gods"), which
again is the Semitic translation of the original Sumerian name Ka-dimirra.
The god was probably Merodach or Marduk (_q.v._), the divine patron of the
city. In an inscription of the Kassite conqueror Gaddas the name appears as
Ba-ba-lam, as if from the Assyrian _babalu_, "to bring"; another foreign
_Volksetymologie_ is found in Genesis xi. 9, from _balbal_, "to confound."
A second name of the city, which perhaps originally denoted a separate
village or quarter, was Su-anna, and in later inscriptions it is often
represented ideographically by E-ki, the pronunciation and meaning of which
are uncertain. One of its oldest names, however, was Din-tir, of which the
poets were especially fond; Din-tir signifies in Sumerian "the life of the
forest," though a native lexicon translates it "seat of life." Uru-azagga,
"the holy city," was also a title sometimes applied to Babylon as to other
cities in Babylonia. Ka-dimirra, the Semitic Bab-ili, probably denoted at
first E-Saggila, "the house of the lofty head," the temple dedicated to
Bel-Merodach, along with its immediate surroundings. Like the other great
sanctuaries of Babylonia the temple had been founded in pre-Semitic times,
and the future Babylon grew up around it. Since Merodach was the son of Ea,
the culture god of Eridu near Ur on the Persian Gulf, it is possible that
Babylon was a colony of Eridu. Adjoining Babylon was a town called Borsippa
(_q.v._).
The earliest mention of Babylon is in a dated tablet of the reign of Sargon
of Akkad (3800 B.C.), who is stated to have built sanctuaries there to
Anunit and A[=e] (or Ea), and H. Winckler may be right in restoring a
mutilated passage in the annals of this king so as to make it mean that
Babylon owed its name to Sargon, who made it the capital of his empire. If
so, it fell back afterwards into the position of a mere provincial town and
remained so for centuries, until it became the capital of "the first
dynasty of Babylon" and then of Khammurabi's empire (2250 B.C.). From this
time onward it continued to be the capital of Babylonia and the holy city
of western Asia. The claim to supremacy in Asia, however real in fact, was
not admitted _de jure_ until the claimant had "taken the hands" of
Bel-Merodach at Babylon, and thereby been accepted as his adopted son and
the inheritor of the old Babylonian empire. It was this which made
Tiglath-pileser III. and other Assyrian kings so anxious to possess
themselves of Babylon and so to legitimize their power. Sennacherib alone
seems to have failed in securing the support of the Babylonian priesthood;
at all events he never underwent the ceremony, and Babylonia throughout his
reign was in a constant state of revolt which was finally suppressed only
by the complete destruction of the capital. In 689 B.C. its walls, temples
and palaces were razed to the ground and the rubbish thrown into the
Arakhtu, the canal which bordered the earlier Babylon on the south. The act
shocked the religious conscience of western Asia; the subsequent murder of
Sennacherib was held to be an expiation of it, and his successor
Esar-haddon hastened to rebuild the old city, to receive there his crown,
and make it his residence during part of the year. On his death Babylonia
was left to his elder son Samas-sum-yukin, who eventually headed a revolt
against his brother Assur-bani-pal of Assyria. Once more Babylon was
besieged by the Assyrians and starved into surrender. Assur-bani-pal
purified the city and celebrated a "service of reconciliation," but did not
venture to "take the hands" of Bel. In the subsequent overthrow of the
Assyrian empire the Babylonians saw another example of divine vengeance.
With the recovery of Babylonian independence under Nabopolassar a new era
of architectural activity set in, and his son Nebuchadrezzar made Babylon
one of the wonders of the ancient world. It surrendered without a struggle
to Cyrus, but two sieges in the reign of Darius Hystaspis, and one in the
reign of Xerxes, brought about the destruction of the defences, while the
monotheistic rule of Persia allowed the temples to fall into decay. Indeed
part of the temple of E-Saggila, which like other ancient temples served as
a fortress, was intentionally pulled down by Xerxes after his capture of
the city. Alexander was murdered in the palace of Nebuchadrezzar, which
must therefore have been still standing, and cuneiform texts show that,
even under the Seleucids, E-Saggila was not wholly a ruin. The foundation
of Seleucia in its neighbourhood, however, drew away the population of the
old city and hastened its material decay. A tablet dated 275 B.C. states
that on the 12th of Nisan the inhabitants of Babylon were transported to
the new town, where a palace was built as well as a temple to which the
ancient name of E-Saggila was given. With this event the history of Babylon
comes practically to an end, though more than a century later we find
sacrifices being still performed in its old sanctuary.
Our knowledge of its topography is derived from the classical writers, the
inscriptions of Nebuchadrezzar, and the excavations of the _Deutsche
Orientgesellschaft_, which were begun in 1899. The topography is
necessarily that of the Babylon of Nebuchadrezzar; the older Babylon which
was destroyed by Sennacherib having left few, if any, traces behind. Most
of the existing remains lie on the E. bank of the Euphrates, the principal
being three vast mounds, the _Babil_ to the north, the _Qasr_ or "Palace"
(also known as the _Mujelliba_) in the centre, and the Ish[=a]n 'Amran ibn
'Ali, with the outlying spur of the Jumjuma, to the south. Eastward of
these come the Ish[=a]n el-Aswad or "Black Mound" and three lines of
rampart, one of which encloses the _Babil_ mound on the N. and E. sides,
while a third forms a triangle with the S.E. angle of the other two. W. of
the Euphrates are other ramparts and the remains of the ancient Borsippa.
We learn from Herodotus and Ctesias that the city was built on both sides
of the river in the form of a square, and enclosed within a double row of
lofty walls to which Ctesias adds a third. Ctesias makes the outermost wall
360 stades (42 m.) in circumference, while according to Herodotus it
measured 480 stades (56 m.), which would include an area of about 200 sq.
m. The estimate of Ctesias is essentially the same as that of Q. Curtius
(v. 1. 26), 368 stades, and Clitarchus (_ap._ Diod. Sic. ii. 7), 365
stades; Strabo (xvi. 1. 5) makes it 385 stades. But even the estimate of
Ctesias, assuming the stade to be its usual length, would imply an area of
about 100 sq. m. According to Herodotus the height of the walls was about
335 ft. and their width 85 ft; [v.03 p.0099] according to Ctesias the
height was about 300 ft. The measurements seem exaggerated, but we must
remember that even in Xenophon's time (_Anab._ iii. 4. 10) the ruined wall
of Nineveh was still 150 ft high, and that the spaces between the 250
towers of the wall of Babylon (Ctes. 417, _ap._ Diod. ii. 7) were broad
enough to let a four-horse chariot turn (Herod. i. 179). The clay dug from
the moat served to make the bricks of the wall, which had 100 gates, all of
bronze, with bronze lintels and posts. The two inner enclosures were faced
with enamelled tiles and represented hunting-scenes. Two other walls ran
along the banks of the Euphrates and the quays with which it was lined,
each containing 25 gates which answered to the number of streets they led
into. Ferry-boats plied between the landing-places of the gates, and a
movable drawbridge (30 ft. broad), supported on stone piers, joined the two
parts of the city together.
The account thus given of the walls must be grossly exaggerated and cannot
have been that of an eye-witness. Moreover, the two walls--Imgur-Bel, the
inner wall, and Nimitti-Bel, the outer--which enclosed the city proper on
the site of the older Babylon have been confused with the outer ramparts
(enclosing the whole of Nebuchadrezzar's city), the remains of which can
still be traced to the east. According to Nebuchadrezzar, Imgur-Bel was
built in the form of a square, each side of which measured "30 _aslu_ by
the great cubit"; this would be equivalent, if Professor F. Hommel is
right, to 2400 metres. Four thousand cubits to the east the great rampart
was built "mountain high," which surrounded both the old and the new town;
it was provided with a moat, and a reservoir was excavated in the triangle
on the inner side of its south-east corner, the western wall of which is
still visible. The Imgur-Bel of Sargon's time has been discovered by the
German excavators running south of the _Qasr_ from the Euphrates to the
Gate of Ishtar.
The German excavations have shown that the _Qasr_ mound represents both the
old palace of Nabopolassar, and the new palace adjoining it built by
Nebuchadrezzar, the wall of which he boasts of having completed in 15 days.
They have also laid bare the site of the "Gate of Ishtar" on the east side
of the mound and the little temple of Nin-Makh (Beltis) beyond it, as well
as the raised road for solemn processions (_A-ibur-sabu_) which led from
the Gate of Ishtar to E-Saggila and skirted the east side of the palace.
The road was paved with stone and its walls on either side lined with
enamelled tiles, on which a procession of lions is represented. North of
the mound was a canal, which seems to have been the Libilkhegal of the
inscriptions, while on the south side was the Arakhtu, "the river of
Babylon," the brick quays of which were built by Nabopolassar.
The site of E-Saggila is still uncertain. The German excavators assign it
to the 'Amr[=a]n mound, its tower having stood in a depression immediately
to the north of this, and so place it south of the _Qasr_; but E. Lindl and
F. Hommel have put forward strong reasons for considering it to have been
north of the latter, on a part of the site which has not yet been explored.
A tablet copied by George Smith gives us interesting details as to the plan
and dimensions of this famous temple of Bel; a plan based on these will be
found in Hommel's _Grundriss der Geographie und Geschichte des alten
Orients_, p. 321. There were three courts, the outer or great court, the
middle court of Ishtar and Zamama, and the inner court on the east side of
which was the tower of seven stages (known as the House of the Foundation
of Heaven and Earth), 90 metres high according to Hommel's calculation of
the measurements in the tablet; while on the west side was the temple
proper of Merodach and his wife Sarpanit or Zarpanit, as well as chapels of
Anu, Ea and Bel on either side of it. A winding ascent led to the summit of
the tower, where there was a chapel, containing, according to Herodotus, a
couch and golden table (for the showbread) but no image. The golden image
of Merodach 40 ft. high, stood in the temple below, in the sanctuary called
E-Kua or "House of the Oracle," together with a table, a mercy-seat and an
altar--all of gold. The deities whose chapels were erected within the
precincts of the temple enclosure were regarded as forming his court.
Fifty-five of these chapels existed altogether in Babylon, but some of them
stood independently in other parts of the city.
There are numerous gates in the walls both of E-Saggila and of the city,
the names of many of which are now known. Nebuchadrezzar says that he
covered the walls of some of them with blue enamelled tiles "on which bulls
and dragons were pourtrayed," and that he set up large bulls and serpents
of bronze on their thresholds.
The _Babil_ mound probably represents the site of a palace built by
Nebuchadrezzar at the northern extremity of the city walls and attached to
a defensive outwork 60 cubits in length. Since H. Rassam found remains of
irrigation works here it might well be the site of the Hanging Gardens.
These consisted, we are told, of a garden of trees and flowers, built on
the topmost of a series of arches some 75 ft. high, and in the form of a
square, each side of which measured 400 Greek ft. Water was raised from the
Euphrates by means of a screw (Strabo xvi. 1. 5; Diod. ii. 10. 6). In the
Jumjuma mound at the southern extremity of the old city the contract and
other business tablets of the Egibi firm were found.
See C. J. Rich, _Memoir on the Ruins of Babylon_ (1816), and _Collected
Memoirs_ (1839); A. H. Layard, _Nineveh and Babylon_ (1853); C. P. Tiele,
_De Hoofdtempel van Babel_ (1886); A. H. Sayce, _Religion of the Ancient
Babylonians_, App. ii. (1887); C. J. Ball in _Records of the Past_ (new
ser. iii. 1890); _Mittheilungen der deutschen Orientgesellschaft_
(1899-1906); F. Delitzsch, _Im Lande des einstigen Paradieses_ (1903);
F. H. Weissbach, _Das Stadtbild von Babylon_ (1904); F. Hommel, _Grundriss
der Geographie und Geschichte des alten Orients_ (1904).
(A. H. S.)
BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA. I. _Geography._--Geographically as well as
ethnologically and historically, the whole district enclosed between the
two great rivers of western Asia, the Tigris and Euphrates, forms but one
country. The writers of antiquity clearly recognized this fact, speaking of
the whole under the general name of Assyria, though Babylonia, as will be
seen, would have been a more accurate designation. It naturally falls into
two divisions, the northern being more or less mountainous, while the
southern is flat and marshy; the near approach of the two rivers to one
another, at a spot where the undulating plateau of the north sinks suddenly
into the Babylonian alluvium, tends to separate them still more completely.
In the earliest times of which we have any record, the northern portion was
included in Mesopotamia; it was definitely marked off as Assyria only after
the rise of the Assyrian monarchy. With the exception of Assur, the
original capital, the chief cities of the country, Nineveh, Calah and
Arbela, were all on the left bank of the Tigris. The reason of this
preference for the eastern bank of the Tigris was due to its abundant
supply of water, whereas the great Mesopotamian plain on the western side
had to depend upon the streams which flowed into the Euphrates. This vast
flat, the modern El-Jezireh, is about 250 miles in length, interrupted only
by a single limestone range, rising abruptly out of the plain, and
branching off from the Zagros mountains under the names of _Saraz[=u]r_,
_Hamrin_ and _Sinjar_. The numerous remains of old habitations show how
thickly this level tract must once have been peopled, though now for the
most part a wilderness. North of the plateau rises a well-watered and
undulating belt of country, into which run low ranges of limestone hills,
sometimes arid, sometimes covered with dwarf-oak, and often shutting in,
between their northern and north-eastern flank and the main mountain-line
from which they detach themselves, rich plains and fertile valleys. Behind
them tower the massive ridges of the Niphates and Zagros ranges, where the
Tigris and Euphrates take their rise, and which cut off Assyria from
Armenia and Kurdistan.
The name Assyria itself was derived from that of the city of Assur (_q.v._)
or Asur, now Qal`at Sherqat (Kaleh Shergat), which stood on the right bank
of the Tigris, midway between the Greater and the Lesser Zab. It remained
the capital long after the Assyrians had become the dominant power in
western Asia, but was finally supplanted by Calah (_Nimr[=u]d_), Nineveh
(_Nebi Yunus_ and _Kuyunjik_), and Dur-Sargina (_Khorsabad_), some 60 m.
farther north (see NINEVEH).
In contrast with the arid plateau of Mesopotamia, stretched the [v.03
p.0100] rich alluvial plain of Chaldaea, formed by the deposits of the two
great rivers by which it was enclosed. The soil was extremely fertile, and
teemed with an industrious population. Eastward rose the mountains of Elam,
southward were the sea-marshes and the Kald[=a] or Chaldaeans and other
Aramaic tribes, while on the west the civilization of Babylonia encroached
beyond the banks of the Euphrates, upon the territory of the Semitic nomads
(or Suti). Here stood Ur (_Mugheir_, more correctly _Muqayyar_) the
earliest capital of the country; and Babylon, with its suburb, Borsippa
(_Birs Nimr[=u]d_), as well as the two Sipparas (the Sepharvaim of
Scripture, now _Abu Habba_), occupied both the Arabian and Chaldaean sides
of the river (see BABYLON). The Arakhtu, or "river of Babylon," flowed past
the southern side of the city, and to the south-west of it on the Arabian
bank lay the great inland freshwater sea of _Nejef_, surrounded by red
sandstone cliffs of considerable height, 40 m. in length and 35 in breadth
in the widest part. Above and below this sea, from Borsippa to Kufa, extend
the famous Chaldaean marshes, where Alexander was nearly lost (Arrian,
_Exp. Al._ vii. 22; Strab. xvi. 1, s. 12); but these depend upon the state
of the Hindiya canal, disappearing altogether when it is closed.
Eastward of the Euphrates and southward of Sippara, Kutha and Babylon were
Kis (_Uhaimir_, 9 m. E. of _Hillah_), Nippur (_Niffer_)--where stood the
great sanctuary of El-lil, the older Bel--Uruk or Erech (_Warka_) and Larsa
(_Senkera_) with its temple of the sun-god, while eastward of the Shatt
el-Hai, probably the ancient channel of the Tigris, was Lagash (_Tello_),
which played an important part in early Babylonian history. The primitive
seaport of the country, Eridu, the seat of the worship of Ea the
culture-god, was a little south of Ur (at _Abu Shahrain_ or _Now[=a]wis_ on
the west side of the Euphrates). It is now about 130 m. distant from the
sea; as about 46 m. of land have been formed by the silting up of the shore
since the foundation of Spasinus Charax (_Muhamrah_) in the time of
Alexander the Great, or some 115 ft. a year, the city would have been in
existence at least 6000 years ago. The marshes in the south like the
adjoining desert were frequented by Aramaic tribes; of these the most
famous were the Kald[=a] or Chaldaeans who under Merodach-baladan made
themselves masters of Babylon and gave their name in later days to the
whole population of the country. The combined stream of the Euphrates and
Tigris as it flowed through the marshes was known to the Babylonians as the
_n[=a]r marrati_, "the salt river" (cp. Jer. l. 21), a name originally
applied to the Persian Gulf.
The alluvial plain of Babylonia was called Edin, the Eden of Gen. ii.,
though the name was properly restricted to "the plain" on the western bank
of the river where the Bedouins pastured the flocks of their Babylonian
masters. This "bank" or _kisad_, together with the corresponding western
bank of the Tigris (according to Hommel the modern Shatt el-Hai), gave its
name to the land of Chesed, whence the _Kasdim_ of the Old Testament. In
the early inscriptions of Lagash the whole district is known as Gu-Edinna,
the Sumerian equivalent of the Semitic _Kisad Edini_. The coast-land was
similarly known as Gu-[=a]bba (Semitic _Kisad tamtim_), the "bank of the
sea." A more comprehensive name of southern Babylonia was Kengi, "the
land," or Kengi Sumer, "the land of Sumer," for which Sumer alone came
afterwards to be used. Sumer has been supposed to be the original of the
Biblical Shinar; but Shinar represented northern rather than southern
Babylonia, and was probably the Sankhar of the Tell el-Amarna tablets (but
see SUMER). Opposed to Kengi and Sumer were Urra (Uri) and Akkad or
northern Babylonia. The original meaning of _Urra_ was perhaps "clayey
soil," but it came to signify "the upper country" or "highlands," _kengi_
being "the lowlands." In Semitic times _Urra_ was pronounced _Uri_ and
confounded with _uru_, "city"; as a geographical term, however, it was
replaced by Akkadu (Akkad), the Semitic form of Agad[=e]--written Akkattim
in the Elamite inscriptions--the name of the elder Sargon's capital, which
must have stood close to Sippara, if indeed it was not a quarter of Sippara
itself. The rise of Sargon's empire was doubtless the cause of this
extension of the name of Akkad; from henceforward, in the imperial title,
"Sumer and Akkad" denoted the whole of Babylonia. After the Kassite
conquest of the country, northern Babylonia came to be known as
Kar-Duniyas, "the wall of the god Duniyas," from a line of fortification
similar to that built by Nebuchadrezzar between Sippara and Opis, so as to
defend his kingdom from attacks from the north. As this last was "the Wall
of Semiramis" mentioned by Strabo (xi. 14. 8), Kar-Duniyas may have
represented the Median Wall of Xenophon (_Anab._ ii. 4. 12), traces of
which were found by F. R. Chesney extending from Faluja to Jibbar.
The country was thickly studded with towns, the sites of which are still
represented by mounds, though the identification of most of them is still
doubtful. The latest to be identified are Bismya, between Nippur and Erech,
which recent American excavations have proved to be the site of Udab (also
called Adab and Usab) and the neighbouring F[=a]ra, the site of the ancient
Kisurra. The dense population was due to the elaborate irrigation of the
Babylonian plain which had originally reclaimed it from a pestiferous and
uninhabitable swamp and had made it the most fertile country in the world.
The science of irrigation and engineering seems to have been first created
in Babylonia, which was covered by a network of canals, all skilfully
planned and regulated. The three chief of them carried off the waters of
the Euphrates to the Tigris above Babylon,--the Zabzallat canal (or _Nahr
Sarsar_) running from Faluja to Ctesiphon, the Kutha canal from Sippara to
Madain, passing Tell Ibrahim or Kutha on the way, and the King's canal or
Ar-Malcha between the other two. This last, which perhaps owed its name to
Khammurabi, was conducted from the Euphrates towards Upi or Opis, which has
been shown by H. Winckler (_Altorientalische Forschungen_, ii. pp. 509
seq.) to have been close to Seleucia on the western side of the Tigris. The
Pallacopas, called Pallukkatu in the Neo-Babylonian texts, started from
Pallukkatu or Faluja, and running parallel to the western bank of the
Euphrates as far as Iddaratu or Teredon (?) watered an immense tract of
land and supplied a large lake near Borsippa. B. Meissner may be right in
identifying it with "the Canal of the Sun-god" of the early texts. Thanks
to this system of irrigation the cultivation of the soil was highly
advanced in Babylonia. According to Herodotus (i. 193) wheat commonly
returned two hundred-fold to the sower, and occasionally three
hundred-fold. Pliny (_H. N._ xviii. 17) states that it was cut twice, and
afterwards was good keep for sheep, and Berossus remarked that wheat,
sesame, barley, ochrys, palms, apples and many kinds of shelled fruit grew
wild, as wheat still does in the neighbourhood of Anah. A Persian poem
celebrated the 360 uses of the palm (Strabo xvi. 1. 14), and Ammianus
Marcellinus (xxiv. 3) says that from the point reached by Julian's army to
the shores of the Persian Gulf was one continuous forest of verdure.
II. _Classical Authorities_.--Such a country was naturally fitted to be a
pioneer of civilization. Before the decipherment of the cuneiform texts our
knowledge of its history, however, was scanty and questionable. Had the
native history of Berossus survived, this would not have been the case; all
that is known of the Chaldaean historian's work, however, is derived from
quotations in Josephus, Ptolemy, Eusebius and the Syncellus. The
authenticity of his list of 10 antediluvian kings who reigned for 120
_sari_ or 432,000 years, has been partially confirmed by the inscriptions;
but his 8 postdiluvian dynasties are difficult to reconcile with the
monuments, and the numbers attached to them are probably corrupt. It is
different with the 7th and 8th dynasties as given by Ptolemy in the
_Almagest_, which prove to have been faithfully recorded:--
1. Nabonassar (747 B.C.) 14 years
2. Nadios 2 "
3. Khinziros and Poros (Pul) 5 "
4. Ilulaeos 5 "
5. Mardokempados (Merodach-Baladan) 12 "
6. Arkeanos (Sargon) 5 "
7. Interregnum 2 "
8. Hagisa 1 month
9. Belibos (702 B.C.) 3 years
10. Assaranadios (Assur-nadin-sum) 6 "
[v.03 p.0101]
11. R[=e]gebelos 1 year
12. M[=e]sesimordakos 4 years
13. Interregnum 8 "
14. Asaridinos (Esar-haddon) 13 "
15. Saosdukhinos (Savul-sum-yukin) 20 "
16. Sin[=e]ladanos (Assur-bani-pal) 22 "
The account of Babylon given by Herodotus is not that of an eye-witness,
and his historical notices are meagre and untrustworthy. He was
controverted by Ctesias, who, however, has mistaken mythology for history,
and Greek romance owed to him its Ninus and Semiramis, its Ninyas and
Sardanapalus. The only ancient authority of value on Babylonian and
Assyrian history is the Old Testament.
III. _Modern Discovery._--The excavations of P. E. Botta and A. H. Layard
at Nineveh opened up a new world, coinciding as they did with the
successful decipherment of the cuneiform system of writing. Layard's
discovery of the library of Assur-bani-pal put the materials for
reconstructing the ancient life and history of Assyria and Babylonia into
the hands of scholars. He also was the first to excavate in Babylonia,
where C. J. Rich had already done useful topographical work. Layard's
excavations in this latter country were continued by W. K. Loftus, who also
opened trenches at Susa, as well as by J. Oppert on behalf of the French
government. But it was only in the last quarter of the 19th century that
anything like systematic exploration was attempted. After the death of
George Smith at Aleppo in 1876, an expedition was sent by the British
Museum (1877-1879), under the conduct of Hormuzd Rassam, to continue his
work at Nineveh and its neighbourhood. Excavations in the mounds of
Balaw[=a]t, called Imgur-Bel by the Assyrians, 15 m. east of Mosul,
resulted in the discovery of a small temple dedicated to the god of dreams
by Assur-nazir-pal III. (883 B.C.), containing a stone coffer or ark in
which were two inscribed tables of alabaster of rectangular shape, as well
as of a palace which had been destroyed by the Babylonians but restored by
Shalmaneser II. (858 B.C.). From the latter came the bronze gates with
hammered reliefs, which are now in the British Museum. The remains of a
palace of Assur-nazir-pal III. at Nimr[=u]d (Calah) were also excavated,
and hundreds of enamelled tiles were disinterred. Two years later
(1880-1881) Rassam was sent to Babylonia, where he discovered the site of
the temple of the sun-god of Sippara at Abu-Habba, and so fixed the
position of the two Sipparas or Sepharvaim. Abu-Habba lies south-west of
Bagdad, midway between the Euphrates and Tigris, on the south side of a
canal, which may once have represented the main stream of the Euphrates,
Sippara of the goddess Anunit, now _D[=e]r_, being on its opposite bank.
Meanwhile (1877-1881) the French consul, de Sarzec, had been excavating at
Tello, the ancient Lagash, and bringing to light monuments of the
pre-Semitic age, which included the diorite statues of Gudea now in the
Louvre, the stone of which, according to the inscriptions upon them, had
been brought from Magan, the Sinaitic peninsula. The subsequent excavations
of de Sarzec in Tello and its neighbourhood carried the history of the city
back to at least 4000 B.C., and a collection of more than 30,000 tablets
has been found, which were arranged on shelves in the time of Gudea (_c._
2700 B.C.). In 1886-1887 a German expedition under Dr Koldewey explored the
cemetery of El Hibba (immediately to the south of Tello), and for the first
time made us acquainted with the burial customs of ancient Babylonia.
Another German expedition, on a large scale, was despatched by the
_Orientgesellschaft_ in 1899 with the object of exploring the ruins of
Babylon; the palace of Nebuchadrezzar and the great processional road were
laid bare, and Dr W. Andrae subsequently conducted excavations at Qal`at
Sherqat, the site of Assur. Even the Turkish government has not held aloof
from the work of exploration, and the Museum at Constantinople is filled
with the tablets discovered by Dr V. Scheil in 1897 on the site of Sippara.
J. de Morgan's exceptionally important work at Susa lies outside the limits
of Babylonia; not so, however, the American excavations (1903-1904) under
E. J. Banks at Bismya (Udab), and those of the university of Pennsylvania
at Niffer (see NIPPUR) first begun in 1889, where Mr J. H. Haynes has
systematically and patiently uncovered the remains of the great temple of
El-lil, removing layer after layer of debris and cutting sections in the
ruins down to the virgin soil. Midway in the mound is a platform of large
bricks stamped with the names of Sargon of Akkad and his son Naram-Sin
(3800 B.C.); as the debris above them is 34 ft. thick, the topmost stratum
being not later than the Parthian era (H. V. Hilprecht, _The Babylonian
Expedition_, i. 2, p. 23), it is calculated that the debris underneath the
pavement, 30 ft. thick, must represent a period of about 3000 years, more
especially as older constructions had to be levelled before the pavement
was laid. In the deepest part of the excavations, however, inscribed clay
tablets and fragments of stone vases are still found, though the cuneiform
characters upon them are of a very archaic type, and sometimes even retain
their primitive pictorial forms.
IV. _Chronology._[1] The later chronology of Assyria has long been fixed,
thanks to the lists of _limmi_, or archons, who gave their names in
succession to their years of office. Several copies of these lists from the
library of Nineveh are in existence, the earliest of which goes back to 911
B.C., while the latest comes down to the middle of the reign of
Assur-bani-pal. The beginning of a king's reign is noted in the lists, and
in some of them the chief events of the year are added to the name of its
archon. Assyrian chronology is, therefore, certain from 911 B.C. to 666,
and an eclipse of the sun which is stated to have been visible in the month
Sivan, 763 B.C., is one that has been calculated to have taken place on the
15th of June of that year. The system of reckoning time by _limmi_ was of
Assyrian origin, and recent discoveries have made it clear that it went
back to the first days of the monarchy. Even in the distant colony at Kara
Euyuk near Kaisariyeh (Caesarea) in Cappadocia cuneiform tablets show that
the Assyrian settlers used it in the 15th century B.C. In Babylonia a
different system was adopted. Here the years were dated by the chief events
that distinguished them, as was also the case in Egypt in the epoch of the
Old Empire. What the event should be was determined by the government and
notified to all its officials; one of these notices, sent to the Babylonian
officials in Canaan in the reign of Samsu-iluna, the son of Khammurabi, has
been found in the Lebanon. A careful register of the dates was kept,
divided into reigns, from which dynastic lists were afterwards compiled,
giving the duration of each king's reign as well as that of the several
dynasties. Two of these dynastic compilations have been discovered,
unfortunately in an imperfect state.[2] In addition to the chronological
tables, works of a more ambitious and literary character were also
attempted of the nature of chronicles. One of these is the so-called
"Synchronous History of Assyria and Babylonia," consisting of brief
notices, written by an Assyrian, of the occasions on which the kings of the
two countries had entered into relation, hostile or otherwise, with one
another; a second is the _Babylonian Chronicle_ discovered by Dr Th. G.
Pinches, which gave a synopsis of Babylonian history from a Babylonian
point of view, and was compiled in the reign of Darius. It is interesting
to note that its author says of the battle of Khalul[=e], which we know
from the Assyrian inscriptions to have taken place in 691 or 690 B.C., that
he does "not know the year" when it was fought: the records of Assyria had
been already lost, even in Babylonia. The early existence of an accurate
system of dating is not surprising; it was necessitated by the fact that
Babylonia was a great trading community, in which it was not only needful
that commercial and legal documents should be dated, but also that it
should be possible to refer easily to the dates of former business
transactions. The Babylonian and Assyrian kings had consequently no
difficulty in [v.03 p.0102] determining the age of their predecessors or of
past events. Nabonidus (Nabunaid), who was more of an antiquarian than a
politician, and spent his time in excavating the older temples of his
country and ascertaining the names of their builders, tells us that
Naram-Sin, the son of Sargon of Akkad, lived 3200 years before himself
(_i.e._ 3750 B.C.), and Sagarakti-suryas 800 years; and we learn from
Sennacherib that Shalmaneser I. reigned 600 years earlier, and that
Tiglath-pileser I. fought with Merodach-nadin-akhi (Marduk-nadin-akh[=e])
of Babylon 418 years before the campaign of 689 B.C.; while, according to
Tiglath-pileser I., the high-priest Samas-Hadad, son of Isme-Dagon, built
the temple of Anu and Hadad at Assur 701 years before his own time.
Shalmaneser I. in his turn states that the high-priest Samas-Hadad, the son
of Bel-kabi, governed Assur 580 years previously, and that 159 years before
this the high-priest Erisum was reigning there. The raid of the Elamite
king Kutur-Nakhkhunt[=e] is placed by Assur-bani-pal 1635 years before his
own conquest of Susa, and Khammurabi is said by Nabonidus to have preceded
Burna-buryas by 700 years.
[Sidenote: Early Sumerian period.]
V. _History_.--In the earliest period of which we have any knowledge
Babylonia was divided into several independent states, the limits of which
were defined by canals and boundary stones. Its culture may be traced back
to two main centres, Eridu in the south and Nippur in the north. But the
streams of civilization which flowed from them were in strong contrast.
El-lil, around whose sanctuary Nippur had grown up, was lord of the
ghost-land, and his gifts to mankind were the spells and incantations which
the spirits of good or evil were compelled to obey. The world which he
governed was a mountain; the creatures whom he had made lived underground.
Eridu, on the other hand, was the home of the culture-god Ea, the god of
light and beneficence, who employed his divine wisdom in healing the sick
and restoring the dead to life. Rising each morning from his palace in the
deep, he had given man the arts and sciences, the industries and manners of
civilization. To him was due the invention of writing, and the first
law-book was his creation. Eridu had once been a seaport, and it was
doubtless its foreign trade and intercourse with other lands which
influenced the development of its culture. Its cosmology was the result of
its geographical position: the earth, it was believed, had grown out of the
waters of the deep, like the ever-widening coast at the mouth of the
Euphrates. Long before history begins, however, the cultures of Eridu and
Nippur had coalesced. While Babylon seems to have been a colony of Eridu,
Ur, the immediate neighbour of Eridu, must have been colonized from Nippur,
since its moon-god was the son of El-lil of Nippur. But in the admixture of
the two cultures the influence of Eridu was predominant.
We may call the early civilization of Babylonia Sumerian. The race who
first developed it spoke an agglutinative language, and to them was due the
invention of the pictorial hieroglyphs which became the running-hand or
cuneiform characters of later days, as well as the foundation of the chief
cities of the country and the elements of its civilization. The great
engineering works by means of which the marshes were drained and the
overflow of the rivers regulated by canals went back to Sumerian times,
like a considerable part of later Babylonian religion and the beginnings of
Babylonian law. Indeed Sumerian continued to be the language of religion
and law long after the Semites had become the ruling race.
[Sidenote: Semitic Influence.]
_Arrival of the Semites_.--When the Semites first entered the Edin or plain
of Babylonia is uncertain, but it must have been at a remote period. The
cuneiform system of writing was still in process of growth when it was
borrowed and adapted by the new comers, and the Semitic Babylonian language
was profoundly influenced by the older language of the country, borrowing
its words and even its grammatical usages. Sumerian in its turn borrowed
from Semitic Babylonian, and traces of Semitic influence in some of the
earliest Sumerian texts indicate that the Semite was already on the
Babylonian border. His native home was probably Arabia; hence Eridu ("the
good city") and Ur ("the city") would have been built in Semitic territory,
and their population may have included Semitic elements from the first. It
was in the north, however, that the Semites first appear on the monuments.
Here in Akkad the first Semitic empire was founded, Semitic conquerors or
settlers spread from Sippara to Susa, Khana to the east of the Tigris was
occupied by "West Semitic" tribes, and "out of" Babylonia "went forth the
Assyrian." As in Assyria, so too in the states of Babylonia the _patesi_ or
high-priest of the god preceded the king. The state had grown up around a
sanctuary, the god of which was nominally its ruler, the human _patesi_
being his viceregent. In course of time many of the high-priests assumed
the functions and title of king; while retaining their priestly office they
claimed at the same time to be supreme in the state in all secular
concerns. The god remained nominally at its head; but even this position
was lost to him when Babylonia was unified under Semitic princes, and the
earthly king became an incarnate god. A recollection of his former power
survived, however, at Babylon, where Bel-Merodach adopted the king before
his right to rule was allowed.
[Sidenote: Ur-nin[=a]
_Early Princes_.--The earliest monuments that can be approximately
dynasty.] dated come from Lagash (Tello). Here we hear of a "king of
Kengi," as well as of a certain Me-silim, king of Kis, who had dealings
with Lugal-suggur, high-priest of Lagash, and the high-priest of a
neighbouring town, the name of which is provisionally transcribed Gis-ukh
(formerly written Gis-ban and confounded with the name of Opis). According
to Scheil, Gis-ukh is represented by Jokha, south of F[=a]ra and west of
the Shatt el-Hai, and since two of its rulers are called kings of T[=e] on
a seal-cylinder, this may have been the pronunciation of the name.[3] At a
later date the high-priests of Lagash made themselves kings, and a dynasty
was founded there by Ur-Nin[=a]. In the ruins of a building, attached by
him to the temple of Nin[=a], terra-cotta bas-reliefs of the king and his
sons have been found, as well as the heads of lions in onyx, which remind
us of Egyptian work and onyx plates. These were "booty" dedicated to the
goddess Bau. E-anna-du, the grandson of Ur-Nin[=a], made himself master of
the whole of southern Babylonia, including "the district of Sumer" together
with the cities of Erech, Ur and Larsa (?). He also annexed the kingdom of
Kis, which, however, recovered its independence after his death. Gis-ukh
was made tributary, a certain amount of grain being levied upon each person
in it, which had to be paid into the treasury of the goddess Nin[=a] and
the god Ingurisa. The so-called "Stele of the Vultures," now in the Louvre,
was erected as a monument of the victory. On this various incidents in the
war are represented. In one scene the king stands in his chariot with a
curved weapon in his right hand formed of three bars of metal bound
together by rings (similar, as M. L. Heuzey has pointed out, to one carried
by the chief of an Asiatic tribe in a tomb of the 12th dynasty at
Beni-Hasan in Egypt), while his kilted followers with helmets on their
heads and lances in their hands march behind him. In another a flock of
vultures is feeding on the bodies of the fallen enemy; in a third a tumulus
is being heaped up over those who had been slain on the side of Lagash.
Elsewhere we see the victorious prince beating down a vanquished enemy, and
superintending the execution of other prisoners who are being sacrificed to
the gods, while in one curious scene he is striking with his mace a sort of
wicker-work cage filled with naked men. In his hand he holds the crest of
Lagash and its god--a lion-headed eagle with outstretched wings, supported
by two lions which are set heraldically back to back. The sculptures belong
to a primitive period of art.
E-anna-du's campaigns extended beyond the confines of Babylonia. He overran
a part of Elam and took the city of Az on the Persian Gulf. Temples and
palaces were repaired or erected at Lagash and elsewhere, the town of
Nin[=a]--which probably gave [v.03 p.0103] its name to the later Nin[=a] or
Nineveh--was rebuilt, and canals and reservoirs were excavated. He was
succeeded by his brother En-anna-tum I., under whom Gis-ukh once more
became the dominant power. As En-anna-tum has the title only of
high-priest, it is probable that he acknowledged Ur-lumma of Gis-ukh as his
suzerain. His son and successor Entemena restored the prestige of Lagash.
Gis-ukh was subdued and a priest named Illi was made its governor. A tripod
of silver dedicated by Entemena to his god is now in the Louvre. A frieze
of lions devouring ibexes and deer, and incised with great artistic skill,
runs round the neck, while the eagle crest of Lagash adorns the globular
part. The vase is a proof of the high degree of excellence to which the
goldsmith's art had already attained. A vase of calcite, also dedicated by
Entemena, has been found at Nippur.
The eighth successor of Ur-Nin[=a] was Uru-duggina, who was overthrown and
his city captured by Lugal-zaggisi, the high-priest of Gis-ukh.
Lugal-zaggisi was the founder of the first empire in Asia of which we know.
He made Erech his capital and calls himself king of Kengi. In a long
inscription which he caused to be engraved on hundreds of stone vases
dedicated to El-lil of Nippur, he declares that his kingdom extended "from
the Lower Sea of the Tigris and Euphrates," or Persian Gulf, to "the Upper
Sea" or Mediterranean. It was at this time that Erech received the name of
"the City," which it continued to bear when written ideographically.
[Sidenote: Sargon.]
_Semitic Empire of Sargon of Akkad._--The next empire founded in western
Asia was Semitic. Semitic princes had already established themselves at
Kis, and a long inscription has been discovered at Susa by J. de Morgan,
belonging to one of them, Manistusu, who like Lugal-zaggisi was a
contemporary of Uru-duggina. Another Semitic ruler of Kis of the same
period was Alusarsid (or Urumus) who "subdued Elam and Barahs[=e]." But the
fame of these early establishers of Semitic supremacy was far eclipsed by
that of Sargon of Akkad and his son, Naram-Sin. The date of Sargon is
placed by Nabonidus at 3800 B.C. He was the son of Itti-Bel, and a legend
related how he had been born in concealment and sent adrift in an ark of
bulrushes on the waters of the Euphrates. Here he had been rescued and
brought up by "Akki the husbandman"; but the day arrived at length when his
true origin became known, the crown of Babylonia was set upon his head and
he entered upon a career of foreign conquest. Four times he invaded Syria
and Palestine, and spent three years in thoroughly subduing the countries
of "the west," and in uniting them with Babylonia "into a single empire."
Images of himself were erected on the shores of the Mediterranean in token
of his victories, and cities and palaces were built at home out of the
spoils of the conquered lands. Elam and the northern part of Mesopotamia
were also subjugated, and rebellions were put down both in Kazalla and in
Babylonia itself. Contract tablets have been found dated in the years of
the campaigns against Palestine and Sarlak, king of Gutium or Kurdistan,
and copper is mentioned as being brought from Magan or the Sinaitic
peninsula.
[Sidenote: Naram-Sin.]
Sargon's son and successor, Naram-Sin, followed up the successes of his
father by marching into Magan, whose king he took captive. He assumed the
imperial title of "king of the four zones," and, like his father, was
addressed as a god. He is even called "the god of Agad[=e]" (Akkad),
reminding us of the divine honours claimed by the Pharaohs of Egypt, whose
territory now adjoined that of Babylonia. A finely executed bas-relief,
representing Naram-Sin, and bearing a striking resemblance to early
Egyptian art in many of its features, has been found at Diarbekr.
Babylonian art, however, had already attained a high degree of excellence;
two seal cylinders of the time of Sargon are among the most beautiful
specimens of the gem-cutter's art ever discovered. The empire was bound
together by roads, along which there was a regular postal service; and clay
seals, which took the place of stamps, are now in the Louvre bearing the
names of Sargon and his son. A cadastral survey seems also to have been
instituted, and one of the documents relating to it states that a certain
Uru-Malik, whose name appears to indicate his Canaanitish origin, was
governor of the land of the Amorites, as Syria and Palestine were called by
the Babylonians. It is probable that the first collection of astronomical
observations and terrestrial omens was made for a library established by
Sargon.
[Sidenote: Ur dynasty.]
Bingani-sar-ali was the son of Naram-Sin, but we do not yet know whether he
followed his father on the throne. Another son was high-priest of the city
of Tutu, and in the name of his daughter, Lipus-Eaum, a priestess of Sin,
some scholars have seen that of the Hebrew deity Yahweh. The Babylonian god
Ea, however, is more likely to be meant. The fall of Sargon's empire seems
to have been as sudden as its rise. The seat of supreme power in Babylonia
was shifted southwards to Isin and Ur. It is generally assumed that two
dynasties reigned at Ur and claimed suzerainty over the other Babylonian
states, though there is as yet no clear proof that there was more than one.
It was probably Gungunu who succeeded in transferring the capital of
Babylonia from Isin to Ur, but his place in the dynasty (or dynasties) is
still uncertain. One of his successors was Ur-Gur, a great builder, who
built or restored the temples of the Moon-god at Ur, of the Sun-god at
Larsa, of Ishtar at Erech and of Bel at Nippur. His son and successor was
Dungi, whose reign lasted more than 51 years, and among whose vassals was
Gudea, the _patesi_ or high-priest of Lagash. Gudea was also a great
builder, and the materials for his buildings and statues were brought from
all parts of western Asia, cedar wood from the Amanus mountains, quarried
stones from Lebanon, copper from northern Arabia, gold and precious stones
from the desert between Palestine and Egypt, dolerite from Magan (the
Sinaitic peninsula) and timber from Dilmun in the Persian Gulf. Some of his
statues, now in the Louvre, are carved out of Sinaitic dolerite, and on the
lap of one of them (statue E) is the plan of his palace, with the scale of
measurement attached. Six of the statues bore special names, and offerings
were made to them as to the statues of the gods. Gudea claims to have
conquered Anshan in Elam, and was succeeded by his son Ur-Ningirsu. His
date may be provisionally fixed at 2700 B.C.
This dynasty of Ur was Semitic, not Sumerian, notwithstanding the name of
Dungi. Dungi was followed by Bur-Sin, Gimil-Sin, and Ibi-Sin. Their power
extended to the Mediterranean, and we possess a large number of
contemporaneous monuments in the shape of contracts and similar business
documents, as well as chronological tables, which belong to their reigns.
[Sidenote: Khammurabi.]
After the fall of the dynasty, Babylonia passed under foreign influence.
Sumuabi ("Shem is my father"), from southern Arabia (or perhaps Canaan),
made himself master of northern Babylonia, while Elamite invaders occupied
the south. After a reign of 14 years Sumuabi was succeeded by his son
Sumu-la-ilu, in the fifth year of whose reign the fortress of Babylon was
built, and the city became for the first time a capital. Rival kings,
Pungun-ila and Immerum, are mentioned in the contract tablets as reigning
at the same time as Sumu-la-ilu (or Samu-la-ilu); and under Sin-muballidh,
the great-grandson of Sumu-la-ilu, the Elamites laid the whole of the
country under tribute, and made Eri-Aku or Arioch, called Rim-Sin by his
Semitic subjects, king of Larsa. Eri-Aku was the son of Kudur-Mabug, who
was prince of Yamutbal, on the eastern border of Babylonia, and also
"governor of Syria." The Elamite supremacy was at last shaken off by the
son and successor of Sin-muballidh, Khammurabi, whose name is also written
Ammurapi and Khammuram, and who was the Amraphel of Gen. xiv. 1. The
Elamites, under their king Kudur-Lagamar or Chedor-laomer, seem to have
taken Babylon and destroyed the temple of Bel-Merodach; but Khammurabi
retrieved his fortunes, and in the thirtieth year of his reign (in 2340
B.C.) he overthrew the Elamite forces in a decisive battle and drove them
out of Babylonia. The next two years were occupied in adding Larsa and
Yamutbal to his dominion, and in forming Babylonia into a single monarchy,
the head of which was Babylon. A great literary revival followed the
recovery of Babylonian independence, and the rule of Babylon was obeyed as
far as the shores of the Mediterranean. Vast numbers of contract tablets,
dated in the reigns of Khammurabi and other kings of the dynasty, have
[v.03 p.0104] been discovered, as well as autograph letters of the kings
themselves, more especially of Khammurabi. Among the latter is one ordering
the despatch of 240 soldiers from Assyria and Situllum, a proof that
Assyria was at the time a Babylonian dependency. Constant intercourse was
kept up between Babylonia and the west, Babylonian officials and troops
passing to Syria and Canaan, while "Amorite" colonists were established in
Babylonia for the purposes of trade. One of these Amorites, Abi-ramu or
Abram by name, is the father of a witness to a deed dated in the reign of
Khammurabi's grandfather. Ammi-ditana, the great-grandson of Khammurabi,
still entitles himself "king of the land of the Amorites," and both his
father and son bear the Canaanitish (and south Arabian) names of Abesukh or
Abishua and Ammi-zadok.
One of the most important works of this "First Dynasty of Babylon," as it
was called by the native historians, was the compilation of a code of laws
(see BABYLONIAN LAW). This was made by order of Khammurabi after the
expulsion of the Elamites and the settlement of his kingdom. A copy of the
Code has been found at Susa by J. de Morgan and is now in the Louvre, The
last king of the dynasty was Samsu-ditana the son of Ammi-zadok. He was
followed by a dynasty of 11 Sumerian kings, who are said to have reigned
for 368 years, a number which must be much exaggerated. As yet the name of
only one of them has been found in a contemporaneous document. They were
overthrown and Babylonia was conquered by Kassites or Kossaeans from the
mountains of Elam, with whom Samsu-iluna had already come into conflict in
his 9th year. The Kassite dynasty was founded by Kandis, Gandis or Gaddas
(about 1780 B.C.), and lasted for 576-3/4 years. Under this foreign
dominion, which offers a striking analogy to the contemporary rule of the
Hyksos in Egypt, Babylonia lost its empire over western Asia, Syria and
Palestine became independent, and the high-priests of Assur made themselves
kings of Assyria. The divine attributes with which the Semitic kings of
Babylonia had been invested disappeared at the same time; the title of
"god" is never given to a Kassite sovereign. Babylon, however, remained the
capital of the kingdom and the holy city of western Asia, where the priests
were all-powerful, and the right to the inheritance of the old Babylonian
empire could alone be conferred.
_Rise of Assyria_.--Under Khammurabi a Samsi-Hadad (or Samsi-Raman) seems
to have been vassal-prince at Assur, and the names of several of the
high-priests of Assur who succeeded him have been made known to us by the
recent German excavations. The foundation of the monarchy was ascribed to
Zulilu, who is described as living after Bel-kapkapi or Belkabi (1900
B.C.), the ancestor of Shalmaneser I. Assyria grew in power at the expense
of Babylonia, and a time came when the Kassite king of Babylonia was glad
to marry the daughter of Assur-yuballidh of Assyria, whose letters to
Amenophis (Amon-hotep) IV. of Egypt have been found at Tell el-Amarna. The
marriage, however, led to disastrous results, as the Kassite faction at
court murdered the king and placed a pretender on the throne.
Assur-yuballidh promptly marched into Babylonia and avenged his son-in-law,
making Burna-buryas of the royal line king in his stead. Burna-buryas, who
reigned 22 years, carried on a correspondence with Amenophis IV. of Egypt.
[Sidenote: Shalmaneser I.] After his death, the Assyrians, who were still
nominally the vassals of Babylonia, threw off all disguise, and Shalmaneser
I. (1300 B.C.), the great-great-grandson of Assur-yuballidh, openly claimed
the supremacy in western Asia. Shalmaneser was the founder of Calah, and
his annals, which have recently been discovered at Assur, show how widely
extended the Assyrian empire already was. Campaign after campaign was
carried on against the Hittites and the wild tribes of the north-west, and
Assyrian colonists were settled in Cappadocia. His son Tukulti-In-aristi
conquered Babylon, putting its king Bitilyasu to death, and thereby made
Assyria the mistress of the oriental world. Assyria had taken the place of
Babylonia.
For 7 years Tukulti-In-aristi ruled at Babylon with the old imperial title
of "king of Sumer and Akkad." Then the Babylonians revolted. The Assyrian
king was murdered by his son, Assur-nazir-pal I., and Hadad-nadin-akhi made
king of Babylonia. But it was not until several years later, in the reign
of the Assyrian king Tukulti-Assur, that a reconciliation was effected
between the two rival kingdoms. The next Assyrian monarch, Bel-kudur-uzur,
was the last of the old royal line. He seems to have been slain fighting
against the Babylonians, who were still under the rule of Hadad-nadin-akhi,
and a new dynasty was established at Assur by In-aristi-pileser, who
claimed to be a descendant of the ancient prince Erba-Raman. [Sidenote:
Tiglath-pileser I.] His fourth successor was Tiglath-pileser I., one of the
great conquerors of Assyria, who carried his arms towards Armenia on the
north and Cappadocia on the west; he hunted wild bulls in the Lebanon and
was presented with a crocodile by the Egyptian king. In 1107 B.C., however,
he sustained a temporary defeat at the hands of Merodach-nadin-akhi
(Marduk-nadin-akh[=e]) of Babylonia, where the Kassite dynasty had finally
succumbed to Elamite attacks and a new line of kings was on the throne.
[Sidenote: Assur-nazir-pal III.]
Of the immediate successors of Tiglath-pileser I. we know little, and it is
with Assur-nazir-pal III. (883-858 B.C.) that our knowledge of Assyrian
history begins once more to be fairly full. The empire of Assyria was again
extended in all directions, and the palaces, temples and other buildings
raised by him bear witness to a considerable development of wealth and art.
Calah became the favourite residence of a monarch who was distinguished
even among Assyrian conquerors for his revolting cruelties. [Sidenote:
Shalmaneser II.] His son Shalmaneser II. had a long reign of 35 years,
during which the Assyrian capital was converted into a sort of armed camp.
Each year the Assyrian armies marched out of it to plunder and destroy.
Babylon was occupied and the country reduced to vassalage. In the west the
confederacy of Syrian princes headed by Benhadad of Damascus and including
Ahab of Israel (see JEWS, s. 10) was shattered in 853 B.C., and twelve
years later the forces of Hazael were annihilated and the ambassadors of
Jehu of Samaria brought tribute to "the great king." The last few years of
his life, however, were disturbed by the rebellion of his eldest son, which
well-nigh proved fatal. Assur, Arbela and other places joined the
pretender, and the revolt was with difficulty put down by Samsi-Raman (or
Samsi-Hadad), Shalmaneser's second son, who soon afterwards succeeded him
(824 B.C.). In 804 B.C. Damascus was captured by his successor Hadad-nirari
IV., to whom tribute was paid by Samaria.
[Sidenote: Nabu-nazir.]
With Nabu-nazir, the Nabonassar of classical writers, the so-called Canon
of Ptolemy begins. When he ascended the throne of Babylon in 747 B.C.
Assyria was in the throes of a revolution. Civil war and pestilence were
devastating the country, and its northern provinces had been wrested from
it by Ararat. In 746 B.C. Calah joined the rebels, and on the 13th of Iyyar
in the following year, Pulu or Pul, who took the name of Tiglath-pileser
III., seized the crown and inaugurated a new and vigorous policy.
[Sidenote: Tiglath-pileser III.]
_Second Assyrian Empire._--Under Tiglath-pileser III. arose the second
Assyrian empire, which differed from the first in its greater
consolidation. For the first time in history the idea of centralization was
introduced into politics; the conquered provinces were organized under an
elaborate bureaucracy at the head of which was the king, each district
paying a fixed tribute and providing a military contingent. The Assyrian
forces became a standing army, which, by successive improvements and
careful discipline, was moulded into an irresistible fighting machine, and
Assyrian policy was directed towards the definite object of reducing the
whole civilized world into a single empire and thereby throwing its trade
and wealth into Assyrian hands. With this object, after terrorizing Armenia
and the Medes and breaking the power of the Hittites, Tiglath-pileser III.
secured the high-roads of commerce to the Mediterranean together with the
Phoenician seaports and then made himself master of Babylonia. In 729 B.C.
the summit of his ambition was attained, and he was invested with the
sovereignty of Asia in the holy city of Babylon. Two years later, in Tebet
[v.03 p.0105] 727 B.C., he died, but his successor Ulul[=a], who took the
name of Shalmaneser IV., continued the policy he had begun. Shalmaneser
died suddenly in Tebet 722 B.C., while pressing the siege of Samaria, and
the seizure of the throne by another general, Sargon, on the 12th of the
month, gave the Babylonians an opportunity to revolt. [Sidenote:
Merodach-baladan.] In Nisan the Kald[=a] prince, Merodach (Marduk)-baladan,
entered Babylon and was there crowned legitimate king. For twelve years he
successfully resisted the Assyrians; but the failure of his allies in the
west to act in concert with him, and the overthrow of the Elamites,
eventually compelled him to fly to his ancestral domains in the marshes of
southern Babylonia. Sargon, who meanwhile had crushed the confederacy of
the northern nations, had taken (717 B.C.) the Hittite stronghold of
Carchemish and had annexed the future kingdom of Ecbatana, was now accepted
as king by the Babylonian priests and his claim to be the successor of
Sargon of Akkad acknowledged up to the time of his murder in 705 B.C.
