comparative degree of the adjective eald, old, and man),
a term implying the possession of an office of rank or
dignity, and, in modern times, applied to an office-bearer
in the municipal corporations and county councils of England
and Wales,and in the municipal corporations of Ireland and
the United States. Among the Anglo-Saxons, earls, governors
of provinces and other persons of distinction received this
title. Thus we read of the aldermannus totius Angliae, who
seems to have corresponded to the officer afterwards styled
capitalis justiciarius Angliae, or chief-justice of England;
the aldermannus regis, probably an occasional magistrate,
answering to the modern justice of assize, or perhaps an officer
whose duty it was to prosecute for the crown; and aldermannus
comitatus, a magistrate with a middle rank between what was
afterwards called the earl and the sheriff, who sat at
the trial of causes with the bishop and declared the common
law, while the bishop proceeded according to ecclesiastical
law. Besides these, we meet with the titles of aldermannus
civitatis, burgi, castelli, hundredi sive wapentachii, &c.
In England, before the passing of the Municipal Corporations
Act, their functions varied according to the charters of the
different boroughs. By the Municipal Corporations Act 1835,
and other acts, consolidated by the Municipal Corporations Act
1882, the aldermen are elected by the councillors for six
years, one-half going out every three years. The number
of councillors in each borough varies according to its
magnitude. One-fourth of the municipal council consists of
aldermen and three-fourths of councillors. In the counties,
too, the number of aldermen is one-third of the number of
councillors, except in London, where it is one-sixth. In the
municipal corporations of Scotland there is no such title as
alderman, the office-bearers of corresponding rank there being
termed bailies. The corporation of the city of London was
not included in the Borough Reform Act, and the antiquated
system remains there in full force. The court of aldermen
consists of twenty-six, twenty-five of whom are elected for
life by the freemen of the respective wards, who return two
persons, one of whom the court of aldermen elect to supply the
vacancy. The city is divided into twenty-six wards; twenty-four
of these send up one alderman each, the other two combine
to choose a twenty-fifth. The twenty-sixth alderman serves
for the independent borough of Southwark (q.v.) and is
appointed by the other aldermen, who generally select the
senior from among themselves when a vacancy occurs. The lord
mayor is elected from such of the aldermen as have served the
office of sheriff; of these the Common Hall, which consists
of the freemen of the different wards, select two, and the
aldermen elect one of these to the mayoralty. The court of
aldermen has the power of appointment to certain offices,
exercises judicial functions in regard to licensing and in
disputes connected with the ward election, has some power of
disposal over the city cash and possesses magisterial control
over the city, each alderman being a judge and magistrate
for the whole city, and by virtue of his office exercising
the functions of a justice of the peace. The aldermen are
members of the court of common council, the legislative body
of the corporation, which consists in all of 232 members,
the remainder being elected annually by the freemen. In the
United States aldermen form as a rule a legislative rather
than a judicial body, although in some cities they hold
courts and possess very considerable magisterial powers.
ALDERNEY (Fr. Aurigny), one of the Channel Islands, the
northernmost of the principal members of the group, belonging to
England. It lies in 49 deg. 43' N. and 2 deg. 12' W., 9 m. W.
of Cape La Hague on the coast of Normandy. The harbour, on
the north coast in the bay of Braye, is 25 m. from St Peter
Port, Guernsey, by way of which outer communications are
principally carried on, and 55 m. S. by E. of Portland
Bill, the nearest point of England. The length of the
island from N. E. to S. W. is 3 1/2 m., its average breadth 1
m., its area 1962 acres, and its population (1901) 2062.
The strait between the island and Cape La Hague, called
the Race of Alderney (French Raz Blanchard), confined by
numerous rocks and reefs off either coast, is rendered very
dangerous in stormy weather by conflicting currents. Through
this difficult channel the scattered remnant of the French
fleet under Tourville escaped after the defeat of La Hogue in
1692. To the west is the narrower and also dangerous channel
of the Swinge (Sinige), between Alderney and the uninhabited
islets of Burhou, Ortach and others. West of these again are the
Casquets, a group of rocks to which attaches a long record of
shipwreck. Rocks and reefs fringe all the coasts of Alderney. The
island itself is a level open tableland, which on the south-west
and south falls abruptly to the sea in a majestic series of
cliffs. The greatest elevation of the land is about 300
ft. Towards the north-west, north and east the less rocky
coast is indented by several bays, with open sandy shores, of
which those of Crabby, Brave, Corblets and Longy are the most
noteworthy. South-west of Longy Bay, where the coast rises
boldly, there is a remarkable projecting block of sandstone,
called La Roche Pendante (Hanging Rock) overhanging the
cliff. Sandstone (mainly along the north-east coast),
granite and porphyry are the chief geological formations.