[Sidenote: Sennacherib.] His son Sennacherib, who succeeded him on the 12th
of Ab, did not possess the military or administrative abilities of his
father, and the success of his reign was not commensurate with the vanity
of the ruler. He was never crowned at Babylon, which was in a perpetual
state of revolt until, in 691 B.C., he shocked the religious and political
conscience of Asia by razing the holy city of Babylon to the ground. His
campaign against Hezekiah of Judah was as much a failure as his policy in
Babylonia, and in his murder by his sons on the 20th of Tebet 681 B.C. both
Babylonians and Jews saw the judgment of heaven.
[Sidenote: Esar-haddon.]
Esar-haddon, who succeeded him, was of different calibre from his father.
He was commanding the army in a campaign against Ararat at the time of the
murder; forty-two days later the murderers fled from Nineveh and took
refuge at the court of Ararat. But the Armenian army was utterly defeated
near Malatia on the 12th of Iyyar, and at the end of the day Esar-haddon
was saluted by his soldiers as king. He thereupon returned to Nineveh and
on the 8th of Sivan formally ascended the throne.
One of his first acts was to restore Babylon, to send back the image of
Bel-Merodach (Bel-Marduk) to its old home, and to re-people the city with
such of the priests and the former population as had survived massacre.
Then he was solemnly declared king in the temple of Bel-Merodach, which had
again risen from its ruins, and Babylon became the second capital of the
empire. Esar-haddon's policy was successful and Babylonia remained
contentedly quiet throughout his reign. In February (674 B.C.) the
Assyrians entered upon their invasion of Egypt (see also EGYPT: _History_),
and in Nisan (or March) 670 B.C. an expedition on an unusually large scale
set out from Nineveh. The Egyptian frontier was crossed on the 3rd of
Tammuz (June), and Tirhaka, at the head of the Egyptian forces, was driven
to Memphis after fifteen days of continuous fighting, during which the
Egyptians were thrice defeated with heavy loss and Tirhaka himself was
wounded. On the 22nd of the month Memphis was entered by the victorious
army and Tirhaka fled to the south. A stele, commemorating the victory and
representing Tirhaka with the features of a negro, was set up at Sinjirli
(north of the Gulf of Antioch) and is now in the Berlin Museum. Two years
later (668 B.C.) Egypt revolted, and while on the march to reduce it,
Esar-haddon fell ill and died (on the 10th of Marchesvan or October).
[Sidenote: Assur-bani-pal.] Assur-bani-pal succeeded him as king of Assyria
and its empire, while his brother, Samas-sum-yukin, was made viceroy of
Babylonia. The arrangement was evidently intended to flatter the
Babylonians by giving them once more the semblance of independence. But it
failed to work. Samas-sum-yukin became more Babylonian than his subjects;
the viceroy claimed to be the successor of the monarchs whose empire had
once stretched to the Mediterranean; even the Sumerian language was revived
as the official tongue, and a revolt broke out which shook the Assyrian
empire to its foundations. After several years of struggle, during which
Egypt recovered its independence, Babylon was starved into surrender, and
the rebel viceroy and his supporters were put to death.
Egypt had already recovered its independence (660 B.C.) with the help of
mercenaries sent by Gyges of Lydia, who had vainly solicited aid from
Assyria against his Cimmerian enemies. Next followed the contest with Elam,
in spite of the efforts of Assur-bani-pal to ward it off. Assyria, however,
was aided by civil war in Elam itself; the country was wasted with fire and
sword, and its capital Susa or Shushan levelled with the ground. But the
long struggle left Assyria maimed and exhausted. It had been drained of
both wealth and fighting population; the devastated provinces of Elam and
Babylonia could yield nothing with which to supply the needs of the
imperial exchequer, and it was difficult to find sufficient troops even to
garrison the conquered populations. Assyria, therefore, was ill prepared to
face the hordes of Scythians--or Manda, as they were called by the
Babylonians--who now began to harass the frontiers. A Scythian power had
grown up in the old kingdom of Ellip, to the east of Assyria, where
Ecbatana was built by a "Manda" prince; Asia Minor was infested by the
Scythian tribe of Cimmerians, and the death of the Scythian leader
Dugdamm[=e] (the Lygdamis of Strabo i. 3. 16) was regarded by
Assur-bani-pal as a special mark of divine favour.
[Sidenote: Scythian influence.]
When Assur-bani-pal died, his empire was fast breaking up. Under his
successor, Assur-etil-ilani, the Scythians penetrated into Assyria and made
their way as far as the borders of Egypt. Calah was burned, though the
strong walls of Nineveh protected the relics of the Assyrian army which had
taken refuge behind them; and when the raiders had passed on to other
fields of booty, a new palace was erected among the ruins of the
neighbouring city. But its architectural poverty and small size show that
the resources of Assyria were at a low ebb. A contract has been found at
Sippara, dated in the fourth year of Assur-etil-ilani, though it is
possible that his rule in Babylonia was disputed by his Rab-shakeh
(vizier), Assur-sum-lisir, whose accession year as king of Assyria occurs
on a contract from Nippur (Niffer). The last king of Assyria was probably
the brother of Assur-etil-ilani, Sin-sar-iskun (Sin-sarra-uzur), who seems
to have been the Sarakos (Saracus) of Berossus. He was still reigning in
Babylonia in his seventh year, as a contract dated in that year has been
discovered at Erech, and an inscription of his, in which he speaks of
restoring the ruined temples and their priests, couples Merodach of Babylon
with Assur of Nineveh. Babylonia, however, was again restless. After the
over throw of Samas-sum-yukin, Kandalanu, the Chineladanos of Ptolemy's
canon, had been appointed viceroy. [Sidenote: Nabopolassar.] His successor
was Nabopolassar, between whom and the last king of Assyria war broke out.
The Scythian king of Ecbatana, the Cyaxares of the Greeks, came to the help
of the Babylonians. Nineveh was captured and destroyed by the Scythian
army, along with those cities of northern Babylonia which had sided with
Babylonia, and the Assyrian empire was at an end.
[Sidenote: Nabonidus.]
The seat of empire was now transferred to Babylonia. Nabopolassar was
followed by his son Nebuchadrezzar II., whose reign of 43 years made
Babylon once more the mistress of the civilized world. Only a small
fragment of his annals has been discovered relating to his invasion of
Egypt in 567 B.C., and referring to "Phut of the Ionians." Of the reign of
the last Babylonian king, Nabonidus, however, and the conquest of Babylonia
by Cyrus, we now have a fair amount of information.[4] This is chiefly
derived from a chronological tablet containing the annals of Nabonidus,
which is supplemented by an inscription of Nabonidus, in which he recounts
his restoration of the temple of the Moon-god at Harran, as well as by a
proclamation of Cyrus issued shortly after his formal recognition as king
of Babylonia. It was in the sixth year of Nabonidus (549 B.C.)--or perhaps
in 553--that Cyrus, "king of Anshan" in Elam, revolted against his suzerain
Astyages, king of "the Manda" or Scythians, at Ecbatana. The army of
Astyages betrayed him to his enemy, and Cyrus (_q.v._) established himself
at Ecbatana, thus putting an end to the empire of the Scythians, [v.03
p.0106] which the Greek writers called that of the Medes, through a
confusion of Mad[=a] or "Medes" with Manda. [Sidenote: Invasion by Cyrus.]
Three years later we find that Cyrus has become king of Persia and is
engaged in a campaign in the north of Mesopotamia. Meanwhile Nabonidus has
established a camp at Sippara, near the northern frontier of his kingdom,
his son--probably the Belshazzar of other inscriptions--being in command of
the army. In 538 B.C. Cyrus invaded Babylonia. A battle was fought at Opis
in the month of June, in which the Babylonians were defeated, and
immediately afterwards Sippara surrendered to the invader. Nabonidus fled
to Babylon, whither he was pursued by Gobryas, the governor of Kurdistan,
and on the 16th of Tammuz, two days after the capture of Sippara, "the
soldiers of Cyrus entered Babylon without fighting." Nabonidus was dragged
out of his hiding-place, and Kurdish guards were placed at the gates of the
great temple of Bel, where the services continued without intermission.
Cyrus did not arrive till the 3rd of Marchesvan (October), Gobryas having
acted for him in his absence. Gobryas was now made governor of the province
of Babylon, and a few days afterwards the son of Nabonidus, according to
the most probable reading, died. A public mourning followed, which lasted
six days, and Cambyses accompanied the corpse to the tomb. Cyrus now
claimed to be the legitimate successor of the ancient Babylonian kings and
the avenger of Bel-Merodach, who was wrathful at the impiety of Nabonidus
in removing the images of the local gods from their ancestral shrines to
his capital Babylon. Nabonidus, in fact, had excited a strong feeling
against himself by attempting to centralize the religion of Babylonia in
the temple of Merodach (Marduk) at Babylon, and while he had thus alienated
the local priesthoods the military party despised him on account of his
antiquarian tastes. He seems to have left the defence of his kingdom to
others, occupying himself with the more congenial work of excavating the
foundation records of the temples and determining the dates of their
builders. The invasion of Babylonia by Cyrus was doubtless facilitated by
the existence of a disaffected party in the state, as well as by the
presence of foreign exiles like the Jews, who had been planted in the midst
of the country. One of the first acts of Cyrus accordingly was to allow
these exiles to return to their own homes, carrying with them the images of
their gods and their sacred vessels. The permission to do so was embodied
in a proclamation, in which the conqueror endeavoured to justify his claim
to the Babylonian throne. The feeling was still strong that none had a
right to rule over western Asia until he had been consecrated to the office
by Bel and his priests; and from henceforth, accordingly, Cyrus assumed the
imperial title of "king of Babylon." A year before his death, in 529 B.C.,
he associated his son Cambyses (_q.v._) in the government, making him king
of Babylon, while he reserved for himself the fuller title of "king of the
(other) provinces" of the empire. It was only when Darius Hystaspis, the
representative of the Aryan race and the Zoroastrian religion, had
re-conquered the empire of Cyrus, that the old tradition was broken and the
claim of Babylon to confer legitimacy on the rulers of western Asia ceased
to be acknowledged (see DARIUS). Darius, in fact, entered Babylon as a
conqueror; after the murder of the Magian it had recovered its independence
under Nidinta-Bel, who took the name of Nebuchadrezzar III., and reigned
from October 521 B.C. to August 520 B.C., when the Persians took it by
storm. A few years later, probably 514 B.C., Babylon again revolted under
the Armenian Arakha; on this occasion, after its capture by the Persians,
the walls were partly destroyed. E-Saggila, the great temple of Bel,
however, still continued to be kept in repair and to be a centre of
Babylonian patriotism, until at last the foundation of Seleucia diverted
the population to the new capital of Babylonia and the ruins of the old
city became a quarry for the builders of the new seat of government.[5]
VI. _Assyria and Babylonia contrasted._--The sister-states of Babylonia and
Assyria differed essentially in character. Babylonia was a land of
merchants and agriculturists; Assyria was an organized camp. The Assyrian
dynasties were founded [v.03 p.0107] by successful generals; in Babylonia
it was the priests whom a revolution raised to the throne. The Babylonian
king remained a priest to the last, under the control of a powerful
hierarchy; the Assyrian king was the autocratic general of an army, at
whose side stood in early days a feudal nobility, and from the reign of
Tiglath-pileser III. onwards an elaborate bureaucracy. His palace was more
sumptuous than the temples of the gods, from which it was quite separate.
The people were soldiers and little else; even the sailor belonged to
Babylonia. Hence the sudden collapse of Assyria when drained of its
fighting population in the age of Assur-bani-pal.
VII. _Assyro-Babylonian Culture_.--Assyrian culture came from Babylonia,
but even here there was a difference between the two countries. There was
little in Assyrian literature that was original, and education, which was
general in Babylonia, was in the northern kingdom confined for the most
part to a single class. In Babylonia it was of very old standing. There
were libraries in most of the towns and temples; an old Sumerian proverb
averred that "he who would excel in the school of the scribes must rise
with the dawn." Women as well as men learned to read and write, and in
Semitic times this involved a knowledge of the extinct Sumerian as well as
of a most complicated and extensive syllabary. A considerable amount of
Semitic Babylonian literature was translated from Sumerian originals, and
the language of religion and law long continued to be the old agglutinative
language of Chaldaea. Vocabularies, grammars and interlinear translations
were compiled for the use of students as well as commentaries on the older
texts and explanations of obscure words and phrases. The characters of the
syllabary were all arranged and named, and elaborate lists of them were
drawn up. The literature was for the most part inscribed with a metal
stylus on tablets of clay, called _laterculae coctiles_ by Pliny; the
papyrus which seems to have been also employed has perished. Under the
second Assyrian empire, when Nineveh had become a great centre of trade,
Aramaic--the language of commerce and diplomacy--was added to the number of
subjects which the educated class was required to learn. Under the
Seleucids Greek was introduced into Babylon, and fragments of tablets have
been found with Sumerian and Assyrian (_i.e._ Semitic Babylonian) words
transcribed in Greek letters.
_Babylonian Literature and Science_.--There were many literary works the
titles of which have come down to us. One of the most famous of these was
the _Epic of Gilgamesh_, in twelve books, composed by a certain
Sin-liqi-unninni, and arranged upon an astronomical principle. Each
division contains the story of a single adventure in the career of
Gilgamesh. The whole story is a composite product, and it is possible that
some of the stories are artificially attached to the central figure. (See
GILGAMESH, EPIC OF.)
Another epic was that of the Creation, the object of which was to glorify
Bel-Merodach by describing his contest with Tiamat, the dragon of chaos. In
the first book an account is given of the creation of the world out of the
primeval deep and the birth of the gods of light. Then comes the story of
the struggle between the gods of light and the powers of darkness, and the
final victory of Merodach, who clove Tiamat asunder, forming the heaven out
of one half of her body and the earth out of the other. Merodach next
arranged the stars in order, along with the sun and moon, and gave them
laws which they were never to transgress. After this the plants and animals
were created, and finally man. Merodach here takes the place of Ea, who
appears as the creator in the older legends, and is said to have fashioned
man out of the clay.
The legend of Adapa, the first man, a portion of which was found in the
record-office of the Egyptian king Amenophis IV. (Akhenaton) at
Tell-el-Amarna, explains the origin of death. Adapa while fishing had
broken the wings of the south wind, and was accordingly summoned before the
tribunal of Anu in heaven. Ea counselled him not to eat or drink there. He
followed the advice, and thus refused the food which would have made him
and his descendants immortal.
Among the other legends of Babylonia may be mentioned those of Namtar, the
plague-demon, of Urra, the pestilence, of Etanna and of Zu. Hades, the
abode of Nin-erisgal or Allat, had been entered by Nergal, who, angered by
a message sent to her by the gods of the upper world, ordered Namtar to
strike off her head. She, however, declared that she would submit to any
conditions imposed on her and would give Nergal the sovereignty of the
earth. Nergal accordingly relented, and Allatu became the queen of the
infernal world. Etanna conspired with the eagle to fly to the highest
heaven. The first gate, that of Anu, was successfully reached; but in
ascending still farther to the gate of Ishtar the strength of the eagle
gave way, and Etanna was dashed to the ground. As for the storm-god Zu, we
are told that he stole the tablets of destiny, and therewith the
prerogatives of Bel. God after god was ordered to pursue him and recover
them, but it would seem that it was only by a stratagem that they were
finally regained.
Besides the purely literary works there were others of the most varied
nature, including collections of letters, partly official, partly private.
Among them the most interesting are the letters of Khammurabi, which have
been edited by L. W. King. Astronomy and astrology, moreover, occupy a
conspicuous place. Astronomy was of old standing in Babylonia, and the
standard work on the subject, written from an astrological point of view,
which was translated into Greek by Berossus, was believed to go back to the
age of Sargon of Akkad. The zodiac was a Babylonian invention of great
antiquity; and eclipses of the sun as well as of the moon could be
foretold. Observatories were attached to the temples, and reports were
regularly sent by the astronomers to the king. The stars had been numbered
and named at an early date, and we possess tables of lunar longitudes and
observations of the phases of Venus. In Seleucid and Parthian times the
astronomical reports were of a thoroughly scientific character; how far the
advanced knowledge and method they display may reach back we do not yet
know. Great attention was naturally paid to the calendar, and we find a
week of seven and another of five days in use. The development of astronomy
implies considerable progress in mathematics; it is not surprising,
therefore, that the Babylonians should have invented an extremely simple
method of ciphering or have discovered the convenience of the duodecimal
system. The _ner_ of 600 and the _sar_ of 3600 were formed from the _soss_
or unit of 60, which corresponded with a degree of the equator. Tablets
[v.03 p.0108] of squares and cubes, calculated from 1 to 60, have been
found at Senkera, and a people who were acquainted with the sun-dial, the
clepsydra, the lever and the pulley, must have had no mean knowledge of
mechanics. A crystal lens, turned on the lathe, was discovered by Layard at
Nimrud along with glass vases bearing the name of Sargon; this will explain
the excessive minuteness of some of the writing on the Assyrian tablets,
and a lens may also have been used in the observation of the heavens.
_Art and Architecture_.--The culture of Assyria, and still more of
Babylonia, was essentially literary; we miss in it the artistic spirit of
Egypt or Greece. In Babylonia the abundance of clay and want of stone led
to the employment of brick; the Babylonian temples are massive but
shapeless structures of crude brick, supported by buttresses, the rain
being carried off by drains, one of which at Ur was of lead. The use of
brick led to the early development of the pilaster and column, as well as
of frescoes and enamelled tiles. The walls were brilliantly coloured, and
sometimes plated with bronze or gold as well as with tiles. Painted
terra-cotta cones were also embedded in the plaster. Assyria in this, as in
other matters, the servile pupil of Babylonia, built its palaces and
temples of brick, though stone was the natural building material of the
country, even preserving the brick platform, so necessary in the marshy
soil of Babylonia, but little needed in the north. As time went on,
however, the later Assyrian architect began to shake himself free from
Babylonian influences and to employ stone as well as brick. The walls of
the Assyrian palaces were lined with sculptured and coloured slabs of
stone, instead of being painted as in Chaldaea. We can. trace three periods
in the art of these bas-reliefs; it is vigorous but simple under
Assur-nazir-pal III., careful and realistic under Sargon, refined but
wanting in boldness under Assur-bani-pal. In Babylonia, in place of the
bas-relief we have the figure in the round, the earliest examples being the
statues from Tello which are realistic but somewhat clumsy. The want of
stone in Babylonia made every pebble precious and led to a high perfection
in the art of gem-cutting. Nothing can be better than two seal-cylinders
that have come down to us from the age of Sargon of Akkad. No remarkable
specimens of the metallurgic art of an early period have been found, apart
perhaps from the silver vase of Entemena, but at a later epoch great
excellence was attained in the manufacture of such jewellery as ear-rings
and bracelets of gold. Copper, too, was worked with skill; indeed, it is
possible that Babylonia was the original home of copper-working, which
spread westward with the civilization to which it belonged. At any rate the
people were famous from an early date for their embroideries and rugs. The
ceramic history of Babylonia and Assyria has unfortunately not yet been
traced; at Susa alone has the care demanded by the modern methods of
archaeology been as yet expended on examining and separating the pottery
found in the excavations, and Susa is not Babylonia. We do not even know
the date of the spirited terra-cotta reliefs discovered by Loftus and
Rawlinson. The forms of Assyrian pottery, however, are graceful; the
porcelain, like the glass discovered in the palaces of Nineveh, was derived
from Egyptian originals. Transparent glass seems to have been first
introduced in the reign of Sargon. Stone as well as clay and glass were
employed in the manufacture of vases, and vases of hard stone have been
disinterred at Tello similar to those of the early dynastic period of
Egypt.
_Social Life_.--Castes were unknown in both Babylonia and Assyria, but the
priesthood of Babylonia found its counterpart in the military aristocracy
of Assyria. The priesthood was divided into a great number of classes,
among which that of the doctors may be reckoned. The army was raised, at
all events in part, by conscription; a standing army seems to have been
first organized in Assyria. Successive improvements were introduced into it
by the kings of the second Assyrian empire; chariots were superseded by
cavalry; Tiglath-pileser III. gave the riders saddles and high boots, and
Sennacherib created a corps of slingers. Tents, baggage-carts and
battering-rams were carried on the march, and the _tartan_ or
commander-in-chief ranked next to the king. In both countries there was a
large body of slaves; above them came the agriculturists and commercial
classes, who were, however, comparatively little numerous in Assyria. The
scribes, on the other hand, formed a more important class in Assyria than
in Babylonia. Both countries had their artisans, money-lenders, poets and
musicians.
The houses of the people contained but little furniture; chairs, tables and
couches, however, were used, and Assur-bani-pal is represented as reclining
on his couch at a meal while his wife sits on a chair beside him. After
death the body was usually partially cremated along with the objects that
had been buried with it. The cemetery adjoined the city of the living and
was laid out in streets through which ran rivulets of "pure" water. Many of
the tombs, which were built of crude brick, were provided with gardens, and
there were shelves or altars on which were placed the offerings to the
dead. As the older tombs decayed a fresh city of tombs arose on their
ruins. It is remarkable that thus far no cemetery older than the Seleucid
or Parthian period has been found in Assyria.
AUTHORITIES.--See A. H. Layard, _Nineveh and Babylon_ (1853); E. de Sarzec
and L. Heuzey, _Decouvertes en Chaldee_ (1884 foll.); H. V. Hilprecht, _The
Babylonian Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania_ (1893 foll.);
J. P. Peters, _Nippur_ (1897); E. Schrader, _Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek_
(1889-1900); _Records of the Past_ (new series, 1888-1892); Th. G. Pinches,
"The Babylonian Chronicle," in _Journ. R. A. S._ (1887); H. Winckler,
_Altorientalische Forschungen_ (1893 foll.), and _The Tell-el-Amarna,
Letters_ (1896); G. Maspero, _Dawn of Civilization_ (1896), _Struggle of
the Nations_ (1897), and _Passing of the Empires_ (1900); L. W. King,
_Letters of Khammurabi_ (1898-1900); H. Radau, _Early Babylonian History_
(1900); R. W. Rogers, _History of Babylonia and Assyria_ (1900); F. Hommel,
_Grundriss der Geographie und Geschichte des alten Orients_ (1904);
_Mitteilungen der deutschen Orientgesellschaft_ (1899).
(A. H. S.)
VIII. _Chronological Systems_.--The extreme divergence in the chronological
schemes employed by different writers on the history of Babylonia and
Assyria has frequently caused no small perplexity to readers who have no
special knowledge of the subject. In this section an attempt is made to
indicate briefly the causes which have led to so great a diversity of
opinion, and to describe in outline the principles underlying the chief
schemes of chronology that have been suggested; a short account will then
be given of the latest discoveries in this branch of research, and of the
manner in which they affect the problems at issue. It will be convenient to
begin with the later historical periods, and then to push our inquiry back
into the earlier periods of Babylonian and Sumerian history.
Up to certain points no difference of opinion exists upon the dates to be
assigned to the later kings who ruled in Babylon and in Assyria. The
Ptolemaic Canon (see sect. II.) gives a list of the Babylonian, Assyrian
and Persian kings who ruled in Babylon, together with the number of years
each of them reigned, from the accession of Nabonassar in 747 B.C. to the
conquest of Babylon by Alexander the Great in 331 B.C. The accuracy of this
list is confirmed by the larger List of Kings and by the principal
Babylonian Chronicle; the latter, like the Canon, begins with the reign of
Nabonassar, who, it has been suggested, may have revised the calendar and
have inaugurated a new epoch for the later chronology. The Ptolemaic Canon
is further controlled and its accuracy confirmed by the Assyrian Eponym
Lists, or lists of _limmi_ (see sect. II.), by means of which Assyrian
chronology is fixed from 911 B.C. to 666 B.C., the solar eclipse of June
15th, 763 B.C., which is recorded in the eponymy of Pur-Sagale, placing the
dead reckoning for these later periods upon an absolutely certain basis.
Thus all historians are agreed with regard to the Babylonian chronology
back to the year 747 B.C., and with regard to that of Assyria back to the
year 911 B.C. It is in respect of the periods anterior to these two dates
that different writers have propounded differing systems of chronology,
and, as might be imagined, the earlier the period we examine the greater
becomes the discrepancy between the systems proposed. This variety of
opinion is due to the fact that the data available for settling the
chronology often conflict with one another, or are capable of more than one
interpretation.
Since its publication in 1884 the Babylonian List of Kings has furnished
the framework for every chronological system that has [v.03 p.0109] been
proposed. In its original form this document gave a list, arranged in
dynasties, of the Babylonian kings, from the First Dynasty of Babylon down
to the Neo-Babylonian period. If the text were complete we should probably
be in possession of the system of Babylonian chronology current in the
Neo-Babylonian period from which our principal classical authorities (see
sect. II.) derived their information. The principal points of uncertainty,
due to gaps in the text, concern the length of Dynasties IV. and VIII.; for
the reading of the figure giving the length of the former is disputed, and
the summary at the close of the latter omits to state its length. This
omission is much to be regretted, since Nabonassar was the last king but
two of this dynasty, and, had we known its duration, we could have combined
the information on the earlier periods furnished by the Kings' List with
the evidence of the Ptolemaic Canon. In addition to the Kings' List, other
important chronological data consist of references in the classical
authorities to the chronological system of Berossus (_q.v._); chronological
references to earlier kings occurring in the later native inscriptions,
such as Nabonidus's estimate of the period of Khammurabi (or Hammuribi);
synchronisms, also furnished by the inscriptions, between kings of Babylon
and of Assyria; and the early Babylonian date-lists.
Dyn. I. Dyn. II. Dyn. III.
--------- -------- ------------
B.C. B.C. B.C.
Oppert (1888) 2506-2202 2202-1834 1834-1257
Sayce (1899) 2478-(2174) 2174-(1806) 1806-(1229)
" (1902) 2460-(2174) 2174-(1806) 1806-(1229)
Rogers (1900) 2454-2451 2150-1783 1782-1207
Winckler (1894) (2425-2120) 2120-1752 1752-1177
" (1892) 2403-2098 2098-1730 1729-1150
" (1905) c. 2400-2100 c. 2100-1700 c. 1700-1150
Delitzsch (1907) c. 2420-2120 c. 2120-(1752) (1752-1176)
" (1891) 2399-2094 2094-1726 1726-1150
Maspero (1897) 2416-2082 2082-1714 1714-(1137)
Lehmann-Haupt (1898) 2360-2057 2056-1689 1688-1113
" " (1903) 2296-2009/8 2008/7-1691 1690-1115
Marquart (1899) 2335-2051 2051/0-1694/3 1693/2-1118/7
Peiser (1891) 2051-1947 1947-1579 1579-1180
Rost (1897) 2232-1928 1928-1560 1560-1224
" (1900) 2231-1941 1940-1573 1572-1179
Hommel (1901) 2223-1923 (1923-1752) 1752-1175
or 2050-1752 " "
" (1895) 2058-1754 1753-1178
" (1886) 2035-1731 2403-2035 1731-1154
(1898) 1884-1580 1580-1180
Niebuhr (1896) 2193-1889 2114-1746 1746-1169
In view of the uncertainty regarding the length of Dynasties IV. and VIII.
of the Kings' List, attempts have been made to ascertain the dates of the
earlier dynasties by independent means. The majority of writers, after
fixing the date at which Dynasty III. closed by means of the synchronisms
and certain of the later chronological references, have accepted the
figures of the Kings' List for the earlier dynasties, ignoring their
apparent inconsistencies with the system of Berossus and with the
chronology of Nabonidus. Others have attempted to reconcile the conflicting
data by emendations of the figures and other ingenious devices. This will
explain the fact that while the difference between the earliest and latest
dates suggested for the close of Dynasty III. is only 144 years, the
difference between the earliest and latest dates suggested for the
beginning of Dynasty I. is no less than 622 years. A comparison of the
principal schemes of chronology that have been propounded may be made by
means of the preceding table. The first column gives the names of the
writers and the dates at which their schemes were published, while the
remaining columns give the dates they have suggested for Dynasties I., II.
and III. of the Kings' List.[6] The systems with the highest dates are
placed first in the list; where a writer has produced more than one system,
these are grouped together, the highest dates proposed by him determining
his place in the series.
Omitting that of Oppert, which to some extent stands in a category by
itself, the systems fall into three groups. The first group, comprising the
second to the sixth names, obtains its results by selecting the data on
which it relies and ignoring others. The second group, comprising the next
four names, attempts to reconcile the conflicting data by emending the
figures. The third group, consisting of the last two names, is
differentiated by its proposals with regard to Dynasty II. It will be noted
that the first group has obtained higher dates than the second, and the
second group higher dates on the whole than the third.
Oppert's system[7] represents the earliest dates that have been suggested.
He accepted the figures of the Kings' List and claimed that he reconciled
them with the figures of Berossus, though he ignored the later
chronological notices. But there is no evidence for his "cyclic date" of
2517 B.C., on which his system depended, and there is little doubt that the
beginning of the historical period of Berossus is to be set, not in 2506
B.C., but in 2232 B.C. The two systems of Sayce,[8] that of Rogers,[9] the
three systems of Winckler,[10] both those of Delitzsch,[11] and that of
Maspero,[12] may be grouped together, for they are based on the same
principle. Having first fixed the date of the close of Dynasty III., they
employed the figures of the Kings' List unemended for defining the earlier
periods, and did not attempt to reconcile their results with other
conflicting data. The difference of eighteen years in Sayce's two dates for
the rise of Dynasty I. was due to his employing in 1902 the figures
assigned to the first seven kings of the dynasty upon the larger of the two
contemporary date-lists, which had meanwhile been published, in place of
those given by the List of Kings. It should be noted that Winckler (1905)
and Delitzsch (1907) gives the dates only in round numbers.
A second group of systems may be said to consist of those proposed by
Lehmann-Haupt, Marquart, Peiser, and Rost, for these writers attempted to
get over the discrepancies in the data by emending some of the figures
furnished by the inscriptions. In 1891, with the object of getting the
total duration of the dynasties to agree with the chronological system of
Berossus and with the statement of Nabonidus concerning Khammurabi's date,
Peiser proposed to emend the figure given by the Kings' List for the length
of Dynasty III. The reading of "9 soss and 36 years," which gives the total
576 years, he suggested was a scribal error for "6 soss and 39 years"; he
thus reduced the length of Dynasty III. by 177 years and effected a
corresponding reduction in the dates assigned to Dynasties I. and II.[13]
In 1897 Rost followed up Peiser's suggestion by reducing the figure still
further, but he counteracted to some extent the effects of this additional
reduction by emending Sennacherib's date for Marduk-nadin-akh[=e]'s defeat
of Tiglath-pileser I. as engraved on the rock at Bavian, holding that the
figure "418," as engraved upon the rock, was a mistake for "478."[14]
Lehmann-Haupt's first system (1898) resembled those of Oppert, Sayce,
Rogers, Winckler, Delitzsch and Maspero in that he accepted the figures of
the Kings' List, and did not attempt to emend them. But he obtained his low
date for the close of Dynasty III. by emending [v.03 p.0110] Sennacherib's
figure in the Bavian inscription; this he reduced by a hundred years,[15]
instead of increasing it by sixty as Rost had suggested. Lehmann-Haupt's
influence is visible in Marquart's system, published in the following
year;[16] it may be noted that his slightly reduced figure for the
beginning of Dynasty I. was arrived at by incorporating the new information
supplied by the first date-list to be published. When revising his scheme
of chronology in 1900, Rost abandoned his suggested emendation of
Sennacherib's figure, but by decreasing his reduction of the length of
Dynasty III., he only altered his date for the beginning of Dynasty I. by
one year.[17] In his revised scheme of chronology, published in 1903,[18]
Lehmann-Haupt retained his emendation of Sennacherib's figure, and was in
his turn influenced by Marquart's method of reconciling the dynasties of
Berossus with the Kings' List. He continued to accept the figure of the
Kings' List for Dynasty III., but he reduced the length of Dynasty II. by
fifty years, arguing that the figures assigned to some of the reigns were
improbably high. His slight reduction in the length of Dynasty I. was
obtained from the recently published date-lists, though his proposed
reduction of Ammizaduga's reign to ten years has since been disproved.
A third group of systems comprises those proposed by Hommel and Niebuhr,
for their reductions in the date assigned to Dynasty I. were effected
chiefly by their treatment of Dynasty II. In his first system, published in
1886,[19] Hommel, mainly with the object of reducing Khammurabi's date,
reversed the order of the first two dynasties of the Kings' List, placing
Dynasty II. before Dynasty I. In his second and third systems (1895 and
1898),[20] and in his second alternative scheme of 1901 (see below), he
abandoned this proposal and adopted a suggestion of Halevy that Dynasty
III. followed immediately after Dynasty I.; Dynasty II., he suggested, had
either synchronized with Dynasty I., or was mainly apocryphal (_eine
spaetere Geschichtskonstruction_). Niebuhr's system was a modification of
Hommel's second theory, for, instead of entirely ignoring Dynasty II., he
reduced its independent existence to 143 years, making it overlap Dynasty
I. by 225 years.[21] The extremely low dates proposed by Hommel in 1898
were due to his adoption of Peiser's emendation for the length of Dynasty
III., in addition to his own elimination of Dynasty II. In 1901 Hommel
abandoned Peiser's emendation and suggested two alternative schemes.[22]
According to one of these he attempted to reconcile Berossus with the
Kings' List by assigning to Dynasty II. an independent existence of some
171 years, while as a possible alternative he put forward what was
practically his theory of 1895.
Such are the principles underlying the various chronological schemes which
had, until recently, been propounded. The balance of opinion was in favour
of those of the first group of writers, who avoided emendations of the
figures and were content to follow the Kings' List and to ignore its
apparent discrepancies with other chronological data; but it is now
admitted that the general principle underlying the third group of theories
was actually nearer the truth. The publication of fresh chronological
material in 1906 and 1907 placed a new complexion on the problems at issue,
and enabled us to correct several preconceptions, and to reconcile or
explain the apparently conflicting data.
From a Babylonian chronicle in the British Museum[23] we now know that
Dynasty II. of the Kings' List never occupied the throne of Babylon, but
ruled only in the extreme south of Babylonia on the shores of the Persian
Gulf; that its kings were contemporaneous with the later kings of Dynasty
I. and with the earlier kings of Dynasty III. of the Kings' List; that in
the reign of Samsu-ditana, the last king of Dynasty I., Hittites from
Cappadocia raided and captured Babylon, which in her weakened state soon
fell a prey to the Kassites (Dynasty III.); and that later on southern
Babylonia, till then held by Dynasty II. of the Kings' List, was in its
turn captured by the Kassites, who from that time onward occupied the whole
of the Babylonian plain. The same chronicle informs us that Ilu-sh[=u]ma,
an early Assyrian patesi, was the contemporary of Su-abu, the founder of
Dynasty I. of the Kings' List, thus enabling us to trace the history of
Assyria back beyond the rise of Babylon.
Without going into details, the more important results of this new
information may be summarized: the elimination of Dynasty II. from the
throne of Babylon points to a date not much earlier than 2000 or 2050 B.C.
for the rise of Dynasty I., a date which harmonizes with the chronological
notices of Shalmaneser I.; Nabonidus's estimate of the period of
Khammurabi, so far from being centuries too low, is now seen to have been
exaggerated, as the context of the passage in his inscription suggests; and
finally the beginning of the historical period of Berossus is not to be
synchronized with Dynasty I. of the Kings' List, but, assuming that his
figures had an historical basis and that they have come down to us in their
original form, with some earlier dynasty which may possibly have had its
capital in one of the other great cities of Babylonia (such as the Dynasty
of Isin).
New data have also been discovered bearing upon the period before the rise
of Babylon. A fragment of an early dynastic chronicle from Nippur[24] gives
a list of the kings of the dynasties of Ur and Isin. From this text we
learn that the Dynasty of Ur consisted of five kings and lasted for 117
years, and was succeeded by the Dynasty of Isin, which consisted of sixteen
kings and lasted for 225 1/2 years. Now the capture of the city of Isin by
R[=i]m-Sin, which took place in the seventeenth year of Sin-muballit, the
father of Khammurabi, formed an epoch for dating tablets in certain parts
of Babylonia,[25] and it is probable that we may identify the fall of the
Dynasty of Isin with this capture of the city. In that case the later
rulers of the Dynasty of Isin would have been contemporaneous with the
earlier rulers of Dynasty I. of the Kings' List, and we obtain for the rise
of the Dynasty of Ur a date not much earlier than 2300 B.C.
These considerable reductions in the dates of the earlier dynasties of
Babylonia necessarily react upon our estimate of the age of Babylonian
civilization. The very high dates of 5000 or 6000 B.C., formerly assigned
by many writers to the earliest remains of the Sumerians and the Babylonian
Semites,[26] depended to a great extent on the statement of Nabonidus that
3200 years separated his own age from that of Nar[=a]m-Sin, the son of
Sargon of Agade; for to Sargon, on this statement alone, a date of 3800
B.C. has usually been assigned. But even by postulating the highest
possible dates for the Dynasties of Babylon and Ur, enormous gaps occurred
in the scheme of chronology, which were unrepresented by any royal name or
record. In his valiant attempt to fill these gaps Radau was obliged to
invent kings and even dynasties,[27] the existence of which is now
definitely disproved. The statement of Nabonidus has not, however, been
universally accepted. Lehmann-Haupt suggested an emendation of the text,
reducing the number by a thousand years;[28] while Winckler has regarded
the statement of Nabonidus as an uncritical exaggeration.[29] Obviously the
scribes of Nabonidus were not anxious to diminish the antiquity of the
foundation-inscription of Nar[=a]m-Sin, which their royal master had
unearthed; [v.03 p.0111] and another reason for their calculations
resulting in so high a figure is suggested by the recent discoveries: they
may in all good faith have reckoned as consecutive a number of early
dynasties which were as a matter of fact contemporaneous. But, though we
may refuse to accept the accuracy of this figure of Nabonidus, it is not
possible at present to fix a definite date for the early kings of Agade.
All that can be said is that both archaeological and epigraphic evidence
indicates that no very long interval separated the empire of the Semitic
kings of Agade from that of the kings of Sumer and Akkad, whose rule was
inaugurated by the founding of the Dynasty of Ur.[30]
To use caution in accepting the chronological notices of the later kings is
very far removed from suggesting emendations of their figures. The emenders
postulate mechanical errors in the writing of the figures, but, equally
with those who accept them, regard the calculations of the native scribes
as above reproach. But that scribes could make mistakes in their reckoning
is definitely proved by the discovery at Shergat of two totally conflicting
accounts of the age and history of the great temple of Assur.[31] This
discovery in itself suggests that all chronological data are not to be
treated as of equal value and arranged mechanically like the pieces of a
Chinese puzzle; and further, that no more than a provisional acceptance
should be accorded any statement of the later native chronologists, until
confirmed by contemporary records. On the other hand, the death-blow has
been given to the principle of emendation of the figures, which for so long
has found favour among a considerable body of German writers.
(L. W. K.)
IX. _Proper Names._--In the early days of the decipherment of the cuneiform
inscriptions, the reading of the proper names borne by Babylonians and
Assyrians occasioned great difficulties; and though most of these
difficulties have been overcome and there is general agreement among
scholars as to the principles underlying both the formation and the
pronunciation of the thousands of names that we encounter in historical
records, business documents, votive inscriptions and literary productions,
differences, though mostly of a minor character, still remain. Some time
must elapse before absolute uniformity in the transliteration of these
proper names is to be expected; and since different scholars still adopt
varying spellings of Babylonian and Assyrian proper names, it has been
considered undesirable in this work to ignore the fact in individual
articles contributed by them. The better course seems to be to explain here
the nature of these variations.
The main difficulty in the reading of Babylonian and Assyrian proper names
arises from the preference given to the "ideographic" method of writing
them. According to the developed cuneiform system of writing, words may be
written by means of a sign (or combination of signs) expressive of the
entire word, or they may be spelled out phonetically in syllables. So, for
example, the word for "name" may be written by a sign MU, or it may be
written cut by two signs _shu-mu_, the one sign MU representing the
"Sumerian" word for "name," which, however, in the case of a Babylonian or
Assyrian text must be read as _shumu_--the Semitic equivalent of the
Sumerian MU. Similarly the word for "clothing" may be written SIG-BA, which
represents again the "Sumerian" word, whereas, the Babylonian-Assyrian
equivalent being _lubushtu_ it is so to be read in Semitic texts, and may
therefore be also phonetically written _lu-bu-ush-tu_. This double method
of writing words arises from the circumstance that the cuneiform syllabary
is of non-Semitic origin, the system being derived from the non-Semitic
settlers of the Euphrates valley, commonly termed Sumerians (or
Sumero-Akkadians), to whom, as the earlier settlers, the origin of the
cuneiform script is due. This script, together with the general Sumerian
culture, was taken over by the Babylonians upon their settlement in the
Euphrates valley and adapted to their language, which belonged to the
Semitic group. In this transfer the Sumerian words--largely
monosyllabic--were reproduced, but read as Semitic, and at the same time
the advance step was taken of utilizing the Sumerian words as means of
writing the Babylonian words phonetically. In this case the signs
representing Sumerian words were treated merely as syllables, and, without
reference to their meaning, utilized for spelling Babylonian words. The
Babylonian syllabary which thus arose, and which, as the culture passed on
to the north--known as Assyria--became the Babylonian Assyrian
syllabary,[32] was enlarged and modified in the course of time, the Semitic
equivalents for many of the signs being distorted or abbreviated to form
the basis of new "phonetic" values that were thus of "Semitic" origin; but,
on the whole, the "non-Semitic" character of the signs used as syllables in
the phonetic method of writing Semitic words was preserved; and,
furthermore, down to the latest days of the Babylonian and Assyrian empires
the mixed method of writing continued, though there were periods when
"purism" was the fashion, and there was a more marked tendency to spell out
the words laboriously in preference to using signs with a phonetic
complement as an aid in suggesting the reading desired in any given
instance. Yet, even in those days, the Babylonian syllabary continued to be
a mixture of ideographic and phonetic writing. Besides the conventional use
of certain signs as the indications of names of gods, countries, cities,
vessels, birds, trees, &c., which, known as "determinants," are the
Sumerian signs of the terms in question and were added as a guide for the
reader, proper names more particularly continued to be written to a large
extent in purely "ideographic" fashion. The conservatism which is a feature
of proper names everywhere, in consequence of which the archaic traits of a
language are frequently preserved in them, just as they are preserved in
terms used in the ritual and in poetic diction, is sufficient to account
for the interesting fact that the Semitic settlers of the Euphrates valley
in handing down their names from one generation to another retained the
custom of writing them in "Sumerian" fashion, or, as we might also put it,
in "ideographic" form. Thus the name of the deity, which enters as an
element in a large proportion of the proper names,[33] was almost
invariably written with the sign or signs representing this deity, and it
is only exceptionally that the name is spelled phonetically. Thus the name
of the chief god of the Babylonian pantheon, Marduk, is written by two
signs to be pronounced AMAR-UD, which describe the god as the "young
bullock of the day"--an allusion to the solar character of the god in
question. The moon-god Sin is written by a sign which has the force of
"thirty," and is a distinct reference to the monthly course of the planet;
or the name is written by two signs to be pronounced EN-ZU, which describe
the god as the "lord of wisdom." The god Nebo appears as PA--the sign of
the stylus, which is associated with this deity as the originator and
patron of writing and of knowledge in general,--or it is written with a
sign AK, which describes the god as a "creator."
Until, therefore, through parallel passages or through explanatory lists
prepared by the Babylonian and Assyrian scribes in large numbers as an aid
for the study of the language,[34] the exact phonetic reading of these
divine names was determined, scholars remained in doubt or had recourse to
conjectural or provisional readings. Even at the present time there are
many names of deities, as, _e.g._ Ninib, the phonetic reading of which is
still unknown or uncertain. In most cases, however, these belong to the
category of minor deities or represent old local gods assimilated to some
more powerful god, who absorbed, as it were, the attributes and
prerogatives of these minor ones. In many cases they will probably turn out
to be descriptive epithets of gods [v.03 p.0112] already known rather than
genuine proper names. A peculiar difficulty arises in the case of the god
of storms, who, written IM, was generally known in Babylonia as Ramman,
"the thunderer," whereas in Assyria he also had the designation Adad. In
many cases, therefore, we may be in doubt how the sign IM is to be read,
more particularly since this same god appears to have had other
designations besides Ramman and Adad.
Besides the divine element, proper names as a rule in the
Babylonian-Assyrian periods had a verbal form attached and a third element
representing an object. Even when the sign indicative of the verb is
clearly recognised there still remains to be determined the form of the
verb intended. Thus in the case of the sign KUR, which is the equivalent of
_na[s.][=a]ru_, "protect," there is the possibility of reading it as the
active participle _n[=a][s.]ir_, or as an imperative _u[s.][s.]ur_, or even
the third person perfect _i[s.][s.]ur_. Similarly in the case of the sign
MU, which, besides signifying "name" as above pointed out, is also the
Sumerian word for "give," and therefore may be read _iddin_, "he gave,"
from _nad[=a]nu_, or may be read _n[=a]din_, "giver"; and when, as actually
happens, a name occurs in which the first element is the name of a deity
followed by MU-MU, a new element of doubt is introduced through the
uncertainty whether the first MU is to be taken as a form of the verb
_nad[=a]nu_ and the second as the noun _shumu_, "name," or vice versa.
Fortunately, in the case of a large number of names occurring on business
documents as the interested parties or as scribes or as witnesses--and it
is through these documents that we obtain the majority of the
Babylonian-Assyrian proper names--we have variant readings, the same name
being written phonetically in whole or part in one instance and
ideographically in another. Certain classes of names being explained in
this way, legitimate and fairly reliable conclusions can be drawn for many
others belonging to the same class or group. The proper names of the
numerous business documents of the Khammurabi period, when phonetic writing
was the fashion, have been of special value in resolving doubts as to the
correct reading of names written ideographically. Thus names like
_Sin-na-di-in-shu-mi_ and _Bel-na-di-in-shu-mi_, _i.e._ "Sin is the giver
of a name" (_i.e._ offspring), and "Bel is the giver of a name," form the
model for names with deities as the first element followed by MU-MU, even
though the model may not be consistently followed in all cases. In
historical texts also variant readings occur in considerable number. Thus,
to take a classic example, the name of the famous king Nebuchadrezzar
occurs written in the following different manners:--(a)
_Na-bi-um-ku-du-ur-ri-u-[s.]u-ur_, (b) AK-DU-_u-[s.]u-ur_, (c)
AK-_ku-dur-ri_-SHES, and (d) PA-GAR-DU-SHES, from which we are permitted to
conclude that PA or AK (with the determinative for deity AN) = _Na-bi-um_
or Nebo, that GAR-DU or DU alone = _kudurri_, and that SHES =
_u[s.][s.]ur_. The second element signifies "boundary" or "territory"; the
third element is the imperative of _nasaru_, "protect"; so that the whole
name signifies, "O, Nebo! protect my boundary" (or "my territory").
It is not the purpose of this note to set forth the principles underlying
the formation of proper names among the Babylonians and Assyrians, but it
may not be out of place to indicate that by the side of such full names,
containing three elements (or even more), we have already at an early
period the reduction of these elements to two through the combination of
the name of a deity with a verbal form merely, or through the omission of
the name of the deity. From such names it is only a step to names of one
element, a characteristic feature of which is the frequent addition of an
ending _-tum_ (feminine), _[=a]n_, _[=a]_, _um_, _atum_, _atija_, _sha,_
&c., most of these being "hypocoristic affixes," corresponding in a measure
to modern pet-names.
Lastly, a word about genuine or pseudo-Sumerian names. In the case of texts
from the oldest historical periods we encounter hundreds of names that are
genuinely Sumerian, and here in view of the multiplicity of the phonetic
values attaching to the signs used it is frequently difficult definitely to
determine the reading of the names. Our knowledge of the ancient Sumerian
language is still quite imperfect, despite the considerable progress made,
more particularly during recent years. It is therefore not surprising that
scholars should differ considerably in the reading of Sumerian names, where
we have not helps at our command as for Babylonian and Assyrian names.
Changes in the manner of reading the Sumerian names are frequent. Thus the
name of a king of Ur, generally read Ur-Bau until quite recently, is now
read Ur-Engur; for Lugal-zaggisi, a king of Erech, some scholars still
prefer to read Ungal-zaggisi; the name of a famous political and religious
centre generally read Shir-pur-la is more probably to be read Shir-gul-la;
and so forth. There is reason, however, to believe that the uncertainty in
regard to many of these names will eventually be resolved into reasonable
certainty. A doubt also still exists in regard to a number of names of the
older period because of the uncertainty whether their bearers were
Sumerians or Semites. If the former, then their names are surely to be read
as Sumerian, while, if they were Semites, the signs with which the names
are written are probably to be read according to their Semitic equivalents,
though we may also expect to encounter Semites bearing genuine Sumerian
names. At times too a doubt may exist in regard to a name whose bearer was
a Semite, whether the signs composing his name represent a phonetic reading
or an ideographic compound. Thus, _e.g._ when inscriptions of a Semitic
ruler of Kish, whose name was written Uru-mu-ush, were first deciphered,
there was a disposition to regard this as an ideographic form and to read
phonetically Alu-usharshid ("he founded a city," with the omission of the
name of the deity), but scholarly opinion finally accepted Uru-mu-ush
(Urumush) as the correct designation.
For further details regarding the formation of Sumerian and
Babylonian-Assyrian proper names, as well as for an indication of the
problems involved and the difficulties still existing, especially in the
case of Sumerian names,[35] see the three excellent works now at our
disposal for the Sumerian, the old Babylonian, and the neo-Babylonian
period respectively, by Huber, _Die Personennamen in den
Keilschrifturkunden aus der Zeit der Koenige von Ur und Nisin_ (Leipzig,
1907); Ranke, _Early Babylonian Proper Names_ (Philadelphia, 1905); and
Tallqvist, _Neu-Babylonisches Namenbuch_ (Helsingfors, 1905).
(M. JA.)
[Plate I.] [Plate II.]
[1] For a survey of the chronological systems adopted by different modern
scholars, see below, section viii. "Chronological Systems."
[2] The compiler of the more complete one seems to have allowed himself
liberties. At all events he gives 30 years of reign to Sin-muballidh
instead of the 20 assigned to him in a list of dates drawn up at the time
of Ammi-zadok's accession, 55 years to Khammurabi instead of 43, and 35
years to Samsu-iluna instead of 38, while he omits altogether the seven
years' reign of the Assyrian king Tukulti-In-aristi at Babylon.
[3] They are also called high-priests of Gunammid[=e] and a contract-tablet
speaks of "T[=e] in Babylon," but this was probably not the T[=e] of the
seal. It must be remembered that the reading of most of the early Sumerian
proper names is merely provisional, as we do not know how the ideographs of
which they are composed were pronounced in either Sumerian or Assyrian.
[4] For the events leading up to the conquests of Cyrus, see PERSIA:
_Ancient History_, s. v. The chronology is not absolutely certain.
[5] The following is a list of the later dynasties and kings of Babylonia
and Assyria so far as they are known at present. For the views of other
writers on the chronology, see s. viii., _Chronological Systems._
_The Babylonian Dynasties from cir._ 2500 B.C.
_Dynasty of Ur._
Gungunu, _cir._ 2500 B.C.
Ur-Gur.
Dungi, more than 51 years.
Bur-Sin, more than 12 years.
Gimil-Sin, more than 9 years.
Ibi-Sin.
Idin-Dagan.
Sumu-ilu.
_First Dynasty of Babylon._ 2350 B.C.
Sumu-abi, 14 years.
Sumu-la-ilu, 36 years.
Zabium, 14 years.
Abil-Sin, 18 years.
Sin-muballidh, 20 years.
Khammurabi, 43 years.
Samsu-iluna, 38 years.
Abesukh, 25 years.
Ammi-ditana, 25 years.
Ammi-zadoq, 21 years.
Samsu-ditana, 31 years.
_Dynasty of Sisku (?) for 368 years._ 2160 B.C.
Anman, 60 years.
Ki-Nigas, 56 years.
Damki-ilisu, 26 years.
Iskipal, 15 years.
Sussi, 27 years.
Gul-ki[sar], 55 years.
Kirgal-daramas, 50 years.
[=A]-dara-kalama, 28 years.
Akur-duana, 26 years.
Melamma-kurkura, 8 years.
Ea-ga(mil), 9 years.
_Kassite Dynasty of 36 kings for 576 years 9 months._ 1780 B.C.
Gandis, 16 years.
Agum-sipak, 22 years.
Bitilyasu I., 22 years.
Ussi (?), 9 years.
Adu-metas.
Tazzi-gurumas.
Agum-kakrime.
. . . .
Kara-indas.
Kadasman-Bel, his son, corresponded with
Amon-hotep (Amenophis) III. of Egypt, 1400 B.C.
Kuri-galzu II.
Burna-buryas, his son, 22 years.
Kuri-galzu III., his son, 26 years.
Nazi-Maruttas, his son, 17 years.
Kadasman-Turgu, his son, 13 years.
Kudur-bel, 6 years.
Sagarakti-suryas, his son, 13 years.
Bitilyasu II., 8 years.
Tukulti-In-aristi of Assyria (1272 B.C.)
for 7 years, native vassal kings being--
Bel-sum-iddin, 1-1/2 years.
Kadasman-Bel II., 1-1/2 years.
Hadad-sum-iddin, 6 years.
Hadad-sum-uzur, 30 years.
Meli-sipak, 15 years.
Merodach-baladan I., his son, 13 years.
Zamama-sum-iddin, 1 year.
Bel-sum-iddin, 3 years.
_Dynasty of Isin of 11 kings for 132-1/2 years._ 1203 B.C.
Merodach-... 18 years.
. . . .
Nebuchadrezzar I.
Bel-nadin-pal.
Merodach-nadin-akhi, 22 years.
Merodach-... 1-1/2 years.
Hadad-baladan, an usurper.
Merodach-sapik-zer-mati, 12 years.
Nabu-nadin, 8 years.
_Dynasty of the Sea-coast._ 1070 B.C.
Simbar-sipak, 18 years.
Ea-mukin-zeri, 5 months.
Kassu-nadin-akhi, 3 years.
_Dynasty of Bit-Bazi._ 1050 B.C.
[=E]-Ulmas-sakin-sumi, 17 years.
Ninip-kudur-uzur I., 3 years.
Silanim-Suqamuna, 3 months.
_Dynasty of Elam._ 1030 B.C.
An Elamite, 6 years.
_Second Dynasty of Babylon._ 1025 B.C.
Nebo-kin-abli, 36 years.
Ninip-kudur-uzur II. (?) 8 months 12 days.
Probably 5 names missing. B.C.
Samas-mudammiq _cir._ 920
Nebo-sum-iskun _cir._ 900
Nebo-baladan _cir._ 880
Merodach-nadin-sumi _cir._ 860
Merodach-baladhsu-iqbi _cir._ 830
Bau-akhi-iddin _cir._ 810
Probably 2 names missing.
Nebo-sum-iskun, son of Dakuri _cir._ 760
Nabonassar, 14 years 747
Nebo-nadin-suma, his son, 2 years 733
Nebo-sum-yukin, his son, 1 month 12 days 731
End of "the 22nd dynasty."
_Dynasty of Sape._
B.C.
Yukin-zera or Chinziros, 3 years. 730
Pulu (Pul or Poros), called
Tiglath-pileser III. in Assyria, 2 years 727
Ulul[=a], called Shalmaneser IV. in Assyria 725
Merodach-baladan II. the Chaldaean 721
Sargon of Assyria 709
Sennacherib, his son 705
Merodach-zakir-sumi, 1 month 702
Merodach-baladan III., 6 months 702
Bel-ebus of Babylon 702
Assur-nadin-sumi, son of Sennacherib 700
Nergal-yusezib 694
Musezib-Merodach 693
Sennacherib destroys Babylon 689
Esar-haddon, his son 681
Samas-sum-yukin, his son 668
Kandalanu (Kineladanos) 648
Nabopolassar 626
Nabu-kudur-uzur (Nebuchadrezzar II.) 605
Amil-Marduk (Evil-Merodach), his son 562
Nergal-sarra-uzur (Nergal-sharezer) 560
Labasi-Marduk, his son, 3 months 556
Nabu-nahid (Nabonidus) 556
Cyrus conquers Babylon 538
Cambyses, his son 529
Gomates, the Magian, 7 months 521
Nebuchadrezzar III., native king 521
Darius, son of Hystaspes 520
Nebuchadrezzar IV., rebel king 514
Darius restored 513
_Kings of Assyria._
Zulilu "founder of the monarchy."
. . . .
Assur-rabi.
Assur-nirari, his son.
Assur-rim-nisesu, his son.
. . . .
Erba-Hadad,
Assur-nadin-akhi I., his son.
Assur-yuballidh I., his son.
B.C.
Assur-bil-nisi-su _cir._ 1450
Buzur-Assur 1440
Assur-nadin-akhi II. 1410
Assur-yuballidh, his son 1390
Bel-nirari, his son 1370
Arik-den-ilu, his son 1350
Hadad-nirari I., his son 1330
Shalmaneser I., his son
(built Calah) 1310
Tiglath-In-aristi I., his son, 1280
conquers Babylon _cir._ 1270
Assur-nazir-pal I., his son 1260
Assur-narara and his son
Nebo-dan 1250
Assur-sum-lisir 1235
In-aristi-tukulti-Assur 1225
Bel-kudur-uzur 1215
In-aristi-pileser, descendant
of Erba-Hadad 1200
Assur-dan I., his son 1185
Mutaggil-Nebo, his son 1160
Assur-ris-isi, his son 1140
Tiglath-pileser I., his son 1120
Assur-bil-kala, his son 1090
Samsi-Hadad I., his brother 1070
Assur-nazir-pal II., his son 1060
Assur-irbi --
Hadad-nirari II. _cir._ 960
Tiglath-pileser II., his son 950
Assur-dan II., his son 930
Hadad-nirari III., his son 911
Tukulti-In-aristi, his son 889
Assur-nazir-pal III., his son 883
Shalmaneser II., his son 858
Assur-danin-pal (Sardanapallos),
rebel king 825
Samsi-Hadad II., his brother 823
Hadad-nirari IV., his son 810
Shalmaneser III. 781
Assur-dan III. 771
Assur-nirari 753
Pulu, usurper, takes the
name of Tiglath-pileser III. 745
Ulul[=a], usurper, takes the
name of Shalmaneser IV. 727
Sargon, usurper 722
Sennacherib, his son 705
Esar-haddon, his son 681
Assur-bani-pal, his son 668
Assur-etil-ilani-yukin, his son ?
Assur-sum-lisir ?
Sin-sarra-uzur (Sarakos) ?
Destruction of Nineveh 606
[6] These three dynasties are usually known as the First Dynasty of
Babylon, the Dynasty of Sisku or Uruku, and the Kassite Dynasty; see sect.
v.
[7] See Oppert, _Comptes rendus de l'Acad. des Inscr. et Belles-Lettres_
(1888), xvi. pp. 218 ff., and _Bab. and Or. Rec._ ii. pp. 107 ff.
[8] See Sayce, _Early Israel_, pp. 281 ff., and _Encyc. Brit._, 10th ed.,
vol. xxvi. p. 45 (also his account above).
[9] See Rogers _History of Babylonia and Assyria_ (1900).
[10] See Winckler, _Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens_ (1892),
_Altorientalische Forschungen_, i. Hft. 2 (1894), and _Auszug aus der
Vorderasiatischen Geschichte_ (1905).
[11] See Delitzsch and Muerdter, _Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens_
(1891), and Delitzsch, _Mehr Licht_ (1907).
[12] See Maspero, _Histoire ancienne des peuples de l'Orient classique_,
tome ii.
[13] See Peiser, _Zeits. fuer Assyr._ vi. pp. 264 ff.
[14] See Rost, _Mitteil. der vorderas. Gesellschaft_ (1897), ii.
[15] See Lehmann-Haupt, _Zwei Hauptprobleme_ (1898).
[16] See Marquart, _Philologus_, Supplbd. vii. (1899), pp. 637 ff.
[17] See Rost, _Orient. Lit.-Zeit._, iii. (1900), No. 6.
[18] See Lehmann-Haupt, _Beitraege zur alten Geschichte (Klio)_, Bd. iii.
Heft 1 (1903).
[19] See Hommel, _Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens_.
[20] See _Ancient Hebrew Tradition_, p. 125, and Hastings' _Dictionary of
the Bible_, i. pp. 226 f.
[21] See Niebuhr, _Chronologie_ (1896).
[22] See Hommel, "Sitzungsberichte der koenigl. boehmischen Gesellschaft
der Wissenschaften," _Phil.-hist. Classe_ (1901), v.
[23] Published and discussed by L. W. King, "Chronicles concerning early
Babylonian Kings" (_Studies in Eastern History_, vols. ii. and iii., 1907),
and _History of Egypt_, vol. xiii. (published by the Grolier Society, New
York, in the spring of 1906), pp. 244 ff.
[24] Published and discussed by Hilprecht, "Mathematical, Metrological and
Chronological Texts" (_Bab. Exped._, Ser. A, xx. 1, dated 1906, published
1907), pp. 46 ff.
[25] See L. W. King, _Letters and Inscriptions of Khammurabi_, vol. iii.
pp. 228 ff.
[26] Cf., _e.g._, Hilprecht, _Old Babylonian Inscriptions_, pt. ii. p. 24.
[27] See Radau, _Early Babylonian History_ (1900).
[28] See Lehmann-Haupt, _Zwei Hauptprobleme_, pp. 172 ff.
[29] See Winckler in Schrader's _Keilinschriften und das Alte-Testament_
(3rd ed.), i. pp. 17 f., and cf. _Mitteil. der vorderas. Gesellschaft_
(1906), i. p. 12, n.l.
[30] Cf. L. W. King, _Chronicles_, i. pp. 15 ff., 61 f.
[31] See _Mitteilungen der deutschen Orientgesellschaft_, Nos. 21 and 22,
and cf. L. W. King, Chronicles, i. pp. 114 ff.
[32] The Assyrian language is practically identical with the Babylonian,
just as the Assyrians are the same people as the Babylonians with some
foreign admixtures.
[33] In many names the divine element is lopped off, but was originally
present.
[34] Aramaic endorsements on business documents repeating in Aramaic
transliteration the names of parties mentioned in the texts have also been
of service in fixing the phonetic readings of names. See _e.g._ Clay's
valuable article, "Aramaic Endorsements on the Documents of Murash[=u]
Sons" (Persian period) in _Old Testament and Semitic Studies in Memory of
William Rainey Harper_ (Chicago, 1908, vol. i.), pp. 285-322.
[35] Even in the case of the "Semitic" name of the famous Sargon I.
(_q.v._), whose full name is generally read Sharru-kenu-sha-ali, and
interpreted as "the legitimate king of the city," the question has recently
been raised whether we ought not to read "Sharru-kenu-shar-ri" and
interpret as "the legitimate king rules"--an illustration of the
vacillation still prevailing in this difficult domain of research.
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN RELIGION. The development of the religion of
Babylonia, so far as it can be traced with the material at hand, follows
closely along the lines of the periods to be distinguished in the history
of the Euphrates valley. Leaving aside the primitive phases of the religion
as lying beyond the ken of historical investigation, we may note the sharp
distinction to be made between the pre-Khammurabic age and the
post-Khammurabic age. While the political movement represented by
Khammurabi may have been proceeding for some time prior to the appearance
of the great conqueror, the period of _c._ 2250 B.C., when the union of the
Euphratean states was effected by Khammurabi, marks the beginning of a new
epoch in the religion as well as in the political history of the Euphrates
valley. Corresponding to the states into which we find the country divided
before 2250 B.C., we have a various number of religious centres such as
Nippur, Erech, Kutha (Cuthah), Ur, Sippara (Sippar), Shirgulla (Lagash),
Eridu and Agade, in each of which some god was looked upon as the chief
deity around whom there were gathered a number of minor deities and with
whom there was invariably associated a female consort. The jurisdiction of
this chief god was, however, limited to the political extent or control of
the district in which the main seat of the cult of the deity in question
lay. Mild attempts, to be sure, to group the chief deities associated with
the most important religious and political centres into a regular pantheon
were made--notably in Nippur and later in Ur--but such attempts lacked the
enduring quality which attaches to Khammurabi's avowed policy to raise
Marduk--the patron deity of the future capital, Babylon--to the head of the
entire Babylonian pantheon, as [v.03 p.0113] Babylon itself came to be
recognized as the real centre of the entire Euphrates valley.
Associated with Marduk was his consort Sarpanit, and grouped around the
pair as princes around a throne were the chief deities of the older
centres, like Ea and Damkina of Eridu, Nebo and Tashmit of Borsippa, Nergal
and Allatu of Kutha, Shamash and [=A] of Sippar, Sin and Ningal of Ur, as
well as pairs like Ramman (or Adad) and Shala whose central seat is unknown
to us. In this process of accommodating ancient prerogatives to new
conditions, it was inevitable that attributes belonging specifically to the
one or the other of these gods should have been transferred to Marduk, who
thus from being, originally, a solar deity becomes an eclectic power,
taking on the traits of Bel, Ea, Shamash, Nergal, Adad and even Sin (the
moon-god)--a kind of composite residuum of all the chief gods.
In the religious literature this process can be traced with perfect
definiteness. The older incantations, associated with Ea, were re-edited so
as to give to Marduk the supreme power over demons, witches and sorcerers:
the hymns and lamentations composed for the cult of Bel, Shamash and of
Adad were transformed into paeans and appeals to Marduk, while the ancient
myths arising in the various religious and political centres underwent a
similar process of adaptation to changed conditions, and as a consequence
their original meaning was obscured by the endeavour to assign all mighty
deeds and acts, originally symbolical of the change of seasons or of
occurrences in nature, to the patron deity of Babylon--the supreme head of
the entire Babylonian pantheon. Besides the chief deities and their
consorts, various minor ones, representing likewise patron gods of less
important localities and in most cases of a solar character were added at
one time or the other to the court of Marduk, though there is also to be
noted a tendency on the part of the chief solar deity, Shamash of Sippara,
and for the chief moon-god to absorb the solar and lunar deities of less
important sites, leading in the case of the solar gods to the
differentiation of the functions of Shamash during the various seasons of
the year and the various times of the day among these minor deities. In
this way Ninib, whose chief seat appears to have been at Shirgulla
(Lagash), became the sun-god of the springtime and of the morning, bringing
joy and new life to the earth, while Nergal of Kutha was regarded as the
sun of the summer solstice and of the noonday heat--the harbinger of
suffering and death.
There were, however, two deities who appear to have retained an independent
existence--Anu (_q.v._), the god of heaven, and Ishtar (_q.v._), the great
mother-goddess, who symbolized fertility and vitality in general. There are
some reasons for believing that the oldest seat, and possibly the original
seat, of the Anu cult was in Erech, as it is there where the Ishtar cult
that subsequently spread throughout Babylonia and Assyria took its rise.
While Anu, with whom there was associated as a pale reflection a consort
Antum, assigned to him under the influence of the widely prevalent view
among the early Semites which conceived of gods always in pairs, remained
more or less of an abstraction during the various periods of the
Babylonian-Assyrian religion and taking little part in the active cult of
the temples, his unique position as the chief god of the highest heavens
was always recognized in the theological system developed by the priests,
which found an expression in making him the first figure of a triad,
consisting of Anu, Bel and Ea, among whom the priests divided the three
divisions of the universe, the heavens, the earth with the atmosphere above
it, and the watery expanse respectively.
Postponing the discussion of this triad, it is to be noted that the
systematization of the pantheon after the days of Khammurabi did not
seriously interfere with the independence of the goddess Ishtar. While
frequently associated with Marduk, and still more closely with the chief
god of Assyria, the god Assur (who occupies in the north the position
accorded to Marduk in the south), so much so as to be sometimes spoken of
as Assur's consort--the lady or Belit _par excellence_--the belief that as
the source of all life she stands apart never lost its hold upon the people
and found an expression also in the system devised by the priests. By the
side of the first triad, consisting of Anu, Bel and Ea--disconnected in
this form entirely from all local associations--we encounter a second triad
composed of Shamash, Sin and Ishtar. As the first triad symbolized the
three divisions of the universe--the heavens, earth and the watery
element--so the second represented the three great forces of nature--the
sun, the moon and the life-giving power. According as the one or the other
aspect of such a power is brought into the foreground, Ishtar becomes the
mother of mankind, the fertile earth, the goddess of sexual love, and the
creative force among animals, while at times she appears in hymns and myths
as the general personification of nature.
We thus find in the post-Khammurabic period the pantheon assuming distinct
shapes. The strong tendency towards concentrating in one deity--Marduk--the
attributes of all others was offset by the natural desire to make the
position of Marduk accord with the rank acquired by the secular rulers. As
these emphasized their supremacy by grouping around them a court of loyal
attendants dependent in rank and ready to do their master's bidding, so the
gods of the chief centres and those of the minor local cults formed a group
around Marduk; and the larger the group the greater was the reflected glory
of the chief figure. Hence throughout the subsequent periods of Babylonian
history, and despite a decided progress towards a monotheistic conception
of divine government of the universe, the recognition of a large number of
gods and their consorts by the side of Marduk remained a firmly embedded
doctrine in the Babylonian religion as it did in the Assyrian religion,
with the important variation, however, of transferring the role of the head
of the pantheon from Marduk to Assur. Originally the patron god of the city
of Assur (_q.v._), when this city became the centre of a growing and
independent district, Assur was naturally advanced to the same position in
the north that Marduk occupied in the south. The religious predominance of
the city of Babylon served to maintain for Marduk recognition even on the
part of the Assyrian rulers, who, on the political side likewise, conceded
to Babylonia the form at least of an independent district even when, as
kings of Assyria, they exercised absolute control over it. They appointed
their sons or brothers governors of Babylonia, and in the long array of
titles that the kings gave themselves, a special phrase was always set
aside to indicate their mastery over Babylonia. "To take the hand of
Bel-Marduk" was the ceremony of installation which Assyrian rulers
recognized equally with Babylonians as an essential preliminary to
exercising authority in the Euphrates valley. Marduk and Assur became
rivals only when Babylonia gave the Assyrians trouble; and when in 689 B.C.
Sennacherib, whose patience had been exhausted by the difficulties
encountered in maintaining peace in the south, actually besieged and
destroyed the city of Babylon, he removed the statue of Marduk to Nineveh
as a symbol that the god's rule had come to an end. His grandson
Assur-bani-pal, with a view of re-establishing amicable relations, restored
the statue to the temple E-Saggila in Babylon and performed the
time-honoured ceremony of "taking the hand of Bel" as a symbol of his
homage to the ancient head of the Babylonian pantheon.
But for the substitution of Assur for Marduk, the Assyrian pantheon was the
same as that set up in the south, though some of the gods were endowed with
attributes which differ slightly from those which mark the same gods in the
south. The warlike nature of the Assyrians was reflected in their
conceptions of the gods, who thus became little Assurs by the side of the
great protector of arms, the big Assur. The cult and ritual in the north
likewise followed the models set up in the south. The hymns composed for
the temples of Babylonia were transferred to Assur, Calah, Harran, Arbela
and Nineveh in the north; and the myths and legends also wandered to
Assyria, where, to be sure, they underwent certain modifications. To all
practical purposes, however, the religion of Assyria was identical with
that practised in the south.
We thus obtain four periods in the development of the Babylonian-Assyrian
religion: (1) the oldest period from [v.03 p.0114] _c._ 3500 B.C. to the
time of Khammurabi (_c._ 2250 B.C.); (2) the post-Khammurabic period in
Babylonia; (3) the Assyrian period (_c._ 2000 B.C.) to the destruction of
Nineveh in 606 B.C.; (4) the neo-Babylonian period beginning with
Nabopolassar (625-604 B.C.), the first independent ruler under whom
Babylonia inaugurates a new though short-lived era of power and prosperity,
which ends with Cyrus's conquest of Babylon and Babylonia in 539 B.C.,
though since the religion proceeds on its undisturbed course for several
centuries after the end of the political independence, we might
legitimately carry this period to the Greek conquest of the Euphrates
valley (331 B.C.), when new influences began to make themselves felt which
gradually led to the extinction of the old cults.
In this long period of _c._ 3500 to _c._ 300 B.C., the changes introduced
after the adjustment to the new conditions produced by Khammurabi's union
of the Euphratean states are of a minor character. As already indicated,
the local cults in the important centres of the south and north maintained
themselves despite the tendency towards centralization, and while the cults
themselves varied according to the character of the gods worshipped in each
centre, the general principles were the same and the rites differed in
minor details rather than in essential variations. An important factor
which thus served to maintain the rites in a more or less stable condition
was the predominance of what may be called the astral theology as the
theoretical substratum of the Babylonian religion, and which is equally
pronounced in the religious system of Assyria. The essential feature of
this astral theology is the assumption of a close link between the
movements going on in the heavens and occurrences on earth, which led to
identifying the gods and goddesses with heavenly bodies--planets and stars,
besides sun and moon--and to assigning the seats of all the deities in the
heavens. The personification of the two great luminaries--the sun and the
moon--was the first step in the unfolding of this system, and this was
followed by placing the other deities where Shamash and Sin had their
seats. This process, which reached its culmination in the post-Khammurabic
period, led to identifying the planet Jupiter with Marduk, Venus with
Ishtar, Mars with Nergal, Mercury with Nebo, and Saturn with Ninib. The
system represents a harmonious combination of two factors, one of popular
origin, the other the outcome of speculation in the schools attached to the
temples of Babylonia. The popular factor is the belief in the influence
exerted by the movements of the heavenly bodies on occurrences on earth--a
belief naturally suggested by the dependence of life, vegetation and
guidance upon the two great luminaries. Starting with this belief the
priests built up the theory of the close correspondence between occurrences
on earth and phenomena in the heavens. The heavens presenting a constant
change even to the superficial observer, the conclusion was drawn of a
connexion between the changes and the ever-changing movement in the fate of
individuals and of nature as well as in the appearance of nature.
To read the signs of the heavens was therefore to understand the meaning of
occurrences on earth, and with this accomplished it was also possible to
foretell what events were portended by the position and relationship to one
another of sun, moon, planets and certain stars. Myths that symbolized
changes in season or occurrences in nature were projected on the heavens,
which were mapped out to correspond to the divisions of the earth. All the
gods, great and small, had their places assigned to them in the heavens,
and facts, including such as fell within the domain of political history,
were interpreted in terms of astral theology. So completely did this system
in the course of time sway men's minds that the cult, from being an
expression of animistic beliefs, took on the colour derived from the
"astral" interpretation of occurrences and doctrines. It left its trace in
incantations, omens and hymns, and it gave birth to astronomy, which was
assiduously cultivated because a knowledge of the heavens was the very
foundation of the system of belief unfolded by the priests of Babylonia and
Assyria. "Chaldaean wisdom" became in the classical world the synonym of
this science, which in its character was so essentially religious. The
persistent prominence which astrology (_q.v._) continued to enjoy down to
the border line of the scientific movement of our own days, and which is
directly traceable to the divination methods perfected in the Euphrates
valley, is a tribute to the scope and influence attained by the astral
theology of the Babylonian and Assyrian priests.
As an illustration of the manner in which the doctrines of the religion
were made to conform to the all-pervading astral theory, it will be
sufficient to refer to the modification undergone in this process of the
view developed in a very early period which apportioned the control of the
universe among the three gods Anu, Bel and Ea. Disassociating these gods
from all local connexions, Anu became the power presiding over the heavens,
to Bel was assigned the earth and the atmosphere immediately above it,
while Ea ruled over the deep. With the transfer of all the gods to the
heavens, and under the influence of the doctrine of the correspondence
between the heavens and the earth, Anu, Bel and Ea became the three "ways"
(as they are called) on the heavens. The "ways" appear in this instance to
have been the designation of the ecliptic circle, which was divided into
three sections or zones--a northern, a middle and a southern zone, Anu
being assigned to the first, Bel to the second, and Ea to the third zone.
The astral theology of the Babylonian-Assyrian religion, while thus bearing
the ear-marks of a system devised by the priests, succeeded in assimilating
the beliefs which represented the earlier attempts to systematize the more
popular aspects of the religion, and in this way a unification of diverse
elements was secured that led to interpreting the contents and the form of
the religion in terms of the astral-theological system.
The most noteworthy outcome of this system in the realm of religious
practice was, as already intimated, the growth of an elaborate and
complicated method of divining the future by the observation of the
phenomena in the heavens. It is significant that in the royal collection of
cuneiform literature made by King Assur-bani-pal of Assyria (668-626 B.C.)
and deposited in his palace at Nineveh, the omen collections connected with
the astral theology of Babylonia and Assyria form the largest class. There
are also indications that the extensive texts dealing with divination
through the liver of sacrificial animals, which represents a more popular
origin than divination through the observations of the heavens, based as it
is on the primitive view which regarded the liver as the seat of life and
of the soul, were brought into connexion with astral divination. Less
influenced by the astral-theological system are the old incantation texts
which were gathered together into series. In these series we can trace the
attempt to gather the incantation formulae and prayers produced in
different centres, and to make them conform to the tendency to centralize
the cult in the worship of Marduk and his consort in the south, and of
Assur and Ishtar in the north. Incantations originally addressed to Ea of
Eridu, as the god of the watery element, and to Nusku, as the god of fire,
were transferred to Marduk. This was done by making Ea confer on Marduk as
his son the powers of the father, and by making Nusku a messenger between
Ea and Marduk. At the same time, since the invoking of the divine powers
was the essential element in the incantations, in order to make the magic
formulae as effective as possible, a large number of the old local deities
are introduced to add their power to the chief ones; and it is here that
the astral system comes into play through the introduction of names of
stars, as well as through assigning attributes to the gods which clearly
reflect the conception that they have their seats in the heavens. The
incantations pass over naturally into hymns and prayers. The connexion
between the two is illustrated by the application of the term _shiptu_,
"incantation," to the direct appeals to the gods, as well as by the
introduction, on the one hand, of genuine prayers into the incantations and
by the addition, on the other hand, of incantations to prayers and hymns,
pure and simple. In another division of the religious literature of
Babylonia which is largely represented in Assur-bani-pal's collection--the
myths and legends--tales which originally symbolized the change of seasons,
or in which historical occurrences are overcast with more or less copious
[v.03 p.0115] admixture of legend and myth, were transferred to the
heavens, and so it happens that creation myths, and the accounts of
wanderings and adventures of heroes of the past, are referred to movements
among the planets and stars as well as to occurrences or supposed
occurrences on earth.
The ritual alone which accompanied divination practices and incantation
formulae and was a chief factor in the celebration of festival days and of
days set aside for one reason or the other to the worship of some god or
goddess or group of deities, is free from traces of the astral theology.
The more or less elaborate ceremonies prescribed for the occasions when the
gods were approached are directly connected with the popular elements of
the religion. Animal sacrifice, libations, ritualistic purification,
sprinkling of water, and symbolical rites of all kinds accompanied by short
prayers, represent a religious practice which in the Babylonian-Assyrian
religion, as in all religions, is older than any theology and survives the
changes which the theoretical substratum of the religion undergoes.
On the ethical side, the religion of Babylonia more particularly, and to a
less extent that of Assyria, advances to noticeable conceptions of the
qualities associated with the gods and goddesses and of the duties imposed
on man. Shamash the sun-god was invested with justice as his chief trait,
Marduk is portrayed as full of mercy and kindness, Ea is the protector of
mankind who is grieved when, through a deception practised upon Adapa,
humanity is deprived of immortality. The gods, to be sure, are easily
aroused to anger, and in some of them the dire aspects predominated, but
the view becomes more and more pronounced that there is some cause always
for the divine wrath. Though, in accounting for the anger of the gods, no
sharp distinction is made between moral offences and a ritualistic
oversight or neglect, yet the stress laid in the hymns and prayers, as well
as in the elaborate atonement ritual prescribed in order to appease the
anger of the gods, on the need of being clean and pure in the sight of the
higher powers, the inculcation of a proper aspect of humility, and above
all the need of confessing one's guilt and sins without any reserve--all
this bears testimony to the strength which the ethical factor acquired in
the domain of the religion.
This factor appears to less advantage in the unfolding of the views
concerning life after death. Throughout all periods of Babylonian-Assyrian
history, the conception prevailed of a large dark cavern below the earth,
not far from the Apsu--the ocean encircling and flowing underneath the
earth--in which all the dead were gathered and where they led a miserable
existence of inactivity amid gloom and dust. Occasionally a favoured
individual was permitted to escape from this general fate and placed in a
pleasant island. It would appear also that the rulers were always singled
out for divine grace, and in the earlier periods of the history, owing to
the prevailing view that the rulers stood nearer to the gods than other
mortals, the kings were deified after death, and in some instances divine
honours were paid to them even during their lifetime.
The influence exerted by the Babylonian-Assyrian religion was particularly
profound on the Semites, while the astral theology affected the ancient
world in general, including the Greeks and Romans. The impetus to the
purification of the old Semite religion to which the Hebrews for a long
time clung in common with their fellows--the various branches of nomadic
Arabs--was largely furnished by the remarkable civilization unfolded in the
Euphrates valley and in many of the traditions, myths and legends embodied
in the Old Testament; traces of direct borrowing from Babylonia may be
discerned, while the indirect influences in the domain of the prophetical
books, as also in the Psalms and in the so-called "Wisdom Literature," are
even more noteworthy. Even when we reach the New Testament period, we have
not passed entirely beyond the sphere of Babylonian-Assyrian influences. In
such a movement as early Christian gnosticism, Babylonian
elements--modified, to be sure, and transformed--are largely present, while
the growth of an apocalyptic literature is ascribed with apparent justice
by many scholars to the recrudescence of views the ultimate source of which
is to be found in the astral-theology of the Babylonian and Assyrian
priests.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Morris Jastrow, jun., _Religion Babyloniens und Assyriens_
(Giessen, 1904), enlarged and re-written form of the author's smaller
_Religion of Babylonia and Assyria_ (Boston, 1898); A. H. Sayce, _The
Religion of the Ancient Babylonians_ (Hibbert Lectures, London, 1887), now
superseded by the same author's _Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia_
(Gifford Lectures, Edinburgh, 1902); Friedrich Jeremias, _Die Babylonier
und Assyrer_, in de la Saussaye's _Lehrbuch der Religionsgeschichte_ (3rd
ed., Tuebingen, 1905), vol. i.; L. W. King, _Babylonian Religion and
Mythology_ (London, 1899); T. G. Pinches, _Religion of Babylonia and
Assyria_ (London, 1906). Of special texts and monographs bearing on the
religion may be mentioned various volumes in the new series of cuneiform
texts from Babylonian tablets, &c., in the British Museum (London, 1901- ),
especially parts v., xii., xv., xvii., xviii., xx. and xxi. and vol. iv. of
the earlier series of _Selections from the Miscellaneous Inscriptions of
Western Asia_, ed. by H. C. Rawlinson (2nd ed., London, 1891); H. Zimmern,
_Beitraege zur Kenntniss der babylonischen Religion_ (Leipzig, 1901); J. A.
Craig, _Assyrian and Babylonian Religious Texts_ (Leipzig, 1895-1897);
L. W. King, _The Seven Tablets of Creation_ (London, 1902); R. C. Thompson,
_The Reports of the Magicians and Astrologers of Nineveh and Babylon_
(London, 1900); A. Boissier, _Documents assyriens relatifs aux presages_
(Paris, 1894-1897); and his _Choix de textes relatifs a la divination
assyro-babylonienne_ (Geneva, 1905-1906); Ch. Fossey, _La Magie assyrienne_
(Paris, 1902); G. A. Reisner, _Sumerisch-babylonische Hymnen_ (Berlin,
1896); L. W. King, _Babylonian Magic and Sorcery_ (London, 1896); R. C.
Thompson, _Devils and Evil Spirits of Babylonia_ (London, 1903-1904); K. L.
Tallqvist, _Die assyrische Beschwoerungsserie Maql[=u]_ (Leipzig, 1895);
J. A. Knudtzon, _Assyrische Gebete an den Sonnengott_ (Leipzig, 1893);
Virolleaud, _L'Astrologie chaldeenne_ (Paris, 1906- ); Craig,
_Astrological-Astronomical Texts_ (Leipzig, 1892); Martin, _Textes
religieux assyriens et babyloniens_ (Paris, 1900 and 1903); Paul Haupt,
_Das babylonische Nimrodepos_ (Leipzig, 1891); Friedrich Delitzsch, _Das
babylonische Weltschoepfungsepos_ (Leipzig, 1896); P. Jensen,
"Assyrisch-babylonische Mythen und Epen," in Schrader's _Keilinschriftliche
Bibliothek_, vol. vi. part 1 (Berlin, 1900); also his _Das Nationalepos der
Babylonier_, &c. (Strassburg, 1906); H. Zimmern in vol. ii. of 3rd ed. of
Schrader's _Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament_ (Berlin, 1903); Alfred
Jeremias, _Die babylonisch-assyrischen Vorstellungen von Leben nach dem
Tode_ (Leipzig, 1887); and his _Das Alte Testament im Lichte des Alten
Orients_ (2nd ed., Leipzig, 1906-1907); and _Babylonisches im Neuen
Testament_ (Leipzig, 1905). On the religious literature of Babylonia and
Assyria, see also chapters xv. to xxiv. in Jastrow's work (German and
English edition), Carl Bezold's _Ninive and Babylon_ (Bielefeld, 1905),
chapters vi. to xii., and the same author's monumental catalogue of the
cuneiform tablets in the Kuyunjik collection of the British Museum (5
vols., London, 1889-1899).
(M. JA.)
BABYLONIAN CAPTIVITY, the name generally given to the deportation of the
Jews to Babylon by Nebuchadrezzar. Three separate occasions are mentioned
(Jer. lii. 28-30). The first was in the time of Jehoiachin in 597 B.C.,
when the temple of Jerusalem was partially despoiled and a number of the
leading citizens removed. After eleven years (in the reign of Zedekiah) a
fresh rising of the Judaeans occurred; the city was razed to the ground,
and a further deportation ensued. Finally, five years later, Jeremiah
(_loc. cit._) records a third captivity. After the overthrow of Babylonia
by the Persians, Cyrus gave the Jews permission to return to their native
land (537 B.C.), and more then forty thousand are said to have availed
themselves of the privilege. (See JEHOIAKIM; JEHOIACHIN; ZEDEKIAH;
EZRA-NEHEMIAH and JEWS: _History_.)
BABYLONIAN LAW. The material for the study of Babylonian law is singularly
extensive without being exhaustive. The so-called "contracts," including a
great variety of deeds, conveyances, bonds, receipts, accounts and, most
important of all, the actual legal decisions given by the judges in the law
courts, exist in thousands. Historical inscriptions, royal charters and
rescripts, despatches, private letters and the general literature afford
welcome supplementary information. Even grammatical and lexicographical
works, intended solely to facilitate the study of ancient literature,
contain many extracts or short sentences bearing on law and custom. The
so-called "Sumerian Family Laws" are thus preserved. The discovery of the
now celebrated Code of Khammurabi (Hammurabi)[1] (hereinafter simply termed
[v.03 p.0116] "the Code") has, however, made a more systematic study
possible than could have resulted from the classification and
interpretation of the other material. Some fragments of a later code exist
and have been published; but there still remain many points upon which we
have no evidence.
This material dates from the earliest times down to the commencement of our
era. The evidence upon a particular point may be very full at one period
and almost entirely lacking at another. The Code forms the backbone of the
skeleton sketch which is here reconstructed. The fragments of it which have
been recovered from Assur-bani-pal's library at Nineveh and later
Babylonian copies show that it was studied, divided into chapters entitled
_Ninu ilu [s.]irum_ from its opening words, and recopied for fifteen
hundred years or more. The greater part of it remained in force, even
through the Persian, Greek and Parthian conquests, which affected private
life in Babylonia very little, and it survived to influence Syro-Roman and
later Mahommedan law in Mesopotamia. The law and custom which preceded the
Code we shall call "early," that of the New Babylonian empire (as well as
the Persian, Greek, &c.) "late." The law in Assyria was derived from
Babylonia but conserved early features long after they had disappeared
elsewhere.
When the Semitic tribes settled in the cities of Babylonia, their tribal
custom passed over into city law. The early history of the country is the
story of a struggle for supremacy between the cities. A metropolis demanded
tribute and military support from its subject cities but left their local
cults and customs unaffected. The city rights and usages were respected by
kings and conquerors alike.
As late as the accession of Assur-bani-pal and Samas-sum-yukin we find the
Babylonians appealing to their city laws that groups of aliens to the
number of twenty at a time were free to enter the city, that foreign women
once married to Babylonian husbands could not be enslaved and that not even
a dog that entered the city could be put to death untried.
The population of Babylonia was of many races from early times and
intercommunication between the cities was incessant. Every city had a large
number of resident aliens. This freedom of intercourse must have tended to
assimilate custom. It was, however, reserved for the genius of Khammurabi
to make Babylon his metropolis and weld together his vast empire by a
uniform system of law.
[Sidenote: Code of Khammurabi.]
Almost all trace of tribal custom has already disappeared from the law of
the Code. It is state-law; alike self-help, blood-feud, marriage by
capture, are absent; though family solidarity, district responsibility,
ordeal, the _lex talionis_, are primitive features that remain. The king is
a benevolent autocrat, easily accessible to all his subjects, both able and
willing to protect the weak against the highest-placed oppressor. The royal
power, however, can only pardon when private resentment is appeased. The
judges are strictly supervised and appeal is allowed. The whole land is
covered with feudal holdings, masters of the levy, police, &c. There is a
regular postal system. The _pax Babylonica_ is so assured that private
individuals do not hesitate to ride in their carriage from Babylon to the
coast of the Mediterranean. The position of women is free and dignified.
The Code did not merely embody contemporary custom or conserve ancient law.
It is true that centuries of law-abiding and litigious habitude had
accumulated in the temple archives of each city vast stores of precedent in
ancient deeds and the records of judicial decisions, and that intercourse
had assimilated city custom. The universal habit of writing and perpetual
recourse to written contract even more modified primitive custom and
ancient precedent. Provided the parties could agree, the Code left them
free to contract as a rule. Their deed of agreement was drawn up in the
temple by a notary public, and confirmed by an oath "by god and the king."
It was publicly sealed and witnessed by professional witnesses, as well as
by collaterally interested parties. The manner in which it was thus
executed may have been sufficient security that its stipulations were not
impious or illegal. Custom or public opinion doubtless secured that the
parties would not agree to wrong. In case of dispute the judges dealt first
with the contract. They might not sustain it, but if the parties did not
dispute it, they were free to observe it. The judges' decision might,
however, be appealed against. Many contracts contain the proviso that in
case of future dispute the parties would abide by "the decision of the
king." The Code made known, in a vast number of cases, what that decision
would be, and many cases of appeal to the king were sent back to the judges
with orders to decide in accordance with it. The Code itself was carefully
and logically arranged and the order of its sections was conditioned by
their subject-matter. Nevertheless the order is not that of modern
scientific treatises, and a somewhat different order from both is most
convenient for our purpose.
The Code contemplates the whole population as falling into three classes,
the _amelu_, the _muskinu_ and the _ardu_. The _amelu_ was a patrician, the
man of family, whose birth, marriage and death were registered, of
ancestral estates and full civil rights. He had aristocratic privileges and
responsibilities, the right to exact retaliation for corporal injuries, and
liability to heavier punishment for crimes and misdemeanours, higher fees
and fines to pay. To this class belonged the king and court, the higher
officials, the professions and craftsmen. The term became in time a mere
courtesy title but originally carried with it standing. Already in the
Code, when status is not concerned, it is used to denote "any one." There
was no property qualification nor does the term appear to be racial. It is
most difficult to characterize the _muskinu_ exactly. The term came in time
to mean "a beggar" and with that meaning has passed through Aramaic and
Hebrew into many modern languages; but though the Code does not regard him
as necessarily poor, he may have been landless. He was free, but had to
accept monetary compensation for corporal injuries, paid smaller fees and
fines, even paid less offerings to the gods. He inhabited a separate
quarter of the city. There is no reason to regard him as specially
connected with the court, as a royal pensioner, nor as forming the bulk of
the population. The rarity of any reference to him in contemporary
documents makes further specification conjectural. The _ardu_ was a slave,
his master's chattel, and formed a very numerous class. He could acquire
property and even hold other slaves. His master clothed and fed him, paid
his doctor's fees, but took all compensation paid for injury done to him.
His master usually found him a slave-girl as wife (the children were then
born slaves), often set him up in a house (with farm or business) and
simply took an annual rent of him. Otherwise he might marry a freewoman
(the children were then free), who might bring him a dower which his master
could not touch, and at his death one-half of his property passed to his
master as his heir. He could acquire his freedom by purchase from his
master, or might be freed and dedicated to a temple, or even adopted, when
he became an _amelu_ and not a _muskinu_. Slaves were recruited by purchase
abroad, from captives taken in war and by freemen degraded for debt or
crime. A slave often ran away; if caught, the captor was bound to restore
him to his master, and the Code fixes a reward of two shekels which the
owner must pay the captor. It was about one-tenth of the average value. To
detain, harbour, &c., a slave was punished by death. So was an attempt to
get him to leave the city. A slave bore an identification mark, which could
only be removed by a surgical operation and which later consisted of his
owner's name tattoed or branded on the arm. On the great estates in Assyria
and its subject provinces were many serfs, mostly of subject race, settled
captives, or quondam slaves, tied to the soil they cultivated and sold with
the estate but capable of possessing land and property of their own. There
is little trace of serfs in Babylonia, unless the _muskinu_ be really a
serf.
The god of a city was originally owner of its land, which encircled it with
an inner ring of irrigable arable land and an outer fringe of pasture, and
the citizens were his tenants. The god and his viceregent, the king, had
long ceased to disturb tenancy, and were content with fixed dues in
_naturalia_, stock, [v.03 p.0117] money or service. One of the earliest
monuments records the purchase by a king of a large estate for his son,
paying a fair market price and adding a handsome honorarium to the many
owners in costly garments, plate, and precious articles of furniture. The
Code recognizes complete private ownership in land, but apparently extends
the right to hold land to votaries, merchants (and resident aliens?). But
all land was sold subject to its fixed charges. The king, however, could
free land from these charges by charter, which was a frequent way of
rewarding those who deserved well of the state. It is from these charters
that we learn nearly all we know of the obligations that lay upon land. The
state demanded men for the army and the corvee as well as dues in kind. A
definite area was bound to find a bowman together with his linked pikeman
(who bore the shield for both) and to furnish them with supplies for the
campaign. This area was termed "a bow" as early as the 8th century B.C.,
but the usage was much earlier. Later, a horseman was due from certain
areas. A man was only bound to serve so many (six?) times, but the land had
to find a man annually. The service was usually discharged by slaves and
serfs, but the _amelu_ (and perhaps the _muskinu_) went to war. The "bows"
were grouped in tens and hundreds. The corvee was less regular. The letters
of Khammurabi often deal with claims to exemption. Religious officials and
shepherds in charge of flocks were exempt. Special liabilities lay upon
riparian owners to repair canals, bridges, quays, &c. The state claimed
certain proportions of all crops, stock, &c. The king's messengers could
commandeer any subject's property, giving a receipt. Further, every city
had its own octroi duties, customs, ferry dues, highway and water rates.
The king had long ceased to be, if he ever was, owner of the land. He had
his own royal estates, his private property and dues from all his subjects.
The higher officials had endowments and official residences. The Code
regulates the feudal position of certain classes. They held an estate from
the king consisting of house, garden, field, stock and a salary, on
condition of personal service on the king's errand. They could not delegate
the service on pain of death. When ordered abroad they could nominate a
son, if capable, to hold the benefice and carry on the duty. If there was
no son capable, the state put in a _locum tenens_, but granted one-third to
the wife to maintain herself and children. The benefice was inalienable,
could not be sold, pledged, exchanged, sublet, devised or diminished. Other
land was held of the state for rent. Ancestral estate was strictly tied to
the family. If a holder would sell, the family had the right of redemption
and there seems to have been no time-limit to its exercise.
The temple occupied a most important position. It received from its
estates, from tithes and other fixed dues, as well as from the sacrifices
(a customary share) and other offerings of the faithful, vast amounts of
all sorts of _naturalia_; besides money and permanent gifts. The larger
temples had many officials and servants. Originally, perhaps, each town
clustered round one temple, and each head of a family had a right to
minister there and share its receipts. As the city grew, the right to so
many days a year at one or other shrine (or its "gate") descended in
certain families and became a species of property which could be pledged,
rented or shared within the family, but not alienated. In spite of all
these demands, however, the temples became great granaries and
store-houses; as they also were the city archives. The temple had its
responsibilities. If a citizen was captured by the enemy and could not
ransom himself the temple of his city must do so. To the temple came the
poor farmer to borrow seed corn or supplies for harvesters, &c.--advances
which he repaid without interest. The king's power over the temple was not
proprietary but administrative. He might borrow from it but repaid like
other borrowers. The tithe seems to have been the composition for the rent
due to the god for his land. It is not clear that all lands paid tithe,
perhaps only such as once had a special connexion with the temple.
The Code deals with a class of persons devoted to the service of a god, as
vestals or hierodules. The vestals were vowed to chastity, lived together
in a great nunnery, were forbidden to open or enter a tavern, and together
with other votaries had many privileges.
The Code recognizes many ways of disposing of property--sale, lease,
barter, gift, dedication, deposit, loan, pledge, all of which were matters
of contract. Sale was the delivery of the purchase (in the case of real
estate symbolized by a staff, a key, or deed of conveyance) in return for
the purchase money, receipts being given for both. Credit, if given, was
treated as a debt, and secured as a loan by the seller to be repaid by the
buyer, for which he gave a bond. The Code admits no claim unsubstantiated
by documents or the oath of witnesses. A buyer had to convince himself of
the seller's title. If he bought (or received on deposit) from a minor or a
slave without power of attorney, he would be executed as a thief. If the
goods were stolen and the rightful owner reclaimed them, he had to prove
his purchase by producing the seller and the deed of sale or witnesses to
it. Otherwise he would be adjudged a thief and die. If he proved his
purchase, he had to give up the property but had his remedy against the
seller or, if he had died, could reclaim five-fold from his estate. A man
who bought a slave abroad, might find that he had been stolen or captured
from Babylonia, and he had to restore him to his former owner without
profit. If he bought property belonging to a feudal holding, or to a ward
in chancery, he had to return it and forfeit what he gave for it as well.
He could repudiate the purchase of a slave attacked by the _bennu_ sickness
within the month (later, a hundred days), and had a female slave three days
on approval. A defect of title or undisclosed liability would invalidate
the sale at any time.
Landowners frequently cultivated their land themselves but might employ a
husbandman or let it. The husbandman was bound to carry out the proper
cultivation, raise an average crop and leave the field in good tilth. In
case the crop failed the Code fixed a statutory return. Land might be let
at a fixed rent when the Code enacted that accidental loss fell on the
tenant. If let on share-profit, the landlord and tenant shared the loss
proportionately to their stipulated share of profit. If the tenant paid his
rent and left the land in good tilth, the landlord could not interfere nor
forbid subletting. Waste land was let to reclaim, the tenant being rent
free for three years and paying a stipulated rent in the fourth year. If
the tenant neglected to reclaim the land the Code enacted that he must hand
it over in good faith and fixed a statutory rent. Gardens or plantations
were let in the same ways and under the same conditions; but for
date-groves four years' free tenure was allowed. The metayer system was in
vogue, especially on temple lands. The landlord found land, labour, oxen
for ploughing and working the watering-machines, carting, threshing or
other implements, seed corn, rations for the workmen and fodder for the
cattle. The tenant, or steward, usually had other land of his own. If he
stole the seed, rations or fodder, the Code enacted that his fingers should
be cut off. If he appropriated or sold the implements, impoverished or
sublet the cattle, he was heavily fined and in default of payment might be
condemned to be torn to pieces by the cattle on the field. Rent was as
contracted.
Irrigation was indispensable. If the irrigator neglected to repair his
dyke, or left his runnel open and caused a flood, he had to make good the
damage done to his neighbours' crops, or be sold with his family to pay the
cost. The theft of a watering-machine, water-bucket or other agricultural
implement was heavily fined.
Houses were let usually for the year, but also for longer terms, rent being
paid in advance, half-yearly. The contract generally specified that the
house was in good repair, and the tenant was bound to keep it so. The
woodwork, including doors and door frames, was removable, and the tenant
might bring and take away his own. The Code enacted that if the landlord
would re-enter before the term was up, he must remit a fair proportion of
the rent. Land was leased for houses or other buildings to be built upon
it, the tenant being rent-free for eight or ten years; after which the
building came into the landlord's possession.
Despite the multitude of slaves, hired labour was often needed, especially
at harvest. This was matter of contract, and the hirer, [v.03 p.0118] who
usually paid in advance, might demand a guarantee to fulfil the engagement.
Cattle were hired for ploughing, working the watering-machines, carting,
threshing, etc. The Code fixed a statutory wage for sowers, ox-drivers,
field-labourers, and hire for oxen, asses, &c.
There were many herds and flocks. The flocks were committed to a shepherd
who gave receipt for them and took them out to pasture. The Code fixed him
a wage. He was responsible for all care, must restore ox for ox, sheep for
sheep, must breed them satisfactorily. Any dishonest use of the flock had
to be repaid ten-fold, but loss by disease or wild beasts fell on the
owner. The shepherd made good all loss due to his neglect. If he let the
flock feed on a field of corn he had to pay damages four-fold; if he turned
them into standing corn when they ought to have been folded he paid
twelve-fold.
In commercial matters, payment in kind was still common, though the
contracts usually stipulate for cash, naming the standard expected, that of
Babylon, Larsa, Assyria, Carchemish, &c. The Code enacted, however, that a
debtor must be allowed to pay in produce according to statutory scale. If a
debtor had neither money nor crop, the creditor must not refuse goods.
Debt was secured on the person of the debtor. Distraint on a debtor's corn
was forbidden by the Code; not only must the creditor give it back, but his
illegal action forfeited his claim altogether. An unwarranted seizure for
debt was fined, as was the distraint of a working ox. The debtor being
seized for debt could nominate as mancipium or hostage to work off the
debt, his wife, a child, or slave. The creditor could only hold a wife or
child three years as mancipium. If the mancipium died a natural death while
in the creditor's possession no claim could lie against the latter; but if
he was the cause of death by cruelty, he had to give son for son, or pay
for a slave. He could sell a slave-hostage, unless she were a slave-girl
who had borne her master children. She had to be redeemed by her owner.
The debtor could also pledge his property, and in contracts often pledged a
field, house or crop. The Code enacted, however, that the debtor should
always take the crop himself and pay the creditor from it. If the crop
failed, payment was deferred and no interest could be charged for that
year. If the debtor did not cultivate the field himself he had to pay for
the cultivation, but if the cultivation was already finished he must
harvest it himself and pay his debt from the crop. If the cultivator did
not get a crop this would not cancel his contract. Pledges were often made
where the intrinsic value of the article was equivalent to the amount of
the debt; but antichretic pledge was more common, where the profit of the
pledge was a set-off against the interest of the debt. The whole property
of the debtor might be pledged as security for the payment of the debt,
without any of it coming into the enjoyment of the creditor. Personal
guarantees were often given that the debtor would repay or the guarantor
become liable himself.
Trade was very extensive. A common way of doing business was for a merchant
to entrust goods or money to a travelling agent, who sought a market for
his goods. The caravans travelled far beyond the limits of the empire. The
Code insisted that the agent should inventory and give a receipt for all
that he received. No claim could be made for anything not so entered. Even
if the agent made no profit he was bound to return double what he had
received, if he made poor profit he had to make up the deficiency; but he
was not responsible for loss by robbery or extortion on his travels. On his
return, the principal must give a receipt for what was handed over to him.
Any false entry or claim on the agent's part was penalised three-fold, on
the principal's part six-fold. In normal cases profits were divided
according to contract, usually equally.
A considerable amount of forwarding was done by the caravans. The carrier
gave a receipt for the consignment, took all responsibility and exacted a
receipt on delivery. If he defaulted he paid five-fold. He was usually paid
in advance. Deposit, especially warehousing of grain, was charged for at
one-sixtieth. The warehouseman took all risks, paid double for all
shortage, but no claim could be made unless he had given a properly
witnessed receipt. Water traffic on the Euphrates and canals was early very
considerable. Ships, whose tonnage was estimated at the amount of grain
they could carry, were continually hired for the transport of all kinds of
goods. The Code fixes the price for building and insists on the builder's
giving a year's guarantee of seaworthiness. It fixes the hire of ship and
of crew. The captain was responsible for the freight and the ship; he had
to replace all loss. Even if he refloated the ship he had to pay a fine of
half its value for sinking it. In the case of collision the boat under way
was responsible for damages to the boat at anchor. The Code also regulated
the liquor traffic, fixing a fair price for beer and forbidding the
connivance of the tavern-keeper (a female!) at disorderly conduct or
treasonable assembly, under pain of death. She was to hale the offenders to
the palace, which implied an efficient and accessible police system.
Payment through a banker or by written draft against deposit was frequent.
Bonds to pay were treated as negotiable. Interest was rarely charged on
advances by the temple or wealthy landowners for pressing needs, but this
may have been part of the metayer system. The borrowers may have been
tenants. Interest was charged at very high rates for overdue loans of this
kind. Merchants (and even temples in some cases) made ordinary business
loans, charging from 20 to 30%.
Marriage retained the form of purchase, but was essentially a contract to
be man and wife together. The marriage of young people was usually arranged
between the relatives, the bridegroom's father providing the bride-price,
which with other presents the suitor ceremonially presented to the bride's
father. This bride-price was usually handed over by her father to the bride
on her marriage, and so came back into the bridegroom's possession, along
with her dowry, which was her portion as a daughter. The bride-price varied
much, according to the position of the parties, but was in excess of that
paid for a slave. The Code enacted that if the father does not, after
accepting a man's presents, give him his daughter, he must return the
presents doubled. Even if his decision was brought about by libel on the
part of the suitor's friend this was done, and the Code enacted that the
faithless friend should not marry the girl. If a suitor changed his mind,
he forfeited the presents. The dowry might include real estate, but
generally consisted of personal effects and household furniture. It
remained the wife's for life, descending to her children, if any; otherwise
returning to her family, when the husband could deduct the bride-price if
it had not been given to her, or return it, if it had. The marriage
ceremony included joining of hands and the utterance of some formula of
acceptance on the part of the bridegroom, as "I am the son of nobles,
silver and gold shall fill thy lap, thou shall be my wife, I will be thy
husband. Like the fruit of a garden I will give thee offspring." It must be
performed by a freeman.
The marriage contract, without which the Code ruled that the woman was no
wife, usually stated the consequences to which each party was liable for
repudiating the other. These by no means necessarily agree with the Code.
Many conditions might be inserted: as that the wife should act as
maidservant to her mother-in-law, or to a first wife. The married couple
formed a unit as to external responsibility, especially for debt. The man
was responsible for debts contracted by his wife, even before her marriage,
as well as for his own; but he could use her as a mancipium. Hence the Code
allowed a proviso to be inserted in the marriage contract, that the wife
should not be seized for her husband's pre-nuptial debts; but enacted that
then he was not responsible for her pre-nuptial debts, and, in any case,
that both together were responsible for all debts contracted after
marriage. A man might make his wife a settlement by deed of gift, which
gave her a life interest in part of his property, and he might reserve to
her the right to bequeath it to a favourite child, but she could in no case
leave it to her family. Although married she always remained a member of
her father's house--she is rarely named wife of A, usually daughter of B,
or mother of C.
Divorce was optional with the man, but he had to restore the dowry and, if
the wife had borne him children, she had the [v.03 p.0119] custody of them.
He had then to assign her the income of field, or garden, as well as goods,
to maintain herself and children until they grew up. She then shared
equally with them in the allowance (and apparently in his estate at his
death) and was free to marry again. If she had no children, he returned her
the dowry and paid her a sum equivalent to the bride-price, or a mina of
silver, if there had been none. The latter is the forfeit usually named in
the contract for his repudiation of her.
If she had been a bad wife, the Code allowed him to send her away, while he
kept the children and her dowry; or he could degrade her to the position of
a slave in his own house, where she would have food and clothing. She might
bring an action against him for cruelty and neglect and, if she proved her
case, obtain a judicial separation, taking with her her dowry. No other
punishment fell on the man. If she did not prove her case, but was proved
to be a bad wife, she was drowned. If she were left without maintenance
during her husband's involuntary absence, she could cohabit with another
man, but must return to her husband if he came back, the children of the
second union remaining with their own father. If she had maintenance, a
breach of the marriage tie was adultery. Wilful desertion by, or exile of,
the husband dissolved the marriage, and if he came back he had no claim on
her property; possibly not on his own.