There are a few streams, but water is obtained mainly from
wells. Trees are scarce. The town of St Anne stands almost in
the centre of the island overlooking and extending towards the
harbour. Here are the courthouse, a gateway commemorating
Albert, prince-consort, the clock tower, which belonged to
the ancient parish church, and the modern church (1850),
in Early English style, an excellent example of the work of
Sir Gilbert Scott. The church is a memorial to the family
of Le Mesurier, in which the hereditary governorship of
the island was vested until the abolition of the office in
1825. There is a chain of forts round the north coast from
Clanque Fort on the west to Fort Essex on the east; the largest
is Fort Albert, above Brave Bay. In 1847 work was begun on
a great breakwater west of the harbour, the intention being
to provide a harbour of refuge, but although a sum exceeding
one and a half million sterling was spent the scheme was
unsuccessful. The soil of Alderney is light, fertile and
well cultivated; grain and vegetables are grown and early
potatoes are exported. A large part of the island is under
grass, affording pasture for cattle. The well-known term
``Alderney cattle,'' however, has lost in great measure
its former signification of a distinctive breed. Alderney
is included in the bailiwick of Guernsey. It has a court
consisting of a judge and six jurats, attorney-general,
prevot, greffiero and sergent; but as a judicial court
it is subordinate to that of Guernsey, and its administrative
powers are limited to such matters as the upkeep of roads.
For its relations to the constitution of the bailiwick,
and for the history of the island, see CHANNEL ISLANDS.
ALDERSHOT, an urban district in the Basingstoke parliamentary
division of Hampshire, England, 34 m. S.W. by W. of London,
on the London & South-Western and the South- Eastern & Chatham
railways. It was a mere village till 1855, when Aldershot
camp was established. Pop. (1891) 25,595; (1901) 30,974. Its
germ is to be found in the temporary camp on Chobham Ridges,
formed in 1853 by Lord Hardinge, the commander-in-chief, the
success of which convinced him of the necessity of giving
troops practical instruction in the field and affording the
generals opportunities of manoeuvring large bodies of the three
arms. He therefore advised the purchase of a tract of waste
land whereon a permanent camp might be established. His
choice fell on Aldershot, a spot also recommended by strategic
reasons, being situated on the flank of any army advancing upon
London from the south. Nothing came of Lord Hardinge's proposal
till the experience of the Crimean campaign fully endorsed his
opinion. The lands at Aldershot, an extensive open heath
country, sparsely dotted by fir-woods and intersected by the
Basingstoke canal, were then acquired by the crown. Wooden
huts were erected in 1855, and permanent buildings to replace
them were begun in 1881. Under the Barracks Act 1890, and the
Military Works Act of 1897 and 1899, large sums were provided
for completing the work. The former division of North and
South camps and permanent barracks no longer obtains. North
camp is now named Marlborough Lines, with a field artillery
barrack and five infantry barracks called after Marlborough's
victories. South camp is now named Stanhope Lines, after Mr
Stanhope, who was secretary of state for war when the Barracks
Act 1890 was passed and the reconstruction commenced in
earnest. They contain barracks for the Royal Engineers and
Army Service Corps, the general parade, which stretches east
and west, and five infantry barracks called after battles
(other than those of Wellington), of the wars with France,
1793-1815. There are also barracks for the Royal Army Medical
Corps. The old permanent barracks (which were built for the
most part about 1857) have been renamed Wellington Lines, with
cavalry and artillery barracks; and three infantry barracks
called after Wellington's victories in the Peninsula. For
the sick there are the Connaught Hospital in the Marlborough
Lines, the Cambridge Hospital in Stanhope Lines, and the Union
Hospital in Wellington Lines, besides the Louise Margaret Hospital
for women and children and the isolated infection hospital.