As a widow, the wife took her husband's place in the family, living on in
his house and bringing up the children. She could only remarry with
judicial consent, when the judge was bound to inventory the deceased's
estate and hand it over to her and her new husband in trust for the
children. They could not alienate a single utensil. If she did not remarry,
she lived on in her husband's house and took a child's share on the
division of his estate, when the children had grown up. She still retained
her dowry and any settlement deeded to her by her husband. This property
came to her children. If she had remarried, all her children shared equally
in her dowry, but the first husband's gift fell to his children or to her
selection among them, if so empowered.
Monogamy was the rule, and a childless wife might give her husband a maid
(who was no wife) to bear him children, who were reckoned hers. She
remained mistress of her maid and might degrade her to slavery again for
insolence, but could not sell her if she had borne her husband children. If
the wife did this, the Code did not allow the husband to take a concubine.
If she would not, he could do so. The concubine was a wife, though not of
the same rank; the first wife had no power over her. A concubine was a free
woman, was often dowered for marriage and her children were legitimate. She
could only be divorced on the same conditions as a wife. If a wife became a
chronic invalid, the husband was bound to maintain her in the home they had
made together, unless she preferred to take her dowry and go back to her
father's house; but he was free to remarry. In all these cases the children
were legitimate and legal heirs.
There was, of course, no hindrance to a man having children by a slave
girl. These children were free, in any case, and their mother could not be
sold, though she might be pledged, and she was free on her master's death.
These children could be legitimized by their father's acknowledgment before
witnesses, and were often adopted. They then ranked equally in sharing
their father's estate, but if not adopted, the wife's children divided and
took first choice.
Vestal virgins were not supposed to have children, yet they could and often
did marry. The Code contemplated that such a wife would give a husband a
maid as above. Free women might marry slaves and be dowered for the
marriage. The children were free, and at the slave's death the wife took
her dowry and half what she and her husband had acquired in wedlock for
self and children; the master taking the other half as his slave's heir.
A father had control over his children till their marriage. He had a right
to their labour in return for their keep. He might hire them out and
receive their wages, pledge them for debt, even sell them outright. Mothers
had the same rights in the absence of the father; even elder brothers when
both parents were dead. A father had no claim on his married children for
support, but they retained a right to inherit on his death.
The daughter was not only in her father's power to be given in marriage,
but he might dedicate her to the service of some god as a vestal or a
hierodule; or give her as a concubine. She had no choice in these matters,
which were often decided in her childhood. A grown-up daughter might wish
to become a votary, perhaps in preference to an uncongenial marriage, and
it seems that her father could not refuse her wish. In all these cases the
father might dower her. If he did not, on his death the brothers were bound
to do so, giving her a full child's share if a wife, a concubine or a
vestal, but one-third of a child's share if she were a hierodule or a
Marduk priestess. The latter had the privilege of exemption from state dues
and absolute disposal of her property. All other daughters had only a life
interest in their dowry, which reverted to their family, if childless, or
went to their children if they had any. A father might, however, execute a
deed granting a daughter power to leave her property to a favourite brother
or sister. A daughter's estate was usually managed for her by her brothers,
but if they did not satisfy her, she could appoint a steward. If she
married, her husband managed it.
The son also appears to have received his share on marriage, but did not
always then leave his father's house; he might bring his wife there. This
was usual in child marriages.
Adoption was very common, especially where the father (or mother) was
childless or had seen all his children grow up and marry away. The child
was then adopted to care for the parents' old age. This was done by
contract, which usually specified what the parent had to leave and what
maintenance was expected. The real children, if any, were usually
consenting parties to an arrangement which cut off their expectations. They
even, in some cases, found the estate for the adopted child who was to
relieve them of a care. If the adopted child failed to carry out the filial
duty the contract was annulled in the law courts. Slaves were often adopted
and if they proved unfilial were reduced to slavery again.
A craftsman often adopted a son to learn the craft. He profited by the
son's labour. If he failed to teach his son the craft, that son could
prosecute him and get the contract annulled. This was a form of
apprenticeship, and it is not clear that the apprentice had any filial
relation.
A man who adopted a son, and afterwards married and had a family of his
own, could dissolve the contract but must give the adopted child one-third
of a child's share in goods, but no real estate. That could only descend in
the family to which he had ceased to belong. Vestals frequently adopted
daughters, usually other vestals, to care for their old age.
Adoption had to be with consent of the real parents, who usually executed a
deed making over the child, who thus ceased to have any claim upon them.
But vestals, hierodules, certain palace officials and slaves had no rights
over their children and could raise no obstacle. Foundlings and
illegitimate children had no parents to object. If the adopted child
discovered his true parents and wanted to return to them, his eye or tongue
was torn out. An adopted child was a full heir, the contract might even
assign him the position of eldest son. Usually he was residuary legatee.
All legitimate children shared equally in the father's estate at his death,
reservation being made of a bride-price for an unmarried son, dower for a
daughter or property deeded to favourite children by the father. There was
no birthright attaching to the position of eldest son, but he usually acted
as executor and after considering what each had already received equalized
the shares. He even made grants in excess to the others from his own share.
When there were two mothers, the two families shared equally in the
father's estate until later times when the first family took two-thirds.
Daughters, in the absence of sons, had sons' rights. Children also shared
their own mother's property, but had no share in that of a stepmother.
A father could disinherit a son in early times without restriction, but the
Code insisted upon judicial consent and that only for repeated unfilial
conduct. In early times the son who denied his father had his front hair
shorn, a slave-mark put on him, and [v.03 p.0120] could be sold as a slave;
while if he denied his mother he had his front hair shorn, was driven round
the city as an example and expelled his home, but not degraded to slavery.
Adultery was punished with the death of both parties by drowning, but if
the husband was willing to pardon his wife, the king might intervene to
pardon the paramour. For incest with his own mother, both were burned to
death; with a stepmother, the man was disinherited; with a daughter, the
man was exiled; with a daughter-in-law, he was drowned; with a son's
betrothed, he was fined. A wife who for her lover's sake procured her
husband's death was gibbeted. A betrothed girl, seduced by her prospective
father-in-law, took her dowry and returned to her family, and was free to
marry as she chose.
In the criminal law the ruling principle was the _lex talionis_. Eye for
eye, tooth for tooth, limb for limb was the penalty for assault upon an
_amelu_. A sort of symbolic retaliation was the punishment of the offending
member, seen in the cutting off the hand that struck a father or stole a
trust; in cutting off the breast of a wet-nurse who substituted a
changeling for the child entrusted to her; in the loss of the tongue that
denied father or mother (in the Elamite contracts the same penalty was
inflicted for perjury); in the loss of the eye that pried into forbidden
secrets. The loss of the surgeon's hand that caused loss of life or limb;
or the brander's hand that obliterated a slave's identification mark, are
very similar. The slave, who struck a freeman or denied his master, lost an
ear, the organ of hearing and symbol of obedience. To bring another into
danger of death by false accusation was punished by death. To cause loss of
liberty or property by false witness was punished by the penalty the
perjurer sought to bring upon another.
The death penalty was freely awarded for theft and other crimes regarded as
coming under that head; for theft involving entrance of palace or temple
treasury, for illegal purchase from minor or slave, for selling stolen
goods or receiving the same, for common theft in the open (in default of
multiple restoration) or receiving the same, for false claim to goods, for
kidnapping, for assisting or harbouring fugitive slaves, for detaining or
appropriating same, for brigandage, for fraudulent sale of drink, for
disorderly conduct of tavern, for delegation of personal service, for
misappropriating the levy, for oppression of feudal holders, for causing
death of a householder by bad building. The manner of death is not
specified in these cases. This death penalty was also fixed for such
conduct as placed another in danger of death. A specified form of death
penalty occurs in the following cases: gibbeting (on the spot where crime
was committed) for burglary, later also for encroaching on the king's
highway, for getting a slave-brand obliterated, for procuring husband's
death; burning for incest with own mother, for vestal entering or opening
tavern, for theft at fire (on the spot); drowning for adultery, rape of
betrothed maiden, bigamy, bad conduct as wife, seduction of
daughter-in-law.
A curious extension of the _talio_ is the death of creditor's son for his
father's having caused the death of debtor's son as mancipium; of builder's
son for his father's causing the death of house-owner's son by building the
house badly; the death of a man's daughter because her father caused the
death of another man's daughter.
The contracts naturally do not concern such criminal cases as the above, as
a rule, but marriage contracts do specify death by strangling, drowning,
precipitation from a tower or pinnacle of the temple or by the iron sword
for a wife's repudiation of her husband. We are quite without evidence as
to the executive in all these cases.
Exile was inflicted for incest with a daughter; disinheritance for incest
with a stepmother or for repeated unfilial conduct. Sixty strokes of an
ox-hide scourge were awarded for a brutal assault on a superior, both being
_amelu_. Branding (perhaps the equivalent of degradation to slavery) was
the penalty for slander of a married woman or vestal. Deprivation of office
in perpetuity fell upon the corrupt judge. Enslavement befell the
extravagant wife and unfilial children. Imprisonment was common, but is not
recognized by the Code.
The commonest of all penalties was a fine. This is awarded by the Code for
corporal injuries to a _muskinu_ or slave (paid to his master); for damages
done to property, for breach of contract. The restoration of goods
appropriated, illegally bought, or damaged by neglect, was usually
accompanied by a fine, giving it the form of multiple restoration. This
might be double, treble, fourfold, fivefold, sixfold, tenfold, twelvefold,
even thirtyfold, according to the enormity of the offence.
The Code recognized the importance of intention. A man who killed another
in a quarrel must swear he did not do so intentionally, and was then only
fined according to the rank of the deceased. The Code does not say what
would be the penalty of murder, but death is so often awarded where death
is caused that we can hardly doubt that the murderer was put to death. If
the assault only led to injury and was unintentional, the assailant in a
quarrel had to pay the doctor's fees. A brander, induced to remove a
slave's identification mark, could swear to his ignorance and was free. The
owner of an ox which gored a man on the street was only responsible for
damages if the ox was known by him to be vicious, even if it caused death.
If the mancipium died a natural death under the creditor's hand, the
creditor was scot free. In ordinary cases responsibility was not demanded
for accident or for more than proper care. Poverty excused bigamy on the
part of a deserted wife.
On the other hand carelessness and neglect were severely punished, as in
the case of the unskilful physician, if it led to loss of life or limb his
hands were cut off, a slave had to be replaced, the loss of his eye paid
for to half his value; a veterinary surgeon who caused the death of an ox
or ass paid quarter value; a builder, whose careless workmanship caused
death, lost his life or paid for it by the death of his child, replaced
slave or goods, and in any case had to rebuild the house or make good any
damages due to defective building and repair the defect as well. The
boat-builder had to make good any defect of construction or damage due to
it for a year's warranty.
Throughout the Code respect is paid to status.
Suspicion was not enough. The criminal must be taken in the act, _e.g._ the
adulterer, ravisher, &c. A man could not be convicted of theft unless the
goods were found in his possession.
In the case of a lawsuit the plaintiff preferred his own plea. There is no
trace of professional advocates, but the plea had to be in writing and the
notary doubtless assisted in the drafting of it. The judge saw the plea,
called the other parties before him and sent for the witnesses. If these
were not at hand he might adjourn the case for their production, specifying
a time up to six months. Guarantees might be entered into to produce the
witnesses on a fixed day. The more important cases, especially those
involving life and death, were tried by a bench of judges. With the judges
were associated a body of elders, who shared in the decision, but whose
exact function is not yet clear. Agreements, declarations and
non-contentious cases are usually witnessed by one judge and twelve elders.
Parties and witnesses were put on oath. The penalty for false witness was
usually that which would have been awarded the convicted criminal. In
matters beyond the knowledge of men, as the guilt or innocence of an
alleged wizard or a suspected wife, the ordeal by water was used. The
accused jumped into the sacred river, and the innocent swam while the
guilty drowned. The accused could clear himself by oath where his own
knowledge was alone available. The plaintiff could swear to his loss by
brigands, as to goods claimed, the price paid for a slave purchased abroad
or the sum due to him. But great stress was laid on the production of
written evidence. It was a serious thing to lose a document. The judges
might be satisfied of its existence and terms by the evidence of the
witnesses to it, and then issue an order that whenever found it should be
given up. Contracts annulled were ordered to be broken. The court might go
a journey to view the property and even take with them the sacred symbols
on which oath was made.
The decision given was embodied in writing, sealed and witnessed by the
judges, the elders, witnesses and a scribe. Women might act in all these
capacities. The parties swore an [v.03 p.0121] oath, embodied in the
document, to observe its stipulations. Each took a copy and one was held by
the scribe to be stored in the archives.
Appeal to the king was allowed and is well attested. The judges at Babylon
seem to have formed a superior court to those of provincial towns, but a
defendant might elect to answer the charge before the local court and
refuse to plead at Babylon.
Finally, it may be noted that many immoral acts, such as the use of false
weights, lying, &c., which could not be brought into court, are severely
denounced in the Omen Tablets as likely to bring the offender into "the
hand of God" as opposed to "the hand of the king."
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Contracts in general: Oppert and Menant, _Documents
juridiques de l'Assyrie et de la Chaldee_ (Paris, 1877); J. Kohler and
F. E. Peiser, _Aus dem babylonischen Rechtsleben_ (Leipzig, 1890 ff.);
F. E. Peiser, _Babylonische Vertrage_ (Berlin, 1890), _Keilinschriftliche
Actenstuecke_ (Berlin, 1889); Br. Meissner, _Beitraege zur altbabylonischen
Privatrecht_ (Leipzig, 1893); F. E. Peiser, "Texte juristischen und
geschaeftlichen Inhalts," vol. iv. of Schrader's _Keilinschriftliche
Bibliothek_ (Berlin, 1896); C. H. W. Johns, _Assyrian Deeds and Documents
relating to the Transfer of Property_ (3 vols., Cambridge, 1898); H. Radau,
_Early Babylonian History_ (New York, 1900); C. H. W. Johns, _Babylonian
and Assyrian Laws, Contracts and Letters_ (Edinburgh, 1904). For editions
of texts and the innumerable articles in scientific journals see the
bibliographies and references in the above works. "The Code of Hammurabi,"
_Editio princeps_, by V. Scheil in tome iv. of the _Textes
Elamites-Semitiques_ of the _Memoires de la delegation en Perse_ (Paris,
1902); H. Winckler, "Die Gesetze Hammurabis Koenigs von Babylon um 2250 v.
Chr." _Der alte Orient_, iv. Jahrgang, Heft 4; D. H. Mueller, _Die Gesetze
Hammurabis_ (Vienna, 1903); J. Kohler and F. E. Peiser, _Hammurabis Gesetz_
(Leipzig, 1904); R. F. Harper, _The Code of Hammurabi, King of Babylon
about 2250 B.C._ (Chicago, 1904); S. A. Cook, _The Laws of Moses and the
Code of Hammurabi_ (London, 1903).
(C. H. W. J.)
[1] For the transliteration of Babylonian and Assyrian names generally, see
BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA, section ix., _Proper Names_.
BACAU, the capital of the department of Bacau, Rumania; situated among the
foothills of the Carpathian Mountains, and on the river Bistritza, which
enters the river Sereth 5 m. S. Pop. (1900) 16,187, including 7850 Jews.
Although of modern growth, Bacau is one of the chief commercial centres in
Moldavia, possessing many large timber yards. It is on the main railway
from Czernovitz, in Bukovina, to Galatz; and on two branch lines, one of
which enters Transylvania through the Ghimesh Pass, while both give access
to the salt mines, petroleum wells and forests of the Carpathians.
BACCARAT, a gambling card-game (origin of name unknown), supposed to have
been introduced into France from Italy during the reign of Charles VIII.
There are two accepted varieties of the game--_baccarat chemin de fer_
(railway) and _baccarat banque_ (or _a deux tableaux_). In _baccarat chemin
de fer_ six full packs of cards are used. These are shuffled by a croupier
and then by any of the players who wish to do so. From three to eleven
persons may play. Counters are generally used and are sold by the banker
who afterwards redeems them. The croupier takes a number of cards from the
top of the pack and passes them to the player on his right (sometimes left)
who becomes banker, a position which he holds until he loses, when the deal
passes to the player next in order. The other players are called _punters_.
The banker places before him the sum he wishes to stake and the punters do
likewise, unless a punter desires to _go bank_, signifying his intention by
saying, _Banco!_ In this case he plays against the entire stake of the
banker. After the stakes have been made the dealer deals a card to his
right for the punters, then one to himself, then a third to his left for
the punters and, finally, another to himself, all face downwards. Court
cards and tens count nothing; all others the number of their pips. Each
punter looks at his cards, and any one having 8 or 9 turns his card up and
announces it, the hand then being at an end. The player having the highest
stake plays for both punters, and if the card turned is better than that of
the banker, the latter pays each punter the amount of his stake. If not,
the banker wins all stakes and the game proceeds as before. If no
announcement is made, meaning that neither player holds 8 or 9, the banker
deals another card to the player on his right, who, if his first card is 6
or 7, will refuse it, fearing to overrun. The second card is turned face
upwards on the table. If his card is 5 he may, or may not, accept the
second card, according to his judgment. In case of his refusal the card is
offered to the second punter. If the first card is _baccarat_ (_i.e._
amounts to 0) or 1, 2, 3 or 4, a punter always accepts the second card. The
banker then decides whether he will draw another card himself or expose his
original ones, and when he has made his play pays or receives according as
he wins or loses. Ties neither win nor lose but go over to the next deal. A
player who has lost on _going bank_ may go bank again, but no player may go
bank more than twice in succession. In the variation _baccarat banque_ (or
_a deux tableaux_), three packs of cards are used and the banker is
permanent; the player who offers to risk the largest amount occupying the
position. A line is drawn across the table and any one wishing to do so may
place his stake _a cheval_, _i.e._ on the line. Stakes so placed neither
win nor lose if one side wins and the other loses, but win if both sides
win and are lost if both sides lose. The laws of baccarat are complicated
and no one code is accepted as authoritative, the different clubs making
their own rules.
See Badoureau, _Etude mathematique sur le jeu de baccarat_ (Paris, 1881);
L. Billard, _Breviaire du baccara experimental_ (Paris, 1883).
BACCHANALIA, the Lat. name for the wild and mystic festivals of Bacchus
(Dionysus). They were introduced into Rome from lower Italy by way of
Etruria, and held in secret, attended by women only, on three days in the
year in the grove of Simila (_Stimula_, _Semele_; Ovid, _Fasti_, vi. 503),
near the Aventine hill. Subsequently, admission to the rites were extended
to men and celebrations took place five times a month. The evil reputation
of these festivals, at which the grossest debaucheries took place, and all
kinds of crimes and political conspiracies were supposed to be planned, led
in 186 B.C. to a decree of the senate--the so-called _Senatus consultum de
Bacchanalibus_, inscribed on a bronze tablet discovered in Calabria (1640),
now at Vienna--by which the Bacchanalia were prohibited throughout the
whole of Italy, except in certain special cases, in which the senate
reserved the right of allowing them, subject to certain restrictions. But,
in spite of the severe punishment inflicted upon those who were found to be
implicated in the criminal practices disclosed by state investigation, the
Bacchanalia were not stamped out, at any rate in the south of Italy, for a
very long time (Livy xxxix. 8-19, 41; xl. 19).
BACCHYLIDES, Greek lyric poet, was born at Iulis, in the island of Ceos.
His father's name was probably Meidon; his mother was a sister of
Simonides, himself a native of Iulis. Eusebius says that Bacchylides
"flourished" ([Greek: ekmazen]) in Ol. 78. 2 (467 B.C.). As the term
[Greek: ekmazen] refers to the physical prime, and was commonly placed at
about the fortieth year, we may suppose that Bacchylides was born _circa_
507 B.C. Among his Odes the earliest that can be approximately dated is
xii.,[1] which may belong to 481 or 479 B.C.; the latest is vi., of which
the date is fixed by the recently found fragment of the Olympic register to
Ol. 82. 1 (452 B.C.). He would thus have been some forty-nine years younger
than his uncle Simonides, and some fifteen years younger than Pindar.
Elsewhere Eusebius states that Bacchylides "was of repute" ([Greek:
egnorizeto]) in Ol. 87. 2 (431 B.C.); and Georgius Syncellus, using the
same word, gives Ol. 88 (428-425 B.C.). The phrase would mean that he was
then in the fulness of years and of fame. There is nothing improbable in
the supposition that he survived the beginning of the Peloponnesian war.
Bacchylides, like Simonides and Pindar, visited the court of Hiero I. of
Syracuse (478-467). In his fifth Ode (476 B.C.), the word [Greek: xenos]
(v. 11) has been taken to mean that he had already been the guest of the
prince; and, as Simonides went to Sicily in or about 477 B.C., that is not
unlikely. Ode iii. (468 B.C.) was possibly written at Syracuse, as verses
15 and 16 suggest. He there pays a high compliment to Hiero's taste in
poetry (ver. 3 ff.). A scholium on _Pyth._ ii. 90 (166) avers that Hiero
preferred the Odes of Bacchylides to those of Pindar. The Alexandrian
scholars interpreted a number of passages in Pindar as hostile allusions to
Bacchylides or Simonides. If the scholiasts [v.03 p.0122] are right, it
would appear that Pindar regarded the younger of the two Cean poets as a
jealous rival, who disparaged him to their common patron (schol. _Pyth._
ii. 52 f.), and as one whose poetical skill was due to study rather than to
genius (_Ol._ ii. 91-110). In _Olymp._ ii. 96 the dual [Greek: garueton],
if it does not refer to the uncle and nephew, remains mysterious; nor does
it admit of probable emendation.[2] One would gladly reject this tradition,
to which the scholia so frequently refer; yet it would be rash to assume
that it rested merely on surmise. The Alexandrians may have possessed
evidence on the subject which is now lost. It is tolerably certain that the
three poets were visitors at Hiero's court at about the same time: Pindar
and Bacchylides wrote odes of the same kind in his honour; and there was a
tradition that he preferred the younger poet. There is thus no intrinsic
improbability in the hypothesis that Pindar's haughty spirit had suffered,
or imagined, some mortification. It is noteworthy that, whereas in 476 and
470 both he and Bacchylides celebrated Hiero's victories, in 468 (the most
important occasion of all) Bacchylides alone was commissioned to do so;
although in that year Pindar composed an ode (_Olymp._ vi.) for another
Syracusan victor at the same festival. Nor is it difficult to conceive that
a despot such as Hiero, whose constitutional position was ill-defined, and
who was perhaps all the more exigent of deference on that account, may have
found the genial Ionian a more agreeable courtier than Pindar, an
aristocrat of the Boeoto-Aeolic type, not unmindful of "his fathers the
Aegidae," and rather prone to link the praises of his patron with a lofty
intimation of his own claims (see, _e.g._, _Olymp._ i. _ad fin._). But,
whatever may have been the true bearing of Pindar's occasional innuendoes,
it is at any rate pleasant to find that in the extant work of Bacchylides
there is not the faintest semblance of hostile allusion to any rival. Nay,
one might almost imagine a compliment to Pindar, when, in mentioning
Hesiod, he calls him [Greek: Boiotos aner].
Plutarch (_de Exilio_, p. 605 c) names Bacchylides in a list of writers,
who after they had been banished from their native cities, were active and
successful in literature. It was Peloponnesus that afforded a new home to
the exiled poet. The passage gives no clue to date or circumstance; but it
implies that Peloponnesus was the region where the poet's genius ripened
and where he did the work which established his fame. This points to a
residence of considerable length; and it may be noted that some of the
poems illustrate their author's intimate knowledge of Peloponnesus. Thus in
Ode viii., for Automedes of Phlius, he draws on the legends connected with
the Phliasian river Asopus. In Ode x., starting from the Argive legend of
Proetus and Acrisius, he tells how the Arcadian cult of Artemis [Greek:
Hemera] was founded. In one of his dithyrambs (xix.) he treated the legend
of Idas (a Messenian hero) and Marpessa in the form of a _hymenaeus_ sung
by maidens of Sparta.
The Alexandrian scholars, who drew up select lists of the best writers in
each kind, included Bacchylides in their "canon" of the nine lyric poets,
along with Alcman, Sappho, Alcaeus, Stesichorus, Ibycus, Anacreon,
Simonides and Pindar. The Alexandrian grammarian Didymus (_circ._ 30 B.C.)
wrote a commentary on the epinikian odes of Bacchylides. Horace, a poet in
some respects of kindred genius, was a student of his works, and imitated
him (according to Porphyrion) in _Odes_, i. 15, where Nereus predicts the
destruction of Troy. Quotations from Bacchylides, or references to him,
occur in Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Strabo, Plutarch, Stobaeus, Athenaeus,
Aulus Gellius, Zenobius, Hephaestion, Clement of Alexandria, and various
grammarians or scholiasts. Ammianus Marcellinus (xxv. 4) says that the
emperor Julian enjoyed reading Bacchylides. It is clear, then, that this
poet continued to be popular during at least the first four centuries of
our era. No inference adverse to his repute can fairly be drawn from the
fact that no mention of him occurs in the extant work of any Attic writer.
The only definite estimate of him by an ancient critic occurs in the
treatise [Greek: Peri Hupsous] commonly translated "On the Sublime," but
meaning rather, "On the Sources of Elevation in Style"; a work ambiguously
ascribed to Cassius Longinus (_circ._ A.D. 260), but more probably due to
some writer of the first century of our era. In chapter xxxiii. of that
treatise, the author asks whether we ought to prefer "greatness" in
literature, with some attendant faults, to flawless merit on a lower level,
and of course replies in the affirmative. In tragedy, he asks, who would be
Ion of Chios rather than Sophocles; or in lyric poetry, Bacchylides rather
than Pindar? Yet Bacchylides and Ion are "faultless, with a style of
perfect elegance and finish." In short, the essayist regards Bacchylides as
a thoroughly finished poet of the second class, who never commits glaring
faults, but never reaches the loftier heights.
The first and most general quality of style in Bacchylides is his perfect
simplicity and clearness. Where the text is not corrupt, there are few
sentences which are not lucid in meaning and simple in structure. This
lucidity is partly due, no doubt, to the fact that he seldom attempts
imagery of the bolder kind, and never has thoughts of a subtle or complex
order. Yet it would be very unjust to regard such clearness as merely a
compensatory merit of lyric mediocrity, or to ignore its intimate connexion
with the man's native grace of mind, with the artist's feeling for
expression, with the poet's delicate skill. How many readers, who could
enjoy and appreciate Pindar if he were less difficult, are stopped on the
threshold by the aspect of his style, and are fain to save their
self-esteem by concluding that he is at once turgid and shallow! A pellucid
style must always have been a source of wide, though modest, popularity for
Bacchylides. If it be true that Hiero preferred him to Pindar, and that he
was a favourite with Julian, those instances suggest the charm which he
must always have had for cultivated readers to whom affairs did not leave
much leisure for study, and who rejoiced in a poet with whom they could
live on such easy terms.
Another prominent trait in the style of Bacchylides is his love of
picturesque detail. This characteristic marks the fragment by which, before
the discovery of the 1896 MS., he was best known--a passage, from one of
his paeans, on the blessings of peace (fr. 13, Bergk, 3, Jebb); and it
frequently appears in the Odes, especially in the mythical narratives.
Greater poets can make an image flash upon the mind, as Pindar sometimes
does, by a magic phrase, or by throwing one or two salient points into
strong relief. The method of Bacchylides is usually quieter; he paints
cabinet pictures. Observation and elegance do more for him than grasp or
piercing insight; but his work is often of very high excellence in its own
kind. His treatment of simile is only a special phase of this general
tendency. It is exemplified by the touches with which he elaborates the
simile of the eagle in Ode v., and that of the storm-tossed mariners in Ode
xii. This full development of simile is Homeric in manner, but not Homeric
in motive: Homer's aim is vividness; Bacchylides is rather intent on the
decorative value of the details themselves. There are occasional flashes of
brilliancy in his imagery, when it is lit up by his keen sense of beauty or
splendour in external nature. A radiance, "as of fire," streams from the
forms of the Nereids (xvi. 103 ff.). An athlete shines out among his
fellows like "the bright moon of the mid-month night" among the stars
(viii. 27 ff.). The sudden gleam of hope which comes to the Trojans by the
withdrawal of Achilles is like a ray of sunshine "from beneath the edge of
a storm-cloud" (xii. 105 ff.). The shades of the departed, as seen by
Heracles on the banks of the Cocytus, are compared to the countless leaves
fluttering in the wind on "the gleaming headlands of Ida" (v. 65 ff.)--an
image not unworthy of Dante or of Milton.
Among the minor features of this poet's style the most remarkable is his
use of epithets. A god or goddess nearly always receives some ornamental
epithet; sometimes, indeed, two or even three (_e.g._ [Greek:
kalukostephanou semnas ... Artemidos leukolenou], v. 98 f.). Such a trait
is in unison with the epic manner, the straightforward narrative, which we
find in some of the larger poems (as in v., x., and xvi.). On the other
hand, the copious use of such ornament has the disadvantage that it
sometimes gives a tinge of conventionality to his work. This impression is
somewhat strengthened by the fact that many [v.03 p.0123] of the epithets
are long compound words, not found elsewhere and (in some cases at least)
probably invented by the poet; words which suggest a deliberate effort to
vary the stock repertory.
The poems contained in the MS. of Bacchylides found (see below) in 1896 are
of two classes: I. _Odes of Victory_; II. _Dithyrambs_. The Ode of Victory,
[Greek: epinikion (melos] or [Greek: epinikos (humnos], is a form derived
from the [Greek: humnos], which was properly a song in praise of a deity.
Stesichorus (c. 610 B.C.) seems to have been the first who composed hymns
in honour, not of gods, but of heroes; the next step was to write hymns in
celebration of victories by living men. This custom arose in the second
half of the 6th century B.C., the age in which the games at the four great
Greek festivals reached the fulness of their popularity. Simonides (b. c.
556 B.C.) was the earliest recorded writer of _epinikia_. His odes of this
class are now represented only by a few very small fragments, some twenty
lines in all. Two of these fragments, belonging to the description of a
chariot-race, warrant the belief that Simonides, in his epinikia, differed
from Pindar in dwelling more on the incidents of the particular victory.
The same characteristic is found in the epinikia of Bacchylides. His fifth
ode, and Pindar's first _Olympian_, alike celebrate the victory of the
horse Pherenicus; but, while Pindar's reference to the race itself is
slight and general (vv. 20-22), Bacchylides describes the running of the
winner much more vividly and fully (vv. 37-49).
The MS. contains fourteen epinikia, or thirteen if Blass be right in
supposing that Odes vi. and vii., as numbered by Kenyon in the _editio
princeps_, are parts of a single ode (for Lachon of Ceos). Four (or on the
view just stated, three) of the odes relate to the Olympian festival; two
to the Pythian; three to the Isthmian; three to the Nemean; and one to a
Thessalian festival called the [Greek: Petraia]. This comes last. The order
in which the MS. arranges the other epinikia seems to be casual; at least
it does not follow (1) the alphabetical sequence of the victors' names, or
of the names of their cities; nor (2) chronological sequence; nor (3)
classification by contests; nor (4) classification by festivals--except
that the four great festivals precede the _Petraea_. The first ode,
celebrating a victory of the Cean Argeios at the Isthmus, may possibly have
been placed there for a biographical reason, viz., because the poet treated
in it the early legends of his native island.
A mythical narrative, connected in some way with the victor or his city,
usually occupies the central part of the Pindaric ode. It serves to lift
the poem into an ideal region, and to invest it with more than a local or
temporary significance. The method of Bacchylides in this department of the
epinikion is best illustrated by the myth of Croesus in Ode iii., that of
Heracles and Meleager in Ode v., and that of the Proetides in Ode x.
Pindar's habit is to select certain moments or scenes of a legend, which he
depicts with great force and vividness. Bacchylides, on the other hand, has
a gentle flow of simple epic narrative; he relies on the interest of the
story as a whole, rather than on his power of presenting situations.
Another element, always present in the longer odes of victory, is that
which may be called the "gnomic." Here, again, there is a contrast between
the two poets. Pindar packs his [Greek: gnomai], his maxims or moral
sentiments, into terse and sometimes obscure epigrams; he utters them in a
didactic tone, as of one who can speak with the commanding voice of Delphic
wisdom. The moralizing of Bacchylides is rather an utterance of quiet
meditation, sometimes recalling the strain of Ionian gnomic elegy.
The epinikia of Bacchylides are followed in the MS. by six compositions
which the Alexandrians classed under the general name of [Greek:
dithuramboi], and which we, too, must be content to describe collectively
as _Dithyrambs_. The derivation of [Greek: di-thurambos] is uncertain:
[Greek: di] may be the root seen in [Greek: dios] (cp. [Greek: dipolia],
and [Greek: thurambos] another form of [Greek: thriambos], a word by which
Cratinus (c. 448 B.C.) denotes some kind of hymn to the wine-god. The
"dithyramb," first mentioned by Archilochus (c. 670 B.C.), received a
finished and choral form from Arion of Lesbos (c. 600 B.C.). His
dithyrambs, produced at Corinth, belonged to the cult of Dionysus, and the
members of his chorus ([Greek: tragikos choros]) personated satyrs.
Originally concerned with the birth of the god, the dithyramb came to deal
with all his fortunes: then its scope became still larger; it might
celebrate, not Dionysus alone, but any god or hero. This last development
had taken place before the close of the 6th century B.C. Simonides wrote a
dithyramb on Memnon and Tithonus; Pindar, on Orion and on Heracles. Hence
the Alexandrian scholars used [Greek: dithurambos] in a wide sense, as
denoting simply a lyric poem occupied with a mythical narrative. Thus Ode
xvii. of Bacchylides (relating the voyage of Theseus to Crete), though it
was clearly a [Greek: paian] for the Delian Apollo, was classed by the
Alexandrians among his "dithyrambs"--as appears not only from its place in
our MS., but also from the allusion of Servius (on _Aen_. vi. 21). The six
dithyrambs of Bacchylides are arranged in (approximately) alphabetical
order: [Greek: Antenoridai, Herakles, Eitheoi e Theseus, Theseus, Io,
Idas]. The principal feature, best exemplified by the first and third, is
necessarily epic narrative,--often adorned with touches of picturesque
detail, and animated by short speeches in the epic manner.
Several other classes of composition are represented by those fragments of
Bacchylides, preserved in ancient literature, which were known before the
discovery of the new MS. (1) [Greek: humnoi]. Among these we hear of the
[Greek: apopemptikoi], hymns of pious farewell, speeding some god on his
way at the season when he passed from one haunt to another. (2) [Greek:
paianes], represented by the well-known fragment on the blessings of peace.
(3) [Greek: prosodia], choral odes sung during processions to temples. (4)
[Greek: huporchemata], lively dance-songs for religious festivals. (5)
[Greek: erotika], represented by five fragments of a class akin to [Greek:
skolia], drinking-songs. Under this head come some lively and humorous
verses on the power of wine, imitated by Horace (_Odes_, iii. 21. 13-20).
It may be conjectured that the facile grace and bright fancy of Bacchylides
were seen to especial advantage in light compositions of this kind. (6) The
elegiacs of Bacchylides are represented by two [Greek: epigrammata
anathematika], each of four lines, in the Palatine Anthology. The first
(_Anth_. vi. 313) is an inscription for an offering commemorative of a
victory gained by a chorus with a poem written by Bacchylides. The second
(_Anth_. vi. 53) is an inscription for a shrine dedicated to Zephyrus. Its
authenticity has been questioned, but not disproved.
The papyrus containing the odes of Bacchylides was found in Egypt by
natives, and reached the British Museum in the autumn of 1896. It was then
in about 200 pieces. By the skill and industry of Mr F. G. Kenyon, the
editor of the _editio princeps_ (1897), the MS. was reconstructed from
these lacerated members. As now arranged, the MS. consists of three
sections, (1) The first section contains 22 columns of writing. It breaks
off after the 8 opening verses of Ode xii. (2) The second section contains
columns 23-29. Of these, column 23 is represented only by the last letters
of two words. This section comprises what remains of Odes xiii. and xiv. It
breaks off before the end of xiv., which is the last of the epinikia. (3)
The third section comprises columns 30-39. It begins with the mutilated
opening verses of Ode xv. ([Greek: Antenoridai], the first of the
dithyrambs), and breaks off after verse 11 of the last dithyramb,[Greek:
Idas]. The number of lines in a column varies from 32 to 36, the usual
number being 35, or (though less often) 34.
It is impossible to say how much has been lost between the end of column 29
and the beginning of column 30. Probably, however, Ode xiv., if not the
last, was nearly the last of the epinikia. It concerns a festival of a
merely local character, the Thessalian [Greek: Petraia], and was therefore
placed after the thirteen other epinikia, which are connected with the four
great festivals. The same lacuna leaves it doubtful whether any collective
title was prefixed to the [Greek: dithuramboi]. After the last column (39)
of the MS., a good deal has probably been lost. Bacchylides seems to have
written at least three other poems of this class (on Cassandra, Laocoon and
Philoctetes); and these would have come, in alphabetical order, after the
last of the extant six (Idas).
The writing of the MS. is a fine uncial. It presents some traits of a
distinctly Ptolemaic type, though it lacks some features found in the
earlier Ptolemaic MSS. (those of the 3rd or 2nd century B.C.). Among the
characteristic forms of letters is the [form of Upsilon], with a shallow
curve on the top of the upright; a form found in MSS. ascribed to the 1st
century B.C., and different from the more fully formed upsilon of the Roman
period. Another very significant letter is the [Xi], written as [form of
Xi], a form which begins to go out after _c._ 50 B.C., giving place to one
in which the middle stroke is connected with the other two. From these and
other indications it is probable that the MS. is not later than the middle
of the 1st century B.C.
The scribe, though he sometimes corrected his own mistakes, was, on the
whole, careless of the sense, as of the metre; he seems to have been a
mechanical copyist, excellent in penmanship, but [v.03 p.0124] intent only
on the letters. The MS. has received corrections or small supplements from
at least two different persons. One of them (Kenyon's A^2) was
contemporary, or nearly so, with the scribe. The other (A^3) was
considerably later; he wrote a Roman cursive which might belong to the end
of the 1st century A.D., or to the early part of the 2nd. The correctors
seem to be generally trustworthy; though, like the scribe, they were
inattentive to metre, passing over many metrical faults which could easily
have been removed. They appear to have compared their MS. with another, or
others; but they sometimes made a bad use of such aid, intruding a false
reading where their text had the true one.
Breathings are generally added, especially rough breathings; the form is
usually square, but sometimes partially rounded. Accents are added, not to
all words, but only, as a rule, to those which might cause doubt or
difficulty to the reader. This was the Alexandrian practice, accents being
regarded as aids to correct reading, and more liberally used when the
dialect was not Attic. In accordance with the older system, the accent is
not written on the last syllable of a word; when the accent falls there, a
grave accent is written on the preceding syllable, or on two such syllables
(_e.g._ [Greek: blechras, pauthales]).
As Kenyon observes, no MS. of equal antiquity is so well supplied with
accents. The MS. which comes nearest to it in this respect is the Alcman
fragment in the Louvre, which is of similar or slightly higher age,
belonging perhaps to the early part of the 1st century A.D.; and in that
MS. the comparatively frequent accents were doubtless designed to aid
readers unfamiliar with Alcman's Laconian Doric. With regard to other
grammatical or metrical signs ([Greek: prosoidiai]) used in the Bacchylides
MS., there is not much that calls for special remark. The punctuation,
whether by the scribe or by correctors, is very sparse, and certainly
cannot always be regarded as authoritative. The signs denoting the end of a
strophe or antistrophe (_paragraphus_), of an epode (_coronis_), or of an
ode (_asterisk_), are often omitted by the scribe, and, when employed, are
sometimes placed incorrectly, or employed in an irregular manner.
EDITIONS.--F. G. Kenyon, _Ed. princeps_ (1897); F. Blass, 3rd ed. (1904);
H. Jurenka (1898); N. Festa, text, translation and notes (1898). [The
latest edition is by Sir Richard Jebb (1905), with introduction, notes,
translation, and bibliography; text only (1906). See also T. Zanghieri,
_Studi su Bacchilide, Bibliografia Bacchilidea, 1897-1905_ (1905)].
(R. C. J.)
[1] The references are given according to the numbering in Jebb's edition.
[2] For other explanations suggested, see Jebb's edition, Introd. p. 18.
BACCIO D'AGNOLO (_c._ 1460-1543), Florentine wood-carver, sculptor and
architect, had the family name of Baglioni, but was always known by the
abbreviation of Bartolommeo into Baccio and the use of d'Agnolo as meaning
the son of Angelo, his father's name. He started as a wood-carver, and
between 1491 and 1502 did much of the decorative carving in the church of
Santa Maria Novella and the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence. Having made his
reputation as a sculptor he appears to have turned his attention to
architecture, and to have studied at Rome, though at what precise date is
uncertain; but quite at the beginning of the 16th century he was engaged
with Simon Pollajuolo in restoring the Palazzo Vecchio, and in 1506 he was
commissioned to complete the drum of the cupola of the metropolitan church
of Santa Maria del Fiore. The latter work, however, was interrupted on
account of adverse criticisms from Michelangelo, and it remained
unexecuted. Baccio d' Agnolo also planned the Villa Borghese and the
Bartolini palace, with other fine palaces and villas. The Bartolini palace
was the first house to be given frontispieces of columns to the door and
windows, previously confined to churches; and he was ridiculed by the
Florentines for his innovation. Another much-admired work by him was the
campanile of the church of Santo Spirito. His studio was the resort of the
most celebrated artists of the day, Michelangelo, Sansovino, the brothers
Sangallo and the young Raphael. He died in 1543, leaving three sons, all
architects, the best-known being Giuliano.
BACH, JOHANN SEBASTIAN (1685-1750), German musical composer.
[Sidenote: Family.]
The Bach family was of importance in the history of music for nearly two
hundred years. Four branches of it were known at the beginning of the 16th
century, and in 1561 we hear of Hans Bach of Wechmar who is believed to be
the father of Veit Bach (born about 1555). The family genealogy, drawn up
by J. Sebastian Bach himself and completed by his son Philipp Emanuel,
describes Veit Bach as the founder of the family, a baker and a miller,
"whose zither must have sounded very pretty among the clattering of the
mill-wheels." His son, Hans Bach, "_der Spielmann_," is the first
professional musician of the family. Of Hans's large family the second son,
Christoph, was the grandfather of Sebastian Bach. Another son, Heinrich, of
Arnstadt, had two sons, Johann Michael and Johann Christoph, who are among
the greatest of J. S. Bach's forerunners, Johann Christoph being now
supposed (although this is still disputed) to be the author of the splendid
motet, _Ich lasse dich nicht_ ("I wrestle and pray"), formerly ascribed to
Sebastian Bach. Another descendant of Veit Bach, Johann Ludwig, was admired
more than any other ancestor by Sebastian, who copied twelve of his church
cantatas and sometimes added work of his own to them.
The Bach family never left Thuringia until the sons of Sebastian went into
a more modern world. Through all the misery of the peasantry at the period
of the Thirty Years' War this clan maintained its position and produced
musicians who, however local their fame, were among the greatest in Europe.
So numerous and so eminent were they that in Erfurt musicians were known as
"Bachs," even when there were no longer any members of the family in the
town. Sebastian Bach thus inherited the artistic tradition of a united
family whose circumstances had deprived them of the distractions of the
century of musical fermentation which in the rest of Europe had destroyed
polyphonic music.
[Sidenote: Biography.]
Johann Sebastian Bach was baptized at Eisenach on the 23rd of March 1685.
His parents died in his tenth year, and his elder brother, Johann
Christoph, organist at Ohrdruf, took charge of him and taught him music.
The elder brother is said to have been jealous of Sebastian's talent, and
to have forbidden him access to a manuscript volume of works by Froberger,
Buxtehude and other great organists. Every night for six months Sebastian
got up, put his hand through the lattice of the bookcase, and copied the
volume out by moonlight, to the permanent ruin of his eyesight (as is shown
by all the extant portraits of him at a later age and by the blindness of
his last years). When he had finished, his brother discovered the copy and
took it away from him. In 1700 Sebastian, now fifteen and thrown on his own
resources by the death of his brother, went to Lueneburg, where his
beautiful soprano voice obtained him an appointment at the school of St
Michael as chorister. He seems, however, to have worked more at
instrumental than at vocal music. Apart from the choristers' routine, his
position provided only for his general education, and we know little about
his definite musical instructors. In any case he owed his musical
development mainly to his own incessant study of classical and contemporary
composers, such as Frescobaldi (_c._ 1587), Caspar Kerl (1628-1693),
Buxtehude, Froberger, Muffat the elder, Pachelbel and probably Johann
Joseph Fux (1660-1741), the author of the _Gradus ad Parnassum_ on which
all later classical composers were trained. A prettier and no less
authentic story than that of his brother's forbidden organ-volume tells
how, on his return from one of the many holiday expeditions which Bach made
to Hamburg on foot to hear the great Dutch organist Reinken, he sat outside
an inn longing for the dinner he could not afford, when two herring-heads
were flung out of the window, and he found in each of them a ducat with
which he promptly paid his way, not home, but back to Hamburg. At Hamburg,
also, Keiser was laying the foundations of German opera on a splendid scale
which must have fired Bach's imagination though it never directly
influenced his style. On the other hand Keiser's church music was of
immense importance in his development. In Celle the famous _Hofkapelle_
brought the influence of French music to bear upon Bach's art, an influence
which inspired nearly all his works in suite-form and to which his many
autograph copies of Couperin's music bear testimony. Indeed, there is no
branch of music, from Palestrina onwards, conceivably accessible in Bach's
time, of which we do not find specimens carefully copied in his own
handwriting. On the other hand, when Bach, at the age of nineteen, became
organist at Arnstadt, he found Luebeck within easy distance, and there, in
October 1705, he went to hear Buxtehude, whose organ works show so close an
affinity to Bach's style that only their lack of coherence as wholes
reveals to the attentive listener that with all their nobility they are not
by Bach himself. Bach's enthusiasm for Buxtehude caused him to outstay his
leave by three months, and this, together with his [v.03 p.0125] habit of
astonishing the congregation by the way he harmonized the chorales got him
into trouble. But he was already too great an ornament to be lightly
dismissed; and though his answers to the complaints of the authorities
(every word of which makes amusing reading in the archives of the church)
were spirited rather than satisfactory, and the _consistorium_ had to add
to their complaints the grave scandal of his allowing a "strange maiden" to
sing in the church,[1] Bach was able to maintain his position at Arnstadt
until he obtained the organistship of St Blasius in Muehlhausen in 1707.
Here he married his cousin, easily identified with the "strange maiden" of
Arnstadt; and here he wrote his first great church cantatas, _Aus der
Tiefe_, _Gott ist mein Koenig_ and _Gottes Zeit_.
Bach's mastery of the keyboard attracted universal attention, and prevented
his ever being unemployed. In 1708 he went to Weimar where his successes
were crowned by his appointment, in 1714, at the age of twenty-nine, as
_Hofkonzertmeister_ to the duke of Weimar. Here the composition of sacred
music was one of his most congenial duties, and the great cantata, _Ich
hatte viel Bekuemmerniss_, was probably the first work of his new office.
In 1717 Bach visited Dresden in the course of a concert tour, and was
induced to challenge the arrogant French organist, J. Louis Marchand, who
was making himself thoroughly disliked by the German musicians who could
not deny his powers. Bach was first given an opportunity of listening
secretly to Marchand's playing, then a competition on the organ was
proposed, and a day was fixed for the tournament at which all the court and
all the musical celebrities of the town were to be present, to see nothing
less than the issue between French and German music. Marchand took up the
challenge contemptuously, but it would appear that he also was allowed to
listen secretly to Bach's playing, for on the day of the tournament the
only news of him was that he had left Dresden by the earliest coach.
This triumph was followed by Bach's appointment as _Kapellmeister_ to the
duke of Coethen, a post which he held from 1717 to 1723. The Coethen period
is that of Bach's central instrumental works, such as the first book of the
_Wohltemperirtes Klavier_, the solo violin and violoncello sonatas, the
Brandenburg concertos, and the French and English suites.
In 1723, finding his position at Coethen uninspiring for choral music, he
removed to Leipzig, where he became cantor of the Thomasschule, being still
able to retain his post as visiting _Kapellmeister_ at Coethen, besides a
similar position at Weissenfels. His wife had died in 1720, leaving seven
children, of whom Friedermann and Philipp Emanuel had a great future before
them. (For his sons see BACH, K. P. E., below.) In December 1721 Bach
married again, and for the beautiful soprano voice of his second wife he
wrote many of his most inspired arias. She was a great help to him with all
his work, and her musical handwriting soon became so like his own that her
copies are difficult to distinguish from his autographs. In 1729 Bach heard
that Handel was for a second time visiting Halle on his way back to London
from Italy. A former attempt of Bach's to meet Handel had failed, and now
he was too ill to travel, so he sent his son to Halle to invite Handel to
Leipzig; but the errand was not successful, and much to Bach's
disappointment he never met his only compeer. Bach so admired Handel that
he made a manuscript copy of his _Passion nach Brockes_. This work, though
almost unknown in England then as now, was, next to the oratorios of
Keiser, incomparably the finest Passion then accessible, as Graun's
beautiful masterpiece, _Der Tod Jesu_, was not composed until four years
after Bach's death. The disgusting poem of Brockes (which was set by every
German composer of the time) was transformed by Bach with real literary
skill as the groundwork of the non-scriptural numbers in his _Passion
according to St John_.
All Bach's most colossal achievements, such as the _Passion according to St
Matthew_ and the _B Minor Mass_ (for discussion of which see ORATORIO and
MASS), date from his cantorship at Leipzig. But, important and congenial as
was his position there, and smooth as the course of his life seems to have
been until his death in 1750, he must have had quite as much experience as
can have been good for him. He was often ruffled by the town councillors of
Leipzig, who (like his earlier employers at Arnstadt) were shocked by the
"unecclesiastical style" of his compositions and by his independent
bearing. But he had more serious troubles. Of his seven children by his
first wife only three survived him. By his second wife he had thirteen
children, of whom he lost four of the six sons. For the head of so large a
family his post was dignified rather than lucrative, and few documents tell
a prouder tale of uncomplaining thrift than the inventory of his
possessions made after his death. One can only be thankful that he did not
live to see anything but the wonderful promise of his son Friedermann, who,
in the words of the brilliantly successful K. Philipp Emanuel Bach, was
more nearly capable of replacing his father than all the rest of the family
together. The prospect of complete loss of the tradition of his own
polyphonic art he faced with equanimity, saying of the new style, which in
the hands of his own son, Philipp Emanuel, was soon to eclipse it for the
next hundred years, "The art has advanced to great heights: the old style
of music no longer pleases our modern ears." But it would have broken his
heart if he had forseen that Friedermann Bach was to attain a disreputable
old age after a dissolute and unproductive life.
The brilliant successes of Philipp Emanuel led to his appointment as
court-composer to the king of Prussia and hence, in 1747, to Sebastian's
being summoned to visit Frederick the Great at Potsdam, an incident which
Bach always regarded as the culmination of his career, much as Dr Johnson
regarded his interview with George III. Bach had to play on the numerous
newly invented pianofortes of Silbermann which the king had bought, and
also to try the organs of the churches of Potsdam. Frederick, whose musical
reputation rested on a genuine if narrow basis, gave him a splendid theme
on which to extemporize; and on that theme Bach afterwards wrote _Das
musikalische Opfer_. Two years after this event his sight began to fail,
and before long he shared the fate of Handel in becoming perfectly
blind.[2]
Bach died of apoplexy on the 28th of July 1750. His loss was deplored as
that of one of the greatest organists and clavier players of his time. Of
his compositions comparatively little was known. At his death his MS. works
were divided amongst his sons, and many of them have been lost; only a
small fraction of his greater works was recovered when, after the lapse of
nearly a century, the verdict of his neglectful posterity was reversed by
the modern upholders of polyphonic art. Even now some important works are
still apparently irrecoverable.
[Sidenote: Work and influence.]
The rediscovery of Bach is closely connected with the name of Mendelssohn,
who was amongst the first to proclaim by word and deed the powers of a
genius too gigantic to be grasped by three generations. By the enthusiastic
endeavours of Mendelssohn, Schumann and others, and in England still
earlier by the performances and publications of Wesley and Crotch, the
circle of Bach's worshippers rapidly increased. In 1850, a century after
his death, a society was started for the correct publication of all Bach's
remaining works. Robert Franz, the great song-writer, did good service in
arranging some of Bach's finest works for modern performance, until the
experience of a purer scholarship could prove not only the possibility but
the incomparably greater beauty of a strict adherence to Bach's own
scoring. The Porson of Bach-scholarship, however, is Wilhelm Rust (grandson
of the interesting composer of that name who wrote polyphonic suites and
fantasias early in the 19th century). During the fourteen years of his
editorship of the _Bach-Gesellschaft_ he displayed a steadily increasing
insight into Bach's style which has never since been rivalled. In more than
one case he has restored harmonies of priceless value from incomplete
texts, by means of research and reasoning which he sums up in a modest
footnote that reads as something self-evident. His prefaces to the
_Bach-Gesellschaft_ volumes are perhaps the most valuable contributions to
the criticism of 18th-century music ever written, Spitta's great biography
not excepted.
[v.03 p.0126] Bach's importance in the history of music cannot be
exaggerated. His art, neglected as old-fashioned and crabbed by his younger
contemporaries, survived only in certain limited aspects as the subject of
a desultory and unintelligent academic study, until its re-discovery by
Mendelssohn. And yet, whatever disguise may have been foisted on it by
corrupt traditions and ignorance of its idioms, whenever any fragment of it
gained the inner ear of a true composer the effect on the history of music
was immediate and profound. Indeed his influence is by no means chiefly
manifested in the time when his work became known in its larger aspects,
though the Bach-revival is very obviously connected with certain tendencies
in the "Romantic" movement in music. But, however clear we may consider
Bach's claim to the title of "the first of Romanticists," the full
influence of his whole work has hardly yet begun to show itself. Schumann
died before even such enthusiasts as the editors of the _Bach-Gesellschaft_
began to find more beauty than extravagance in Bach's ordinary musical
language (see, for example, Hauptmann's letters _passim_, _The Letters of a
Leipzig Cantor_, trans. by A. D. Coleridge, London, Novello, Ewer, 1892),
or, indeed, to grasp the main features of his designs.[3] The labours of
the _Bach-Gesellschaft_ have occupied more than fifty years, during which
about four-fifths of Bach's choral works have been published for the first
time; and it would be surprising if another fifty years sufficed to make
these adequately known to the world at large. It is difficult to make an
anthology of such bulky works as church-cantatas, nor does an anthology
meet the purpose where the whole work so constantly attains that excellence
for which the anthologist seeks. Except for practical difficulties (as when
Bach writes for obsolete instruments) the only reason why some cantatas are
better known than others is that a beginning must be made somewhere.
Indeed, a cantata was recently selected, on the ground of its popularity,
for a choral competition in a small English country town the year before it
was performed as a novelty in Berlin!
It is clear, then, that the influence of Bach's art as an understood whole
is still undeveloped. In the past history of music his part was hardly
suspected except by the great composers themselves; and, to any one
contemplating the art of the generation after him, it might have seemed
that both he and Handel had worked in vain. Yet his was the most subtle and
universal force in the development of music, even when his musical language
seemed hopelessly forgotten. Mozart, when rapidly advancing to the height
of his mastery, had but to read the Baron von Swieten's manuscript copies
of the motets and of the _Wohltemperirtes Klavier_, and his style, quite
apart from his immediate essays in the old art-forms, and apart also from
the influence of his study of Handel, developed a new polyphonic richness
and depth of harmony which steadily increased until his untimely death.
Beethoven studied all the accessible works of Bach profoundly, and
frequently quoted them in his sketch-books, often with a direct bearing on
his own works. His rendering of the _Wohltemperirtes Klavier_ is said to be
recorded in the marks of expression and _tempo_ given in Czerny's edition;
and if that record is true, Beethoven must have been completely in the dark
as to Bach's meaning in many important respects; but art is full of such
illustrations of the way in which great minds influence each other in spite
of every barrier which diversity of language and time can set. Beethoven's
great Thirty-three Variations on a Waltz by Diabelli were actually
described in the publisher's puff as worthy of their kinship with the
"Goldberg Variations" of Bach; and that kinship is revealed in its truest
light by a comparison between Beethoven's 31st variation and Bach's 25th;
for here, just where the resemblance is most obvious, each composer utters
his most intimate expression of feeling.
In the same way, Chopin is nowhere more characteristic than where he shows
his love of the _Wohltemperirtes Klavier_ in his Etudes and Preludes; and
so subtle is the influence of polyphonic style even over a writer so little
apt to make direct use of it as Chopin, that one of Schumann's few
plagiarisms occurs in his use of a phrase from Chopin's F minor Etude
(written for the _Methode des methodes_) as the subject of a fugue (Op. 72,
No. 3). And, apart from fugues, which Schumann cultivated assiduously at a
late stage in his career, the influence of Bach pervades the texture and
rhythm of his work in more ways than can easily be followed.
In a more external, but not less significant way, the _Passion according to
St Matthew_ made its mark on Mendelssohn from the time when he discovered
it at the age of twelve, and suggested to him many features in the general
design of oratorios, by means of which he rescued that branch of art from
the operatic influences that ruined Beethoven's _Mount of Olives_. Without
the example of Bach, Wagner's schemes of _Leitmotif_ would never in his
lifetime have become woven into that close polyphonic texture which secures
for his music a flow as continuous as that of drama itself:--and intimately
connected with this is the whole subject of Wagner's harmonization, which
in many of its boldest characteristics was foreshadowed by Bach. A close
study of the texture of Brahms's work shows that he develops Bach's and
Beethoven's artistic devices _pari passu_, and that the result is a
complete unification of that opposition between polyphony and form which in
the infancy of the sonata (as in every transitional stage in musical
history) threatened to wreck the art as a false antithesis wrecks a
philosophy. Perhaps the only great composers who escaped the direct
influence of Bach are Gluck and Berlioz. Even Gluck reproduced in every
detail of harmony and figure the first twelve bars of the _Gigue_ of Bach's
B flat Clavier-Partita in the aria "Je t'implore et je tremble" in
_Iphigenie en Tauride_. But plagiarism, however unconscious, is a very
different thing from that profound indebtedness which makes a great man
attain his truest originality; and Gluck's training practically deprived
him of Bach's direct influence, useful as that would have been to the
attainment of his aims in harmonic and choral expression. The indirect
influence no one could escape, for whatever in modern music is not
traceable to Sebastian Bach is traceable to his sons, who were encouraged
by their father in the cultivation of those infant art-forms which were so
soon to dazzle the world into the belief that his own work was obsolete.
Bach's place in music is thus far higher than that of a reformer, or even
of an inventor of new forms. He is a spectator of all musical time and
existence, to whom it is not of the smallest importance whether a thing be
new or old, so long as it is true. It is doubtful whether even the forms
most peculiar to him (such as the arpeggio-prelude) are of his invention.
Yet he left no form as he found it,--not even that most conventional of
all, the Da Capo Aria, which he did not outwardly alter in the least. On
the other hand, with every form he touched he said the last word. All the
material that could be assimilated into a mature art he vitalized in his
own way, and he had no imitators. The language of music changed at his
death, and his influence became all-pervading just because he was not the
prophet of the new art, but an unbiassed seeker of truth. Whether so great
a man becomes "progressive" or "reactionary" depends on the artistic
resources of his time. He will always work at the kind of art that is most
complete and consistent in all its aspects. The same spirit of truthfulness
that makes Sebastian Bach hold himself aloof from the progressive art which
he encourages in his sons, drives Beethoven to invent new forms and new
means of expression with every work he writes. Gluck abolished the Da Capo
Aria, because it was unfit for dramatic music. Bach did not abolish it,
because he did not intend to write dramatic music in the strict sense of
the term. Mature musical art in Bach's time could not be dramatic, except
in the loose sense in which the term may be applied to an epic poem.
Dramatic expression, properly so called, can only be attained in music by
the full development of resources that do not blend with those of Bach's
art at all. Meanwhile there are many things unsuitable for the stage which
are nevertheless valuable on purely musical grounds; and the Da Capo Aria
was one. Bach [v.03 p.0127] developed it in a great variety of ways, while
retaining even the minor details of what in other hands had long before
become its conventional form; but the one thing he did not do was to abuse
it according to time-honoured custom as the staple form for opera. For that
he had too much dramatic insight. His treatment of other important
art-forms is illustrated in the articles on CONTRAPUNTAL FORMS; CONCERTO
and INSTRUMENTATION. Here we may attempt to illustrate his methods by such
forms and characteristics as cannot be classified under those headings.
[Sidenote: Illustrations of Bach's method.]
1. The toccatas of Buxtehude and his predecessors show how an effective
musical scheme may be suggested by running over the keyboard of an organ as
if to try (_toccare_) the touch, then bursting out into sustained and full
harmony, and at last settling down to a fugue. But before Bach no one
seemed able to keep the fugue in motion long enough to make a convincing
climax. Very soon it collapsed and the process of quasi-extemporization
began again, to culminate in a new fugue which often gave the whole work a
happy but deceptive suggestion of organic unity by being founded on an
ingenious variation of the subject of the first fugue. But in Bach's hands
the toccata becomes one of the noblest and most plastic of forms. The
introductory runs may be disjointed and exaggerated to grotesqueness, until
the gaps between them gradually fill out, and they build themselves up into
grand piles of musical architecture, as in the organ toccata in C; or they
may be worked out on an enormous scale in long and smooth canonic passages
with a definite theme, as in the greatest of all toccatas, that in F for
organ, which is most artistically followed by a fugue unusually quiet for
its size. In one instance, the toccata at the beginning of the E minor
clavier-partita, the introductory runs, though retaining much of the
extempore character from which the form derives its name, take shape in a
highly organized and rounded-off group of contrasted themes. The fugue
follows without change of time, and is developed in so leisurely a manner
that it is fully as long as a normal fugue on a large scale by the time it
reaches what sounds like its central episode. At this point some of the
introductory matter quietly enters, and leads to a recapitulation of the
whole introduction in the key now reached. The obvious sequel would be a
counter-development of the fugue, at least as long as what has gone before,
as in the clavier-toccata in C minor; but Bach does not choose to weary the
hearer and weaken the impression of breadth he has already made here.
Instead, he expands this restatement of the introduction, and makes its
harmonies deliberately return to the fundamental key, and thus in an
astonishingly short time the toccata is brought to a close with the utmost
effect of climax and finality. The same grasp of all the possible meanings
of an artistic device shows itself in his treatment of the other features
of toccata form. With his variety of proportion and flow he has no need to
break off the fugue like earlier composers: but all the old devices by
which the division into sections was managed are turned to account by him,
and almost every toccata has its own scheme of contrasted movements, always
based on the old natural idea of the growth of an organized music from a
chaos of extemporization.
If this is Bach's treatment of a comparatively small and specialized
art-form, it is obviously impossible to reduce the scantiest account of the
rest of his work into practical limits here, nor is there as yet a
sufficient body of accepted criticism of Bach for such an account to carry
further conviction than an expression of individual opinion. Fortunately,
however, Bach was constantly re-arranging his own compositions; indeed he
evidently regards adaptability to fresh environment as the test of his
finest work: and we cannot do better than review the evidence thus given to
us,--evidence which only Beethoven's sketch-books surpass in significance.
2. The successful transplanting of a work of art to a fresh environment is
obviously a convincing test of our definitions of the art-forms concerned,
if only we take care to distinguish between the alterations produced by the
change of environment and those that imply the composer's dissatisfaction
with the original version. In Bach's case this seldom causes much
difficulty; his methods of adaptation are so logical and so varied as to
form a scheme of musical morphology with all the interest and none of the
imperfections of the geological record; and the few cases in which a work
owes its changes to the need for improvement as well as adaptation cause no
confusion, but rather form a link between the pure adaptations and the
numerous revisions of his favourite works without change of medium. There
is, for example, no difficulty in separating the element of corrective
criticism from that of the impulse to give an already successful
composition a larger or more permanent form, in such cases as the
transformations undergone by the movements of the birthday cantata, _Was
mir behagt ist nur die muntre Jagd_, during their distribution among the
church cantatas, _Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt_ and _Man singet mit
Freuden vom Sieg_. The fine bass aria, "Ein Fuerst ist seines Landes Pan,"
was obviously ill-proportioned, with its breakneck return to the tonic and
its perfunctory close; and Bach's chief concern in adapting it for its
place as the aria, "Du bist geboren mir zu Gute," in _Also hat Gott_, was
to remedy this defect. On the other hand, the use of the delightful
ritornello for violoncello from the little aria, "Weil die wollenreichen
Heerden," in the birthday cantata, and the restoration of the rejected long
instrumental _fugato_ that was to follow, were obviously brought about by
the conception of the entirely new material for the voice in the famous
aria, "Mein glaeubiges Herze." And when the last chorus of _Was mir behagt_
became the first chorus of _Man singet mit Freuden_, it was expanded to the
proportions necessary for a triumphant opening (as distinguished from a
cheerful finale) by the adroit insertion of new material between every
joint in the design. This material, being new, could not produce the effect
of diffuseness that would result from the expansion of the old material
already complete in its simplest form, and thus this instance does not
imply criticism.
A highly interesting example of pure self-criticism is the _Passion
according to St John_, which was twice revised, and each time reduced to a
smaller scale by the omission of some of its finest numbers. The final
result was a work of perfect proportions, and of the rejected numbers one
(a magnificent aria with chorale) remained unused, two were replaced by
finer substitutes, others took shape as one of the most complete and
remarkable of the church cantatas, _Du wahrer Gott_, while the greatest of
the figured chorales was transferred to the _Passion according to St
Matthew_, of which it now crowns the first part.
3. Such instances of self-criticism might be paralleled in the works of
other composers; but there is no parallel in music to Bach's power of
reproducing already perfect works in different media. Here Bach reveals to
us identities in difference which we should otherwise never have suspected.
Of course it is possible to arrange works in different ways without
illustrating any profound identities at all. Handel, for instance,
collected several of his favourite choruses in an enormous instrumental
concerto (see vol. 46 of the _Haendel-Gesellschaft_), and the result in the
case of a chorus like "Lift up your Heads" was ridiculous. Bach, however,
does not arrange old work merely to please a court where it was already
admired. He never leaves it in a state of mere make-shift, though he cannot
always attain his evident aim of a new originality. His methods of
orchestration and the profoundly significant identity of certain forms of
chorus with certain concerto forms may better be described under their
proper headings (see articles INSTRUMENTATION and CONCERTO). Here we will
attempt first to show, by illustrations of Bach's power of adding parts to
already complete harmonic and contrapuntal schemes, what was his conception
of the nature of an art-form, and secondly, by means of a short analysis of
cases in which he adapts the same music to different words, to define his
range of expression.
Bach arranged all his violin concertos for clavier, including two that are
lost in the original version. Here his power of providing new and
apparently necessary material for the left hand of the cembalist (or, in
the double concertos, two left [v.03 p.0128] hands) without disturbing the
already complete score, is astonishing; and it fails only in the slow
movements, which he prefers to leave obviously in the condition of an
arrangement rather than to spoil their broad cantabile style by a too
polyphonic bass.
But these cases are insignificant compared with such transformations as
that of the prelude of the E major partita for unaccompanied violin into
the sinfonia for organ obligato accompanied by full orchestra (including
three trumpets and a pair of drums) at the beginning of the church cantata,
_Wir danken dir, Gott._ The original version is perhaps the most complete
and natural of the violin solos, for its arpeggios produce full harmony
without recourse to that constant attempt to play on all four strings at
once, which makes the performance of the polyphonic movements a _tour de
force_ in which steady rhythm is nearly impossible. Yet in the sinfonia its
proportions seem to reveal themselves for the first time. Not a bar is
displaced and not a note of the new accompaniment is unnecessary. The whole
is almost entirely without themes; for even this, the largest of all
arpeggio-preludes, consists essentially of the gradual unfolding of a
scheme of harmony in which rhythmic and melodic organization is reduced to
a minimum. Only in the first line does the incisive initial figure persist
a little longer in the new accompaniment than in the original solo, but on
the last page it reappears and pervades the whole orchestra, even the drums
thundering out its rhythm at the climax where the holding-notes of the
trumpet span the torrent of harmony like a rainbow.
Deeper still is the thought that underlies the transformation of two
movements of the great violin-concerto in D minor (unfortunately lost
except in its splendid arrangement for clavier) into parts of the church
cantata, _Wir muessen durch viel Truebsal in das Reich Gottes eingehen_. In
both movements the violin is replaced by the organ an octave lower, the
orchestral accompaniment remaining where it was. This treatment, with the
addition of new and plaintive parts for wind instruments, turns the already
very long and sombre first movement into an impressive idealization of the
"much tribulation" that lies between us and the kingdom of heaven. The slow
movement is still more solemn, and is arranged in the same way as regards
the instruments; but from the first note to the last a four-part chorus
sings, to the words of the title, a mass of quite new material (except for
the bass and for numerous imitations of the solo-part), treated with every
variety of vocal colouring and a grandeur of conception which is not
dwarfed even by the _Passion according to St Matthew._
4. The four short masses, the Christmas oratorio and the B minor mass,
contain every variety of adaptation from earlier work. The four short
masses are indeed obviously compiled for use in a church where the
orchestra was small. Only four movements in the whole collection are not
traceable to other extant works; all the rest comes from church cantatas.
The adaptations are not always significant; no attempt, for example, is
made in the G minor mass to conceal how unfit for a _Kyrie eleison_ is the
tremendous denunciatory chorus, _Herr, deine Augen sehen nach dem Glauben_.
But the F major and G major masses are very instructive; and the A major
mass, except for the damage done to the instrumentation, is a work that no
one would conceive to be not original. The Kyrie is one of Bach's most
individual utterances and could surely never have fitted any other text,
but we should say the same of the Gloria if we did not possess the church
cantata, _Halt im Gedaechtniss_. The Gloria begins with a triumphant
polyphonic chorus accompanied by a spirited symphony for strings. At the
words "et in terra pax" the time changes, and two flutes softly accompany a
single solemn melody in the altos. At the "laudamus te" the material of the
beginning returns, and is interrupted again by the calm slow movement, this
time in another key and for another voice, at the words "adoramus te."
Twice the "laudamus" and "adoramus" alternate in a finely proportioned
design; at last the words "gratias agimus tibi propter magnam gloriam tuam"
are set for the full chorus to the music of the slow movement, the strings
join with the flutes, and this most appropriate setting of those words is
finished. And yet it is quite impossible to regard this as superseding the
last chorus of _Halt im Gedaechtniss_. Not one bar or harmony of the
framework differs; yet the two versions are two independent works of art.
In the cantata the beginning is for instruments only; when the slow
movement (here adequately scored for a flute and two _oboe d' amore_)
begins, the basses, permanently separated from the rest of the chorus, sing
"Peace be unto you." The other voices then sing the triumph of the faithful
helped by the Saviour in their battle against the world. The slow movement
is, of course, set for bass alone throughout, and at the last recurrence of
the _allegro_ the bass continues to sing "Friede sei mit euch" through the
rest of the chorus, as if leading the chorus of humanity through strife to
the kingdom of heaven, and then the single voice of peace remains to the
end. Hardly a bar of the chorus-material is on the same themes in the two
versions.
The study of the sources of the Christmas oratorio will complete the
evidence on which we support our estimate of Bach's methods and range of
expression. It is certain that the occasional cantatas, from which all
except the chorale-tune numbers and those set to words from the Bible were
taken, date from shortly before the oratorio; and that Bach, being
incapable of putting inferior work even into birthday odes, rescued it from
oblivion by having the verses for the oratorio numbers built on the same
rhythms as those of the odes in order that he might use those occasional
works as a sketch (see _B.-G._, _Jahr._ xxxiv. preface). Be this as it may,
the alterations are confined to details even where an aria is transposed a
fourth or fifth; but the effect of them is startling. Pleasure (Wollust)
sings a lovely soprano aria to allure Hercules from the paths of Virtue, to
which Hercules replies indignantly with an aria in a spirited staccato
style. It is no doubt a shock to our feelings to find that Wollust's aria
became the Virgin's cradle-song, while Hercules's reply became the alto
aria in which Zion is bidden to "prepare for the Bridegroom." But it does
not warrant the inference that Bach's music lacks definite
characterization: on the contrary, these two arias are the best
demonstration of his profound insight into the possibilities of musical
expression within his range. It is no part of his conception of art that
Wollust should be represented by a Wagnerian Venusberg-music; the obvious
way to represent Pleasure was by writing pleasant music, and with Bach's
ideas of pleasance the step from this to the solemn beauty of the sacred
cradle-song was a mere matter of change of colour and _tempo_. The key is
lowered from B flat to G, the strings are veiled with the tender reed tone
of a group of _oboe d' amore_, the soprano becomes an alto whose notes are,
as it were, surrounded with a nimbus by being doubled in the upper octave
by a flute; and the aria becomes worthy of its new purpose, not by losing a
grossness which it never possessed, but by gaining the richness which
distinguishes the perfect work from the boldly executed draft.
As to the aria of Hercules the change is in manner, while the character, in
the human sense of the term, is quite rightly the same. Both Hercules and
the faithful Christian of the oratorio are renouncing pomps and vanities
for the claims of a higher life; in the one case indignantly, in the other
case inspired "mit zaertlichem Triebe." A change to a _legato_ style, the
substitution of a single _oboe d' amore_ for _tutti_ violins, the addition
of delicate ornaments indicative of a slower pace, and the noble stream of
melody preserve its identity while changing its aspect. Bach's larger
designs react on their changing contents as a cathedral reacts on the
impressiveness of the rites performed within it, or as nature reacts on a
poet's thoughts; and in the same way Bach's melody is greater than any
possible mood of the moment, not because of that vague and negative
pseudo-classical quality misnamed "reserve," but because of its vital
individuality. In their proper directions its changes are limitless;
elsewhere change is inconceivable. No amount of "Umarbeitung" could, for
instance, turn the aria of Hercules into the Virgin's cradle-song, or
Wollust's aria into the exhortation of Zion to prepare for the Bridegroom.
In short, Bach's melodies are characteristic, not like a mask with a set
expression, but like a living face that is the more individual for the
mobility of its features.
[v.03 p.0129] Within these limits, that is, short of dramatic expression in
just so far as "the end of drama is not character but action," there is
nothing good that Bach's art does not express. He has plenty of humour, if
the term may be applied to art which is, so to speak, always literal,--art
in which a jest is a jest and serious things are treated with familiar
directness, and all, whether in jest or earnest, is primarily beautiful. In
_Der Streit zwischen Phoebus und Pan_ Bach answers the critics who censured
him for his pedantry and provincial ignorance of the grand Italian operatic
style, by making effective use of that style in Pan's prize-aria ("Zum
Tanze, zum Sprunge, so wack-ack-ack-ackelt das Herz"), nobly representing
his own style in Phoebus's aria, and promptly caricaturing it in the second
part of Pan's ("Wenn der Ton zu muehsam klingt"). Midas votes for
Pan--"denn nach meinen beiden Ohren singt er unvergleichlich schoen." At
the word "Ohren" the violins give a pianissimo "hee-haw" which is fully as
witty in its musical aptness as Mendelssohn's clown-theme in the Overture
to the _Midsummer Night's Dream_; and in the ensuing dialogue their
prophecy is verified. As with many other great artists, Bach's playfulness
occasionally showed itself inconveniently where little things shock little
minds. The hilarious aria, "Ermuntre dich," in the church cantata,
_Schmuecke dich, o liebe Seele_, is one instance, and the quaint
representation of the words "dimisit inanes" in the _Magnificat_ is
another. This great work, one of the most terse and profound things Bach
ever wrote, contains, among many other subtle inspirations, one conception
with which we may fitly end our survey, for it strongly suggests Bach
himself and the destiny of all that work which he finished so lovingly,
with no prospect of its becoming more than a family heirloom and a salutary
tradition in his Leipzig choir-school. In the _Magnificat_ he sets the
words "quia respexit humilitatem ancillae suae" to a touchingly appropriate
soprano solo accompanied by his favourite _oboe d'amore_. With the next
sentence "ecce enim beatam me dicent" the tone brightens to a quiet joy,
but Bach takes advantage of the syntax of the Latin in a way that defies
translation, and the sentence is finished by the chorus. "Omnes
generationes" seem indeed to pass before us in the crowded fugue which
rises in perpetual stretto, the incessant entries of its subject now
mounting the whole scale, each part a step higher than the last, and now
collecting in unison with a climax of closeness and volume overwhelming in
its impression of time and multitude.
SUMMARY OF BACH'S WORKS
No attempt is here made at chronological sequence. The changes in Bach's
style, though clear and important, are almost impossible to describe in
untechnical language; nor are they of such general interest as to make it
worth while to expand this summary by an attempt to apportion its contents
among the Arnstadt-Muehlhausen period, the Weimar period, the Coethen
period (chiefly remarkable for instrumental music and comparatively
uninteresting in its easy-going choral music), and the last period
(1733-1750) in which, while the choral works became at once more numerous
and more terse (_e.g._ _Jesu, der du meine Seele_) the instrumental music,
though never diffuse, shows an increasing preference for designs on a large
scale. (Compare, for example, the second book of the _Wohltemperirtes
Klavier_, 1744, with the first, 1722.)
I.--CHURCH MUSIC
A. _With Orchestra_
190 church cantatas: besides several which are only known from fragmentary
sets of parts. Of the 190, 40 are for solo voices, about 60 (including some
solo cantatas) are more or less founded on chorales, and the rest, though
almost invariably containing a chorale (for congregational singing), are
practically short oratorios and frequently so entitled by Bach himself.
3 wedding cantatas: the Easter oratorio (exactly like the above-mentioned
oratorio-cantatas; and the Christmas oratorio (six similar cantatas forming
a connected design for performance on six separate days).
The Passions according to St Matthew and St John.
Funeral ode for the Duchess Eberhardine (now known to be arranged from
portions of the lost Passion according to St Mark).
4 short masses (_i.e._ Kyrie and Gloria only) mainly compiled from church
cantatas.
Mass in B minor. Magnificat in D. A few other ecclesiastical Latin
choruses.
B. _Without Orchestra_
5 motets _a capella_ (but there is reason to believe that these, except
_Komm Jesu komm_, were intended to be partly supported by the organ). A
sixth motet has an obligato figured-bass accompaniment.
A few early choruses, mostly turned to account in later works.
A large collection of plain chorales, including several original melodies.
II.--SECULAR VOCAL MUSIC
_Der Streit zwischen Phoebus und Pan_ and _Der zufrieden gestellte Aeolus_;
both entitled _Dramma per Musica_, but showing no more essential connexion
with the stage than Handel's _Acis and Galatea_.
7 solo and 7 choral cantatas, of which latter three were almost entirely
absorbed into the Christmas oratorio and the B minor mass. Of the solo
cantatas two are Italian (one of these being Bach's only developed work for
voice and clavier) and two are burlesque.
Several tunes with clavier bass, almost foreshadowing the modern song.
III.--INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC
A. _Orchestral_
7 clavier concertos arranged from violin concertos and other sources.
3 concertos for two claviers (two being arranged from concertos for two
violins).
2 concertos for three claviers.
The 6 Brandenburg concertos, for various combinations.
2 violin concertos, and a colossal _torso_ of a concerted violin-movement
forming the prelude to a lost church cantata.
1 concerto for two violins.
4 orchestral suites. (The symphony in F in the same volume of the _B. G._
is only an earlier version of the first Brandenburg concerto.)
B. _Chamber Music_
3 sonatas for clavier and flute; a suite and 6 sonatas for clavier and
violin, 3 for clavier and viola da gamba; 2 trios with figured bass; 2
flute-sonatas and a violin suite with figured bass; 6 sonatas (_i.e._ 3
sonatas and 3 partitas) for violin alone; 6 suites for violoncello alone.
C. _Clavier and Organ Music_
Bach's own collections are:--
1. _Das wohltemperirte Klavier_ for clavichord: two books each containing
24 preludes and fugues, one in each major and minor key; with the object of
stimulating tuning by "equal temperament" instead of sacrificing the
euphony of remoter keys to that of the more usual ones.
2. _Klavier-Uebung_ (chiefly for harpsichord) in four books comprising:
(i.) 15 two-part inventions and 15 three-part symphonies, (ii.) 6 partitas,
(iii.) The "Goldberg" variations. 4 duets, and an important collection of
organ choral-preludes, with the "St Anne" prelude and fugue in E flat,
(iv.) The Italian concerto and French overture.
3. The 6 "French" and 6 "English" suites.
The other clavier works fill two _Jahrgaenge_ of the _B.-G._
Bach's collections of organ music are (besides that included in the third
part of the _Klavier-Uebung_):--(1) 6 sonatas. (2) 4 groups of 6 organ
preludes and fugues. (3) _Das Orgelbuechlein_, a collection of short
choral-preludes carefully planned--all the blank pages of the autograph
being headed with the titles of the chorales intended for them--but not
half executed. (The projected whole would have been a larger volume than
the _Wohltemperirtes Klavier_). (4) 18 larger chorale-preludes, including
Bach's last composition. (5) The 6 "Schuebler" chorales, all arranged from
movements of cantatas.
Besides these there are the three great independent toccatas and the
Passacaglia. The remaining choral-preludes fill one _Jahrgang_, and the
other organ works two more.
D. _Unclassified_
Two important instrumental works cannot be classified, viz. _Das
musikalische Opfer_, the volume of compositions (two great fugues, various
puzzle-canons, and a splendid trio for flute, violin and figured bass) on
the theme given to Bach by Frederick the Great; and _Die Kunst der Fuge_, a
progressive series of fugues on one and the same subject, written in open
score as if entirely abstract studies, but all (except the extreme
contrapuntal _tours de force_) in admirable clavier style and of great
musical value.
IV.--LOST WORKS
A. _Choral_
J. N. Forkel's statement that Bach wrote 5 _Jahrgange_ of church cantatas
(_i.e._ enough to provide one for each Sunday and holy day for five years)
would indicate that some 80 are lost, but there is reason to believe that
this is a great exaggeration. Not more than six or seven cantatas are known
to be lost, by the evidence of fragments, text-books, &c.
Forkel also says that Bach wrote five Passions. Besides the great Matthew
and John Passions there is in an indisputable Bach autograph one according
to St Luke; but it is so worthless that the best plea for its authenticity
offered by responsible critics is that only a personal interest could have
induced Bach to make a copy of it.
[v.03 p.0130] The lost Passion according to St Mark must, judging by the
movements preserved in the _Trauer-Ode_, have been larger than that
according to St John.
Was there a _genuine_ Lucas-Passion? If so, Forkel's report of five
Passions would be explained. Several lost secular works are partly
preserved in those portions of the Christmas oratorio of which the sources
are not definitely known, but which, like the other duplicated numbers, are
fair copies in the autograph.
B. _Instrumental_
Three violin concertos and one for two violins; known only from the
wonderful clavier versions.
Most of the first movement of the A major sonata for clavier and flute
which was written in the spare staves at the bottom of a larger score. Some
of these have been cut off.
V.--ARRANGEMENTS OF WORKS BY OTHER COMPOSERS
Arrangements for harpsichord alone of 16 concertos, generally described as
by Vivaldi, but including several by other composers.
4 Vivaldi concertos arranged for organ.
Many of these arrangements contain much original matter, such as entirely
new slow movements, large cadenzas, &c.
Concerto in A minor for 4 claviers and orchestra, from Vivaldi's B minor
concerto for 4 violins. This, though the most faithful to its original, is
the richest and most Bach-like of all these arrangements, and is well worth
performing in public.
2 sonatas from the _Hortus Musicus_ of Reinken, arranged for clavier. (The
ends of the slow movements are Bach.)
Finishing touches to cantatas by his uncle Johann Ludwig Bach. Also a very
characteristic complete "Christe eleison" inserted in Kyrie of Johann
Ludwig's.
VI.--DOUBTFUL AND SPURIOUS WORKS
Bach's autographs give the name of the composer on the outside sheet only.
He was constantly making copies of all that interested him; and where the
outside sheet is lost, only the music itself can tell us whether it is his
or not. The above-mentioned _Passion according to St Luke_ is the chief
case in point. The little music-books he and his second wife wrote for
their children are full of pieces in the most various styles, and the
editors of the _Bach-Gesellschaft_ have not completely identified them,
even Couperin's well-known "Les Bergeries" escaping their scrutiny. A
sonata for two claviers by Bach's eldest son, Wilhelm Friedermann, was
detected by the editors after its inclusion in _Jahrgang_ xliv. The second
of the 3 sonatas for clavier and flute is extremely suggestive of Bach's
sons, but Philipp Emanuel ascribes it to his father. However, he might
easily have docketed it wrongly while arranging copies of his father's
works. It has a twin brother (_B.-G._ ix. Anhang ii.) for which he has not
vouched.
Four absurd church cantatas are printed for conscience' sake in _Jahrgang_
xliii. More important than these, because by no means too obviously
ridiculous to deceive a careless listener, is the well-known 8-part motet,
_Lob, Ehr' und Weisheit_ (blessing and glory and wisdom). A closer
acquaintance shows that it is really very poor stuff; and it was finally
crowned with absurdity by the discovery that its composer was a
contemporary of Bach,--and that his name was Wagner.
The beautiful motet, _Ich lasse dich nicht_, has long been known to be by
one of Bach's uncles (Johann Christoph).
EDITIONS
Almost the only works of Bach published during his lifetime were the
instrumental collections, most of which he engraved himself. Of the church
cantatas only one, _Gott ist mein Koenig_ (written when he was nineteen,
but a very great work), was published in his lifetime.
Of modern editions that of the _Bach-Gesellschaft_ is, of course, the only
complete one. It is, inevitably, of very unequal merit. Its first editors
could not realize their own ignorance of Bach's language; their immediate
admiration of his larger choruses seemed to them proof of their competence
to retain or dismiss details of ornamentation, figured bass, variants
between score and parts, &c., without always stopping to see what light
these might shed on questions of _tempo_ and style--especially in the arias
and recitatives, which they regarded as archaic almost in direct proportion
to the depth of thought really displayed in them. In the 9th _Jahrgang_
Wilhelm Rust introduced scholarly methods, with the happiest results. The
_Wohltemperirtes Klavier (Jahrgang_ xiv.) was edited by Kroll, who also
made his text accessible in the _Edition Peters_ (which till then had only
Czerny's--an amazing result of corrupt tradition, still widely accepted).
Kroll's and Rust's volumes are far the best in the _B. G._ On Rust's death
the standard deteriorated; his immediate successor seems more interested in
reprinting in full an early version of a work of which Rust had given only
the variants, than in digesting his own materials (_Jahrgang_ xxix.); and
in his next volume (_Jahrgang_ xxx. p. 109) the bass and violin are a bar
apart for a whole line. The last ten volumes, however, are again
satisfactory, and in _Jahrgang_ xliv. the French and English suites are
re-edited. Part of the B minor mass was also worked over again; and Kroll's
text of the _Wohltemperirtes Klavier_ was supplemented by the evidence of
the British Museum autograph. The Steingraeber edition of the clavier
works, edited by Dr Hans Bischoff, is incomparably the best, giving all the
variants in footnotes and clearly distinguishing the extremely intelligent
nuances and phrasing signs of the editor from the rare but significant
indications of Bach himself. Nor does this wealth of scholarship interfere
with the presentation of a straightforward, single text; though in addition
there is every necessary explanation of the ornaments and kindred matters.
We have seen no other editions that distinguish Bach's text from the
editor's taste--the disappointing publications of the _Neue
Bachgesellschaft_[4] by no means excepted. We may remark that the older
vocal scores of cantatas in the _Edition Peters_ are, though unfortunately
but a selection, far better than the complete series issued by Breitkopf
and Haertel in conformity with the _Bach Gesellschaft_, and therefore
accepted as authoritative (see INSTRUMENTATION). The English vocal scores
published by Novello are generally very good though covering but small
ground. The Novello score of the Christmas oratorio contains a fine
analytic preface by Sir George Macfarren.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--J. N. Forkel, _Ueber Bach's Leben, Kunst und Kunstwerke_,
translated (London, 1820); C. H. Bitter, _John Sebastian Bach_ (Berlin,
1865); Ernest David, _La Vie et les oeuvres de Bach_ (Paris, 1882); P.
Spitta, _Johann Sebastian Bach_ (Leipzig, 1873 and 1880); E. Heinrich,
_Sebastian Bach's Leben_ (Berlin, 1885); A. Pirro, _L'Esthetique de Jean
Sebastian Bach_ (Paris, 1907); and _L'Orgue de Jean Sebastian Bach_ (Paris,
1907); A. Schweitzer, _J. S. Bach: Le Musicien poete_. Spitta's biography
superseded everything written before it and has not since been approached.
With corrections in the light of Rust's _B. G._ prefaces it contains
everything worth knowing about Bach, except the music itself.
(D. F. T.)
[1] Spitta points out that this cannot mean singing in the choir at a
service, but making music in church privately.
[2] The same surgeon operated unsuccessfully on both composers.
[3] See the wild conjectures of the editor of the Four Short Masses as to
the "displacing" of structure in the _kyrie_ of the G minor Mass (_B.-G.,
Jahr. viii._ preface, with Rust's answer in the preface to _Jahr. xxiii._).
[4] The object of the _Neue Bachgesellschaft_ is to render the completed
results of the first _Bachgesellschaft_ generally accessible by holding
frequent Bach festivals and issuing cheap and practical editions. The
activities of this society, together with the new movement to restore
Bach's vocal music to its place in the Lutheran Church, cannot fail to have
a salutary effect on the future of music.
BACH, KARL PHILIPP EMANUEL (1714-1788), German musician and composer, the
third son of Johann Sebastian Bach, was born at Weimar on the 14th of March
1714. When he was ten years old he entered the Thomasschule at Leipzig, of
which in 1723 his father had become cantor, and continued his education as
a student of jurisprudence at the universities of Leipzig (1731) and of
Frankfort on the Oder (1735). In 1738 he took his degree, but at once
abandoned all prospects of a legal career and determined to devote himself
to music. A few months later he obtained an appointment in the service of
the crown prince of Prussia, on whose accession in 1740 he became a member
of the royal household. He was by this time one of the first
clavier-players in Europe, and his compositions, which date from 1731,
included about thirty sonatas and concerted pieces for his favourite
instrument. His reputation was established by the two sets of sonatas which
he dedicated respectively to Frederick the Great (1742) and to the grand
duke of Wuerttemberg (1744); in 1746 he was promoted to the post of
_Kammermusikus_, and for twenty-two years shared with Karl Heinrich, Graun,
Johann Joachim, Quantz and Johann Gottlieb Naumann the continued favour of
the king. During his residence at Berlin he wrote a fine setting of the
_Magnificat_ (1749), in which he shows more traces than usual of his
father's influence, an Easter cantata (1756), several symphonies and
concerted works, at least three volumes of songs,--_Geistliche Oden und
Lieder_, to words by Gellert (1758), _Oden mit Melodien_ (1762) and
_Sing-Oden_ (1766), and a few secular cantatas and other _pieces
d'occasion_. But his main work was concentrated on the clavier, for which
he composed, at this time, nearly two hundred sonatas and other solos,
including the set _mit veraenderten Reprisen_ (1760-1768) and a few of
those _fuer Kenner und Liebhaber_. Meanwhile he placed himself in the
forefront of European critics by his _Versuch ueber die wahre Art das
Clavier zu spielen_ (first part 1753, second, with the first reprinted,
1762), a systematic and masterly treatise which by 1780 had reached its
third edition, and which laid the foundation for the methods of Clementi
and Cramer. In 1768 Bach succeeded Georg Philipp Telemann as
_Kapellmeister_ at Hamburg, and in consequence of his new office began to
turn his attention more towards church music. Next year he produced his
oratorio _Die Israeliten in der Wueste_, a composition remarkable not only
for its great beauty but for the resemblance of its plan to that of
Mendelssohn's _Elijah_, and between 1769 and 1788 added over twenty
settings of the Passion, a second oratorio _Der Auferstehung [v.03 p.0131]
und Himmelfahrt Jesu_ (1777), and some seventy cantatas, litanies, motets
and other liturgical pieces. At the same time his genius for instrumental
composition was further stimulated by the career of Haydn, to whom he sent
a letter of high appreciation, and the climax of his art was reached in the
six volumes of sonatas _fuer Kenner und Liebhaber_, to which he devoted the
best work of his last ten years. He died at Hamburg on the 14th of December
1788.
Through the latter half of the 18th century the reputation of K. P. E. Bach
stood very high. Mozart said of him, "He is the father, we are the
children"; the best part of Haydn's training was derived from a study of
his work; Beethoven expressed for his genius the most cordial admiration
and regard. This position he owes mainly to his clavier sonatas, which mark
an important epoch in the history of musical form. Lucid in style, delicate
and tender in expression, they are even more notable for the freedom and
variety of their structural design; they break away altogether from the
exact formal antithesis which, with the composers of the Italian school,
had hardened into a convention, and substitute the wider and more flexible
outline which the great Viennese masters showed to be capable of almost
infinite development. The content of his work, though full of invention,
lies within a somewhat narrow emotional range, but it is not less sincere
in thought than polished and felicitous in phrase. Again he was probably
the first composer of eminence who made free use of harmonic colour for its
own sake, apart from the movement of contrapuntal parts, and in this way
also he takes rank among the most important pioneers of the school of
Vienna. His name has now fallen into undue neglect, but no student of music
can afford to disregard his _Sonaten fuer Kenner und Liebhaber_, his
oratorio _Die Israeliten in der Wueste_, and the two concertos (in G major
and D major) which have been republished by Dr Hugo Riemann.
A list of his voluminous compositions may be found in Eitner's _Quellen
Lexikon_, and a critical account of them is given in Bitter's _C. P. E. und
W. F. Bach und deren Bruder_ (2 vols., Berlin, 1868), a mine of valuable
though ill-arranged information.
Four more of Johann Sebastian Bach's sons grew to manhood and became
musicians. The eldest of them, WILHELM FRIEDERMANN BACH (1710-1784) was by
common repute the most gifted; a famous organist, a famous improvisor and a
complete master of counterpoint. But, unlike the rest of the family, he was
a man of idle and dissolute habits, whose career was little more than a
series of wasted opportunities. Educated at Leipzig, he was appointed in
1733 organist of the Sophienkirche at Dresden, and in 1747 became musical
director of the Liebfrauenkirche at Halle. The latter office he was
compelled to resign in 1764, and thenceforward he led a wandering life
until, on the 1st of July 1784, he died in great poverty at Berlin. His
compositions, very few of which were printed, include many church cantatas
and instrumental works, of which the most notable are the fugues,
polonaises and fantasias for clavier, and an interesting sestet for
strings, clarinet and horns. Several of his manuscripts are preserved in
the Royal library at Berlin; and a complete list of his works, so far as
they are known, may be found in Eitner's _Quellen Lexikon_.
The fourth son, JOHANN GOTTFRIED BERNHARD BACH (1715-1739) was, like his
elder brothers, born at Weimar and educated at Leipzig. From 1735 to 1738
he held successively the organistships at Muehlhausen and Sangerhausen; in
1738 he threw up his appointment and went to study law at Jena; in 1739 he
died, aged 24.
JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH BACH (1732-1795), the ninth son, was born at
Leipzig, studied at the Thomasschule and the university, and in 1750 was
appointed _Kapellmeister_ at Bueckeburg. He was an industrious composer,
especially of church-music and opera, whose work reflects no discredit on
the family name.
JOHANN CHRISTIAN BACH (1735-1782), the eleventh son, was born at Leipzig,
and on the death of his father in 1750 became the pupil of his brother
Emanuel at Berlin. In 1754 he went to Italy where he studied under Padre
Martini, and from 1760 to 1762 held the post of organist at Milan
cathedral, for which he wrote two Masses, a _Requiem_, a _Te Deum_ and
other works. Having also gained some reputation as a composer of opera, he
was in 1762 invited to London and there spent the rest of his life. For
twenty years he was the most popular musician in England, his dramatic
works, produced at the King's theatre, were received with great cordiality,
he was appointed music-master to the queen, and his concerts, given in
partnership with Abel at the Hanover Square rooms, soon became the most
fashionable of public entertainments. He is of some historical interest as
the first composer who preferred the pianoforte to the older
keyed-instruments; but his works, though elegant and pleasing, were
ephemeral in character and have been deservedly forgotten.
A full account of J. C. Bach's career is given in the fourth volume of
Burney's _History of Music_, and a catalogue of his compositions in an
article by Max Schwarz, published in the _Sammelbaende_ of the
_Internationale Musik-Gesellschaft_, Jhrg. ii. p. 401.
(W. H. HA.)
BACHARACH, YAIR (1639-1702), German rabbi, was the author of _[H.]awwoth
Ya[=i]r_ (a collection of _Responsa_) and other works. Bacharach was a man
of wide culture, and holds an honourable place among the pioneers of the
Jewish Renaissance which was inaugurated towards the end of the 18th
century.
BACHARACH, a town of Germany, in the Prussian Rhine Province, romantically
situated on the left bank of the Rhine, 30 m. above Coblenz on the railway
to Mainz. Pop. 2000. There is an interesting church, a basilica, dating
from the beginning of the 13th century. There are also ruins of a Gothic
church of the 13th and 15th centuries. The ruined castle of Stahleck,
crowning the heights above the town, is celebrated in history as the scene
of the marriage between Henry, eldest son of Henry the Lion (shortly before
the latter's death in 1195) and Agnes of Hohenstaufen, which effected a
temporary reconciliation between the houses of Welf and Hohenstaufen. Other
ruined castles are those of Fuerstenberg and Stahlberg. All three belonged
to the counts palatine. The wines of Bacharach were once held in the
greatest esteem, and it is still one of the chief markets of the Rhenish
wine trade.
BACHAUMONT, LOUIS PETIT DE (1690-1771), French litterateur, was of noble
family and was brought up at the court of Versailles. He passed his whole
life in Paris as the centre of the _salon_ of Madame Doublet de Persan
(1677-1771), where criticism of art and literature took the form of
malicious gossip. A sort of register of news was kept in a journal of the
_salon_, which dealt largely in scandals and contained accounts of books
suppressed by the censor. Bachaumont's name is commonly connected with the
first volumes of this register, which was published anonymously under the
title _Memoires secrets pour servir a l'histoire de la Republique des
Lettres_, but his exact share in the authorship is a matter of controversy.
It was continued by Pidansat de Mairobert (1707-1779) and others, until it
reached 36 volumes (1774-1779). It is of some value as a historical source,
especially for prohibited literature. Extracts were published by P. Lacroix
in one volume, 1859. An incomplete edition (4 vols.) was undertaken in 1830
by Ravenal.
See, in addition to the memoirs of the time, especially the _Correspondance
litteraire_ of Grimm, Diderot, d'Alembert and others (new ed., Paris, 1878,
17 vols.); Ch. Aubertin, _L'Esprit public au XVIII^e siecle_ (Paris, 1872).
BACHE, ALEXANDER DALLAS (1806-1867), American physicist, great-grandson of
Benjamin Franklin, was born at Philadelphia on the 19th of July 1806. After
graduating at the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1825, he
acted as assistant professor there for some time, and as a lieutenant in
the corps of engineers he was engaged for a year or two in the erection of
coast fortifications. He occupied the post of professor of natural
philosophy and chemistry in the University of Pennsylvania in 1828-1841 and
in 1842-1843. For the trustees of what in 1848 was to become Girard
College, but had not yet been opened, he spent the years 1836-1838 in
Europe, examining European systems of education, and on his return
published a very valuable report. In 1843, on the death of Professor F. R.
Hassler (1770-1843), he was appointed [v.03 p.0132] superintendent of the
United States coast survey. He succeeded in impressing Congress with a
sense of the great value of this work, and by means of the liberal aid it
granted, he carried out a singularly comprehensive plan with great ability
and most satisfactory results. By a skilful division of labour, and by the
erection of numerous observing stations, the mapping out of the whole coast
proceeded simultaneously under the eye of the general director, and in
addition a vast mass of magnetic and meteorological observations was
collected. He died at Newport, Rhode Island, on the 17th of February 1867.
BACHE, FRANCIS EDWARD (1833-1858), English musical composer, was born in
Birmingham on the 14th of September 1833. The pupil of Alfred Mellon for
violin and Sterndale Bennett for composition, he afterwards went to Leipzig
in 1853 and studied with Hauptmann and Plaidy. Considering the early age at
which he died, his compositions are fairly numerous, and the best, a trio
for piano and strings, is still held in high esteem. Two operettas, a piano
concerto and a number of published pianoforte pieces and songs do little
more than show how great was his promise. He died at Birmingham of
consumption on the 24th of August 1858. His younger brother, WALTER BACHE
(1842-1888), was born in Birmingham on the 19th of June 1842, and followed
him to the Leipzig Conservatorium, where he became an excellent pianist.
From 1862 to 1865 he studied with Liszt in Rome, and for many years devoted
himself to the task of winning popularity for his master's works in
England. At his annual concerts in London nearly all Liszt's larger works
were heard for the first time in England, and on the occasion of Liszt's
last visit to England in 1886, he was entertained by Bache at a memorable
reception at the Grosvenor Gallery. Walter Bache was professor of the
pianoforte at the Royal Academy of Music for some years before his death,
and the foundation of the Liszt scholarship at that institution was mainly
due to his efforts. He died in London on the 26th of March 1888.
An interesting memoir of the two brothers, by Miss Constance Bache,
appeared in 1901 under the title _Brother Musicians_.
BACHELOR (from Med. Lat. _baccalarius_, with its late and rare variant
_baccalaris_--cf. Ital. _baccalare_--through O. Fr. _bacheler_), in the
most general sense of the word, a young man. The word, however, as it
possesses several widely distinct applications, has passed through many
meanings, and its ultimate origin is still involved in a certain amount of
obscurity. The derivation from Welsh _bach_, little, is mentioned as
"possible" by Skeat (_Etymological Dictionary_), but is "definitely
discarded" by the _New English Dictionary_, and that given here is
suggested as probable. The word _baccalarius_ was applied to the tenant of
a _baccalaria_ (from _baccalia_, a herd of cows, _bacca_ being a Low Latin
variant of _vacca_), which was presumably at first a grazing farm and was
practically the same as a _vaselleria_, _i.e._ the fief of a sub-vassal.
Just, however, as the character and the size of the _baccalaria_ varied in
different ages, so the word _baccalarius_ changed its significance; thus in
the 8th century it was applied to the _rustici_, whether men or women
(_baccalariae_), who worked for the tenant of a _mansus_. Throughout all
its meanings the word has retained the idea of subordination suggested in
this origin. Thus it came to be applied to various categories of persons as
follows.--(1) Ecclesiastics of an inferior grade, _e.g._ young monks or
even recently appointed canons (Severtius, _de episcopis Lugdunensibus_, p.
377, in du Cange). (2) Those belonging to the lowest stage of knighthood.
Knights bachelors were either poor vassals who could not afford to take the
field under their own banner, or knights too young to support the
responsibility and dignity of knights bannerets (see KNIGHTHOOD AND
CHIVALRY). (3) Those holding the preliminary degree of a university,
enabling them to proceed to that of master (_magister_) which alone
entitled them to teach. In this sense the word _baccalarius_ or
_baccalaureus_ first appears at the university of Paris in the 13th century
in the system of degrees established under the auspices of Pope Gregory
IX., as applied to scholars still _in statu pupillari_. Thus there were two
classes of _baccalarii_: the _baccalarii cursores_, _i.e._ theological
candidates passed for admission to the divinity course, and the _baccalarii
dispositi_, who, having completed this course, were entitled to proceed to
the higher degrees. In modern universities the significance of the degree
of bachelor, in relation to the others, varies; _e.g._ at Oxford and
Cambridge the bachelor can proceed to his mastership by simply retaining
his name on the books and paying certain fees; at other universities a
further examination is still necessary. But in no case is the bachelor a
full member of the university. The degree of bachelor (of arts, &c.) is
borne by women also. (4) The younger or inferior members of a trade gild or
city company, otherwise known as "yeomen" (now obsolete). (5) Unmarried
men, since these presumably have their fortunes yet to make and are not
full citizens. The word bachelor, now confined to men in this connotation,
was formerly sometimes used of women also.
Bachelors, in the sense of unmarried men, have in many countries been
subjected to penal laws. At Sparta, citizens who remained unmarried after a
certain age suffered various penalties. They were not allowed to witness
the gymnastic exercises of the maidens; and during winter they were
compelled to march naked round the market-place, singing a song composed
against themselves and expressing the justice of their punishment. The
usual respect of the young to the old was not paid to bachelors (Plut.
_Lyc._ 15). At Athens there was no definite legislation on this matter; but
certain minor laws are evidently dictated by a spirit akin to the Spartan
doctrine (see Schoemann, _Gr. Alterth._ i. 548). At Rome, though there
appear traces of some earlier legislation in the matter, the first clearly
known law is that called the Lex Julia, passed about 18 B.C. It does not
appear to have ever come into full operation; and in A.D. 9 it was
incorporated with the Lex Papia et Poppaea, the two laws being frequently
cited as one, Lex Julia et Papia Poppaea. This law, while restricting
marriages between the several classes of the people, laid heavy penalties
on unmarried persons, gave certain privileges to those citizens who had
several children, and finally imposed lighter penalties on married persons
who were childless. Isolated instances of such penalties occur during the
middle ages, _e.g._ by a charter of liberties granted by Matilda I.,
countess of Nevers, to Auxerre in 1223, an annual tax of five _solidi_ is
imposed on any man _qui non habet uxorem et est bachelarius_. In Britain
there has been no direct legislation bearing on bachelors; but,
occasionally, taxes have been made to bear more heavily on them than on
others. Instances of this are the act (6 and 7 Will. III.) passed in 1695;
the tax on servants, 1785; and the income tax, 1798.
BACHIAN (Dutch _Batjan_), one of the Molucca Islands, in the residency of
Ternate, Dutch East Indies, in the Molucca Sea, in 0deg13'-0deg55' S. and
127deg22'-128deg E. With its subordinate islands, Mandioli, Tawali and
others, it lies west of the southern peninsula of the island of Halmahera
or Jilolo, and has an area of 914 sq. m. It is of irregular form,
consisting of two distinct mountainous parts, united by a low isthmus,
which a slight subsidence would submerge. The island is in part of volcanic
formation, and the existence of hot springs points to volcanic activity.
There are, however, especially in the southern portion, ancient and
non-volcanic rocks. The highest elevation occurs at the south of the
island, the mountain of Labua reaching 6950 ft. Coal and other minerals
have been discovered. A large portion of the island is richly wooded, and
sago, cocoa-nuts and cloves (which are indigenous) are abundantly produced.
Bachian is remarkable as the most eastern point on the globe inhabited by
any of the _Quadrumana_, a black ape occurring here as in Celebes. The
island is very rich in birds and insects. The interior of the island is
uninhabited and none of the dwellers on the coast are indigenous. They
consist of the Sirani or Christian descendants of the Portuguese, of
Malays, with a Papuan element, Galela men from the north of Halmahera,
immigrants from Celebes, with some Chinese and Arabs. The total number of
inhabitants is about 13,000. The chief village, called Amasing by the
inhabitants, but also called Bachian, is situated on the west side of the
isthmus. Bachian is the most important island of a group formerly governed
by a sultan, but since 1889 by a committee of chiefs under the control of a
Dutch _controleur_. From 1882 onwards a Batjan company attempted to exploit
the island, but [v.03 p.0133] unsuccessfully, owing to a deficient
knowledge of the soil and its capabilities and a lack of labourers.
BACK-BOND, or BACK-LETTER, in Scots law, a deed qualifying the terms of
another deed, or declaratory of the purposes for which another deed has
been granted. Thus an _ex facie_ absolute disposition, qualified by a
back-bond expressing the limited nature of the right actually held by the
person to whom the disposition is made, would constitute what in England is
termed a deed of trust.
BACK-CHOIR, RETRO-CHOIR, a space behind the high altar in the choir of a
church, in which there is, or was, a small altar standing back to back with
the other.