The drainage of the station is all modern, and the sewage is
disposed of on a sewage farm under the direction of the war
department. The water supply is partly from the Aldershot Water
Company, and partly from springs and reservoirs collecting
water from a reserved area of war department property.
Most of the barracks can accommodate not only the units they are
constructed for, but also detachments going through courses of
instruction. The total of men, women and children for
whom quarters are provided is at times as high as 24,000.
Besides the regimental buildings there are a large number of
buildings for garrison purposes, such as quarters and offices
for general, staff and departmental officers, with the warrant
and non-commissioned officers employed under them; the supply
depot with abattoir and bakery; the ordnance stores; barrack
stores for furniture and bedding, shops and stores for R. E.
services; the balloon establishment; the detention barracks;
fire brigade stations; five churches; recreation grounds
for officers and men; schools; and especially the military
technical schools of army cooking, gymnastics, signalling,
ballooning and of mounted infantry, Army Service Corps,
Royal Army Medical Corps and veterinary duties. The work of
these schools is, however, only a small part of the military
training afforded at Aldershot; of greater importance is the
field and musketry training, for the carrying out of which a
considerable extent of land is essential. The land required
for these purposes extends at present over an area about 9 1/4
m. in extreme length by 7 3/4 m. in extreme width. In addition
to this there is the land at Sandhurst and the Staff College
(Camberley) about 6 1/2 m. distant, and at Woolmer Forest, 12 m.
distant. The musketry practice of the troops at Aldershot
is carried out at the Ash ranges, 2 m. east of the barracks,
while the Pirbright ranges, alongside those of the National
Rifle Association at Bisley, are utilized by the Household
Cavalry and Guards, who are encamped there in succession.
Suitable grounds in the vicinity of the barracks, of which
Caesar's Camp, the Long Valley and Laffan's Plain are best
known, are utilized for company, battalion and brigade training
of infantry, while the mounted branches work over a wider
area, and the engineers carry out their practices where most
convenient. For the field-days of the combined arms, the
whole of the war department property is available. Aldershot
is the headquarters of the ``Aldershot Army Corps,'' which is
the largest organized force maintained in the United Kingdom.
Besides the troops in barracks, during the drill season there
is often a considerable force in camp, both regular troops from
other stations and militia and volunteer units, so that, including
the regular garrison, sometimes as many as 40,000 troops have
been concentrated at the station for training and manoeuvres.
ALDHELM (c. 640-709), bishop of Sherborne, English
scholar, was born before the middle of the 7th century. He
is said to have been the son of Kenten, who was of the royal
house of Wessex, but who was certainly not, as Aldhelm's
early biographer Faritius asserts, the brother of King Ine.
He received his first education in the school of an Irish
scholar and monk, Maildulf, Maeldubh or Meldun (d. c. 675),
who had settled in the British stronghold of Bladon or Bladow
on the site of the town called Mailduberi, Maldubesburg,
Meldunesburg, &c., and finally Malmesbury,1 after him. In
668 Pope Vitalian sent Theodore of Tarsus to be archbishop of
Canterbury, and about the same time came the African scholar
Hadrian, who became abbot of St Augustine's at Canterbury.
Aldhelm was one of his disciples, for he addresses him as
the ``venerable preceptor of my rude childhood.'' He must,
nevertheless, have been thirty years of age when he began
to study with Hadrian. His studies included Roman law,
astronomy, astrology, the art of reckoning and the difficulties
of the calendar. He learned, according to the doubtful
statements of the early lives, both Greek and Hebrew. He
certainly introduces many Latinized Greek words into his
works. Ill-health compelled him to leave Canterbury, and he
returned to Malmesbury, where he was a monk under Maildulf
for fourteen years, dating probably from 661, and including
the period of his studies with Hadrian. When Maildulf
died, Aldhelm was appointed in 675, according to a charter
of doubtful authenticity cited by William of Malmesbury, by
Leutherius, bishop of Dorchester from 671 to 676, to succeed
to the direction of the monastery, of which he became the first
abbot. He introduced the Benedictine rule, and secured the
right of the election of the abbot to the monks themselves.