BACKERGUNJE, or BAKARGANJ, a district of British India in the Dacca
division of Eastern Bengal and Assam. It forms part of the joint delta of
the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, and its area is 4542 sq. m. The general
aspect of the district is that of a flat even country, dotted with clusters
of bamboos and betel-nut trees, and intersected by a perfect network of
dark-coloured and sluggish streams. There is not a hill or hillock in the
whole district, but it derives a certain picturesque beauty from its wide
expanses of cultivation, and the greenness and freshness of the vegetation.
This is especially conspicuous in the rains, but at no time of the year
does the district present a dried or burnt-up appearance. The villages,
which are always walled round by groves of bamboos and betel-nut palms,
have often a very striking appearance; and Backergunje has many beauties of
detail which strike a traveller in passing through the country. The level
of the country is low, forming as it does a part of the great Gangetic
delta; and the rivers, streams and water-courses are so numerous that it is
very difficult to travel except by boat at any season of the year. Every
natural hollow is full of water, around the margin of which long grasses,
reeds and other aquatic plants grow in the greatest profusion, often making
it difficult to say where the land ends and the water begins. Towards the
north-west the country is very marshy and nothing is to be seen for miles
but tracts of unreclaimed swamps and rice lands, with a few huts scattered
here and there and raised on mounds of earth. In the south of the district,
along the coast of the Bay of Bengal, lie the forest tracts of the
Sundarbans, the habitation of tigers, leopards and other wild beasts.
The principal rivers of the district are the Meghna, the Arial Khan and the
Haringhata or Baleswar, with their numerous offshoots. The Meghna
represents the accumulated waters of the Brahmaputra and Ganges. It flows
along the eastern boundary of the district in a southerly direction for
about 100 m. till it debouches into the Bay of Bengal. During the latter
part of its course this noble river expands into a large estuary containing
many islands, the principal of which is that of Dakshin Shahbazpur. The
islands on the sea-front are exposed to devastation by cyclonic
storm-waves. The Arial Khan, a branch of the Ganges, enters the district
from the north, and flows generally in a south-easterly direction till it
falls into the estuary of the Meghna. The main channel of the Arial Khan is
about 1700 yds. in width in the dry season, and from 2000 to 3000 yds. in
the rains. It receives a number of tributaries, sends off several
offshoots, and is navigable throughout the year by native cargo boats of
the largest size. The Haringhata, Baleswar, Madhumati and Garai are various
local names for the same river in different parts of its course and
represent another great offshoot of the Ganges. It enters Backergunje near
the north-west corner of the district, whence it forms its western
boundary, and runs south, but with great windings in its upper reaches,
till it crosses the Sundarbans, and finally falls into the Bay of Bengal by
a large and deep estuary, capable of receiving ships of considerable
burden. In the whole of its course through the district the river is
navigable by native boats of large tonnage, and by large sea-going ships as
high up as Morrellganj, in the neighbouring district of Jessore. Among its
many tributaries in Backergunje the most important is the Kacha, itself a
considerable stream and navigable by large boats all the year round, which
flows in a southerly direction for 20 m., when it falls into the Baleswar.
Other rivers of minor importance are the Barisal, Bishkhali, Nihalganj,
Khairabad, Ghagar, Kumar, &c. All the rivers in the district are subject to
tidal action from the Meghna on the north, and from the Bay of Bengal on
the south, and nearly all of them are navigable at high tide by country
boats of all sizes. The rise of the tide is very considerable in the
estuary of the Meghna, and many of the creeks and water-courses in the
island of Dakshin Shahbazpur, which are almost dry at ebb tide, contain 18
or 19 ft. of water at the flood. A very strong "bore" or tidal wave runs up
the estuary of the Meghna at spring tides, and a singular sound like
thunder, known as the "Barisal guns," is often heard far out at sea about
the time it is coming in. There are numerous marshes in the district, of
great size and depth, and abounding in fish.
The Mussulmans of Backergunje are among the worst of their creed, steeped
in ignorance and prejudice, easily excited to violence and murder, very
litigious and grossly immoral. On account of an epidemic of murders
disarmament had to be enforced in the district. The Faraizis or Puritan
sect of Mahommedans are exceedingly numerous in the district. The Buddhist
population consists of Maghs or the people of Arakan, who first settled in
Backergunje about 1800, and have made themselves very useful in the
clearing of the Sundarbans. A gipsy-like tribe called the Bebajias are
rather numerous in this district. They live principally in boats,
travelling from place to place, profess Mahommedanism, and gain their
subsistence by wood-cutting in the Sundarbans, fishing, fortune-telling and
trading in trinkets. In 1901 the population was 2,291,752, showing an
increase of 6% in the decade.
A number of small trading villages exist throughout the district, and each
locality has its periodical fairs for purposes of traffic. The material
condition of the people is good. Every inhabitant is a small landholder and
cultivates sufficient rice and other necessaries for the support of his
family. Owing to this reason, hired labour is very scarce. Rice is the
great crop of the district, and three harvests are obtained annually--the
_aman_, or winter rice; _aus_, or autumn crop; and _boro_, or spring rice.
The climate of Backergunje is one of the healthiest in Eastern Bengal,
owing to the strong south-west monsoon, which comes up directly from the
Bay of Bengal, and keeps the atmosphere cool; but the heavy rainfall and
consequent humidity of the atmosphere, combined with the use of bad water,
are fruitful sources of disease. The average annual temperature varies from
78deg to 85deg F. The thermometer ranges from 62deg to 98deg.
Barisal, the headquarters station, situated on the west bank of the Barisal
river, had a population in 1901 of 18,978. The next largest town is
Pirojpur (14,119).
BACKGAMMON, a game played with draughtsmen and a special board, depending
on the throw of dice. It is said to have been invented about the 10th
century (Strutt). A similar game (_Ludus duodecim scriptorum_, the
"twelve-line game") was known to the Romans, and Plato (_Republic_, bk. x.)
alludes to a game in which dice were thrown and men were placed after due
consideration. The etymology of the word "backgammon" is disputed; it is
probably Saxon--_baec_, back, _gamen_, game; _i.e._ a game in which the
players are liable to be sent back. Other derivations are, Dan. _bakke_,
tray, _gammen_, game (Wedgwood); and Welsh _bach_, little, _cammaun_,
battle (Henry). Chaucer alludes to a game of "tables," played with three
dice, in which "men" were moved from the opponent's "tables," the game
(_ludus Anglicorum_) being described in the Harleian MSS. (1527). The
French name for backgammon is _trictrac_, imitative of the rattle of the
dice.
Backgammon is played by two persons. The "board" (see diagram) is divided
into four "tables," each table being marked with six "points" coloured
differently. The inner and outer tables are separated from each other by a
projecting _bar_. The board (in the ordinary form of the game) is furnished
with fifteen white and fifteen black men, "set" or arranged as in the
diagram. It is usual to make the inner table the one nearest to the light.
Two dice-boxes are required, one for each player, and a pair of dice, which
are used by both players. The dice are marked with numbers on their six
sides, from one to six, number one being called, "ace"; two, "deuce":
three, "trey." Formerly the [v.03 p.0134] four was called "quatre"
(pronounced "cater"); the five, "cinque" (pronounced either "sank" or
"sink"); and the six, "six" (size).
For the right to start each player throws one or two dice; the one who
throws the higher number has the right of playing first; and he may either
adopt the numbers thrown or he may throw again, using both dice.
[Illustration]
The men are moved on from point to point, according to the throws of the
dice made by the players alternately. White moves from black's inner table
to black's outer, and from this to white's outer table, and so on to
white's inner table; and all black's moves must be in the contrary
direction. A player may move any of his men a number of points
corresponding to the numbers thrown by him, provided the point to which the
move would bring him is not _blocked_ by two or more of his adversary's men
being on it. The whole throw may be taken with one man, or two men maybe
moved, one the exact number of points on one die, the other the number on
the other die. If doublets are thrown (_e.g._ two sixes), four moves of
that number (_e.g._ four moves of six points) may be made, either all by
one man or separately by more. Thus, suppose white throws five, six, he may
move one of his men from the left-hand corner of the black's inner table to
the left-hand corner of black's outer table for six; he may, again, move
the same man five points farther on, when his move is completed; or he may
move any other man five points. But white cannot move a man for five from
the black's ace-point, because the six-point in that table is blocked. Any
part of the throw which cannot be moved is of no effect, but it is
compulsory for a player to move the whole throw unless blocked. Thus if the
men were differently placed, and white could move a six, and having done so
could not move a five, his move is completed. If, however, by moving the
five first, he can afterwards move a six, he must make the move in that
manner.
When a player so moves as to place two men on the same point, he is said to
"make a point."
When there is only a single man on a point, it is called a "blot." When a
blot is left, the man there may be taken up (technically the blot may be
"hit") by the adversary if he throws a number which will enable him to
place a man on that point. The man hit is placed on the bar, and has to
begin again by entering the adversary's home table again at the next throw
should it result in a number that corresponds to an unblocked point. The
points in the home tables count for this purpose as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,
beginning from the ace-point. A player is not allowed to move any other man
while he has one to enter. It is, therefore, an advantage to have made all
the points in your own board, so that your adversary, if you take a man up,
cannot enter; and you can then continue throwing until a point is opened.
The game proceeds until one of the players gets all his men into his inner
table or _home_. Then he begins to take his men off the board, or to _bear_
them, _i.e._ to remove a man from any point that corresponds in number with
his throw. If such a point is unoccupied, a move must be made, if there is
room for it, and a move may be taken, instead of bearing a man, at any
time; but when six is empty, if six is thrown a man may be borne from five
and so on. If, after a player has commenced throwing off his men, he should
be hit on a blot, he must enter on his adversary's inner table and must
bring the man taken up into his own inner table before he can bear further.
Whoever first takes off all his men wins the game:--a single game (a "hit")
if his adversary has begun bearing; a double game (a "gammon") if the
adversary has not borne a man; and a triple game (a "backgammon") if, at
the time the winner bears his last man, his adversary, not having borne a
man, has one in the winner's inner table, or has a man up. When a series of
games is played, the winner of a hit has the first throw in the succeeding
game; but if a gammon is won, the players each throw a single die to
determine the first move of the next game.
In order to play backgammon well, it is necessary to know all the chances
on two dice and to apply them in various ways. The number of different
throws that can be made is thirty-six. By taking all the combinations of
these throws which include given numbers, it is easily discovered where
blots may be left with the least probability of being hit. For example, to
find the chance of being hit where a blot can only be taken up by an ace,
the adversary may throw two aces, or ace in combination with any other
number up to six, and he may throw each of these in two different ways, so
that there are in all eleven ways in which an ace may be thrown. This,
deducted from thirty-six (the total number of throws), leaves twenty-five;
so that it is 25 to 11 against being hit on an ace. It is very important to
bear in mind the chance of being hit on any number. The following table
gives the odds against being hit on any number within the reach of one or
two dice: -
It is 25 to 11, or about 9 to 4, against being hit on 1
" 24 " 12, or 2 " 1, " 2
" 22 " 14, or about 3 " 2, " 3
" 21 " 15, or 7 " 5, " 4
" 21 " 15, " 7 " 5, " 5
" 19 " 17, " 9-1/2 " 8-1/2, " 6
" 30 " 6, " 5 " 1, " 7
" 30 " 6, " 5 " 1, " 8
" 31 " 5, or about 6 " 1, " 9
" 33 " 3, or 11 " 1, " 10
" 34 " 2, " 17 " 1, " 11
" 33 " 3, " 11 " 1, " 12
The table shows that if a blot must be left within the reach of one die,
the nearer it is left to the adversary's man the less probability there is
of its being hit. Also, that it is long odds against being hit on a blot
which is only to be reached with double dice, and that, in that case (on
any number from 7 to 11), the farther off the blot is, the less chance
there is of its being hit.
The table assumes that the board is open for every possible throw. If part
of the throw is blocked by an intervening point being held by adverse men,
the chance of being hit is less.
Two principles, then, have to be considered in moving the men:-- (1) To
make points where there is the best chance of obstructing the opponent. (2)
When obliged to leave blots, to choose the position in which they are least
likely to be hit.
The best points to secure are the five-point in your own inner table and
the five-point in your adversary's inner table. The next best is your own
bar-point; and the next best the four in your own inner table.
The best move for some throws at the commencement of a game is as
follows:--Aces (the best of all throws), move two on your bar-point and two
on your five-point. This throw is often given to inferior players by way of
odds.
Ace, trey: make the five-point in your inner table.
Ace, six: make your bar-point.
Deuces: move two on the four-point in your inner table, and two on the
trey-point in your opponent's inner table.
Deuce, four: make the four-point in your own table.
Threes: play two on the five-point in your inner table, and two on the
four-point of your adversary's inner table, or make your bar-point.
Trey, five: make the trey-point in your own table.
Trey, six: bring a man from your adversary's ace-point as far as he will
go.
Fours: move on two on the five-point in your adversary's inner table, and
two from the five in his outer table.
Four, five and four, six: carry a man from your adversary's ace-point as
far as he will go.
Fives: move two men from the five in your adversary's outer table to the
trey-point in your inner table.
Five, six: move a man from your adversary's ace-point as far as he will go.
Sixes (the second-best throw): move two on your adversary's bar-point and
two on your own bar-point.
In carrying the men home carry the most distant man to your adversary's
bar-point, to the six-point in your outer table, and then to the six-point
in your inner table. By following this rule as nearly [v.03 p.0135] as the
throws admit, you will carry the men to your inner table in the fewest
number of throws.
Avoid carrying many men upon the trey or deuce-point in your own tables, as
these men are out of play.
Whenever you have taken up two of your adversary's men, and two or more
points made in your inner table, spread your other men in the hope of
making another point in your tables, and of hitting the man your adversary
enters.
Always take up a man if the blot you leave in making the move can only be
hit with double dice, but if you already have two of your opponent's men in
your tables it is unwise to take up a third.
In entering a man which it is to your adversary's advantage to hit, leave
the blot upon the lowest point you can, _e.g._ ace-point in preference to
deuce-point.
When your adversary is bearing his men, and you have two men in his table,
say, on his ace-point, and several men in the outer table, it is to your
advantage to leave one man on the ace-point, because it prevents his
bearing his men to the greatest advantage, and gives you the chance of his
leaving a blot. But if you find that you can probably save the gammon by
bringing both your men out of his table, do not wait for a blot. Eight
points is the average throw.
The laws of backgammon (as given by Hoyle) are as follows:--
1. When a man is touched by the caster it must be played if possible; if
impossible no penalty. 2. A man is not played till it is placed upon a
point and quitted. 3. If a player omits a man from the board there is no
penalty. 4. If he bears any number of men before he has entered a man taken
up, men so borne must be entered again. 5. If he has mistaken his throw and
played it, and his adversary has thrown, it is not in the choice of either
of the players to alter it, unless they both agree to do so. 6. If one or
both dice are "cocked," _i.e._ do not lie fairly and squarely on the table,
a fresh throw is imperative.
_Russian Backgammon_ varies from the above game in that the men, instead of
being set as in the diagram, are entered in the same table by throws of the
dice, and both players move in the same direction round to the opposite
table. There are various rules for this game. By some a player is not
obliged to enter all his men before he moves any; he can take up blots at
any time on entering, but while he has a man up, he must enter it before
entering any more or moving any of those already entered. If he cannot
enter the man that is up, he loses the benefit of the throw.
A player who throws doublets must play or enter not only the number thrown,
but also doublets of the number corresponding to the opposite side of the
dice; thus, if he throws sixes, he must first enter or move the sixes, as
the case may be, and then aces, and he also has another throw. Some rules
allow him to play either doublets first, but he must always complete one
set before playing the other. If a player cannot play the whole of his
throw, his adversary is sometimes allowed to play the unplayed portion, in
which cases the caster is sometimes allowed to come in and complete his
moves, if he can, and in the event of his having thrown deuce-ace or
doublets to throw again. If he throws doublets a second time, he moves and
throws again, and so on. The privilege is sometimes restricted by not
allowing this advantage to the first doublets thrown by each player. It is
sometimes extended by allowing the thrower of the deuce-ace to choose any
doublets he likes on the opposite side of the dice, and to throw again. The
restriction with regard to the first doublets thrown does not apply to
deuce-ace, nor does throwing it remove the restriction with regard to first
doublets. A player must first be able to complete the doublets thrown. If
the player cannot move the whole throw he cannot take the corresponding
doublets, and he is not allowed another throw if he cannot move all the
points to which he is entitled.
BACKHUYSEN, or BAKHUISEN, LUDOLF (1631-1708), Dutch painter, was born at
Emden, in Hanover. He was brought up as a merchant at Amsterdam, but early
discovered so strong a genius for painting that he relinquished business
and devoted himself to art. He studied first under Allart van Everdingen
and then under Hendrik Dubbels, two eminent masters of the time, and soon
became celebrated for his sea-pieces. He was an ardent student of nature,
and frequently exposed himself on the sea in an open boat in order to study
the effects of tempests. His compositions, which are very numerous, are
nearly all variations of one subject, and in a style peculiarly his own,
marked by intense realism or faithful imitation of nature. In his later
years Backhuysen employed his time in etching and calligraphy. He died in
Amsterdam on the 17th of November 1708.
BACKNANG, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Wuerttemberg, 19 m. by rail
N.E. from Stuttgart. Pop. (1900) 7650. It has an interesting church, dating
from the 12th century, and notable tanneries and leather factories, woollen
and cloth mills. In 1325 Backnang was ceded to Wuerttemberg by Baden. In
the vicinity is the Wilhelmsheim sanatorium for consumptives.
BACKSCRATCHER, a long slender rod of wood, whalebone, tortoiseshell, horn
or cane, with a carved human hand, usually of ivory, mounted at the
extremity. Its name suggests the primary use of the implement, but little
is known of its history, and it was unquestionably also employed as a kind
of rake to keep in order the huge "heads" of powdered hair worn by ladies
during a considerable portion of the 18th and the early part of the 19th
centuries. The backscratcher varies in length from 12 to 20 in., and the
more elaborate examples, which were occasionally hung from the waist, are
silver-mounted, and in rare instances the ivory fingers bear carved rings.
The hand is sometimes outstretched, and sometimes the fingers are flexed;
the modelling is frequently good, the fingers delicately formed and the
nails well defined. As a rule the rod is finished off with a knob. The hand
was now and again replaced by a rake or a bird's claw. The hand was
indifferently dexter or sinister, but the Chinese variety usually bears a
right hand. Like most of the obsolete appliances of daily life, the
backscratcher, or scratch-back, as it is sometimes called, has become
scarce, and it is one of the innumerable objects which attract the
attention of the modern collector.
BACK'S RIVER (_Thlewechodyeth_, or "Great Fish"), a river in Mackenzie and
Keewatin districts, Canada, rising in Sussex lake, a small body of water in
108deg 20' W. and 64deg 25' N., and flowing with a very tortuous course
N.E. to an inlet of the Arctic Ocean, passing through several large
lake-expansions--Pelly, Carry, MacDougall and Franklin. Like the
Coppermine, the only other large river of this part of Canada, it is
rendered unnavigable by a succession of rapids and rocks. It was discovered
and explored by Sir George Back in 1834. Its total length is 560 m.
BACKWARDATION, or, as it is more often called for brevity, BACK, a
technical term employed on the London Stock Exchange to express the amount
charged for the loan of stock from one account to the other, and paid to
the purchaser by the seller on a bear account (see ACCOUNT) in order to
allow the seller to defer the delivery of the stock. The seller, having
sold for delivery on a certain date, stocks or shares which probably he
does not possess, in the hope that he may be able, before the day fixed for
delivery, to buy them at a cheaper price and so earn a profit, finds on
settling-day that the prices have not gone down according to his
expectation, and therefore pays the purchaser an agreed amount of interest
(_backwardation_) for the privilege of deferring the delivery, either in
order to procure the stock, or else in the hope that there will be a
shrinkage in the price which will enable him to gain a profit. (See also
STOCK EXCHANGE).
BACON, FRANCIS (BARON VERULAM, VISCOUNT ST ALBANS) (1561-1626), English
philosopher, statesman and essayist, was born at York House in the Strand,
London, on the 22nd of January 1560/1. He was the youngest son of Sir
Nicholas Bacon (_q.v._). His mother, the second wife of Sir Nicholas, was a
daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke, formerly tutor to Edward VI. She was a woman
of considerable culture, well skilled in the classical studies of the
period, and a warm adherent of the Reformed or Puritan Church. Very little
is known of Bacon's early life and education. His health being then, as
always, extremely delicate, he probably received much of his instruction at
home. In April 1573 he was entered at Trinity College, Cambridge, where for
three years he resided with his brother Anthony. At Cambridge he applied
himself diligently to the several sciences as then taught, and came to the
conclusion that the methods employed and the results attained were alike
erroneous. Although he preserved a reverence for Aristotle (of whom,
however, he seems to have known but little), he learned to despise the
current Aristotelian philosophy. It yielded no fruit, was serviceable only
for disputation, and the end it proposed to itself was a mistaken one.
Philosophy must be taught its true purpose, and for this purpose a new
method must be devised. With the [v.03 p.0136] first germs of this great
conception in his mind, Bacon left the university.
On the 27th of June 1576 he and his brother Anthony were entered _de
societate magistrorum_ at Gray's Inn, and a few months later he was sent
abroad with Sir Amyas Paulet, the English ambassador at Paris. The
disturbed state of government and society in France at that time afforded
him valuable political instruction. It was formerly supposed that certain
_Notes on the State of Christendom_, usually printed in his works, contain
the results of his observations, but Spedding has shown that there is no
reason for ascribing these _Notes_ to him, and that they may be attributed
with more probability to one of his brother Anthony's correspondents.
The sudden death of his father in February 1578/9 necessitated Bacon's
return to England, and exercised a very serious influence on his fortunes.
A considerable sum of money had been laid up by Sir Nicholas for the
purchase of an estate for his youngest son, the only one otherwise
unprovided for. Owing to his sudden death, this intention was not carried
out, and a fifth only of the money descended to Francis. This was one of
the gravest misfortunes of his life; he started with insufficient means,
acquired a habit of borrowing and was never afterwards out of debt. As it
had become necessary that he should adopt some profession, he selected that
of law, and took up his residence at Gray's Inn in 1579.
In the fragment _De Interpretation Naturae Prooemium_ (written probably
about 1603) Bacon analyses his own mental character and lays before us the
objects he had in view when he entered on public life. If his opening
sentence, "Ego cum me ad utilitates humanas natum existimarem" ("since I
thought myself born to be of advantage to mankind"), seems at first sight a
little arrogant, it must be remembered that it is the arrogance of
Aristotle's [Greek: megalopsuchos],[1] who thinks himself worthy of great
things, and is worthy. The ideal of production of good to the human race
through the discovery of truth, was combined in him with the practical
desire to be of service to his country. He purposed, therefore, to obtain,
if possible, some honourable post in the state which would give him the
means of realizing these projects, and would enable him to do somewhat for
the church, the third of the objects whose good he had at heart. The
constant striving after these three ends is the key to Bacon's life. His
qualifications for accomplishing the task were not small. His intellect was
far-seeing and acute, quick and yet cautious, meditative, methodical and
free from prejudice. If we add to this account that he seems to have been
of an unusually amiable disposition we have a fairly complete picture of
his mental character at this critical period of his life.
In 1580 he appears to have taken the first step in his career by applying,
through his uncle, Burghley, the lord treasurer, for some post at court.
His suit, though well received by the queen, was unsuccessful; the
particulars are totally unknown. For two years after this disappointment he
worked quietly at Gray's Inn, and in 1582 was admitted an outer barrister.
In 1584 he took his seat in parliament for Melcombe in Dorsetshire, but the
notes for the session do not disclose what reputation he gained. About the
same time he made another application to Burghley, apparently with a view
to expediting his progress at the bar. His uncle, who appears to have
"taken his zeal for ambition," wrote him a severe letter, taking him to
task for arrogance and pride, qualities which Bacon vehemently disclaimed.
As his advancement at the bar was unusually rapid, his uncle's influence
may have been exerted in his behalf. In 1589 he received the first
substantial piece of patronage from his powerful kinsman, the reversion of
the clerkship of the Star Chamber. The office was worth about L1600 a year;
but it did not become vacant for nearly twenty years. A considerable period
of his life thus slipped away, and his affairs had not prospered. He had
written on the condition of parties in the church; he had set down his
thoughts on philosophical reform in the lost tract, _Temporis Partus
Maximus_; but he had failed in obtaining the position which he looked upon
as an indispensable condition of success. A long and eloquent letter to
Burghley[2] throws additional light upon his character, and gives a hint as
to the cause of his uncle's slackness in promoting him.
Some time before this, perhaps as early as 1588, Bacon appears to have
become acquainted with the earl of Essex, Elizabeth's favourite. At the
close of 1591 he was acting as the earl's confidential adviser, and exerted
himself, together with his brother Anthony, diligently in the earl's
service. In February 1593 parliament was called, and Bacon took his seat
for Middlesex. The special occasion for which the House had been summoned
was the discovery of one of the numerous popish plots that distracted
Elizabeth's reign.
As Bacon's conduct in this emergency seriously affected his fortunes and
has been much misunderstood, it is necessary to state, as briefly as
possible, the whole facts of the case. The House having been duly informed
of the state necessities, assented to a double subsidy and appointed a
committee to draw up the requisite articles. Before this was completed, a
message arrived from the House of Lords requesting a conference, which was
granted. The committee of the Commons were then informed that the crisis
demanded a triple subsidy to be collected in a shorter time than usual,
that the Lords could not assent to less than this, and that they desired to
confer on the matter. This proposal of the Lords to discuss supply
infringed upon the privileges of the Commons; accordingly, when the report
of committee was read to the Lower House, Bacon spoke against the proposed
conference, pointing out at the same time that a communication from the
Lords might be received, but that the actual deliberation on it must be
taken by themselves alone. His motion, after some delay, was carried and
the conference was rejected. The Lords upon this lowered their demands, and
desired merely to make a communication, which, being legitimate, was at
once assented to. The House had then before them the proposal for a triple
subsidy, to be collected in three, or, as the motion ultimately was shaped,
in four years, instead of in six, as the ordinary custom would have been.
Bacon, who approved of the increased subsidy, was opposed to the short
period in which it was proposed to raise it. He suggested that it would be
difficult or impossible for the people to meet such heavy demands, that
discontent and trouble would arise, and that the better method of procedure
was to raise money by levy or imposition. His motion appears to have
received no support, and the four years' subsidy was passed unanimously.
Bacon, as it turned out, had been mistaken in thinking that the country
would be unable to meet the increased taxation, and his conduct, though
prompted by a pure desire to be of service to the queen, gave deep and
well-nigh ineradicable offence. He was accused [v.03 p.0137] of seeking
popularity, and was for a time excluded from the court. His letter to
Burghley,[3] who had told him of the queen's displeasure with his speech,
offers no apology for what he had said, but expresses regret that his
motives should have been misunderstood. He soon felt that the queen's anger
was not to be appeased by such a justification. The attorney-generalship
had fallen vacant and Bacon became a candidate for the office, his most
formidable rival being his life-long antagonist, Edward Coke, who was then
solicitor. Essex warmly espoused Bacon's cause and earnestly pressed his
claims upon the queen; but his impetuous, pettish pleading tended to retard
the cause. Burghley, on the other hand, in no way promoted his nephew's
interest; he would recommend him for the solicitorship, but not for the
attorney-generalship; and it is not improbable that Sir Robert Cecil
secretly used his influence against his cousin. The queen delayed the
appointment, and Bacon's fortunes, as they then stood, could ill brook
delay. He was harassed with debt and at times so disheartened that he
contemplated retirement from public life. In March 1594 it was at last
understood that Coke was to be attorney-general. Essex, though bitterly
mortified, at once threw all his energies into the endeavour to procure for
Bacon the solicitorship; but in this case also, his method of dealing,
which was wholly opposed to Bacon's advice,[4] seemed to irritate the
queen. The old offence was not yet forgiven, and after a tedious delay, the
office was given, in October 1595, to Serjeant Thomas Fleming. Burghley and
Sir John Puckering seem to have assisted Bacon honestly, if not
over-warmly, in this second application; but the conduct of Cecil had
roused suspicions which were not perhaps without foundation. Essex, to
compensate in some degree for Bacon's disappointment, insisted on
presenting him with a piece of land, worth about L1800, and situated
probably near Twickenham Park. Nor did his kindness cease there; before
sailing on the expedition to Cadiz, in the beginning of 1596, he addressed
letters to Buckhurst, Fortescue and Egerton, earnestly requesting them to
use their influence towards procuring for Bacon the vacant office of master
of the rolls. Before anything came of this application, the Cadiz
expedition had resulted in a brilliant success, and Essex became the idol
of the army and the people. Bacon saw clearly that such a reputation would
assuredly alienate the affections of the queen, who loved not to have a
subject too powerful or too popular. He therefore addressed an eloquent and
imploring letter to the earl, pointing out the dangers of his position and
urging upon him what he judged to be the only safe course of action, to
seek and secure the favour of the queen alone; above all things dissuading
him from the appearance of military popularity. His advice, however, was
unpalatable and proved ineffectual. The earl still continued his usual
course of dealing with the queen, depending solely upon her supposed
affection for him, and insanely jealous of any other whom she might seem to
favour. His unskilful and unlucky management of the sea expedition to
Ferrol and the Azores in no way lowered his popularity with the people, but
undoubtedly weakened his influence with the queen.
Bacon's affairs in the meantime had not been prospering. He had increased
his reputation by the publication in 1597 of his _Essays_, along with which
were the _Colours of Good and Evil_ and the _Meditationes Sacrae_; but his
private fortunes were in a bad condition. No public office apparently could
be found for him; a scheme for retrieving his position by a marriage with
the wealthy widow, Lady Elizabeth Hatton, failed, and in 1598 he was
arrested for debt. He seems, however, to have been growing in favour with
the queen. Some years previously (perhaps about 1594), he had begun to be
employed by her in crown affairs, and he gradually acquired the standing of
one of the learned counsel, though he had no commission or warrant, and
received no salary. At the same time he was no longer on the former
friendly terms with Essex, a certain estrangement having sprung up between
them, caused no doubt by the earl's dislike of his friend's advice. The
earl's affairs were then at a somewhat critical stage, and as our judgment
upon a most important episode in Bacon's life depends upon our knowledge of
the events of the ensuing year, it will be requisite to enter somewhat
minutely into proceedings with which Bacon himself had nothing to do.
Ireland was then in a rebellious and discontented condition, and it was
difficult for the English government to decide either on a definite course
of policy with regard to it, or on a leader by whom that policy might be
carried out. A violent quarrel took place between the queen and Essex, who
for some months retired from court and refused to be reconciled. At last he
came forth from his seclusion, and it was soon understood that he was in
person to undertake the subjugation of the rebels in Ireland, with a larger
force than had ever before been sent into that country. Into the obscure
details of this unhappy campaign it is unnecessary to enter; one fact
stands out clearly, that Essex endeavoured to carry out a treasonable
design. His jealousy and ill-temper had been so roused that the only course
open to him seemed to be the obtaining a powerful military force, the
possession of which would compel the queen to reinstate him in her favour.
Whether or not this plan was in contemplation before he undertook the Irish
expedition is not evident, though even outsiders at that time entertained
some suspicions, but there can be no doubt of the treasonable character of
the negotiations carried on in Ireland. His plans, probably not very
definite, were disturbed by an imperative message from the queen, ordering
him not to return to England without her permission. He at once set off,
and, trusting apparently to her affection for him, presented himself
suddenly before her. He was, for the moment, received kindly, but was soon
afterwards ordered to keep his chamber, and was then given into the custody
of the lord keeper at York House, where he remained till March 1600. His
great popularity, and the general ignorance of the reasons for his
imprisonment, stirred up a strong feeling against the queen, who was
reported to be influenced by Bacon, and such indignation was raised against
the latter that his friends feared his life would be in danger. It was at
last felt necessary that the queen should in some way vindicate her
proceedings, and this she at first did, contrary to Bacon's advice, by a
declaration from the Star Chamber. This, however, gave little or no
satisfaction, and it was found expedient to do what Bacon had always
recommended, to have a fair trial, yet not one in which the sentence must
needs be damaging to the earl. The trial accordingly took place before a
body of her majesty's councillors, and Bacon had a subordinate and
unimportant part in the accusation. Essex does not seem to have been at all
hurt by his action in this matter, and shortly after his release they were
again on friendly terms, Bacon drawing up letters as if to or from the earl
with the design of having them brought before the queen. But Bacon did not
know the true character of the transactions in which Essex had been
engaged. The latter had been released from all custody in August, but in
the meantime he had been busily engaged in treasonable correspondence with
James of Scotland, and was counting on the Irish army under his ally,
Charles Blount, Baron Mountjoy (afterwards earl of Devonshire), the new
deputy. But Mountjoy had apparently come to see how useless the attempt
would be to force upon the queen a settlement of the succession and
declined to go farther in the matter. Essex was thus thrown upon his own
resources, and his anger against the queen being roused afresh by the
refusal to renew his monopoly of sweet wines, he formed the desperate
project of seizing her person and compelling her to dismiss from her
council his enemies Raleigh, Cobham, and Cecil. As some pretext, he
intended to affirm that his life was in danger from these men, who were in
league with the Spaniards. The plot was forced on prematurely by the
suspicions excited at court, and the rash attempt to rouse the city of
London (8th of February 1601), proved a complete _fiasco_. The leaders were
arrested that night and thrown into prison. Although the actual rising
might have appeared a mere outburst of frantic passion, the private
examinations of the most prominent [v.03 p.0138] conspirators disclosed to
the government a plot so widely spread, and involving so many of the
highest in the land, that it would have been perilous to have pressed home
accusations against all who might be implicated. Essex was tried along with
the young earl of Southampton, and Bacon, as one of her majesty's counsel,
was present on the occasion. Coke, who was principal spokesman, managed the
case with great want of skill, incessantly allowing the thread of the
evidence to escape, and giving the prisoners opportunity to indulge in
irrelevant justifications and protestations which were not ineffectual in
distracting attention from the real question at issue. On the first
opportunity Bacon rose and briefly pointed out that the earl's plea of
having done nothing save what was absolutely necessary to defend his life
from the machinations of his enemies was weak and worthless, inasmuch as
these enemies were purely imaginary; and he compared his case to that of
Peisistratus, who had made use of a somewhat similar stratagem to cloak his
real designs upon the city of Athens. He was thereupon interrupted by the
earl, who proceeded to defend himself, by declaring that in one of the
letters drawn up by Bacon, and purporting to be from the earl to Anthony
Bacon, the existence of these rumours, and the dangers to be apprehended
from them, had been admitted; and he continued, "If these reasons were then
just and true, not counterfeit, how can it be that now my pretences are
false and injurious?" To this Bacon replied, that "the letters, if they
were there, would not blush to be seen for anything contained in them, and
that he had spent more time in vain in studying how to make the earl a good
servant to the queen than he had done in any thing else." It seems to be
forgotten in the general accounts of this matter, not only that Bacon's
letters bear out what he said, but that the earl's excuses were false. A
second time Bacon was compelled to interfere in the course of the trial,
and to recall to the minds of those present the real question at issue. He
animadverted strongly upon the puerile nature of the defence, and in answer
to a remark by Essex, that if he had wished to stir up a rebellion he would
have had a larger company with him, pointed out that his dependence was
upon the people of London, and compared his attempt to that of the duke of
Guise at Paris. To this the earl made little or no reply. Bacon's use of
this illustration and of the former one of Peisistratus, has been much
commented on, and in general it seems to have been thought that had it not
been for his speeches Essex might have escaped, or, at all events, have
been afterwards pardoned. But this view of the matter depends on the
supposition that Essex was guilty only of a rash outbreak.[5] That this was
not the case was well known to the queen and her council. Unfortunately,
prudential motives hindered the publication of the whole evidence; the
people, consequently, were still ignorant of the magnitude of the crime,
and, till recently, biographers of Bacon have been in a like ignorance.[6]
The earl himself, before execution, confessed his guilt and the thorough
justice of his sentence, while, with singular lack of magnanimity, he
incriminated several against whom accusations had not been brought, among
others his sister Lady Rich. After his execution it was thought necessary
that some account of the facts should be drawn up and circulated, in order
to remove the prejudice against the queen's action in the matter. This was
entrusted to Bacon, who drew up a _Declaration of the Practices and
Treasons attempted and committed by Robert, late Earl of Essex_, his first
draft being extensively altered and corrected by the queen and council.
Nothing is known with certainty of the reception given to this official
explanation, but the ill-feeling against Bacon was not wholly removed, and
some years later, in 1604, he published, in the form of a letter to
Mountjoy, an _Apology_ for his action in the case. This _Apology_ gives a
most fair and temperate history of the relations between Bacon and Essex,
shows how the prudent counsel of the one had been rejected by the other,
and brings out very clearly what we conceive to be the true explanation of
the matter. Everything that Bacon could do was done by him, until the real
nature of Essex's design was made apparent, and then, as he had repeatedly
told the earl, his devotion and respect were for the queen and state, not
for any subject; friendship could never take rank above loyalty. Those who
blame Bacon must acquit Essex of all wrong-doing.
Bacon's private fortunes, during the period after the death of Essex, were
not in a flourishing condition. He had obtained a grant of L1200 from the
fines imposed on Catesby, one of the conspirators, but his debts were
sufficient to swallow up this and much more. And, though he was trusted by
Elizabeth, and on good terms with her, he seems to have seen that he had no
chance of advancement. But her death in 1603, followed by the undisputed
succession of James, gave him new hopes. He used every means in his power
to bring himself under James's notice, writing to all his friends at the
Scottish court and to the king himself. He managed to obtain a personal
interview with the king, but does not seem to have been much satisfied with
it. In fact, while the king confirmed in their situations those who had
held crown offices under Elizabeth, Bacon, not holding his post by warrant,
was practically omitted. He was, however, continued, by special order of
the king, as learned counsel extraordinary, but little or no law business
appears to have been entrusted to him. He procured, through his cousin
Cecil, the dignity of knighthood, which, contrary to his inclination, he
received along with about 300 others, on the 23rd of July 1603. Between
this time and the opening of James's first parliament he was engaged in
literary work, and sent to the king two pamphlets--one on the Union, the
other on measures for the pacification of the church. Shortly after he
published his _Apology_. In March 1604 parliament met, and during their
short session Bacon's hands seem to have been full of work. It was a busy
and stirring time, and events occurred during it which carried within them
the seeds of much future dissension. Prerogative and privilege came more
than once into collision, the abuses of purveyance and wardship were made
matters of conference, though the thorough discussion of them was deferred
to a succeeding session; while James's temper was irritated by the
objections brought against his favourite scheme of the Union, and by the
attitude taken up by the House with regard to religious affairs. The
records are barely full enough to enable us to judge of the share taken by
Bacon in these discussions; his name generally appears as the reporter of
the committees on special subjects. We can occasionally, however, discern
traces of his tact and remarkable prudence; and, on the whole, his
attitude, particularly with regard to the Union question, recommended him
to James. He was shortly afterwards formally installed as learned counsel,
receiving the salary of L40, and at the same time a pension of L60 yearly.
He was also appointed one of the commission to treat of the conditions
necessary for the Union; and the admirable manner in which the duties of
that body were discharged must be attributed mainly to his influence and
his complete mastery of the subject. During the recess he published his
_Advancement of Learning_, dedicated to the king.
He was now brought into relations with James, and his prospects began to
improve. It is important for us to know what were his ideas upon
government, upon parliaments, prerogative, and so forth, since a knowledge
of this will clear up much that would seem inexplicable in his life. It
seems quite evident[7] that Bacon, from position, early training and, one
might almost think, natural inclination, held as his ideal of government
the Elizabethan system. The king was the supreme power, the centre of law
and justice, and his prerogative must not be infringed. Parliament was
merely a body called to consult with the king on emergencies (_circa ardua
regni_) and to grant supplies. King and parliament together make up the
state, but the former is first in nature and importance. The duty of a
statesman was, therefore, to carry out the royal will in as prudent a
manner as possible; he was the servant of the king, and stood or fell
according to his pleasure. He was not singular in his opinions and he was
undoubtedly sincere; and it is only [v.03 p.0139] by keeping them
constantly in mind that we can understand his after relations with the
king.
In the second parliament there was not so much scope for the exercise of
his powers. The Gunpowder Plot had aroused in the Commons warmer feelings
towards the king; they passed severe laws against recusants, and granted a
triple subsidy. At the same time they continued the collection of the
grievances concerning which they were to move. In the course of this
session Bacon married Alice Barnham "the alderman's daughter, an handsome
maiden, to my liking," of whom he had written some years before to his
cousin Cecil. Little or nothing is known of their married life.
The third parliament was chiefly occupied with the commercial and legal
questions rising out of the proposed Union, in particular, with the dispute
as to the naturalization of the _Post Nati_. Bacon argued ably in favour of
this measure, but the general feeling was against it. The House would only
pass a bill abolishing hostile laws between the kingdoms; but the case of
the _Post Nati_, being brought before the law courts, was settled as the
king wished. Bacon's services were rewarded in June 1607 by the office of
solicitor.[8] Several years passed before he gained another step. Meantime,
though circumstances had thrown him too much into active life, he had not
forgotten his cherished project of reorganizing natural science. A survey
of the ground had been made in the _Advancement_, and some short pieces not
published at the time were probably written in the subsequent two or three
years. Towards the close of 1607 he sent to his friends a small tract,
entitled _Cogitata et Visa_, probably the first draft of what we have under
that title. In 1609 he wrote the noble panegyric, _In felicem memoriam
Elizabethae_, and the curiously learned and ingenious work, _De Sapientia
Veterum_; and completed what seems to have been the _Redargutio
Philosophiarum_, or treatise on the "idols of the theatre."
In 1610 the famous fourth parliament of James met. Prerogative, despite
Bacon's advice and efforts, clashed more than once with liberty;
Salisbury's bold schemes for relieving the embarrassment caused by the
reckless extravagance of the king proved abortive, and the House was
dissolved in February 1611. Bacon took a considerable share in the debates,
consistently upheld the prerogative, and seemed yet to possess the
confidence of the Commons. The death of Salisbury, occurring soon after,
opened a position in which Bacon thought his great political skill and
sagacity might be made more immediately available for the king's service.
How far he directly offered himself for the post of secretary is uncertain,
but we know that his hopes were disappointed, the king himself undertaking
the duties of the office. About the same time he made two ineffectual
applications for the mastership of the wards; the first, on Salisbury's
death, when it was given to Sir George Carey; the second, on the death of
Carey. It is somewhat hard to understand why so little favour was shown by
the king to one who had proved himself able and willing to do good service,
and who, in spite of his disappointments, still continued zealously to
offer advice and assistance. At last in 1613, a fair opportunity for
promotion occurred. The death of Sir Thomas Fleming made a vacancy in the
chief justiceship of the king's bench, and Bacon, after some deliberation,
proposed to the king that Coke should be removed from his place in the
court of common pleas and transferred to the king's bench. He gives several
reasons for this in his letter to the king, but in all probability his
chief motive was that pointed out by Spedding, that in the court of king's
bench there would be less danger of Coke coming into collision with the
king on questions of prerogative, in handling which Bacon was always very
circumspect and tender. The vacancy caused by Coke's promotion was then
filled up by Hobart, and Bacon, finally, stepped into the place of
attorney-general. The fact of this advice being offered and followed in all
essentials, illustrates very clearly the close relations between the king
and Bacon, who had become a confidential adviser on most occasions of
difficulty. That his adherence to the royal party was already noticed and
commented on appears from the significant remark of Chamberlain, who, after
mentioning the recent changes among the law officials, says, "There is a
strong apprehension that ... Bacon may prove a dangerous instrument."
Further light is thrown upon Bacon's relations with James, and upon his
political sympathies, by the letter to the king advocating the calling of a
parliament,[9] and by the two papers of notes on which his letter was
founded.[10] These documents, even after due weight is given to all
considerations urged in their favour,[11] seem to confirm the view already
taken of Bacon's theory of government, and at the same time show that his
sympathies with the royal party tended to blind him to the true character
of certain courses of action, which can only be justified by a straining of
political ethics. The advice he offered, in all sincerity, was most prudent
and sagacious, and _might_ have been successfully carried out by a man of
Bacon's tact and skill; but it was intensely one-sided, and exhibited a
curious want of appreciation of what was even then beginning to be looked
on as the true relation of king, parliament and people. Unfortunately for
James, he could neither adopt nor carry out Bacon's policy. The parliament
which met in April 1614, in which Bacon sat for Cambridge University, and
was dissolved in June, after a stormy session, was by no means in a frame
of mind suitable for the king's purposes. The House was enraged at the
supposed project (then much misunderstood) of the "Undertakers"; objection
was taken to Bacon being elected or serving as a member while holding
office as attorney-general; and, though an exception was made in his
favour, it was resolved that no attorney-general should in future be
eligible for a seat in parliament. No supply was granted, and the king's
necessities were increased instead of diminished. The emergency suggested
to some of the bishops the idea of a voluntary contribution, which was
eagerly taken up by the noblemen and crown officials. The scheme was
afterwards extended so as to take in the whole kingdom, but lost something
of its voluntary character, and the means taken to raise the money, which
were not what Bacon would have recommended,[12] were calculated to stir up
discontent. The general dissatisfaction received a somewhat unguarded and
intemperate expression in a letter sent to the justices of Marlborough by a
gentleman of the neighbourhood, named Oliver St John,[13] in which he
denounced the attempt to raise funds in this way as contrary to law, reason
and religion, as constituting in the king personally an act of perjury,
involving in the same crime those who contributed, and thereby subjecting
all parties to the curses levelled by the church at such offences. St John
was summoned before the Star Chamber for slander and treasonable language;
and Bacon, _ex officio_, acted as public prosecutor. The sentence
pronounced (a fine of L5000 and imprisonment for life) was severe, but it
was not actually inflicted, and probably was not intended to be carried
out, the success of the prosecution being all that was desired. St John
remained a short time in prison, and was then released, after making a full
apology and submission. The fine was remitted. It seems incredible that
Bacon's conduct on this occasion should have been censured by his
biographers. The offence was clear; the law was undoubted; no particular
sympathy was excited for the culprit; the sentence was not carried out; and
Bacon did only what any one in his place would naturally and necessarily
have done. The nature of his office involved him in several trials for
treason occurring about the same time, and one of these is of interest
sufficient to require a somewhat longer examination. Edmund Peacham[14] had
been [v.03 p.0140] committed to custody for a libel on his superior, James
Montagu (1568?-1618), bishop of Bath and Wells. In searching his house for
certain papers, the officers came upon some loose sheets stitched together
in the form of a sermon, the contents of which were of such a nature that
it was judged right to lay them before the council. As it was at first
suspected that the writing of this book had been prompted by some
disaffected persons, Peacham was interrogated, and after he had declined to
give any information, was subjected to torture. Bacon, as one of the
learned counsel, was ordered by the council to take part in this
examination, which was undoubtedly warranted by precedent, whatever may now
be thought of it. Nothing, however, was extracted from Peacham in this way,
and it was resolved to proceed against him for treason. Now, in the excited
state of popular feeling at that period, the failure of government to
substantiate an accusation of treason would have been a serious matter. The
king, with whom the council agreed, seems therefore to have thought it
desirable to obtain beforehand the opinions of the four chief judges as to
whether the alleged offence amounted to treason. In this there was nothing
unusual or illegal, and no objection would at that time have been made to
it, but James introduced a certain innovation; he proposed that the
opinions of the four judges should be given separately and in private. It
may be reasonably inferred that his motive for this was the suspicion, or
it may be the knowledge, that Coke did not consider the matter treasonable.
At all events when Coke, who as a councillor already knew the facts of the
case, was consulted regarding the new proposal of the king, he at once
objected to it, saying that "this particular and auricular taking of
opinions" was "new and dangerous," and "not according to the custom of the
realm." He at last reluctantly assented, and proposed that Bacon should
consult with him, while the other law officers addressed themselves to the
three puisne judges. By Bacon's directions the proposal to the three judges
to give their opinions separately was made suddenly and confidently, and
any scruples they might have felt were easily overcome. The first step was
thus gained, and it was hoped that if "infusion" could be avoided, if the
papers bearing on the case were presented to the judges quickly, and before
their minds could be swayed by extraneous influence, their decision on the
case would be the same as that of the king. It is clear that the extraneous
influence to be feared was Coke, who, on being addressed by Bacon, again
objected to giving his opinion separately, and even seemed to hope that his
brother judges after they had seen the papers would withdraw their assent
to giving their decisions privately. Even after the discussion of the case
with Bacon, he would not give his opinion until the others had handed in
theirs. What the other judges thought is not definitely known, but Bacon
appears to have been unable to put in operation the plan he had devised for
swaying Coke's judgment,[15] or if he did attempt it, he was unsuccessful,
for Coke finally gave an opinion consistent with what he seems to have held
at first, that the book was not treasonable, as it did not disable the
king's title. Although the opinions of the judges were not made public, yet
as we learn, not only from Bacon, but from a sentence in one of Carleton's
letters,[16] a rumour had got about that there was doubt as to the book
being treasonable. Under these circumstances, Bacon, who feared that such a
report might incite other people to attempt a similar offence, proposed to
the king that a second rumour should be circulated in order to destroy the
impression caused by the first. "I do think it necessary," he says, "that
because we live in an age in which no counsel is kept, and that it is true
there is some bruit abroad that the judges of the king's bench do doubt of
the case that it should not be treason, that it be given out constantly,
and yet as it were in secret, and so a fame to slide, that the doubt was
only upon the publication, in that it was never published. For that (if
your majesty marketh it) taketh away or at least qualifieth the danger of
the example; for that will be no man's case."[17] Bacon's conduct in this
matter has been curiously misrepresented. He has been accused of torturing
the prisoner, and of tampering with the judges[18] by consulting them
before the trial; nay, he is even represented as selecting this poor
clergyman to serve for an example to terrify the disaffected, as breaking
into his study and finding there a sermon never intended to be preached,
which merely encouraged the people to resist tyranny.[19] All this lavish
condemnation rests on a complete misconception of the case. If any blame
attaches to him, it must arise either from his endeavour to force Coke to a
favourable decision, in which he was in all probability prompted by a
feeling, not uncommon with him, that a matter of state policy was in danger
of being sacrificed to some senseless legal quibble or precedent, or from
his advice to the king that a rumour should be set afloat which was not
strictly true.
Bacon's share in another great trial which came on shortly afterwards, the
Overbury and Somerset case, is not of such a nature as to render it
necessary to enter upon it in detail.[20] It may be noted, however, that
his letters about this time show that he had become acquainted with the
king's new favourite, the brilliant Sir George Villiers, and that he stood
high in the king's good graces. In the early part of 1616, when Thomas
Egerton, Baron Ellesmere (_c._ 1540-1617), the lord chancellor, was
dangerously ill, Bacon wrote a long and careful letter to the king,
proposing himself for the office, should it fall vacant, and stating as
frankly as possible of what value he considered his services would be. In
answer, he appears to have received a distinct promise of the reversion of
the office; but, as Ellesmere recovered, the matter stood over for a time.
He proposed, however, that he should be made a privy councillor, in order
to give him more weight in his almost recognized position of adviser to the
king, and on the 9th of June 1616 he took the oaths and his seat at the
council board.
Meanwhile, his great rival Coke, whose constant tendency to limit the
prerogative by law and precedent had made him an object of particular
dislike to James, had on two points come into open collision with the
king's rights. The first case was an action of _praemunire_ against the
court of chancery, evidently instigated by him, but brought at the instance
of certain parties whose adversaries had obtained redress in the
chancellor's court after the cause had been tried in the court of king's
bench. With all his learning and ingenuity Coke failed in inducing or even
forcing the jury to bring in a bill against the court of chancery, and it
seems fairly certain that on the technical point of law involved he was
wrong. Although his motive was, in great measure, a feeling of personal
dislike towards Ellesmere, yet it is not improbable that he was influenced
by the desire to restrict in every possible way the jurisdiction of a court
which was the direct exponent of the king's wishes. The other case, that of
the _commendams_, was more important in itself and in the circumstances
connected with it. The general question involved in a special instance was
whether or not the king's prerogative included the right of granting at
pleasure livings _in commendam_, _i.e._ to be enjoyed by one who was not
the incumbent. Bacon, as attorney-general, delivered a speech, which has
not been reported; but the king was informed that the arguments on the
other side had not been limited to the special case, but had directly
impugned the general prerogative right of granting livings. It was
necessary for James, as a party interested, at once to take measures to see
that the decision of the judges should not be given on the general question
without due consultation. He accordingly wrote to Bacon, directing him to
intimate to the judges his pleasure that they should delay judgment until
after discussion of the matter with himself. Bacon communicated first with
Coke, who in reply desired that similar notice should be given to the other
judges. This was done by Bacon, though he seems to hint that in so doing he
was [v.03 p.0141] going a little beyond his instructions. The judges took
no notice of the intimation, proceeded at once to give judgment, and sent a
letter in their united names to the king announcing what they had done, and
declaring that it was contrary to law and to their oath for them to pay any
attention to a request that their decision should be delayed. The king was
indignant at this encroachment, and acting partly on the advice of Bacon,
held a council on the 6th of June 1616, at which the judges attended. James
then entered at great length into the case, censuring the judges for the
offensive form of their letter, and for not having delayed judgment upon
his demand, which had been made solely because he was himself a party
concerned. The judges, at the conclusion of his speech, fell on their
knees, and implored pardon for the manner of their letter; but Coke
attempted to justify the matter contained in it, saying that the delay
required by his majesty was contrary to law. The point of law was argued by
Bacon, and decided by the chancellor in favour of the king, who put the
question to the judges individually, "Whether, if at any time, in a case
depending before the judges, which his majesty conceived to concern him
either in power or profit, and thereupon required to consult with them, and
that they should stay proceedings in the meantime, they ought not to stay
accordingly?" To this all gave assent except Coke, who said that "when the
case should be, he would do that should be fit for a judge to do." No
notice was taken by the king of this famous, though somewhat evasive,
reply, But the judges were again asked what course they would take in the
special case now before them. They all declared that they would not decide
the matter upon general grounds affecting the prerogative, but upon special
circumstances incident to the case; and with this answer they were
dismissed. Bacon's conduct throughout the affair has been blamed, but
apparently on wrong grounds. As attorney he was merely fulfilling his duty
in obeying the command of the king; and in laying down the law on the
disputed point, he was, we may be sure, speaking his own convictions.
Censure might more reasonably be bestowed on him because he deliberately
advised a course of action than which nothing can be conceived better
calculated to strengthen the hands of an absolute monarch.[21] This
appeared to Bacon justifiable and right, because the prerogative would be
defended and preserved intact. Coke certainly stands out in a better light,
not so much for his answer, which was rather indefinite, and the force of
which is much weakened by his assent to the second question of the king,
but for the general spirit of resistance to encroachment exhibited by him.
He was undeniably troublesome to the king, and it is no matter for wonder
that James resolved to remove him from a position where he could do so much
harm. On the 26th June he was called before the council to answer certain
charges, one of which was his conduct in the _praemunire_ question. He
acknowledged his error on that head, and made little defence. On the 30th
he was suspended from council and bench, and ordered to employ his leisure
in revising certain obnoxious opinions in his reports. He did not perform
the task to the king's satisfaction, and a few months later he was
dismissed from office.
Bacon's services to the king's cause had been most important; and as he
had, at the same time, acquired great favour with Villiers, his prospects
looked brighter than before. According to his custom, he strove earnestly
to guide by his advice the conduct of the young favourite. His letters, in
which he analyses the various relations in which such a man must stand, and
prescribes the course of action suitable for each, are valuable and
deserving of attention.[22] Very striking, in view of future events, are
the words[23] in which he gives him counsel as to his dealing with judges:
"By no means be you persuaded to interpose yourself by word or letter in
any cause depending, or like to be depending, in any court of justice, nor
suffer any man to do it where you can hinder it; and by all means dissuade
the king himself from it, upon the importunity of any, either for their
friends or themselves. If it should prevail, it perverts justice; but if
the judge be so just, and of so undaunted a courage (as he ought to be) as
not to be inclined thereby, yet it always leaves a taint of suspicions and
prejudice behind it." It is probable that Villiers at this time had really
a sense of the duties attaching to his position[24] and was willing to be
guided by a man of approved wisdom. It was not long before an opportunity
occurred for showing his gratitude and favour. Ellesmere resigned the
chancellorship on the 5th of March 1616/7, and on the 7th the great seal
was bestowed upon Bacon, with the title of lord keeper. Two months later he
took his seat with great pomp in the chancery court, and delivered a
weighty and impressive opening discourse. He entered with great vigour on
his new labours, and in less than a month he was able to report to
Buckingham that he had cleared off all outstanding chancery cases. He
seemed now to have reached the height of his ambition; he was the first law
officer in the kingdom, the accredited minister of his sovereign, and on
the best terms with the king and his favourite. His course seemed perfectly
prosperous and secure, when a slight storm arising opened his eyes to the
frailty of the tenure by which he held his position.
Coke was in disgrace but not in despair; there seemed to be a way whereby
he could reconcile himself to Buckingham, through the marriage of his
daughter, who had an ample fortune, to Sir John Villiers, brother of the
marquess, who was penniless or nearly so. The match was distasteful to Lady
Hatton and to her daughter; a violent quarrel was the consequence, and
Bacon, who thought the proposed marriage most unsuitable, took Lady
Hatton's part. His reasons for disapproval he explained to the king and
Buckingham, but found to his surprise that their indignation was strongly
roused against him. He received from both bitter letters of reproof; it was
rumoured that he would be disgraced, and Buckingham was said to have
compared his present conduct to his previous unfaithfulness to Essex.
Bacon, who seems to have acted from a simple desire to do the best for
Buckingham's own interests, at once changed his course, advanced the match
by every means in his power, and by a humble apology appeased the
indignation that had been excited against him. It had been a sharp lesson,
but things seemed to go on smoothly after it, and Bacon's affairs
prospered.
On the 4th of January 1617/8 he received the higher title of lord
chancellor; in July of the same year he was made Baron Verulam and in
January 1620/1 he was created Viscount St Albans. His fame, too, had been
increased by the publication in 1620 of his most celebrated work, the
_Novum Organum_. He seemed at length to have made satisfactory progress
towards the realization of his cherished aims; the method essential for his
Instauration was partially completed; and he had attained as high a rank in
the state as he had ever contemplated. But his actions in that position
were not calculated to promote the good of his country.
Connected with the years during which he held office is one of the
weightiest charges against his character. Buckingham, notwithstanding the
advice he had received from Bacon himself, was in the habit of addressing
letters to him recommending the causes of suitors. In many cases these seem
nothing more than letters of courtesy, and, from the general tone, it might
fairly be concluded that there was no intention to sway the opinion of the
judge illegally, and that Bacon did not understand the letters in that
sense. This view is supported by consideration of the few answers to them
which are extant.[25] One outstanding case, however, that of Dr
Steward,[26] casts some suspicion on all the others. The terms of
Buckingham's note[27] concerning it might easily have aroused doubts; and
we find that the further course of the action was to all appearances
exactly accommodated to Dr Steward, who [v.03 p.0142] had been so strongly
recommended. It is, of course, dangerous to form an extreme judgment on an
isolated and partially understood case, of which also we have no
explanation from Bacon himself, but if the interpretation advanced by Heath
be the true one, Bacon certainly suffered his first, and, so far as we can
see, just judgment on the case to be set aside, and the whole matter to be
reopened in obedience to a request from Buckingham.
It is somewhat hard to understand Bacon's position with regard to the king
during these years. He was the first officer of the crown, the most able
man in the kingdom, prudent, sagacious and devoted to the royal party. Yet
his advice was followed only when it chimed in with James's own will; his
influence was of a merely secondary kind; and his great practical skill was
employed simply in carrying out the measures of the king in the best mode
possible. We know indeed that he sympathized cordially with the home policy
of the government; he had no objection to such monopolies or patents as
seemed advantageous to the country, and for this he is certainly not to be
blamed.[28] The opinion was common at the time, and the error was merely
ignorance of the true principles of political economy. But we know also
that the patents were so numerous as to be oppressive, and we can scarcely
avoid inferring that Bacon more readily saw the advantages to the
government than the disadvantages to the people. In November 1620, when a
new parliament was summoned to meet on January following, he earnestly
pressed that the most obnoxious patents, those of alehouses and inns, and
the monopoly of gold and silver thread, should be given up, and wrote to
Buckingham, whose brothers were interested, advising him to withdraw them
from the impending storm. This prudent advice was unfortunately rejected.
But while he went cordially with the king in domestic affairs, he was not
quite in harmony with him on questions of foreign policy. Not only was he
personally in favour of a war with Spain for the recovery of the
Palatinate, but he foresaw in such a course of action the means of drawing
together more closely the king and his parliament. He believed that the
royal difficulties would be removed if a policy were adopted with which the
people could heartily sympathize, and if the king placed himself at the
head of his parliament and led them on. But his advice was neglected by the
vacillating and peace-loving monarch, his proffered proclamation was put
aside, and a weak, featureless production substituted in its place.
Nevertheless the new parliament seemed at first more responsive than might
have been looked for. A double subsidy was granted, which was expressly
stated to be "not on any consideration or condition for or concerning the
Palatinate." The session, however, was not far advanced when the question
of patents was brought up; a determined attack was made upon the very ones
of which Bacon had been in dread, and it was even proposed to proceed
against the referees (Bacon and Montagu) who had certified that there was
no objection to them in point of law. This proposal, though pressed by
Coke, was allowed to drop; while the king and Buckingham, acting under the
advice of Williams, afterwards lord keeper, agreed to give up the
monopolies. It was evident, however, that a determined attack was about to
be made upon Bacon, and that the proceeding against the referees was really
directed against him. It is probable that this charge was dropped because a
more powerful weapon had in the meantime been placed in his enemies' hands.
This was the accusation of bribery and corrupt dealings in chancery suits,
an accusation apparently wholly unexpected by Bacon, and the possibility of
which he seems never to have contemplated until it was actually brought
against him. At the beginning of the session a committee had been appointed
for inquiring into abuses in the courts of justice. Some illegal practices
of certain chancery officials had been detected and punished by the court
itself, and generally there was a disposition to overhaul its affairs,
while Coke and Lionel Cranfield, earl of Middlesex (1575-1645) directly
attacked some parts of the chancellor's administration. But on the 14th of
March one Christopher Aubrey appeared at the bar of the House, and charged
Bacon with having received from him a sum of money while his suit was going
on, and with having afterwards decided against him. Bacon's letter[29] on
this occasion is worthy of serious attention; he evidently thought the
charge was but part of the deliberate scheme to ruin him which had already
been in progress. A second accusation (Edward Egerton's case) followed
immediately after, and was investigated by the House, who, satisfied that
they had just matter for reprehension, appointed the 19th for a conference
with the Lords. On that day Bacon, as he had feared, was too ill to attend.
He wrote[30] to the Lords excusing his absence, requesting them to appoint
a convenient time for his defence and cross-examination of witnesses, and
imploring them not to allow their minds to be prejudiced against him, at
the same time declaring that he would not "trick up an innocency with
cavillations, but plainly and ingenuously declare what he knew or
remembered." The charges rapidly accumulated, but Bacon still looked upon
them as party moves, and was in hopes of defending himself.[31] Nor did he
seem to have lost his courage, if we are to believe the common reports of
the day,[32] though certainly they do not appear worthy of very much
credit.
The notes[33] bearing upon the interview which he obtained with the king
show that he had begun to see more clearly the nature and extent of the
offences with which he was charged, that he now felt it impossible
altogether to exculpate himself, and that his hopes were directed towards
obtaining some mitigation of his sentence. The long roll of charges made
upon the 19th of April finally decided him; he gave up all idea of defence,
and wrote to the king begging him to show him favour in this emergency.[34]
The next day he sent in a general confession to the Lords,[35] trusting
that this would be considered satisfactory. The Lords, however, decided
that it was not sufficient as a ground for their censure, and demanded a
detailed and particular confession. A list of twenty-eight charges was then
sent him, to which an answer by letter was required. On the 30th of April
his "confession and humble submission"[36] was handed in. In it, after
going over the several instances, he says, "I do again confess, that on the
points charged upon me, although they should be taken as myself have
declared them, there is a great deal of corruption and neglect; for which I
am heartily and penitently sorry, and submit myself to the judgment, grace,
and mercy of the court."[37] On the 3rd of May, after considerable
discussion, the Lords decided upon the sentence, which was,[38] That he
should undergo fine and ransom of L40,000; that he should be imprisoned in
the Tower during the king's pleasure; that he should be for ever incapable
of any office, place or employment in the state or commonwealth; that he
should never sit in parliament, or come within the verge of the court. This
heavy sentence was [v.03 p.0143] only partially executed. The fine was in
effect remitted by the king; imprisonment in the Tower lasted for about
four days; a general pardon (not of course covering the parliamentary
censure) was made out, and though delayed at the seal for a time by Lord
Keeper Williams, was passed probably in November 1621. The cause of the
delay seems to have lain with Buckingham, whose friendship had cooled, and
who had taken offence at the fallen chancellor's unwillingness to part with
York House. This difference was finally smoothed over, and it was probably
through his influence that Bacon received the much-desired permission to
come within the verge of the court. He never again sat in parliament.
So ends this painful episode, which has given rise to the most severe
condemnation of Bacon, and which still presents great and perhaps
insuperable difficulties. On the whole, the tendency of the most recent and
thorough researches has been towards the opinion that Bacon's own account
of the matter (from which, indeed, our knowledge of it is chiefly drawn) is
substantially correct. He distinguishes three ways in which bribes may be
given,[39] and ingenuously confesses that his own acts amounted to
corruption and were worthy of condemnation. Now, corruption strictly
interpreted would imply the deliberate sale of justice, and this Bacon
explicitly denies, affirming that he never "had bribe or reward in his eye
or thought when he pronounced any sentence or order." When we analyse the
specific charges against him, with his answers to them, we find many that
are really of little weight. The twenty-eighth and last, that of negligence
in looking after his servants, though it did him much harm, may fairly be
said to imply no moral blame. The majority of the others are instances of
gratuities given after the decision, and it is to be regretted that the
judgment of the peers gives us no means of determining how such gifts were
looked upon, whether or not the acceptance of them was regarded as a
"corrupt" practice. In four cases specifically, and in some others by
implication, Bacon confesses that he had received bribes from suitors
_pendente lite_. Yet he affirms, as we said before, that his intention was
never swayed by a bribe; and so far as any of these cases can be traced,
his decisions, often given in conjunction with some other official, are to
all appearance thoroughly just. In several cases his judgment appears to
have been given against the party bestowing the bribe, and in at least one
instance, that of Lady Wharton, it seems impossible to doubt that he must
have known when accepting the present that his opinion would be adverse to
her cause. Although, then, he felt that these practices were really
corrupt, and even rejoiced that his own fall would tend to purify the
courts from them,[40] he did not feel that he was guilty of perverting
justice for the sake of reward. How far, then, is such defence or
explanation admissible and satisfactory? It is clear that two things are to
be considered: the one the guilt of taking bribes or presents on any
consideration, the other the moral guilt depending upon the wilful
perversion of justice. The attempt has sometimes been made to defend the
whole of Bacon's conduct on the ground that he did nothing that was not
done by many of his contemporaries. Bacon himself disclaims a defence of
this nature, and we really have no direct evidence which shows to what
extent the offering and receiving of such bribes then prevailed. That the
practice was common is indeed implied by the terms in which Bacon speaks of
it, and it is not improbable that the fact of these gifts being taken by
officials was a thing fairly well known, although all were aware of their
illegal character, and it was plain that any public exposure of such
dealings would be fatal to the individual against whom the charge was made
out.[41] Bacon knew all this; he was well aware that the practice was in
itself indefensible,[42] and that his conduct was therefore corrupt and
deserving of censure. So far, then, as the mere taking of bribes is
concerned, he would permit no defence, and his own confession and judgment
on his action contain as severe a condemnation as has ever been passed upon
him. Yet in the face of this he does not hesitate to call himself "the
justest chancellor that hath been in the five changes since Sir Nicholas
Bacon's time";[43] and this on the plea that his intentions had always been
pure, and had never been affected by the presents he received. His
justification has been set aside by modern critics, not on the ground that
the evidence demonstrates its falsity,[44] but because it is inconceivable
or unnatural that any man should receive a present from another, and not
suffer his judgment to be swayed thereby. It need hardly be said that such
an _a priori_ conviction is not a sufficient basis on which to found a
sweeping condemnation of Bacon's integrity as an administrator of justice.
On the other hand, even if it be admitted to be possible and conceivable
that a present should be given by a suitor simply as seeking favourable
consideration of his cause, and not as desirous of obtaining an unjust
decree, and should be accepted by the judge on the same understanding, this
would not entitle one absolutely to accept Bacon's statement. Further
evidence is necessary in order to give foundation to a definite judgment
either way; and it is extremely improbable, nay, almost impossible, that
such can ever be produced. In these circumstances, due weight should be
given to Bacon's own assertions of his perfect innocence and purity of
intention; they ought not to be put out of court unless found in actual
contradiction to the facts, and the reverse of this is the case, so far as
has yet appeared.[45]
The remaining five years of his life, though he was still harassed by want
of means, for James was not liberal, were spent in work far more valuable
to the world than anything he had accomplished in his high office. In March
1622 he presented to Prince Charles his _History of Henry VII._; and
immediately, with unwearied industry, set to work to complete some portions
of his great work. In November 1622 appeared the _Historia Ventorum_; in
January 1622/3, the _Historia Vitae et Mortis_; and in October of the same
year, the _De Augmentis Scientiarum_, a Latin translation, with many
additions, of the _Advancement_. Finally, in December 1624, he published
his _Apophthegms_, and _Translations of some of the Psalms_, dedicated to
George Herbert; and, in 1625, a third and enlarged edition of the _Essays_.
Busily occupied with these labours, his life now drew rapidly to a close.
In March 1626 he came to London, and when driving one day near Highgate,
was taken with a desire to discover whether snow would act as an
antiseptic. He stopped his carriage, got out at a cottage, purchased a
fowl, and with his own hands assisted to stuff it with snow. He was seized
with a sudden chill, and became so seriously unwell that he had to be
conveyed to Lord Arundel's house, which was near at hand. Here his illness
increased, the cold and chill brought on bronchitis and he died, after a
few days' suffering, on the 9th of April 1626.
[v.03 p.0144] _Bacon's Works and Philosophy._
A complete survey of Bacon's works and an estimate of his place in
literature and philosophy are matters for a volume. It is here proposed
merely to classify the works, to indicate their general character and to
enter somewhat more in detail upon what he himself regarded as his great
achievement,--the reorganization of the sciences and the exposition of a
new method by which the human mind might proceed with security and
certainty towards the true end of all human thought and action.
Putting aside the letters and occasional writings, we may conveniently
distribute the other works into three classes, _Professional, Literary,
Philosophical_. The Professional works include the _Reading on the Statute
of Uses_, the _Maxims of Law_ and the treatise (possibly spurious) on the
_Use of the Law_. "I am in good hope," said Bacon himself, "that when Sir
Edward Coke's reports and my rules and decisions shall come to posterity,
there will be (whatsoever is now thought) question who was the greater
lawyer." If Coke's reports show completer mastery of technical details,
greater knowledge of precedent, and more of the dogged grasp of the letter
than do Bacon's legal writings, there can be no dispute that the latter
exhibit an infinitely more comprehensive intelligence of the abstract
principles of jurisprudence, with a richness and ethical fulness that more
than compensate for their lack of dry legal detail. Bacon seems indeed to
have been a lawyer of the first order, with a keen scientific insight into
the bearings of isolated facts and a power of generalization which
admirably fitted him for the self-imposed task, unfortunately never
completed, of digesting or codifying the chaotic mass of the English law.
Among the literary works are included all that he himself designated moral
and historical pieces, and to these may be added some theological and minor
writings, such as the _Apophthegms_. Of the moral works the most valuable
are the _Essays_, which have been so widely read and universally admired.
The matter is of the familiar, practical kind, that "comes home to men's
bosoms." The thoughts are weighty, and even when not original have acquired
a peculiar and unique tone or cast by passing through the crucible of
Bacon's mind. A sentence from the _Essays_ can rarely be mistaken for the
production of any other writer. The short, pithy sayings have become
popular mottoes and household words. The style is quaint, original,
abounding in allusions and witticisms, and rich, even to gorgeousness, with
piled-up analogies and metaphors.[46] The first edition contained only ten
essays, but the number was increased in 1612 to thirty-eight, and in 1625
to fifty-eight. The short tract, _Colours of Good and Evil_, which with the
_Meditationes Sacrae_ originally accompanied the Essays, was afterwards
incorporated with the _De Augmentis_. Along with these works may be classed
the curiously learned piece, _De Sapientia Veterum_, in which he works out
a favourite idea, that the mythological fables of the Greeks were
allegorical and concealed the deepest truths of their philosophy. As a
scientific explanation of the myths the theory is of no value, but it
affords fine scope for the exercise of Bacon's unrivalled power of
detecting analogies in things apparently most dissimilar. The
_Apophthegms_, though hardly deserving Macaulay's praise of being the best
collection of jests in the world, contain a number of those significant
anecdotes which Bacon used with such effect in his other writings. Of the
historical works, besides a few fragments of the projected history of
Britain there remains the _History of Henry VII._, a valuable work, giving
a clear and animated narrative of the reign, and characterizing Henry with
great skill. The style is in harmony with the matter, vigorous and flowing,
but naturally with less of the quaintness and richness suitable to more
thoughtful and original writings. The series of the literary works is
completed by the minor treatises on theological or ecclesiastical
questions. Some of the latter, included among the occasional works, are
sagacious and prudent and deserve careful study. Of the former, the
principal specimens are the _Meditationes Sacrae_ and the _Confession of
Faith_. The _Paradoxes_ (Characters of a believing Christian in paradoxes,
and seeming contradictions), which was often and justly suspected, has been
conclusively proved by Grosart to be the work of another author.
_Philosophical Works._--The great mass of Bacon's writings consists of
treatises or fragments, which either formed integral parts of his grand
comprehensive scheme, or were closely connected with it. More exactly they
may be classified under three heads: (A) Writings originally intended to
form parts of the _Instauratio_, but which were afterwards superseded or
thrown aside; (B) Works connected with the _Instauratio_, but not directly
included in its plan; (C) Writings which actually formed part of the
_Instauratio Magna_.
(A) This class contains some important tracts, which certainly contain
little, if anything, that is not afterwards taken up and expanded in the
more elaborate works, but are not undeserving of attention, from the
difference in the point of view and method of treatment. The most valuable
of them are: (1) _The Advancement of Learning_, of which no detailed
account need be given, as it is completely worked up into the _De
Augmentis_, and takes its place as the first part of the _Instauratio_. (2)
_Valerius Terminus_, a very remarkable piece, composed probably about 1603,
though perhaps retouched at a later period. It contains a brief and
somewhat obscure outline of the first two parts in the _Instauratio_, and
is of importance as affording us some insight into the gradual development
of the system in Bacon's own mind. (3) _Temporis Partus Masculus_, another
curious fragment, remarkable not only from its contents, but from its
style, which is arrogant and offensive, in this respect unlike any other
writing of Bacon's. The adjective _masculus_ points to the power of
bringing forth fruit possessed by the new philosophy, and perhaps indicates
that all previous births of time were to be looked upon as feminine or
imperfect; it is used in a somewhat similar sense in _Letters and Life_,
vi. 183, "_In verbis masculis_, no flourishing or painted words, but such
words as are fit to go before deeds." (4) _Redargutio Philosophiarum_, a
highly finished piece in the form of an oration, composed probably about
1608 or 1609, and containing in pretty full detail much of what afterwards
appears in connexion with the _Idola Theatri_ in book i. of the _Novum
Organum_. (5) _Cogitata et Visa_, perhaps the most important of the minor
philosophical writings, dating from 1607 (though possibly the tract in its
present form may have been to some extent altered), and containing in
weighty and sonorous Latin the substance of the first book of the
_Organum_. (6) The _Descriptio Globi Intellectualis_, which is to some
extent intermediate between the _Advancement_ and the _De Augmentis_, goes
over in detail the general classification of the sciences, and enters
particularly on some points of minor interest. (7) The brief tract _De
Interpretatione Naturae Sententiae Duodecim_ is evidently a first sketch of
part of the _Novum Organum_, and in phraseology is almost identical with
it. (8) A few smaller pieces, such as the _Inquisitio de Motu_, the _Calor
et Frigus_, the _Historia Soni et Auditus_ and the _Phaenomena Universi_,
are early specimens of his _Natural History_, and exhibit the first
tentative applications of the new method.
(B) The second group consists of treatises on subjects connected with the
_Instauratio_, but not forming part of it. The most interesting, and in
many respects the most remarkable, is the philosophic romance, the _New
Atlantis_, a description of an ideal state in which the principles of the
new philosophy are carried out by political machinery and under state
guidance, and where many of the results contemplated by Bacon are in
imagination attained. The work was to have been completed by the addition
of a second part, treating of the laws of a model commonwealth, which was
never written. Another important tract is the _De Principiis atque
Originibus secundum Fabulas Cupidinis et Caeli_, where, under the disguise
of two old mythological stories, he (in the manner of the _Sapientia
Veterum_) finds the deepest truths [v.03 p.0145] concealed. The tract is
unusually interesting, for in it he discusses at some length the limits of
science, the origin of things and the nature of primitive matter, giving at
the same time full notices of Democritus among the ancient philosophers and
of Telesio among the modern. Deserving of attention are also the
_Cogitationes de Natura Rerum_, probably written early, perhaps in 1605,
and the treatise on the theory of the tides, _De Fluxu et Refluxu Maris_,
written probably about 1616.
(C) The philosophical works which form part of the _Instauratio_ must of
course be classed according to the positions which they respectively hold
in that scheme of the sciences.
The great work, the reorganization of the sciences, and the restoration of
man to that command over nature which he had lost by the fall, consisted in
its final form of six divisions.
I. _Partitiones Scientiarum_, a survey of the sciences, either such as then
existed or such as required to be constructed afresh--in fact, an inventory
of all the possessions of the human mind. The famous classification[47] on
which this survey proceeds is based upon an analysis of the faculties and
objects of human knowledge. This division is represented by the _De
Augmentis Scientiarum_.
II. _Interpretatio Naturae._--After the survey of all that has yet been
done in the way of discovery or invention, comes the new method, by which
the mind of man is to be trained and directed in its progress towards the
renovation of science. This division is represented, though only
imperfectly, by the _Novum Organum_, particularly book ii.
III. _Historia Naturalis et Experimentalis._--The new method is valueless,
because inapplicable, unless it be supplied with materials duly collected
and presented--in fact, unless there be formed a competent natural history
of the _Phaenomena Universi_. A short introductory sketch of the requisites
of such a natural history, which, according to Bacon, is essential,
necessary, the _basis totius negotii_, is given in the tract _Parasceve_,
appended to the _Novum Organum_. The principal works intended to form
portions of the history, and either published by himself or left in
manuscript, are _Historia Ventorum_, _Historia Vitae et Mortis_, _Historia
Densi et Rari_, and the extensive collection of facts and observations
entitled _Sylva Sylvarum_.
IV. _Scala Intellectus._--It might have been supposed that the new
philosophy could now be inaugurated. Materials had been supplied, along
with a new method by which they were to be treated, and naturally the next
step would be the finished result. But for practical purposes Bacon
interposed two divisions between the preliminaries and the philosophy
itself. The first was intended to consist of types or examples of
investigations conducted by the new method, serviceable for keeping the
whole process vividly before the mind, or, as the title indicates, such
that the mind could run rapidly up and down the several steps or grades in
the process. Of this division there seems to be only one small fragment,
the _Filum Labyrinthi_, consisting of but two or three pages.
V. _Prodromi_, forerunners of the new philosophy. This part, strictly
speaking, is quite extraneous to the general design. According to the
_Distributio Operis_,[48] it was to contain certain speculations of Bacon's
own, not formed by the new method, but by the unassisted use of his
understanding. These, therefore, form temporary or uncertain anticipations
of the new philosophy. There is extant a short preface to this division of
the work, and according to Spedding some of the miscellaneous treatises,
such as _De Principiis_, _De Fluxu et Refluxu_, _Cogitationes de Natura
Rerum_, may probably have been intended to be included under this head.
This supposition receives some support from the manner in which the fifth
part is spoken of in the _Novum Organum_, i. 116.
VI. The new philosophy, which is the work of future ages, and the result of
the new method.
Bacon's grand motive in his attempt to found the sciences anew was the
intense conviction that the knowledge man possessed was of little service
to him. "The knowledge whereof the world is now possessed, especially that
of nature, extendeth not to magnitude and certainty of works."[49] Man's
sovereignty over nature, which is founded on knowledge alone, had been
lost, and instead of the free relation between things and the human mind,
there was nothing but vain notions and blind experiments. To restore the
original commerce between man and nature, and to recover the _imperium
hominis_, is the grand object of all science. The want of success which had
hitherto attended efforts in the same direction had been due to many
causes, but chiefly to the want of appreciation of the nature of philosophy
and its real aim. Philosophy is not the science of things divine and human;
it is not the search after truth. "I find that even those that have sought
knowledge for itself, and not for benefit or ostentation, or any practical
enablement in the course of their life, have nevertheless propounded to
themselves a wrong mark, namely, satisfaction (which men call Truth) and
not operation."[50] "Is there any such happiness as for a man's mind to be
raised above the confusion of things, where he may have the prospect of the
order of nature and error of man? But is this a view of delight only and
not of discovery? of contentment and not of benefit? Shall he not as well
discern the riches of nature's warehouse as the beauty of her shop? Is
truth ever barren? Shall he not be able thereby to produce worthy effects,
and to endow the life of man with infinite commodities?"[51] Philosophy is
altogether practical; it is of little matter to the fortunes of humanity
what abstract notions one may entertain concerning the nature and the
principles of things.[52] This truth, however, has never yet been
recognized;[53] it has not yet been seen that the true aim of all science
is "to endow the condition and life of man with new powers or works,"[54]
or "to extend more widely the limits of the power and greatness of
man."[55] Nevertheless, it is not to be imagined that by this being
proposed as the great object of search there is thereby excluded all that
has hitherto been looked upon as the higher aims of human life, such as the
contemplation of truth. Not so, but by following the new aim we shall also
arrive at a _true_ knowledge of the universe in which we are, for without
knowledge there is no power; truth and utility are in ultimate aspect the
same; "works themselves are of greater value as pledges of truth than as
contributing to the comforts of life."[56] Such was the conception of
philosophy with which Bacon started, and in which he felt himself to be
thoroughly original. As his object was new and hitherto unproposed, so the
method he intended to employ was different from all modes of investigation
hitherto attempted. "It would be," as he says, "an unsound fancy and
self-contradictory, to expect that things which have never yet been done
can be done except by means which have never yet been tried."[57] There
were many obstacles in his way, and he seems always to have felt that the
first part of the new scheme must be a _pars destruens_, a destructive
criticism of all other methods. Opposition was to be expected, not only
from previous philosophies, but especially from the human mind itself. In
the first place, natural antagonism might be looked for from the two
opposed sects, the one of whom, in despair of knowledge, maintained that
all science was impossible; while the other, resting on authority and on
the learning that had been handed down from the Greeks, declared that
science was already completely known, and consequently devoted their
energies to methodizing and elaborating it. Secondly, within the domain of
science itself, properly so called, there were two "kind of rovers" who
must be dismissed. The first were the speculative or logical philosophers,
who construe the universe _ex analogia hominis_, and not _ex analogia
mundi_, who fashion nature according to preconceived ideas, and who employ
in their investigations syllogism and abstract reasoning. The second class,
who were equally offensive, consisted of those who practised blind
experience, which is mere [v.03 p.0146] groping in the dark (_vaga
experientia mera palpatio est_), who occasionally hit upon good works or
inventions, which, like Atalanta's apples, distracted them from further
steady and gradual progress towards universal truth. In place of these
straggling efforts of the unassisted human mind, a graduated system of
helps was to be supplied, by the use of which the mind, when placed on the
right road, would proceed with unerring and mechanical certainty to the
invention of new arts and sciences.
Such were to be the peculiar functions of the new method, though it has not
definitely appeared what that method was, or to what objects it could be
applied. But, before proceeding to unfold his method, Bacon found it
necessary to enter in considerable detail upon the general subject of the
obstacles to progress, and devoted nearly the whole of the first book of
the _Organum_ to the examination of them. This discussion, though strictly
speaking extraneous to the scheme, has always been looked upon as a most
important part of his philosophy, and his name is perhaps as much
associated with the doctrine of Idols (_Idola_) as with the theory of
induction or the classification of the sciences.
The doctrine of the kinds of fallacies or general classes of errors into
which the human mind is prone to fall, appears in many of the works written
before the _Novum Organum_, and the treatment of them varies in some
respects. The classification in the _Organum_, however, not only has the
author's sanction, but has received the stamp of historical acceptation;
and comparison of the earlier notices, though a point of literary interest,
has no important philosophic bearing. The _Idola_ (_Nov. Org._ i. 39)[58]
false notions of things, or erroneous ways of looking at nature, are of
four kinds: the first two innate, pertaining to the very nature of the mind
and not to be eradicated; the third creeping insensibly into men's minds,
and hence in a sense innate and inseparable; the fourth imposed from
without. The first kind are the _Idola Tribus_, idols of the tribe,
fallacies incident to humanity or the race in general. Of these, the most
prominent are--the proneness to suppose in nature greater order and
regularity than there actually is; the tendency to support a preconceived
opinion by affirmative instances, neglecting all negative or opposed cases;
and the tendency to generalize from few observations, or to give reality to
mere abstractions, figments of the mind. Manifold errors also result from
the weakness of the senses, which affords scope for mere conjecture; from
the influence exercised over the understanding by the will and passions;
from the restless desire of the mind to penetrate to the ultimate
principles of things; and from the belief that "man is the measure of the
universe," whereas, in truth, the world is received by us in a distorted
and erroneous manner. The second kind are the _Idola Specus_, idols of the
cave, or errors incident to the peculiar mental or bodily constitution of
each individual, for according to the state of the individual's mind is his
view of things. Errors of this class are innumerable, because there are
numberless varieties of disposition; but some very prominent specimens can
be indicated. Such are the tendency to make all things subservient to, or
take the colour of some favourite subject, the extreme fondness and
reverence either for what is ancient or for what is modern, and excess in
noting either differences or resemblances amongst things. A practical rule
for avoiding these is also given: "In general let every student of nature
take this as a rule, that whatever his mind seizes and dwells upon with
particular satisfaction is to be held in suspicion."[59] The third class
are the _Idola Fori_, idols of the market-place, errors arising from the
influence exercised over the mind by mere words. This, according to Bacon,
is the most troublesome kind of error, and has been especially fatal in
philosophy. For words introduce a fallacious mode of looking at things in
two ways: first, there are some words that are really merely names for
non-existent things, which are yet supposed to exist simply because they
have received a name; secondly, there are names hastily and unskilfully
abstracted from a few objects and applied recklessly to all that has the
faintest analogy with these objects, thus causing the grossest confusion.
The fourth and last class are the _Idola Theatri_, idols of the theatre,
_i.e._ fallacious modes of thinking resulting from received systems of
philosophy and from erroneous methods of demonstration. The criticism of
the demonstrations is introduced later in close connexion with Bacon's new
method; they are the rival modes of procedure, to which his own is
definitely opposed. The philosophies which are "redargued" are divided into
three classes, the sophistical, of which the best example is Aristotle,
who, according to Bacon, forces nature into his abstract schemata and
thinks to explain by definitions; the empirical, which from few and limited
experiments leaps at once to general conclusions; and the superstitious,
which corrupts philosophy by the introduction of poetical and theological
notions.
Such are the general causes of the errors that infest the human mind; by
their exposure the way is cleared for the introduction of the new method.
The nature of this method cannot be understood until it is exactly seen to
what it is to be applied. What idea had Bacon of science, and how is his
method connected with it? Now, the science[60] which was specially and
invariably contemplated by him was natural philosophy, the great mother of
all the sciences; it was to him the type of scientific knowledge, and its
method was the method of all true science. To discover exactly the
characteristics and the object of natural philosophy it is necessary to
examine the place it holds in the general scheme furnished in the
_Advancement_ or _De Augmentis_. All human knowledge, it is there laid
down, may be referred to man's memory or imagination or reason. In the
first, the bare facts presented to sense are collected and stored up; the
exposition of them is _history_, which is either natural or civil. In the
second, the materials of sense are separated or divided in ways not
corresponding to nature but after the mind's own pleasure, and the result
is _poesy_ or feigned history. In the third, the materials are worked up
after the model or pattern of nature, though we are prone to err in the
progress from sense to reason; the result is _philosophy_, which is
concerned either with God, with nature or with man, the second being the
most important. Natural philosophy is again divided into speculative or
theoretical and operative or practical, according as the end is
contemplation or works. Speculative or theoretical natural philosophy has
to deal with natural substances and qualities and is subdivided into
physics and metaphysics. Physics inquires into the efficient and material
causes of things; metaphysics, into the formal and final causes. The
principal objects of physics are concrete substances, or abstract though
physical qualities. The research into abstract qualities, the fundamental
problem of physics, comes near to the metaphysical study of _forms_, which
indeed differs from the first only in being more general, and in having as
its results a _form_ strictly so called, _i.e._ a nature or quality which
is a limitation or specific manifestation of some higher and better-known
genus.[61] Natural philosophy is, therefore, in ultimate resort the study
of _forms_, and, consequently, the fundamental problem of philosophy in
general is the discovery of these _forms_.
"On a given body to generate or superinduce a new nature or natures, is
the work and aim of human power.... Of a given nature to discover the
form or true specific difference, or nature-engendering nature (_natura
naturans_) or source of emanation (for these are the terms which are
nearest to a description of the thing), is the work and aim of human
knowledge."[62]
The questions, then, whose answers give the key to the whole Baconian
philosophy, may be put briefly thus--What are [v.03 p.0147] forms? and how
is it that knowledge of them solves both the theoretical and the practical
problem of science? Bacon himself, as may be seen from the passage quoted
above, finds great difficulty in giving an adequate and exact definition of
what he means by a form. As a general description, the following passage
from the _Novum Organum_, ii. 4, may be cited:--
"The form of a nature is such that given the form the nature infallibly
follows.... Again, the form is such that if it be taken away the nature
infallibly vanishes.... Lastly, the true form is such that it deduces
the given nature from some source of being which is inherent in more
natures, and which is better known in the natural order of things than
the form itself."[63]
From this it would appear that, since by a _nature_ is meant some sensible
quality, superinduced upon, or possessed by, a body, so by a form we are to
understand the cause of that nature, which cause is itself a determinate
case or manifestation of some general or abstract quality inherent in a
greater number of objects. But all these are mostly marks by which a form
may be recognized, and do not explain what the form really is. A further
definition is accordingly attempted in Aph. 13:--
"The form of a thing is the very thing itself, and the thing differs
from the form no otherwise than as the apparent differs from the real,
or the external from the internal, or the thing in reference to the man
from the thing in reference to the universe."
This throws a new light on the question, and from it the inference at once
follows, that the forms are the permanent causes or substances underlying
all visible phenomena, which are merely manifestations of their activity.
Are the forms, then, forces? At times it seems as if Bacon had approximated
to this view of the nature of things, for in several passages he identifies
forms with laws of activity. Thus, he says--
"When I speak of forms I mean nothing more than those laws and
determinations of absolute actuality which govern and constitute any
simple nature, as heat, light, weight, in every kind of matter and
subject that is susceptible of them. Thus the form of heat or the form
of light is the same thing as the law of heat or the law of light."[64]
"Matter rather than forms should be the object of our attention, its
configurations and changes of configuration, and simple action, and law
of action or motion; for forms are figments of the human mind, unless
you will call those laws of action forms."[65] "Forms or true
differences of things, which are in fact laws of pure act."[66] "For
though in nature nothing really exists besides individual bodies,
performing pure individual acts according to a fixed law, yet in
philosophy this very law, and the investigation, discovery and
explanation of it, is the foundation as well of knowledge as of
operation. And it is this law, with its clauses, that I mean when I
speak of forms."[67]
Several important conclusions may be drawn from these passages. In the
first place, it is evident that Bacon, like the Atomical school, of whom he
highly approved, had a clear perception and a firm grasp of the _physical_
character of natural principles; his _forms_ are no ideas or abstractions,
but highly general physical properties. Further, it is hinted that these
general qualities may be looked upon as the modes of action of simple
bodies. This fruitful conception, however, Bacon does not work out; and
though he uses the word _cause_, and identifies _form_ with _formal cause_,
yet it is perfectly apparent that the modern notions of cause as dynamical,
and of nature as in a process of flow or development, are foreign to him,
and that in his view of the ultimate problem of science, cause meant _causa
immanens_, or underlying substance, effects were not consequents but
manifestations, and nature was regarded in a purely statical aspect. That
this is so appears even more clearly when we examine his general conception
of the unity, gradation and function of the sciences. That the sciences are
organically connected is a thought common to him and to his distinguished
predecessor Roger Bacon. "I that hold it for a great impediment towards the
advancement and further invention of knowledge, that particular arts and
sciences have been disincorporated from general knowledge, do not
understand one and the same thing which Cicero's discourse and the note and
conceit of the Grecians in their word _circle learning_ do intend. For I
mean not that use which one science hath of another for ornament or help in
practice; but I mean it directly of that use by way of supply of light and
information, which the particulars and instances of one science do yield
and present for the framing or correcting of the axioms of another science
in their very truth and notion."[68] In accordance with this, Bacon placed
at the basis of the particular sciences which treat of God, nature and man,
one fundamental doctrine, the _Prima Philosophia_, or first philosophy, the
function of which was to display the unity of nature by connecting into one
body of truth such of the highest axioms of the subordinate sciences as
were not special to one science, but common to several.[69] This first
philosophy had also to investigate what are called the adventitious or
transcendental conditions of essences, such as Much, Little, Like, Unlike,
Possible, Impossible, Being, Nothing, the logical discussion of which
certainly belonged rather to the laws of reasoning than to the existence of
things, but the physical or real treatment of which might be expected to
yield answers to such questions as, why certain substances are numerous,
others scarce; or why, if like attracts like, iron does not attract iron.
Following this summary philosophy come the sciences proper, rising like a
pyramid in successive stages, the lowest floor being occupied by natural
history or experience, the second by physics, the third, which is next the
peak of unity, by metaphysics.[70] The knowledge of the peak, or of the one
law which binds nature together, is perhaps denied to man. Of the sciences,
physics, as has been already seen, deals with the efficient and material,
_i.e._ with the variable and transient, causes of things. But its inquiries
may be directed either towards concrete bodies or towards abstract
qualities. The first kind of investigation rises little above mere natural
history; but the other is more important and paves the way for metaphysics.
It handles the configurations and the appetites or motions of matter. The
configurations, or inner structure of bodies, include dense, rare, heavy,
light, hot, cold, &c.,--in fact, what are elsewhere called simple natures.
Motions[71] are either simple or compound, the latter being the sum of a
number of the former. In physics, however, these matters are treated only
as regards their material or efficient causes, and the result of inquiry
into any one case gives no general rule, but only facilitates invention in
some similar instance. Metaphysics, on the other hand, treats of the formal
or final cause of[72] these same substances and qualities, and results in a
general rule. With regard to forms, the investigation may be directed
either towards concrete bodies or towards qualities. But the forms of
substances "are so perplexed and complicated, that it is either vain to
inquire into them at all, or such inquiry as is possible should be put off
for a time, and not entered upon till forms of a more simple nature have
been rightly investigated and discussed."[73] "To inquire into the form of
a lion, of an oak, or gold, nay, even of water or air, is a vain pursuit;
but to inquire the _form_ of dense, rare, hot, cold, &c., as well
configurations as motions, which in treating of physic I have in [v.03
p.0148] great part enumerated (I call them forms of the first class), and
which (like the letters of the alphabet) are not many, and yet make up and
sustain the essences and forms of all substances--this, I say, it is which
I am attempting, and which constitutes and defines that part of metaphysic
of which we are now inquiring." Physics inquires into the same qualities,
but does not push its investigations into ultimate reality or reach the
more general causes. We thus at last attain a definite conclusion with
regard to forms, and it appears clear that in Bacon's belief the true
function of science was the search for a few fundamental physical
qualities, highly abstract and general, the combinations of which give rise
to the simple natures and complex phenomena around us. His general
conception of the universe may therefore be called mechanical or statical;
the cause of each phenomenon is supposed to be actually contained in the
phenomenon itself, and by a sufficiently accurate process could be sifted
out and brought to light. As soon as the causes are known man regains his
power over nature, for "whosoever knows any form, knows also the utmost
possibility of superinducing that nature upon every variety of matter, and
so is less restrained and tied in operation either to the basis of the
matter or to the condition of the efficients."[74]
Nature thus presented itself to Bacon's mind as a huge congeries of
phenomena, the manifestations of some simple and primitive qualities, which
were hid from us by the complexity of the things themselves. The world was
a vast labyrinth, amid the windings of which we require some clue or thread
whereby we may track our way to knowledge and thence to power. This thread,
the _filum labyrinthi_, is the new method of _induction_. But, as has been
frequently pointed out, the new method could not be applied until facts had
been observed and collected. This is an indispensable preliminary. "Man,
the servant and interpreter of nature, can do and understand so much, and
so much only, as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of
nature; beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything." The
proposition that our knowledge of nature necessarily begins with
observation and experience, is common to Bacon and many contemporary
reformers of science, but he laid peculiar stress upon it, and gave it a
new meaning. What he really meant by observation was a competent natural
history or collection of facts. "The firm foundations of a purer natural
philosophy are laid in natural history."[75] "First of all we must prepare
a _natural and experimental history_, sufficient and good; and this is the
foundation of all."[76] The senses and the memory, which collect and store
up facts, must be assisted; there must be a _ministration_ of the senses
and another of the memory. For not only are instances required, but these
must be arranged in such a manner as not to distract or confuse the mind,
_i.e._ tables and arrangements of instances must be constructed. In the
preliminary collection the greatest care must be taken that the mind be
absolutely free from preconceived ideas; nature is only to be conquered by
obedience; man must be merely receptive. "All depends on keeping the eye
steadily fixed upon the facts of nature, and so receiving their images
simply as they are; for God forbid that we should give out a dream of our
own imagination for a pattern of the world; rather may He graciously grant
to us to write an apocalypse or true vision of the footsteps of the Creator
imprinted on his creatures."[77] Concealed among the facts presented to
sense are the causes or forms, and the problem therefore is so to analyse
experience[78], so to break it up into pieces, that we shall with certainty
and mechanical ease arrive at a true conclusion. This process, which forms
the essence of the new method, may in its entirety, as a ministration to
the reason, be called a logic; but it differs widely from the ordinary or
school logic in end, method and form. Its aim is to acquire command over
nature by knowledge, and to invent new arts, whereas the old logic strove
only after dialectic victories and the discovery of new arguments. In
method the difference is even more fundamental. Hitherto the mode of
demonstration had been by the syllogism; but the syllogism is, in many
respects, an incompetent weapon. It is compelled to accept its first
principles on trust from the science in which it is employed; it cannot
cope with the subtlety of nature; and it is radically vitiated by being
founded on hastily and inaccurately abstracted notions of things. For a
syllogism consists of propositions, propositions of words, and words are
the symbols of notions. Now the first step in accurate progress from sense
to reason, or true philosophy, is to frame a _bona notio_ or accurate
conception of the thing; but the received logic never does this. It flies
off at once from experience and particulars to the highest and most general
propositions, and from these descends, by the use of middle terms, to
axioms of lower generality. Such a mode of procedure may be called
_anticipatio naturae_ (for in it reason is allowed to prescribe to things),
and is opposed to the true method, the _interpretatio naturae_, in which
reason follows and obeys nature, discovering her secrets by obedience and
submission to rule. Lastly, the very form of induction that has been used
by logicians in the collection of their instances is a weak and useless
thing. It is a mere enumeration of a few known facts, makes no use of
exclusions or rejections, concludes precariously, and is always liable to
be overthrown by a negative instance.[79] In radical opposition to this
method the Baconian induction begins by supplying helps and guides to the
senses, whose unassisted information could not be relied on. Notions were
formed carefully, and not till after a certain process of induction was
completed.[80] The formation of axioms was to be carried on by a gradually
ascending scale. "Then and only then may we hope well of the sciences, when
in a just scale of ascent and by successive steps, not interrupted or
broken, we rise from particulars to lesser axioms; and then to middle
axioms, one above the other; and last of all to the most general."[81]
Finally the very form of induction itself must be new. "The induction which
is to be available for the discovery and demonstration of sciences and arts
must analyse nature by proper rejections and exclusions; and then, after a
sufficient number of negatives, come to a conclusion on the affirmative
instances, which has not yet been done, or even attempted, save only by
Plato.[82] ... And this induction must be used not only to discover axioms,
but also in the formation of notions."[83] This view of the function of
exclusion is closely connected with Bacon's doctrine of forms, [v.03
p.0149] and is in fact dependent upon that theory. But induction is neither
the whole of the new method, nor is it applicable to forms only. There are
two other grand objects of inquiry: the one, the transformation of concrete
bodies; the other, the investigation of the latent powers and the latent
schematism or configuration. With regard to the first, in ultimate result
it depends upon the theory of forms; for whenever the compound body can be
regarded as the sum of certain simple natures, then our knowledge of the
forms of these natures gives us the power of superinducing a new nature on
the concrete body. As regards the latent process (_latens processus_) which
goes on in all cases of generation and continuous development or motion, we
examine carefully, and by quantitative measurements, the gradual growth and
change from the first elements to the completed thing. The same kind of
investigation may be extended to many cases of natural motion, such as
voluntary action or nutrition; and though inquiry is here directed towards
concrete bodies, and does not therefore penetrate so deeply into reality as
in research for forms, yet great results may be looked for with more
confidence. It is to be regretted that Bacon did not complete this portion
of his work, in which for the first time he approaches modern conceptions
of change. The latent configuration (_latens schematismus_) or inward
structure of the parts of a body must be known before we can hope to
superinduce a new nature upon it. This can only be discovered by analysis,
which will disclose the ultimate constituents (natural particles, not
atoms) of bodies, and lead back the discussion to forms or simple natures,
whereby alone can true light be thrown on these obscure questions. Thus, in
all cases, scientific explanation depends upon knowledge of forms; all
phenomena or secondary qualities are accounted for by being referred to the
primary qualities of matter.
The several steps in the inductive investigation of the form of any nature
flow readily from the definition of the form itself. For that is always and
necessarily present when the nature is present, absent when it is absent,
decreases and increases according as the nature decreases and increases. It
is therefore requisite for the inquiry to have before us instances in which
the nature is present. The list of these is called the table of _Essence
and Presence_. Secondly, we must have instances in which the nature is
absent; only as such cases might be infinite, attention should be limited
to such of them as are most akin to the instances of presence.[84] The list
in this case is called table of _Absence in Proximity_. Thirdly, we must
have a number of instances in which the nature is present in different
degrees, either increasing or decreasing in the same subject, or variously
present in different subjects. This is the table of _Degrees_, or
_Comparison_. After the formation of these tables, we proceed to apply what
is perhaps the most valuable part of the Baconian method, and that in which
the author took most pride, the process of exclusion or rejection. This
elimination of the non-essential, grounded on the fundamental propositions
with regard to forms, is the most important of Bacon's contributions to the
logic of induction, and that in which, as he repeatedly says, his method
differs from all previous philosophies. It is evident that if the tables
were complete, and our notions of the respective phenomena clear, the
process of exclusion would be a merely mechanical _counting out_, and would
_infallibly_ lead to the detection of the cause or form. But it is just as
evident that these conditions can never be adequately fulfilled. Bacon saw
that his method was impracticable (though he seems to have thought the
difficulties not insuperable), and therefore set to work to devise new
helps, _adminicula_. These he enumerates in ii., _Aph._ 21:--_Prerogative
Instances, Supports of Induction, Rectification of Induction, Varying the
Investigation according to the Nature of the Subject, Prerogative Natures,
Limits of Investigation, Application to Practice, Preparations for
Investigation, the Ascending and Descending Scale of Axioms_. The remainder
of the _Organum_ is devoted to a consideration of the twenty-seven classes
of Prerogative Instances, and though it contains much that is both luminous
and helpful, it adds little to our knowledge of what constitutes the
Baconian method. On the other heads we have but a few scattered hints. But
although the rigorous requirements of science could only be fulfilled by
the employment of all these means, yet in their absence it was permissible
to draw from the tables and the exclusion a hypothetical conclusion, the
truth of which might be verified by the use of the other processes; such an
hypothesis is called fantastically the First Vintage (_Vindemiatio_). The
inductive method, so far as exhibited in the _Organum_, is exemplified by
an investigation into the nature of heat.
Such was the method devised by Bacon, and to which he ascribed the
qualities of absolute certainty and mechanical simplicity. But even
supposing that this method were accurate and completely unfolded, it is
evident that it could only be made applicable and produce fruit when the
phenomena of the universe have been very completely tabulated and arranged.
In this demand for a complete natural history, Bacon also felt that he was
original, and he was deeply impressed with the necessity for it;[85] in
fact, he seems occasionally to place an even higher value upon it than upon
his _Organum_. Thus, in the preface to his series of works forming the
third part of the _Instauratio_, he says: "It comes, therefore, to this,
that my _Organum_, even if it were completed, would not without the
_Natural History_ much advance the _Instauration of the Sciences_, whereas
the _Natural History_ without the _Organum_ would advance it not a
little."[86] But a complete natural history is evidently a thing
impossible, and in fact a history can only be collected by attending to the
requirements of the _Organum_. This was seen by Bacon, and what may be
regarded as his final opinion on the question is given in the important
letter to Jean Antoine Baranzano[87] ("Redemptus": 1590-1622):--"With
regard to the multitude of instances by which men may be deterred from the
attempt, here is my answer. First, what need to dissemble? Either store of
instances must be procured, or the business must be given up. All other
ways, however enticing, are impassable. Secondly, the prerogatives of
instances, and the mode of experimenting upon experiments of light (which I
shall hereafter explain), will diminish the multitude of them very much.
Thirdly, what matter, I ask, if the description of the instances should
fill six times as many volumes as Pliny's _History_? ... For the true
natural history is to take nothing except instances, connections,
observations and canons."[88] The _Organum_ and the _History_ are thus
correlative, and form the two equally necessary sides of a true philosophy;
by their union the new philosophy is produced.
_Summary._--Two questions may be put to any doctrine which professes to
effect a radical change in philosophy or science. Is it original? Is it
valuable? With regard to the first, it has been already pointed out that
Bacon's induction or inductive method is distinctly his own, though it
cannot and need not be maintained that the general spirit of his philosophy
was entirely new.[89]
The value of the method is the separate and more difficult question. It has
been assailed on the most opposite grounds. Macaulay, while admitting the
accuracy of the process, denied its efficiency, on the ground that an
operation performed naturally was not rendered more easy or efficacious by
being subjected to analysis.[90] This objection is curious when confronted
with Bacon's reiterated assertion that the _natural_ method pursued by the
unassisted human reason is distinctly opposed to his; and it is besides an
argument that tells so strongly against many sciences, as to be
comparatively worthless when applied to any one. There are, however, more
formidable objections against the method. It has been pointed out,[91] and
with perfect justice, [v.03 p.0150] that science in its progress has not
followed the Baconian method, that no one discovery can be pointed to which
can be definitely ascribed to the use of his rules, and that men the most
celebrated for their scientific acquirements, while paying homage to the
name of Bacon, practically set at naught his most cherished precepts. The
reason of this is not far to seek, and has been pointed out by logicians of
the most diametrically opposed schools. The mechanical character both of
the natural history and of the logical method applied to it resulted
necessarily from Bacon's radically false conception of the nature of cause
and of the causal relation. The whole logical or scientific problem is
treated as if it were one of co-existence, to which in truth the method of
exclusion is scarcely applicable, and the assumption is constantly made
that each phenomenon has one and only one cause.[92] The inductive
formation of axioms by a gradually ascending scale is a route which no
science has ever followed, and by which no science could ever make
progress. The true scientific procedure is by hypothesis followed up and
tested by verification; the most powerful instrument is the deductive
method, which Bacon can hardly be said to have recognized. The power of
framing hypothesis points to another want in the Baconian doctrine. If that
power form part of the true method, then the mind is not wholly passive or
recipient; it anticipates nature, and moulds the experience received by it
in accordance with its own constructive ideas or conceptions; and yet
further, the minds of various investigators can never be reduced to the
same dead mechanical level.[93] There will still be room for the scientific
use of the imagination and for the creative flashes of genius.[94]
If, then, Bacon himself made no contributions to science, if no discovery
can be shown to be due to the use of his rules, if his method be logically
defective, and the problem to which it was applied one from its nature
incapable of adequate solution, it may not unreasonably be asked, How has
he come to be looked upon as the great leader in the reformation of modern
science? How is it that he shares with Descartes the honour of inaugurating
modern philosophy? To this the true answer seems to be that Bacon owes his
position not only to the general spirit of his philosophy, but to the
manner in which he worked into a connected system the new mode of thinking,
and to the incomparable power and eloquence with which he expounded and
enforced it. Like all epoch-making works, the _Novum Organum_ gave
expression to ideas which were already beginning to be in the air. The time
was ripe for a great change; scholasticism, long decaying, had begun to
fall; the authority not only of school doctrines but of the church had been
discarded; while here and there a few devoted experimenters were turning
with fresh zeal to the unwithered face of nature. The fruitful thoughts
which lay under and gave rise to these scattered efforts of the human mind,
were gathered up into unity, and reduced to system in the new philosophy of
Bacon.[95] It is assuredly little matter for wonder that this philosophy
should contain much that is now inapplicable, and that in many respects it
should be vitiated by radical errors. The details of the logical method on
which its author laid the greatest stress have not been found of practical
service;[96] yet the fundamental ideas on which the theory rested, the need
for rejecting rash generalization, and the necessity for a critical
analysis of experience, are as true and valuable now as they were then.