The community at Malmesbury increased, and Aldhelm was able to
found two other monasteries to be centres of learning at Frome
and at Bradford on Avon. The little church of St Lawrence at
Bradford dates back to his time and may safely be regarded as
his. At Malmesbury he built a new church to replace Maildulf's
modest building, and obtained considerable grants of land for the
monastery. His fame as a scholar rapidly spread into other
countries. Artwil, the son of an Irish king, submitted his
writings for Aldhelm's approval, and Cellanus, an Irish monk
from Peronne, was one of his correspondents. Aldhelm was the
first Englishman, so far as we know, to write in Latin verse,
and his letter to Acircius (Aldfrith or Eadfrith, king of
Northumbria) is a treatise on Latin prosody for the use of his
countrymen. In this work he included his most famous productions,
101 riddles in Latin hexameters. Each of them is a complete
picture, and one of them runs to 83 lines. That his merits
as a scholar were early recognized in his own country is shown
by the encomium of Bede (Eccl. Hist. v. 18), who speaks of
him as a wonder of erudition. His fame reached Italy, and at
the request of Pope Sergius I. (687-701) he paid a visit to
Rome, of which, however, there is no notice in his extant
writings. On his return, bringing with him privileges for
his monastery and a magnificent altar, he received a popular
ovation. He was deputed by a synod of the church in Wessex
to remonstrate with the Britons of Domnonia (Devon and
Cornwall) on their differences from the Roman practice in
the shape of the tonsure and the date of Easter. This he
did in a long and rather acrimonious letter to their king
Geraint (Geruntius), and their ultimate agreement with Rome
is referred by William of Malmesbury to his efforts. In
705, or perhaps earlier, Haeddi, bishop of Winchester, died,
and the diocese was divided into two parts. Sherborne was
the new see, of which Aldhelm reluctantly became the first
bishop. He wished to resign the abbey of Malmesbury which he
had governed for thirty years, but yielding to the remonstrances
of the monks he continued to direct it until his death. He
was now an old man, but he showed great activity in his new
functions. The cathedral church which he built at Sherborne,
though replaced later by a Norman church, is described by
William of Malmesbury. He was on his rounds in his diocese
when he died in the church of Doulting on the 25th of May
709. The body was taken to Malmesbury, and crosses were
set up by the pious care of his friend, Bishop Ecgwine of
Worcester, at the various halting- places. He was buried in
the church of St Michael. His biographers relate miracles due
to his sanctity worked during his lifetime and at his shrine.
Aldhelm wrote poetry in Anglo-Saxon also, and set his own
compositions to music, but none of his songs, which were
still popular in the time of Alfred, have come down to us.
Finding his people slow to come to church, he is said to have
stood at the end of a bridge singing songs in the vernacular,
thus collecting a crowd to listen to exhortations on sacred
subjects. Aldhelm wrote in elaborate and grandiloquent
Latin, which soon came to be regarded as barbarous. Much
admired as he was by his contemporaries, his fame as a scholar
therefore soon declined, but his reputation as a pioneer
in Latin scholarship in England and as a teacher remains.
Aldhelm's works were collected in J. A. Giles's Patres
eccl. Angl. (Oxford, 1844), and reprinted by J. P.
Migne in his Patrologiae Cursus, vol. 89 (1850). The
letter to Geraint, king of Domnonia, was supposed to have
been destroyed by the Britons (W. of Malmesbury, Gesta
Pontificum, p. 361), but was discovered with others of
Aldhelm's in the correspondence of St Boniface, archbishop of
Mainz. A long letter to Eahfrid, a scholar just returned from
Ireland (first printed in Usserii Veterum Epistt. Hiber.
Sylloge, 1632), is of interest as casting light on the
relations between English and Irish scholars. Next to the
riddles, Aldhelm's best-known work is De Laude Virginitatis
sive de Virginitate Sanctorum, a Latin treatise addressed
about 705 to the nuns of Barking,2 in which he commemorates
a great number of saints. This was afterwards turned by
Aldhelm into Latin verse (printed by Delrio, Mainz, 1601).
The chief source of his Epistola ad Acircium sive liber de
septenario, et de metris, aenigmatibus ac pedum regulis
(ed. A. Mai, Class. Auct. vol. v.) is Priscian. For the
riddles included in it, his model was the collection known
as Symposii aenigmata. The acrostic introduction gives the
sentence, ``Aldhelmus cecinit millenis versibus odas,'' whether
read from the initial or final letters of the lines. His
Latin poems include one on the dedication of a basilica built
by Bugge (or Eadburga), a royal lady of the house of Wessex.
AUTHORITIES.--Faritius (d. 1117), an Italian monk of
Malmesbury, afterwards abbot of Abingdon, wrote a Vita S.
Aldhelmi (MS. Cotton, Faustina, B. 4), printed by Giles and
Migne, also in Original Lives of Anglo-Saxons (Caxton
Soc., 1834); but the best authority is William of Malmesbury,
who in the fifth book, devoted to St Aldhelm, of the Gesta
Pontificum proposes to fill up the outline of Faritius,
using the church records, the traditions of Aldhelm's
miracles preserved by the monks of Malmesbury, and the lost
``Handboc'' or commonplace book of King Alfred. His narrative
is divided into four parts: the birth and attainments of
Aldhelm, the religious houses he had established and endowed,
the miracles recorded of him, and the history of the abbey
down to the writer's own time (see De Gestis Pontificum,
ed. N. E. S. A. Hamilton, 1870, for the Rolls Series. pp.
330-443). The life by John Capgrave in his Legenda
Nova (1516) is chiefly an abridgment of Malmesbury's
narrative. Consult also L. Bonhoff, Aldhelm von Malmesbury
(Dresden, 1894); T. D. Hardy. Descriptive Catalogue
(1862), vol. i. pp. 389-396; T. Wright, Biog. Brit. Lit.
(A.-S. Period, 1842); G. F. Browne, bishop of Bristol, St
Aldhelm; his Life and Times (1903); and W. B. Wildman,
Life of S. Ealdhelm, frst Bishop of Sherborne (1905),
containing many interesting local details. For some poems
attributed to Aldhelm, and printed in Dummler's edition of
the letters of St Boniface and Lul in Monumenta Germaniae
Historica (epistt. tom. iii.), see H. Bradley in Eng.
Hist. Review, xv. p. 291 (1900), where they are attributed
to Aldhelm's disciple AEthilwald. The very varied sources
and the chronology of Aldhelm's work are discussed in ``Zu
Aldhelm und Baeda,'' by Max Manitius, in Sitzungsberichte
der kaiserlichen Akad. der Wissenschaften (Vienna, 1886).
An excellent account of his ecclesiastical importance is
given by W. Bright in Chapters on Early English Church
History (Oxford, 1878). For his position as a writer
of Latin verse consult A. Ebert, Allgemeine Geschichte
d. Literatur des Mittelalters im Abendlande, vol. i. new
edition (1889); M. Manitius, Geschichte der christlich-
lateinischen Poesie &c. (Stuttgart, 1891), pp. 487-496;
also H. Hahn, Bonifaz und Lul ihre angelsachsischen
Korrespondenten, chap. i. (Leipzig, 1883). The two last-named
works contain many further bibliographical references.
1 For the disputed etymology of Malmesbury,
which some connect with Aldhelm's name, see Bishop
Browne, St Aldhelin: his Life and Times, p. 73.
2 Cuthburga, sister of King Ine of Wessex, and therefore
related to Andhelm, left her husband Aldfrith, king of
Northumbria, to enter the nunnery at Barking. She afterwards
founded the nunnery of Wimborne, of which she became abbess.
ALDINE PRESS, the printing office started by Aldus Manutius
at the end of the 15th century in Venice, from which were issued
the celebrated Aldine editions of the classics of that time. (See
MANUTIUS.) The Aldine Press is famous in the history of typography
(q.v.), among other things, for the introduction of italics.
ALDINI, GIOVANNI (1762--1834), Italian physicist, born
at Bologna on the 10th of April 1762, was a brother of the
statesman Count Antonio Aldini (1756-1826) and nephew of L.
Galvani, whose treatise on muscular electricity he edited with
notes in 1791. He became professor of physics at Bologna in
1798, in succession to his teacher Sebastiano Canterzani
(1734-1819). His scientific work was chiefly concerned with
galvanism and its medical applications, with the construction
and illumination of lighthouses, and with experiments for
preserving human life and material objects from destruction by
fire. He wrote in French and English in addition to his
native Italian. In recognition of his merits, the emperor
of Austria made him a knight of the Iron Crown and a
councillor of state at Milan, where he died on the 17th
of January 1834. He left by will a considerable sum to
found a school of natural science for artisans at Bologna.