Progress in scientific discovery is made mainly, if not solely, by the
employment of hypothesis, and for that no code of rules can be laid down
such as Bacon had devised. Yet the framing of hypothesis is no mere random
guesswork; it is left not to the imagination alone, but to the _scientific
imagination_. There is required in the process not merely a preliminary
critical induction, but a subsequent experimental comparison, verification
or proof, the canons of which can be laid down with precision. To formulate
and show grounds for these laws is to construct a philosophy of induction,
and it must not be forgotten that the first step towards the accomplishment
of the task was made by Bacon when he introduced and gave prominence to the
powerful logical instrument of exclusion or elimination.
It is curious and significant that in the domain of the moral and
metaphysical sciences his influence has been perhaps more powerful, and his
authority has been more frequently appealed to, than in that of the
physical. This is due, not so much to his expressed opinion that the
inductive method was applicable to all the sciences,[97] as to the
generally practical, or, one may say, [v.03 p.0151] _positive_ spirit of
his system. Theological questions, which had tortured the minds of
generations, are by him relegated from the province of reason to that of
faith. Even reason must be restrained from striving after ultimate truth;
it is one of the errors of the human intellect that it will not rest in
general principles, but must push its investigations deeper. Experience and
observation are the only remedies against prejudice and error. Into
questions of metaphysics, as commonly understood, Bacon can hardly be said
to have entered, but a long line of thinkers have drawn inspiration from
him, and it is not without justice that he has been looked upon as the
originator and guiding spirit of what is known as the empirical school.
_Bacon's Influence._--It is impossible within our limits to do more than
indicate the influence which Bacon's views have had on subsequent thinkers.
The most valuable and complete discussion of the subject is contained in T.
Fowler's edition of the _Novum Organum_ (introd. s. 14). It is there argued
that, both in philosophy and in natural science, Bacon's influence was
immediate and lasting. Under the former head it is pointed out (i.) that
the fundamental principle of Locke's _Essay_, that all our ideas are
product of sensation and reflection, is briefly stated in the first
aphorism of the _Novum Organum_, and (ii.) that the whole atmosphere of
that treatise is characteristic of the _Essay_. Bacon is, therefore,
regarded by many as the father of what is most characteristic in English
psychological speculation. As he himself said, he "rang the bell which
called the wits together." In the sphere of ethics he is similarly regarded
as a forerunner of the empirical method. The spirit of the _De Augmentis_
(bk. vii.) and the inductive method which is discussed in the _Novum
Organum_ are at the root of all theories which have constructed a moral
code by an inductive examination of human consciousness and the results of
actions. Among such theories utilitarianism especially is the natural
result of the application to the phenomenon of conduct of the Baconian
experimental method. In this connexion, however, it is important to notice
that Hobbes, who had been Bacon's secretary, makes no mention of Baconian
induction, nor does he in any of his works make any critical reference to
Bacon himself. It would, therefore, appear that Bacon's influence was not
immediate.
In the sphere of natural science, Bacon's importance is attested by
references to his work in the writings of the principal scientists, not
only English, but French, German and Italian. Fowler (_op. cit._) has
collected from Descartes, Gassendi, S. Sorbiere, Jean Baptiste du Hamel,
quotations which show how highly Bacon was regarded by the leaders of the
new scientific movement. Sorbiere, who was by no means partial to things
English, definitely speaks of him as "celuy qui a le plus puissamment
solicite les interests de la physique, et excite le monde a faire des
experiences" (_Relation d'un voyage en Angleterre_, Cologne, 1666, pp.
63-64). It was, however, Voltaire and the encyclopaedists who raised Bacon
to the pinnacle of his fame in France, and hailed him as "le pere de la
philosophie experimentale" (_Lettres sur les Anglois_). Condillac, in the
same spirit, says of him, "personne n'a mieux connu que lui la cause de nos
erreurs." So the _Encyclopedie_, besides giving a eulogistic article
"Baconisme," speaks of him (in d'Alembert's preliminary discourse) as "le
plus grand, le plus universel, et le plus eloquent des philosophes." Among
other writers, Leibnitz and Huygens give testimony which is the more
valuable as being critical. Leibnitz speaks of Bacon as "divini ingenii
vir," and, like several other German authors, classes him with Campanella;
Huygens refers to his "bonnes methodes." If, however, we are to attach
weight to English writers of the latter half of the 17th century, we shall
find that one of Bacon's greatest achievements was the impetus given by his
_New Atlantis_ to the foundation of the Royal Society (_q.v._). Dr Thomas
Sprat (1635-1713), bishop of Rochester and first historian of the society,
says that Bacon of all others "had the true imagination of the whole
extent" of the enterprise, and that in his works are to be found the best
arguments for the experimental method of natural philosophy (_Hist. of the
Royal Society_, pp. 35-36, and Thomas Tenison's _Baconiana_, pp. 264-266).
In this connexion reference should be made also to Cowley's _Ode to the
Royal Society_, and to Dr John Wallis's remarks in Hearne's _Preface to P.
Langtoft's Chronicle_ (appendix, num. xi.). Joseph Glanvill, in his
_Scepsis Scientifica_ (dedication) says, "Solomon's house in the _New
Atlantis_ was a prophetic scheme of the Royal Society"; and Henry Oldenburg
(_c._ 1615-1677), one of the first secretaries of the society, speaks of
the new eagerness to obtain scientific data as "a work begun by the single
care and conduct of the excellent Lord Verulam." Boyle, in whose works
there are frequent eulogistic references to Bacon, regarded himself as a
disciple and was indeed known as a second Bacon. The predominating
influence of Bacon's philosophy is thus clearly established in the
generation which succeeded his own. There is abundant evidence to show that
in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge (especially the latter) the new
spirit had already modified the old curricula. Bacon has frequently been
disparaged on the ground that his name is not mentioned by Sir Isaac
Newton. It can be shown, however, that Newton was not ignorant of Bacon's
works, and Dr Fowler explains his silence with regard to them on three
grounds: (1) that Bacon's reputation was so well established that any
definite mention was unnecessary, (2) that it was not customary at the time
to acknowledge indebtedness to contemporary and recent writers, and (3)
that Newton's genius was so strongly mathematical (whereas Bacon's great
weakness was in mathematics) that he had no special reason to refer to
Bacon's experimental principles.
If the foregoing examples are held sufficient to establish the influence of
Bacon on the intellectual development of his immediate successors, it
follows that the whole trend of typically English thought, not only in
natural science, but also in mental, moral and political philosophy, is the
logical fulfilment of Baconian principles. He argued against the tyranny of
authority, the vagaries of unfettered imagination and the academic aims of
unpractical dialectic; the vital energy and the reasoned optimism of his
language entirely outweigh the fact that his contributions to the stock of
actual scientific knowledge were practically inconsiderable. It may be
freely admitted that in the domain of logic there is nothing in the
_Organum_ that has not been more instructively analysed either by Aristotle
himself or in modern works; at the same time, there is probably no work
which is a better and more stimulating introduction to logical study. Its
terse, epigrammatic phrases sink into the fibre of the mind, and are a
healthy warning against crude, immature generalization.
While, therefore, it is a profound mistake to regard Bacon as a great
constructive philosopher, or even as a lonely pioneer of modern thought, it
is quite unfair to speak of him as a trifler. His great work consists in
the fact that he summed up the faults which the widening of knowledge had
disclosed in medieval thought, and in this sense he stands high among those
who were in many parts of 16th-century Europe striving towards a new
intellectual activity.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Editions._--The classical edition is that of R. L. Ellis, J.
Spedding and D. D. Heath, 1st ed., 1857; 2nd ed., 1870 (vols. i.-iii.,
philosophical writings; iv.-v., translations; vi.-vii., literary and
professional works). B. Montagu's edition (17 vols., 1825-1834) is full but
unscholarly. An extremely useful reprint (in one volume) of the
philosophical works (with a few not strictly philosophical), based on the
first Ellis-Spedding edition, was published by J. M. Robertson (London,
1905); besides the original introductions, it contains a useful summary by
the editor of the various problems of Bacon's life and thought. Numerous
cheap editions have lately been published, _e.g._ in the "World's Classics"
(1901), and "New Universal Library" series (1905); Sidney Lee, _English
Works of Francis Bacon_ (London, 1905).
Of particular works there are numerous editions in all the chief languages.
The following are the most important:--T. Fowler, _Novum Organum_ (Oxford,
1878; ed. 1889), with notes, full introduction on Bacon's philosophy in all
its relations, and a most valuable bibliography. This superseded the
edition of G. W. Kitchin (Oxford, 1855). The _Essays_ have been edited more
than twenty times since 1870; the following editions may be
mentioned:--Archbishop Whately (6th ed., 1864); W. Aldis Wright (Lond.,
1862); F. Storr and Gibson (Lond., 1886); E. A. Abbott (Lond., 1879); John
Buchan (Lond., 1879); A. S. West (Cambridge, 1897); W. Evans (Edinburgh,
1897). A facsimile reprint of the 1st edition was published in New York
(1904). _Advancement of Learning_:--W. Aldis [v.03 p.0152] Wright (Camb.,
1866; 5th ed., 1900); F. G. Selby (1892-1895); H. Morley (1905); and, with
the _New Atlantis_, in the "World's Classics" series (introduction by Prof.
T. Case, Lond., 1906). _Wisdom of the Ancients and New Atlantis_, in
"Cassell's National Library" (1886 and 1903). G. C. M. Smith, _New
Atlantis_ (1900). J. Fuerstenhagen, _Kleinere Schriften_ (Leipzig, 1884).
_Biography._--J. Spedding, _The Life and Letters of Lord Bacon_ (1861),
_Life and Times of Francis Bacon_ (1878); also Dr Rawley's _Life_ in the
Ellis-Spedding editions, and J. M. Robertson's reprint (above); W. Hepworth
Dixon, _Personal History of Lord Bacon_ (Lond., 1861), and _Story of Lord
Bacon's Life_ (ib. 1862); John Campbell, _Lives of the Chancellors_ (Lond.,
1845), ii. 51; P. Woodward, _Early Life of Lord Bacon_ (1902); T. Fowler,
_Francis Bacon_ in "English Philos." series (Lond., 1881); R. W. Church's
_Bacon_, in "Men of Letters" series (1884).
_Philosophy._--Beside the introductions in the Ellis-Spedding and T. Fowler
editions, and general histories of philosophy, see:--Kuno Fischer, _Fr.
Bacon_ (1856, 2nd ed., 1875, Eng. trans. by John Oxenford, Lond., 1857);
Ch. de Remusat, _Bacon, sa vie ... et son influence_ (1857, ed. 1858 and
1877); G. L. Craik, _Lord Bacon, his Writings and his Philosophy_ (3 vols.,
1846-1847, ed. 1860); A. Dorner, _De Baconis Philosophia_ (Berlin, 1867;
London, 1886); J. v. Liebig, _Ueber F. B. v. Verulam_ (Mannheim, 1863); Ad.
Lasson, _Ueber B. v. Verulam's wissenschaftliche Principien_ (Berl., 1860);
E. H. Boehmer, _Ueber F. B. v. Verulam_ (Erlangen, 1864); Ch. Adam,
_Philos. de Francis Bacon_ (Paris, 1890); Barthelemy St Hilaire, _Etude sur
Francis Bacon_ (Paris, 1890); R. W. Church, _op. cit._; H. Heussler, _F.
Bacon und seine geschichtliche Stellung_ (Breslau, 1889); H. Hoeffding,
_History of Modern Philosophy_ (Eng. trans., 1900); J. M. Robertson, _Short
History of Freethought_ (Lond., 1906); Sidney Lee, _Great Englishmen of the
16th century_ (Lond., 1904). For the relations between Bacon and Ben Jonson
see _The Tale of the Shakespeare Epitaphs by Francis Bacon_ (New York,
1888); for Bacon's poetical gifts see an article in the _Fortnightly
Review_ (March 1905).
For the Bacon-Shakespeare controversy see SHAKESPEARE.
(R. AD.; J. M. M.)
[1] See _Nic. Eth._ iv. 3. 3. 1123b.
[2] "I wax now somewhat ancient; one-and-thirty years is a great deal of
sand in the hour-glass.... I ever bare a mind (in some middle place that I
could discharge) to serve her majesty; not as a man born under Sol, that
loveth honour; nor under Jupiter, that loveth business (for the
contemplative planet carrieth me away wholly); but as a man born under an
excellent sovereign, that deserveth the dedication of all men's
abilities.... Again the meanness of my estate doth somewhat move me; for
though I cannot accuse myself that I am either prodigal or slothful, yet my
health is not to spend, nor my course to get. Lastly, I confess that I have
as vast contemplative ends as I have moderate civil ends; for I have taken
all knowledge to be my province; and if I could purge it of two sorts of
rovers, whereof the one with frivolous disputations, confutations and
verbosities, the other with blind experiments and auricular traditions and
impostures, hath committed so many spoils, I hope I should bring in
industrious observations, grounded conclusions and profitable inventions
and discoveries--the best state of that province. This, whether it be
curiosity, or vain-glory, or nature, or (if one take it favourably)
_philanthropia_, is so fixed in my mind as it cannot be removed. And I do
easily see, that place of any reasonable commandment doth bring commandment
of more wits than of a man's own.
And if your lordship shall find now, or at any time, that I do seek or
affect any place whereunto any that is nearer to your lordship shall be
convenient, say then that I am a most dishonest man. And if your lordship
will not carry me on,... this I will do, I will sell the inheritance that I
have, and purchase some lease of quick revenue, or some office of gain that
shall be executed by deputy, and so give over all care of service, and
become some sorry bookmaker, or a true pioneer in that mine of
truth."--Spedding, _Letters and Life_, i. 108-109.
[3] Spedding, _Letters and Life_, i. 234-235, cf. i. 362. This letter, with
those to Puckering or Essex and the queen, i. 240-241, should be compared
with what is said of them by Macaulay in his _Essay_ on Bacon, and by
Campbell, _Lives_, ii. 287.
[4] See _Letters and Life_, i. 289, ii. 34.
[5] See Macaulay's Essay on Bacon.
[6] The whole story of Essex is given in Spedding's _Letters and Life_. It
is vigorously told by J. Bruce in the introduction to his _Correspondence
of James VI. with Sir Robert Cecil_ (Camden Society, 1861).
[7] See _Letters and Life_, iv. 177, vi. 38, vii. 116, 117.
[8] In October 1608 he became treasurer of Gray's Inn. The tercentenary was
celebrated in 1908.
[9] _Letters and Life_, iv. 380.
[10] _Ibid._ iv. 365-373.
[11] _Ibid._ iv. 375-378.
[12] _Ibid._ v. 81-83.
[13] Not to be confounded with any of those of the same name who held the
title of Baron St John of Bletsho (see _Dict. of Nat. Biog._ vol. 1. p. 150
_ad fin._).
[14] _Circa_ 1554-1616; educated at Cambridge; ordained priest 1581; vicar
of Ridge, Herts, 1581; rector of Hinton St George, Somerset, 1587;
eventually condemned to death at the Taunton Assizes (7th August 1615). The
sentence was not carried out, and Peacham is said to have died in gaol
(March 1616). See Gardiner's _Hist. of England_, ii. 272-283; _State
Trials_, ii. 869; _Calendar of State Papers_ (1603-1606); Hallam's
_Constitutional Hist._ i. 343; T. P. Taswell-Langmead, _English
Constitutional History_ (5th ed., 1896), p. 425. Nearly all works on
constitutional law and history discuss the case.
[15] _Letters and Life_, v. 101
[16] Ibid. v. 121, _n_.
[17] _Ibid_. v. 124.
[18] Macaulay's _Essay_.
[19] Campbell, _Lives_, ii. 344.
[20] The mysterious crimes supposed to be concealed under the obscure
details of this case have cast a shadow of vague suspicion on all who were
concerned in it. The minute examination of the facts by Spedding (_Letters
and Life_, v. 208-347) seems to show that these secret crimes exist nowhere
but in the heated imaginations of romantic biographers and historians.
[21] A somewhat similar case is that of the writ _De Rege inconsulto_
brought forward by Bacon. See _Letters and Life_, v. 233-236.
[22] _Ibid_. vi. 6, 7, 13-26, 27-56.
[23] Ibid. vi. 33.
[24] A position which Bacon in some respects approved. See _Essays_, "Of
Ambition." "It is counted by some a weakness in princes to have favourites;
but it is of all others the best remedy against ambitious great ones; for
when the way of pleasuring and displeasuring lieth by the favourite, it is
impossible any other should be over great."
[25] _Letters and Life_, vi. 278, 294-296, 313.
[26] _Ibid_. vii. 579-588, analysis of the case by D. D. Heath, who
expresses a strong opinion against Bacon's action in the matter.
[27] _Ibid_. vi. 444.
[28] For a full discussion of Bacon's connexion with the monopolies, see
Gardiner, _Prince Charles_, &c. ii. 355-373. For his opinion of monopolies
in general, see _Letters and Life_, vi. 49.
[29] _Letters and Life_, vii. 213: "I know I have clean hands and a clean
heart, and I hope a clean house for friends or servants. But Job himself,
or whosoever was the justest judge, by such hunting for matters against him
as hath been used against me, may for a time seem foul, specially in a time
when greatness is the mark and accusation is the game."
[30] _Ibid._ vii. 215-216.
[31] _Ibid._ vii. 225-226. From the letter to the king (March 25,
1621)--"When I enter into myself, I find not the materials of such a
tempest as is comen upon me. I have been (as your majesty knoweth best)
never author of any immoderate counsel, but always desired to have things
carried _suavibus modis_. I have been no avaricious oppressor of the
people. I have been no haughty or intolerable or hateful man in my
conversation or carriage. I have inherited no hatred from my father, but am
a good patriot born. Whence should this be? For these are the things that
use to raise dislikes abroad.... And for the briberies and gifts wherewith
I am charged, when the book of hearts shall be opened, I hope I shall not
be found to have the troubled fountain of a corrupt heart in a depraved
habit of taking rewards to pervert justice, howsoever I may be frail, and
partake of the abuse of the times."
[32] _Ibid._ vii. 227, and Gardiner, _Prince Charles_, &c. i. 450.
[33] _Letters and Life_, vii. 236, 238.
[34] _Ibid._ vii. 241.
[35] _Ibid._ vii. 242-244; "It resteth therefore that, without fig-leaves,
I do ingenuously confess and acknowledge, that having understood the
particulars of the charge, not formally from the House but enough to inform
my conscience and memory, I find matter sufficient and full, both to move
me to desert the defence, and to move your lordships to condemn and censure
me."
[36] _Ibid._ vii. 252-262.
[37] _Ibid._ vii. 261.
[38] _Ibid._ vii. 270.
[39] _Letters and Life_, vii. 235-236: "The first, of bargain and contract
for reward to pervert justice, _pendente lite_. The second, where the judge
conceives the cause to be at an end, by the information of the party or
otherwise, and useth not such diligence as he ought to inquire of it. And
the third, where the cause is really ended, and it is _sine fraude_ without
relation to any precedent promise.... For the first of them I take myself
to be as innocent as any born upon St Innocent's Day, in my heart. For the
second, I doubt on some particulars I may be faulty. And for the last, I
conceived it to be no fault, but therein I desire to be better informed,
that I may be twice penitent, once for the fact and again for the error."
[40] _Ibid._ vii. 242.
[41] _Ibid._ vii. 244: "Neither will your lordships forget that there are
_vitia temporis_ as well as _vitia hominis_, and that the beginning of
reformations hath the contrary power to the pool of Bethesda, for that had
strength to cure only him that was first cast in, and this hath commonly
strength to hurt him only that is first cast in."
[42] See, among many other passages, _Essays_, "Of Great Place ": "For
corruptions do not only bind thine own hands or thy servant's hands from
taking, but bind the hands of suitors also from offering; for integrity
used doth the one; but integrity professed, and with a manifest detestation
of bribery, doth the other; and avoid not only the fault but the
suspicion."
[43] Cf. _Letters and Life_, vii. 560: "I was the justest judge that was in
England these fifty years; but it was the justest censure in Parliament
that was these two hundred years."
[44] Or on the ground that there was a distinct rule forbidding chancellors
and the like officials to take presents. This does not seem to have been
the case, if we may judge from what Bacon says _Letters and Life_, vii.
233.
[45] Not only do the cases, so far as they are known, support Bacon's plea
of innocence, but it is remarkable that no attempt at a reversal of any of
his numerous decrees appears to have been successful. Had his decrees been
wilful perversions of justice, it is scarcely conceivable that some of them
should not have been overturned. See _Letters and Life_, vii. 555-562.
[46] The peculiarities of Bacon's style were noticed very early by his
contemporaries. (See _Letters and Life_, i. 268.) Raleigh and Jonson have
both recorded their opinions of it, but no one has characterized it more
happily than his friend, Sir Tobie Matthews, "A man so rare in knowledge,
of so many several kinds, endued with the facility and felicity of
expressing it all in so elegant, significant, so abundant, and yet so
choice and ravishing a way of words, of metaphors, of allusions, as perhaps
the world hath not seen since it was a world."--"Address to the Reader"
prefixed to _Collection of English Letters_ (1660).
[47] The division of the sciences adopted in the great French
_Encyclopedie_ was founded upon this classification of Bacon's. See
Diderot's _Prospectus (Oeuvres_, iii.) and d'Alembert's _Discours
(Oeuvres_, i.) The scheme should be compared with later attempts of the
same nature by Ampere, Cournot, Comte and Herbert Spencer.
[48] See also "Letter to Fulgentio," _Letters and Life_, vii. 533.
[49] _Fil. Lab._; _Cog. et Visa._ i.; cf. Pref. to _Ins. Mag._
[50] _Val. Ter._ 232; cf. _N. O._ i. 124.
[51] _Letters_, i. 123.
[52] _N. O._ i. 116.
[53] _Fil. Lab._ 5; cf. _N. O._ i. 81; _Val. Ter._ (_Works_, iii. 235);
_Advancement_, bk. i. (_Works_, iii. 294).
[54] _Fil. Lab._ 5; cf. _N. O._ i. 81; _Val. Ter._ (_Works_, iii. 222-233);
_New Atlantis (Works_, iii. 156).
[55] _N. O._ i. 116.
[56] _Ibid._ i. 124.
[57] _Ibid._ i. 6.
[58] The word _Idola_ is manifestly borrowed from Plato. It is used twice
in connexion with the Platonic Ideas (_N. O._ i. 23, 124) and is contrasted
with them as the false appearance. The [Greek: eidolon] with Plato is the
fleeting, transient image of the real thing, and the passage evidently
referred to by Bacon is that in the _Rep._ vii. 516 A, [Greek: kai proton
men tas skias an rhaista kathoroie, kai meta touto en tois hudasi ta te ton
anthropon kai ta ton allon eidola, husteron de auta]. It is explained well
in the _Advancement_, bk. i. (_Works_, iii. 287). (For valuable notes on
the _Idola_, see T. Fowler's _Nov. Org._ i. 38 notes; especially for a
comparison of the _Idola_ with Roger Bacon's _Offendicula_.)
[59] _N. O._ i. 58.
[60] _N. O._ i. 79, 80, 98, 108.
[61] On the meaning of the word _form_ in Bacon's theory see also Fowler's
_N. O._ introd. s. 8.
[62] _N. O._ ii. 1.
[63] This _better known in the order of nature_ is nowhere satisfactorily
explained by Bacon. Like his classification of causes, and in some degree
his notion of form itself, it comes from Aristotle. See _An. Post._ 71 b
33; _Topic_, 141 b 5; _Eth. Nic._ 1095 a 30. It should be observed that
many writers maintain that the phrase should be _notiora natura_; others,
_notiora naturae_. See Fowler's _N. O._ p. 199 note.
[64] _N. O._ ii. 17.
[65] _Ibid._ i. 51.
[66] _Ibid._ i. 75.
[67] _Ibid._ ii. 2.
[68] _Valerius Terminus_, iii. 228-229.
[69] Cf. _N. O._ ii. 27. Bacon nowhere enters upon the questions of how
such a science is to be constructed, and how it can be expected to possess
an independent method while it remains the mere receptacle for the
generalizations of the several sciences, and consequently has a content
which varies with their progress. His whole conception of _Prima
Philosophia_ should be compared with such a modern work as the _First
Principles_ of Herbert Spencer.
[70] It is to be noticed that this scale of nature corresponds with the
scale of ascending axioms.
[71] Cf. also for motions, _N. O._ ii. 48.
[72] The knowledge of final causes does not lead to works, and the
consideration of them must be rigidly excluded from physics. Yet there is
no opposition between the physical and final causes; in ultimate resort the
mind is compelled to think the universe as the work of reason, to refer
facts to God and Providence. The idea of final cause is also fruitful in
sciences which have to do with human action. (Cf. _De Aug._ iii. cc. 4, 5;
_Nov. Org._ i. 48, ii. 2.)
[73] _De Aug._ iii. 4. In the _Advancement (Works_, iii. 355) it is
distinctly said that they are not to be inquired into. One can hardly see
how the Baconian method could have applied to concrete substances.
[74] Thus the last step in the theoretical analysis gives the first means
for the practical operation. Cf. Aristotle, _Eth. Nic._ iii. 3. 12, [Greek:
to eschaton en tei analusei proton einai en tei genesei]. Cf. also _Nov.
Org._ i. 103.
[75] _Cogitationes_ (_Works_, iii. 187).
[76] _N. O._ ii. 10.
[77] Pref. to _Instaur._ Cf. _Valerius Term._ (_Works_, iii. 224), and
_N. O._ i. 68, 124.
[78] Pref. to _Inst._
[79] Bacon's summary is valuable. "In the whole of the process which leads
from the senses and objects to axioms and conclusions, the demonstrations
which we use are deceptive and incompetent. The process consists of four
parts, and has as many faults. In the first place, the impressions of the
sense itself are faulty, for the sense both fails us and deceives us. But
its shortcomings are to be supplied and its deceptions to be corrected.
Secondly, notions are all drawn from the impressions of the sense, and are
indefinite and confused, whereas they should be definite and distinctly
bounded. Thirdly, the induction is amiss which infers the principles of
sciences by simple enumeration, and does not, as it ought, employ
exclusions and solutions (or separations) of nature. Lastly, that method of
discovery and proof according to which the most general principles are
first established, and then intermediate axioms are tried and proved by
them, is the parent of error and the curse of all science."--_N. O._ i. 69.
[80] _N. O._ i. 105.
[81] _Ibid._, i. 104; cf. i. 19-26.
[82] This extract gives an answer to the objection sometimes raised that
Bacon is not original in his theory of induction. He certainly admits that
Plato has used a method somewhat akin to his own; but it has frequently
been contended that his induction is nothing more than the [Greek: epagoge]
of Aristotle (see Remusat's _Bacon, &c._, pp. 310-315, and for a criticism,
Waddington, _Essais de Logique_, p. 261. sqq.) This seems a mistake. Bacon
did not understand by induction the argument from particulars to a general
proposition; he looked upon the exclusion and rejection, or upon
_elimination_, as the essence of induction. To this process he was led by
his doctrine of forms, of which it is the necessary consequence; it is the
infallible result of his view of science and its problem, and is as
original as that is. Whoever accepts Bacon's doctrine of cause must accept
at the same time his theory of the way in which the cause may be sifted out
from among the phenomena. It is evident that the Socratic search for the
essence by an analysis of instances--an induction ending in a
definition--has a strong resemblance to the Baconian inductive method.
[83] _N. O._ i. 105.
[84] That is to say, differing in nothing save the absence of the nature
under investigation.
[85] _Distrib. Op._ (_Works_, iv. 28); _Parasceve_ (_ibid._ 251, 252,
255-256); _Descrip. Glob. Intel._ ch. 3.
[86] _Works_, ii. 16; cf. _N. O._ i. 130.
[87] A Barnabite monk, professor of mathematics and philosophy at Annecy.
[88] _Letters and Life_, vii. 377.
[89] For a full discussion of Bacon's relation to his predecessors and
contemporaries, see Fowler's _N. O._ introd. s. 13.
[90] Cf. what Bacon says, _N. O._ i. 130.
[91] Brewster, _Life of Newton_ (1855) (see particularly vol. ii. 403,
405); Lasson, _Ueber Bacon von Verulam's wissenschaftliche Principien_
(1860); Liebig, _Ueber Francis Bacon von Verulam_, &c. (1863). Although
Liebig points out how little science proceeds according to Bacon's rules,
yet his other criticisms seem of extremely little value. In a very
offensive and quite unjustifiable tone, which is severely commented on by
Sigwart and Fischer, he attacks the Baconian methods and its results. These
results he claims to find in the _Sylva Sylvarum_, entirely ignoring what
Bacon himself has said of the nature of that work (_N. O._ i. 117; cf.
Rawley's Pref. to the _S. S._), and thus putting a false interpretation on
the experiments there noted. It is not surprising that he should detect
many flaws, but he never fails to exaggerate an error, and seems sometimes
completely to miss the point of what Bacon says. (See particularly his
remarks on _S. S._ 33, 336.) The method he explains in such a way as to
show he has not a glimpse of its true nature. He brings against Bacon, of
all men, the accusations of making induction start from the undetermined
perceptions of the senses, of using imagination, and of putting a quite
arbitrary interpretation on phenomena. He crowns his criticism by
expounding what he considers to be the true scientific method, which, as
has been pointed put by Fischer, is simply that Baconian doctrine against
which his attack ought to have been directed. (See his account of the
method, _Ueber Bacon_, 47-49; K. Fischer, _Bacon_, pp. 499-502.)
[92] Mill, _Logic_, ii. pp. 115, 116, 329, 330.
[93] Whewell, _Phil. of Ind. Sc._ ii. 399, 402-403; Ellis, _Int. to Bacon's
Works_, i. 39, 61; Brewster, _Newton_, ii. 404; Jevons, _Princ. of Science_
ii. 220. A severe judgment on Bacon's method is given in Duehring's able
but one-sided _Kritische Gesch. d. Phil._, in which the merits of Roger
Bacon are brought prominently forward.
[94] Although it must be admitted that the Baconian method is fairly open
to the above-mentioned objections, it is curious and significant that Bacon
was not thoroughly ignorant of them, but with deliberate consciousness
preferred his own method. We do not think, indeed, that the _notiones_ of
which he speaks in any way correspond to what Whewell and Ellis would call
"conceptions or ideas furnished by the mind of the thinker"; nor do we
imagine that Bacon would have admitted these as necessary elements in the
inductive process. But he was certainly not ignorant of what may be called
a deductive method, and of a kind of hypothesis. This is clear from the use
he makes of the _Vindemiatio_, from certain hints as to the testing of
axioms, from his admission of the syllogism into physical reasoning, and
from what he calls _Experientia Literata_. The function of the
_Vindemiatio_ has been already pointed out; with regard to axioms, he says
(_N. O._ i. 106), "In establishing axioms by this kind of induction, we
must also examine and try whether the axiom so established be framed to the
measure of these particulars, from which it is derived, or whether it be
larger or wider. And if it be larger and wider, we must observe whether, by
indicating to us new particulars, it confirm that wideness and largeness as
by a collateral security, that we may not either stick fast in things
already known, or loosely grasp at shadows and abstract forms, not at
things solid and realized in matter." (Cf. also the passage from _Valerius
Terminus_, quoted in Ellis's note on the above aphorism.) Of the syllogism
he says, "I do not propose to give up the syllogism altogether. S. is
incompetent for the principal things rather than useless for the
generality. In the mathematics there is no reason why it should not be
employed. It is the flux of matter and the inconstancy of the physical body
which requires induction, that thereby it may be fixed as it were, and
allow the formation of notions well defined. In physics you wisely note,
and therein I agree with you, that after the notions of the first class and
the axioms concerning them have been by induction well made out and
defined, syllogism may be applied safely; only it must be restrained from
leaping at once to the most general notions, and progress must be made
through a fit succession of steps."--("Letter to Baranzano," _Letters and
Life_, vii. 377). And with this may be compared what he says of mathematics
(_Nov. Org._ ii. 8; _Parasceve_, vii.). In his account of _Experientia
Literata_ (_De Aug._ v. 2) he comes very near to the modern mode of
experimental research. It is, he says, the procedure from one experiment to
another, and it is not a science but an art or learned sagacity (resembling
in this Aristotle's [Greek: anchinoia]), which may, however, be enlightened
by the precepts of the _Interpretatio_. Eight varieties of such experiments
are enumerated, and a comparison is drawn between this and the inductive
method; "though the rational method of inquiry by the Organon promises far
greater things in the end, yet this sagacity, proceeding by learned
experience, will in the meantime present mankind with a number of
inventions which lie near at hand." (Cf. _N. O._ i. 103.)
[95] See the vigorous passage in Herschel, _Discourse on the Study of
Natural Philosophy_, s. 105; cf. s. 96 of the same work.
[96] Bacon himself seems to anticipate that the progress of science would
of itself render his method antiquated (_Nov. Org._ i. 130).
[97] _Nov. Org._ i. 127.
BACON, JOHN (1740-1799), British sculptor, was born in Southwark on the
24th of November 1740, the son of Thomas Bacon, a cloth-worker, whose
forefathers possessed a considerable estate in Somersetshire. At the age of
fourteen he was bound apprentice in Mr Crispe's manufactory of porcelain at
Lambeth, where he was at first employed in painting the small ornamental
pieces of china, but by his great skill in moulding he soon attained the
distinction of being modeller to the work. While engaged in the porcelain
works his observation of the models executed by different sculptors of
eminence, which were sent to be burned at an adjoining pottery, determined
the direction of his genius; he devoted himself to the imitation of them
with so much success that in 1758 a small figure of Peace sent by him to
the Society for the Encouragement of Arts received a prize, and the highest
premiums given by that society were adjudged to him nine times between the
years 1763 and 1776. During his apprenticeship he also improved the method
of working statues in artificial stone, an art which he afterwards carried
to perfection. Bacon first attempted working in marble about the year 1763,
and during the course of his early efforts in this art was led to improve
the method of transferring the form of the model to the marble (technically
"getting out the points") by the invention of a more perfect instrument for
the purpose. This instrument possessed many advantages above those formerly
employed; it was more exact, took a correct measurement in every direction,
was contained in a small compass, and could be used upon either the model
or the marble. In the year 1769 he was adjudged the first gold medal for
sculpture given by the Royal Academy, his work being a bas-relief
representing the escape of Aeneas from Troy. In 1770 he exhibited a figure
of Mars, which gained him the gold medal of the Society of Arts and his
election as A.R.A. As a consequence of this success he was engaged to
execute a bust of George III., intended for Christ Church, Oxford. He
secured the king's favour and retained it throughout life. Considerable
jealousy was entertained against him by other sculptors, and he was
commonly charged with ignorance of classic style. This charge he repelled
by the execution of a noble head of Jupiter Tonans, and many of his
emblematical figures are in perfect classical taste. He died on the 4th of
August 1799 and was buried in Whitfield's Tabernacle. His various
productions which may be studied in St Paul's cathedral, London, Christ
Church and Pembroke College, Oxford, the Abbey church, Bath, and Bristol
cathedral, give ample testimony to his powers. Perhaps his best works are
to be found among the monuments in Westminster Abbey.
See Richard Cecil, _Memoirs of John Bacon, R.A._ (London. 1801); and also
vol. i. of R. Cecil's works, ed. J. Pratt (1811).
BACON, LEONARD (1802-1881), American Congregational preacher and writer,
was born in Detroit, Michigan, on the 19th of February 1802, the son of
David Bacon (1771-1817), missionary among the Indians in Michigan and
founder of the town of Tallmadge, Ohio. The son prepared for college at the
Hartford (Conn.) grammar school, graduated at Yale in 1820 and at the
Andover Theological Seminary in 1823, and from 1825 until his death on the
24th of December 1881 was pastor of the First Church (Congregational) in
New Haven, Connecticut, occupying a pulpit which was one of the most
conspicuous in New England, and which had been rendered famous by his
predecessors, Moses Stuart and Nathaniel W. Taylor. In 1866, however,
though he was never dismissed by a council from his connexion with that
church, he gave up the active pastorate. He was, from 1826 to 1838, an
editor of the _Christian Spectator_ (New Haven); was one of the founders
(1843) of the _New Englander_ (later the _Yale Review_); founded in 1848
with Dr R. S. Storrs, Joshua Leavitt, Dr Joseph P. Thompson and Henry C.
Bowen, primarily to combat slavery extension, the _Independent_, of which
he was an editor until 1863; and was acting professor of didactic theology
in the theological department of Yale University from 1866 to 1871, and
lecturer on church polity and American church history from 1871 until his
death. Gradually, after taking up his pastorate, he gained greater and
greater influence in his denomination, until he came to be regarded as
perhaps the most prominent Congregationalist of his time, and was sometimes
popularly referred to as "The Congregational Pope of New England." In all
the heated theological controversies of the day, particularly the long and
bitter one concerning the views put forward by Dr Horace Bushnell, he was
conspicuous, using his influence to bring about harmony, and in the
councils of the Congregational churches, over two of which, the Brooklyn
councils of 1874 and 1876, he presided as moderator, he manifested great
ability both as a debater and as a parliamentarian. In his own theological
views he was broad-minded and an advocate of liberal orthodoxy. In all
matters concerning the welfare of his community or the nation, moreover, he
took a deep and constant interest, and was particularly identified with the
temperance and anti-slavery movements, his services to the latter
constituting probably the most important work of his life. In this, as in
most other controversies, he took a moderate course, condemning the
apologists and defenders of slavery on the one hand and the Garrisonian
extremists on the other. His _Slavery Discussed in Occasional Essays from
1833 to 1846_ (1846) exercised considerable influence upon Abraham Lincoln,
and in this book appears the sentence, which, as rephrased by Lincoln, was
widely quoted: "If that form of government, that system of social order is
not wrong--if those laws of the Southern States, by virtue of which slavery
exists there, and is what it is, are not wrong--nothing is wrong." He was
early attracted to the study of the ecclesiastical history of New England
and was frequently called upon to deliver commemorative addresses, some of
which were published in book and pamphlet form. Of these, his _Thirteen
Historical Discourses_ (1839), dealing with the history of New Haven, and
his _Four Commemorative Discourses_ (1866) may be especially mentioned. The
most important of his historical works, however, is his _Genesis of the New
England Churches_ (1874). He published _A Manual for Young Church Members_
(1833); edited, with a biography, the _Select Practical Writings of Richard
Baxter_ (1831); and was the author of a number of hymns, the best-known of
which is the one beginning,
"O God, beneath Thy guiding hand
Our exiled fathers crossed the sea."
There is no good biography, but there is much biographical material in the
commemorative volume issued by his congregation, _Leonard Bacon, Pastor of
the First Church in New Haven_ (New Haven, 1882), and there is a good
sketch in Williston Walker's _Ten New England Leaders_ (New York, 1901).
[v.03 p.0153] Leonard Bacon's sister DELIA BACON (1811-1859), born in
Tallmadge, Ohio, on the 2nd of February 1811, was a teacher in schools in
Connecticut, New Jersey and New York, and then, until about 1852, conducted
in various eastern cities, by methods devised by herself, classes for women
in history and literature. She wrote _Tales of the Puritans_ (1831), _The
Bride of Fort Edward_ (1839), based on the story of Jane McCrea, partly in
blank verse, and _The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakespeare Unfolded_
(1857), for which alone she is remembered. This book, in the preparation of
which she spent several years in study in England, where she was befriended
by Thomas Carlyle and especially by Nathaniel Hawthorne, was intended to
prove that the plays attributed to Shakespeare were written by a coterie of
men, including Francis Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh and Edmund Spenser, for
the purpose of inculcating a philosophic system, for which they felt that
they themselves could not afford to assume the responsibility. This system
she professed to discover beneath the superficial text of the plays. Her
devotion to this one idea, as Hawthorne says, "had thrown her off her
balance," and while she was in England she lost her mind entirely. She died
in Hartford, Connecticut, on the 2nd of September 1859.
There is a biography by her nephew, Theodore Bacon, _Delia Bacon: A Sketch_
(Boston, 1888), and an appreciative chapter, "Recollections of a Gifted
Woman," in Nathaniel Hawthorne's _Our Old Home_ (Boston, 1863).
Leonard Bacon's son LEONARD WOOLSEY BACON (1830-1907), graduated at Yale in
1850, was pastor of various Congregational and Presbyterian churches, and
published _Church Papers_ (1876); _A Life Worth Living: Life of Emily Bliss
Gould_ (1878); _Irenics and Polemics and Sundry Essays in Church History_
(1895); _History of American Christianity_ (1898); and _The
Congregationalists_ (1904).
(W. WR.)
BACON, SIR NICHOLAS (1509-1579), lord keeper of the great seal of England
during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, was the second son of Robert Bacon of
Drinkstone, Suffolk, and was born at Chislehurst. He was educated at Corpus
Christi College, Cambridge, graduating B.A. in 1527, and afterwards spent
some time in Paris. Having returned to England and entered Gray's Inn, he
was called to the bar in 1533, and four years later began his public life
as solicitor of the court of augmentations. Quickly becoming a person of
importance he obtained a number of estates, principally in the eastern
counties, after the dissolution of the monasteries, and in 1545 became
member of parliament for Dartmouth. In 1546 he was made attorney of the
court of wards and liveries, an office of both honour and profit; in 1550
became a bencher and in 1552 treasurer of Gray's Inn. Although his
sympathies were with the Protestants, he retained his office in the court
of wards during Mary's reign, but an order was issued to prevent him from
leaving England. The important period in Bacon's life began with the
accession of Elizabeth in 1558. Owing largely to his long and close
friendship with Sir William Cecil, afterwards Lord Burghley, his
brother-in-law, he was appointed lord keeper of the great seal in December
of this year, and was soon afterwards made a privy councillor and a knight.
He was instrumental in securing the archbishopric of Canterbury for his
friend Matthew Parker, and in his official capacity presided over the House
of Lords when Elizabeth opened her first parliament. In opposition to
Cecil, he objected to the policy of making war on France in the interests
of the enemies of Mary queen of Scots, on the ground of the poverty of
England; but afterwards favoured a closer union with foreign Protestants,
and seemed quite alive to the danger to his country from the allied and
aggressive religious policy of France and Scotland. In 1559 he was
authorized to exercise the full jurisdiction of lord chancellor. In 1564 he
fell temporarily into the royal disfavour and was dismissed from court,
because Elizabeth suspected he was concerned in the publication of a
pamphlet, "A Declaration of the Succession of the Crowne Imperiall of
Ingland," written by John Hales (_q.v._), and favouring the claim of Lady
Catherine Grey to the English throne. Bacon's innocence having been
admitted he was restored to favour, and replied to a writing by Sir Anthony
Browne, who had again asserted the rights of the house of Suffolk to which
Lady Catherine belonged. He thoroughly distrusted Mary queen of Scots;
objected to the proposal to marry her to the duke of Norfolk; and warned
Elizabeth that serious consequences for England would follow her
restoration. He seems to have disliked the proposed marriage between the
English queen and Francis, duke of Anjou, and his distrust of the Roman
Catholics and the French was increased by the massacre of St Bartholomew.
As a loyal English churchman he was ceaselessly interested in
ecclesiastical matters, and made suggestions for the better observation of
doctrine and discipline in the church. He died in London on the 20th of
February 1579 and was buried in St Paul's cathedral, his death calling
forth many tributes to his memory. He was an eloquent speaker, a learned
lawyer, a generous friend; and his interest in education led him to make
several gifts and bequests for educational purposes, including the
foundation of a free grammar school at Redgrave. His figure was very
corpulent and ungainly. Elizabeth visited him several times at Gorhambury,
and had previously visited him at Redgrave. He was twice married and by his
first wife, Jane, had three sons and three daughters. His second wife was
Anne (d. 1610), daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke, by whom he had two sons.
Bacon's eldest son, Nicholas (_c._ 1540-1624), was member of parliament for
the county of Suffolk and in 1611 was created premier baronet of England.
This baronetcy is still held by his descendants. His second and third sons,
Nathaniel (_c._ 1550-1622) and Edward (_c._ 1550-1618), also took some part
in public life, and through his daughter, Anne, Nathaniel was an ancestor
of the marquesses Townshend. His sons by his second wife were Anthony
(1558-1601), a diplomatist of some repute, and the illustrious Francis
Bacon (_q.v._).
See G. Whetstone, "Remembraunce of the life of Sir N. Bacon," in the
_Frondes Caducae_ (London, 1816); J. A. Froude, _History of England_,
passim (London, 1881 f.).
BACON, ROGER (_c._ 1214-_c._ 1294), English philosopher and man of science,
was born near Ilchester in Somerset. His family appears to have been in
good circumstances, but in the stormy reign of Henry III. their property
was despoiled and several members of the family were driven into exile.
Roger completed his studies at Oxford, though not, as current traditions
assert, at Merton or at Brasenose, neither of which had then been founded.
His abilities were speedily recognized by his contemporaries, and he
enjoyed the friendship of such eminent men as Adam de Marisco and Robert
Grosseteste, bishop of Lincoln.
Very little is known of Bacon's life at Oxford; it is said he took orders
in 1233, and this is not improbable. In the following year, or perhaps
later, he crossed over to France and studied at the university of Paris,
then the centre of intellectual life in Europe. The two great orders,
Franciscans and Dominicans, were in the vigour of youth, and had already
begun to take the lead in theological discussion. Alexander of Hales was
the oracle of the Franciscans, while the rival order rejoiced in Albertus
Magnus and Thomas Aquinas.
The scientific training which Bacon had received, mainly from the study of
the Arab writers, showed him the manifold defects in the systems reared by
these doctors. Aristotle was known but in part, and that part was rendered
well-nigh unintelligible through the vileness of the translations; yet not
one of those professors would learn Greek. The Scriptures read, if at all,
in the erroneous versions were being deserted for the _Sentences_ of Peter
Lombard. Physical science, if there was anything deserving that name, was
cultivated, not by experiment in the Aristotelian way, but by arguments
deduced from premises resting on authority or custom. Everywhere there was
a show of knowledge concealing fundamental ignorance. Bacon, accordingly,
withdrew from the scholastic routine and devoted himself to languages and
experimental research. The only teacher whom he respected was a certain
Petrus de Maharncuria Picardus, or of Picardy, probably identical with a
certain mathematician, Petrus Peregrinus of Picardy, who is perhaps the
author of a MS. treatise, _De Magnete_, contained in the Bibliotheque
Imperiale at Paris. The contrast between the obscurity of such a man and
[v.03 p.0154] the fame enjoyed by the fluent young doctors roused Bacon's
indignation. In the _Opus Minus_ and _Opus Tertium_ he pours forth a
violent tirade against Alexander of Hales, and another professor, not
mentioned by name, but spoken of as alive, and blamed even more severely
than Alexander. This anonymous writer,[1] he says, acquired his learning by
teaching others, and adopted a dogmatic tone, which has caused him to be
received at Paris with applause as the equal of Aristotle, Avicenna, or
Averroes.
Bacon, during his stay in Paris, acquired considerable renown. He took the
degree of doctor of theology, and seems to have received the complimentary
title of _doctor mirabilis_. In 1250 he was again at Oxford, and probably
about this time entered the Franciscan order. His fame spread at Oxford,
though it was mingled with suspicions of his dealings in the black arts and
with some doubts of his orthodoxy. About 1257, Bonaventura, general of the
order, interdicted his lectures at Oxford, and commanded him to place
himself under the superintendence of the body at Paris. Here for ten years
he remained under supervision, suffering great privations and strictly
prohibited from writing anything for publication. But his fame had reached
the ears of the papal legate in England, Guy de Foulques, who in 1265
became pope as Clement IV. In the following year he wrote to Bacon,
ordering him notwithstanding any injunctions from his superiors, to write
out and send to him a treatise on the sciences which he had already asked
of him when papal legate. Bacon, whose previous writings had been mostly
scattered tracts, _capitula quaedam_, took fresh courage from this command
of the pope. He set at naught the jealousy of his superiors and brother
friars, and despite the want of funds, instruments, materials for copying
and skilled copyists, completed in about eighteen months three large
treatises, the _Opus Majus_, _Opus Minus_ and _Opus Tertium_, which, with
some other tracts, were despatched to the pope. We do not know what opinion
Clement formed of them, but before his death he seems to have bestirred
himself on Bacon's behalf, for in 1268 the latter was permitted to return
to Oxford. Here he continued his labours in experimental science and also
in the composition of complete treatises. The works sent to Clement he
regarded as preliminaries, laying down principles which were afterwards to
be applied to the sciences. The first part of an encyclopaedic work
probably remains to us in the _Compendium Studii Philosophiae_ (1271). In
this work Bacon makes a vehement attack upon the ignorance and vices of the
clergy and monks, and generally upon the insufficiency of the existing
studies. In 1278 his books were condemned by Jerome de Ascoli, general of
the Franciscans, afterwards Pope Nicholas IV., and he himself was thrown
into prison for fourteen years. During this time, it is said, he wrote the
small tract _De Retardandis Senectutis Accidentibus_, but this is merely a
tradition. In 1292, as appears from what is probably his latest
composition, the _Compendium Studii Theologiae_, he was again at liberty.
The exact time of his death cannot be determined; 1294 is probably as
accurate a date as can be fixed upon.
_Works and Editions_.--Leland said that it is easier to collect the leaves
of the Sibyl than the titles of the works written by Roger Bacon; and
though the labour has been somewhat lightened by the publications of Brewer
and Charles, referred to below, it is no easy matter even now to form an
accurate idea of his actual productions. An enormous number of MSS. are
known to exist in British and French libraries, and probably not all have
yet been discovered. Many are transcripts of works or portions of works
already published and, therefore, require no notice.[2]
The works hitherto printed (neglecting reprints) are the following:--(1)
_Speculum Alchimiae_ (1541)--translated into English (1597); French, A
Poisson (1890); (2) _De Mirabili Potestate Artis et Naturae_
(1542)--English translation (1659); (3) _Libellus de Retardandis Senectutis
Accidentibus_ (1590)--translated as the "Cure of Old Age," by Richard Brown
(London, 1683); (4) _Sanioris Medicinae Magistri D. Rogeri Baconis Anglici
de Arte Chymiae Scripta_ (Frankfort, 1603)--a collection of small tracts
containing _Excerpta de Libra Avicennae de Anima_, _Breve Breviarium_,
_Verbum Abbreviatum,_[3] _Secretum Secretorum_, _Tractatus Trium Verborum_,
and _Speculum Secretorum_; (5) _Perspectiva_ (1614), which is the fifth
part of the _Opus Majus_; (6) _Specula Mathematica_, which is the fourth
part of the same; (7) _Opus Majus ad Clementem IV._, edited by S. Jebb
(1733) and J. H. Bridges (London, 1897); (8) _Opera hactenus Inedita_, by
J. S. Brewer (1859), containing the _Opus Tertium_, _Opus Minus_,
_Compendium Studii Philosophiae_ and the _De Secretis Operibus Naturae_;
(9) _De Morali Philosophia_ (Dublin, 1860, see below); (10) _The Greek
Grammar of R. Bacon and a Fragment of his Hebrew Grammar_, edited with
introduction and notes by E. S. Nolan and S. A. Hirsch (1902); (11)
_Metaphysica Fratris Rogeri_, edited by R. Steele, with a preface (1905);
(12) _Opera hactenus inedita_, by Robert Steele (1905).
How these works stand related to one another can only be determined by
internal evidence. The smaller works, chiefly on alchemy, are unimportant,
and the dates of their composition cannot be ascertained. It is known that
before the _Opus Majus_ Bacon had already written some tracts, among which
an unpublished work, _Computus Naturalium_, on chronology, belongs probably
to the year 1263; while, if the dedication of the _De Secretis Operibus_ be
authentic, that short treatise must have been composed before 1249.
It is, however, with the _Opus Majus_ that Bacon's real activity begins. It
has been called by Whewell at once the Encyclopaedia and the Organum of the
13th century.
Part I. (pp. 1-22), which is sometimes designated _De Utililate
Scientiarum_, treats of the four _offendicula_, or causes of error. These
are, authority, custom, the opinion of the unskilled many, and the
concealment of real ignorance with pretence of knowledge. The last error is
the most dangerous, and is, in a sense, the cause of all the others. The
_offendicula_ have sometimes been looked upon as an anticipation of Francis
Bacon's _Idola_, but the two classifications have little in common. In the
summary of this part, contained in the _Opus Tertium_, Bacon shows very
clearly his perception of the unity of science and the necessity of
encyclopaedic treatment.
Part II. (pp. 23-43) treats of the relation between philosophy and
theology. All true wisdom is contained in the Scriptures, at least
implicitly; and the true end of philosophy is to rise from the imperfect
knowledge of created things to a knowledge of the Creator. Ancient
philosophers, who had not the Scriptures, received direct illumination from
God, and only thus can the brilliant results attained by them be accounted
for.