ALDRED, or EALDRED (d. 1069), English ecclesiastic,
became abbot of Tavistock about 1027, in 1044 was made
bishop of Worcester, and in 1060 archbishop of York. He
had considerable influence over King Edward the Confessor,
and as his interests were secular rather than religious he
took a prominent part in affairs of state, and in 1046 led
an unsuccessful expedition against the Welsh. In 1050 he
was largely instrumental in restoring Sweyn, the son of Earl
Godwin, to his earldom, and about the same time went to Rome
``on the king's errand.'' In 1054 he was sent to the emperor
Henry III. to obtain that monarch's influence in securing
the return to England of Edward, son of Edmund Ironside,
who was in Hungary with King Andrew I. In this mission he
was successful and obtained some insight into the working of
the German church during a stay of a year with Hermann II.,
archbishop of Cologne. After his return to England he took
charge of the sees of Hereford and Ramsbury, although not
appointed to these bishoprics; and in 1058 made a pilgrimage
to Jerusalem, being the first English bishop to take this
journey. Having previously given up Hereford and Ramsbury,
Aldred was elected archbishop of York in 1060, and in 1061
he proceeded to Rome to receive the pallium. On his arrival
there, however, various charges were brought against him by a
synod, and Pope Nicholas II. not only refused his request
but degraded him from the episcopate. The sentence was,
however, subsequently reversed, and Aldred received the pallium
and was restored to his former station. It is stated by
Florence of Worcester that Aldred crowned King Harold II. in
1066, although the Norman authorities mention Stigand as the
officiating prelate. After the battle of Hastings Aldred
joined the party who sought to bestow the throne upon Edgar
the AEtheling, but when these efforts appeared hopeless he
was among those who submitted to William the Conqueror at
Berkhampstead. Selected to crown the new king he performed
the ceremony on Christmas Day 1066, and in 1068 performed
the same office at the coronation of Matilda, the Conqueror's
wife. But though often at court, he seems to have been no
sympathiser with Norman oppression, and is even said to have
bearded the king himself. He died at York on the 11th of
September 1069 and was buried in his own cathedral. Aldred
did much for the restoration of discipline in the monasteries
and churches under his authority, and was liberal in his
gifts for ecclesiastical purposes. He built the monastic
church of St Peter at Gloucester, and rebuilt a large part of
that of St John at Beverley. At his instigation, Folcard, a
monk of Canterbury, wrote the Life of St John of Beverley.
See The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, edited by C. Plummer
(Oxford, 1892-1899); Florence of Worcester, Chronicon ex
Chronicis, edited by B. Thorpe (London, 1848-1849); William
of Malmesbury, De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum, edited
by N. E. S. A. Hamilton (London, 1870); W. H. Dixon, Fasti
Eboracenses, vol. i., edited by J. Raine (London, 1863); T.
Stubbs, Chronica Pontificum Ecclesiae Eboracensis, edited by
J. Raine (London, 1879-1894); E. A. Freeman, History of the
Norman Conquest, vols. ii., iii., iv. (Oxford, 1867-1879).
ALDRICH, HENRY (1647-1710), English theologian and philosopher,
was born in 1647 at Westminster, and was educated at the
collegiate school there, under Dr Busby. In 1662 he entered
Christ Church, Oxford, and in 1689 was made dean in succession
to the Roman Catholic, John Massey, who had fled to the
continent. In 1692 he was vice-chancellor of the University. In
1702 he was appointed rector of Wem in Shropshire, but continued
to reside at Oxford, where he died on the 14th of December
1710. He was buried in the cathedral without any memorial
at his own desire. Aldrich was a man of unusually varied
gifts. A classical scholar of fair merits, he is best known
as the author of a little book on logic (Compendium Artis
Logicae), a work of little value in itself, but used at Oxford
(in Mansel's revised edition) till long past the middle of the
19th century. Aldrich also composed a number of anthems and
church services of high merit, and adapted much of the music of
Palestrina and Carissimi to English words with great skill and
judgment. To him we owe the well-known catch, ``Hark, the
bonny Christ Church bells.'' Evidence of his skill as an
architect may be seen in the church and campanile of All
Saints, Oxford, and in three sides of the so-called Peckwater
Quadrangle of Christ Church, which were erected after his
designs. He bore a great reputation for conviviality,
and wrote a humorous Latin version of the popular ballad--
A soldier and a sailor,
A tinker and a tailor, &c.
Another specimen of his wit is furnished by the
following epigram of the five reasons for drinking:--
Si bene quid memini, causae sunt quinque bibendi;
Hospitis adventus, praesens sitis atque futura,
Aut vini bonitas, aut quaelibet altera causa.
The translation runs:--
If on my theme I rightly think,
There are five reasons why men drink:--
Good wine; a friend; because I'm dry;
Or lest I should be by and by;
Or--any other reason why.
ALDRICH, NELSON WILMARTH (1841- ), American politician,
was born at Foster, Rhode Island, on the 6th of November
1841. His first political service was as a member (1869-1875)
and president (1871-1872) of the Providence common council.
He was a member of the lower house of the Rhode Island
legislature in 1875 and 1876, and speaker in the latter
year. By this time he had become a power in Republican
state politics, and in 1878 and 1880 was elected to
Congress. Early in his second term he was chosen United
States senator, and was re-elected in 1886, 1892, 1898 and
1905. In the Senate he was looked upon as the special
representative of the high protective industries and moneyed
interests, and he took a prominent part in all legislation
dealing with the tariff, banking and the merchant marine.
ALDRICH, THOMAS BAILEY (1836-1907), American author, was
born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the 11th of November
1836. When he was but a child his father moved to New Orleans,
but after ten years the boy was sent back to Portsmouth--the
``Rivermouth'' of several of his stories--to prepare for
college. This period of his life is partly described in his
Story of a Bad Boy (1870), of which ``Tom Bailey'' is the
juvenile hero.1 His father's death in 1852 compelled Aldrich to
abandon the idea of college and enter a business office in New
York. Here he soon became a constant contributor to the
newspapers and magazines, and the intimate friend of the young
poets, artists and wits of the metropolitan Bohemia of the
early'sixties, among whom were E. C. Stedman, R. H. Stoddard,
Bayard Taylor and Walt Whitman. From 1856 to 1859 he was
on the staff of the Home Journal, then edited by N. P.
Willis, while during the Civil War he was himself editor of
the New York Illustrated News. In 1865 he moved to Boston
and was editor for ten years for Ticknor and Fields--then
at the height of their prestige--of the eclectic weekly
Every Saturday, discontinued in 1875. From 1881 to 1890
he was editor of the Atlantic Monthly. Meanwhile Aldrich
had written much, both in prose and verse. His genius was
many-sided, and it is surprising that so busy an editor and
so prolific a writer should have attained the perfection of
form for which he was remarkable. His successive volumes of
verse, chiefly The Ballad of Babie Bell (1856), Pampinea,
and Other Poems (1861), Cloth of Gold (1874), Flower
and Thorn (1876), Friar Jerome's Beautiful Book (1881),
Mercedes and Later Lyrics (1883), Wyndham Towers (1889),
and the collected editions of 1865, 1882, 1897 and 1900,
showed him to be a poet of lyrical skill, dainty touch and
felicitous conceit, the influence of Herrick being constantly
apparent. He repeatedly essayed the long narrative or
dramatic poem, but seldom with success, save in such earlier
work as Garnaut Hall. But no American poet has shown more
skill in describing some single picture, mood, conceit or
episode. His best things are such lyrics as ``Hesperides,''
``When the Sultan goes to Ispahan,'' ``Before the Rain,''
``Nameless Pain,'' ``The Tragedy,'' ``Seadrift,'' ``Tiger
Lilies,'' ``The One White Rose,'' ``Palabras Carinosas,''
``Destiny,'' or the eight-line poem ``Identity,'' which did
more to spread Aldrich's reputation than any of his writing
after Babie Bell. Beginning with the collection of stories
entitled Marjorie Daw and Other People (1873), Aldrich
applied to his later prose work that minute care in composition
which had previously characterized his verse--taking a
near, new or salient situation, and setting it before the
reader in a pretty combination of kindly realism and reticent
humour. In the novels, Prudence Palfrey (1874), The
(Queen of Sheba (1877), and The Stillwater Tragedy (1880),
there is more rapid action; but the Portsmouth pictures
in the first are elaborated with the affectionate touch
shown in the shorter humourous tale, A Rivermouth Romance
(1877). In An Old Town by the Sea (1893) the author's
birthplace was once more commemorated, while travel and
description are the theme of From Ponkapog to Pesth
(1883). Aldrich died at Boston on the 19th of March 1907.
His Life was written by Ferris Greenslet (1908).
1 This book has been translated into French as Education et
recreation, and into German as a specimen of American humour.
ALDRINGER (ALTRINGER, ALDRINGEN), JOHANN, COUNT
VON (1588-1634), Austrian soldier, was born at Diedenhofen
(Thionville) in Lorraine. After travelling as page to a
nobleman in France, Italy and the Netherlands, he went to
the university of Paris. In 1606 he entered the service of
Spain, in which he remained until 1618, when he joined the
imperial army. Here he distinguished himself in the field
and in the cabinet. Made a colonel in 1622, two years later
he was employed on the council of war and on diplomatic
missions. At the bridge of Dessau in 1626 he performed very
distinguished service against Ernst von Mansfeld. He and
his constant comrade Matthias Gallas (q.v.) were ennobled
on the same day, and in the course of the Italian campaign
of 1630 the two officers married the two daughters of Count
d'Arco. Aldringer served as Count Rambold Collalto's
major-general in this campaign and was present at the taking of
Mantua. The plunder of the duke of Mantua's treasures made
Gallas and Aldringer wealthy men. Back in Germany in 1631,
he served after Breitenfeld as Tilly's artillery commander,
and, elevated to the dignity of count of the Empire, he was
present at the battle of the Lech, where he was wounded.
When Tilly died of his wounds Aldringer succeeded to the
command. Made field-marshal after the assault of the Alte
Veste near Nuremberg, at which he had been second in command
under Wallenstein, duke of Friedland (with whom he was a
great favourite), he was next placed at the head of the corps
formed by Maximilian I. of Bavaria to support Wallenstein.
In this post his tact and diplomatic ability were put to a
severe test in the preservation of harmony between the two
dukes. Finally Count Aldringer was won over by the court
party which sought to displace the too successful duke of
Friedland. After Wallenstein's death Aldringer commanded
against the Swedes on the Danube, and at the defence of Landshut
he fell (July 22, 1634). His great possessions descended to
his sister, and thence to the family of Clary and Aldringen.
See Brohm, Johann von Aldringen (Halle, 1882), and
Hermann Hallwich, Johann von Aldringen (Leipzig, 1885);
also Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, s.v. Gallas,
correcting earlier biography of Aldringer in the same work.
ALDROVANDI, ULISSI (1522-1605), Italian naturalist, was,
born of noble parentage at Bologna on the 11th of September
1522. He was apprenticed to a merchant in Brescia, but a
commercial career being distasteful to him, he turned his
attention to law and medicine, studying first in his native
town and afterwards at Padua. In 1550 he was accused of
heresy, but succeeded in clearing himself before the
Inquisition. In 1553 he took his doctor's degree in
medicine at Bologna, and in the following year was appointed
professor of philosophy and also lecturer on botany at the
university. In 1560 he was transferred to the chair of natural
history. At his instance the senate of Bologna established in
1568 a botanical garden, of which he was appointed the first
director. About the same time he became inspector of drugs, and
in that capacity published in 1574 a work entitled Antidotarii
Bononiensis Epitome, which formed the model for many subsequent
pharmacopoeias. He was also instrumental in founding the public
museum of Bologna, which contains, especially in the natural
history department, a large number of specimens collected by
him. The results of his various researches were embodied
in a magnum opus, which was designed to include everything
that was known about natural history. The first three
volumes, comprising his ornithology, were published in 1599,
and a fourth, treating of insects, appeared in 1602. After
his death a number of other volumes were compiled from his
manuscript materials, under the editorship of several of his
pupils, to whom the task was entrusted by the senate of
Bologna. The work was enriched by a large number of
illustrations prepared at great expense, the author having,
it is said, employed several celebrated artists for thirty
years. Among these were Lorenzo Benini of Florence and
Christopher Coriolanus of Nuremberg. It has been said,
indeed, that the cost of the undertaking was so great as to
exhaust its author's means, and that he died penniless and
blind in the public hospital of Bologna. This, however, is
probably incorrect, at least as regards the allegation of
poverty. Published records of the senate of Bologna show
that it liberally supported Aldrovandi in his undertaking,
doubling his salary soon after his appointment as professor,
and bestowing on him from time to time sums amounting in
all to 40,000 crowns. If, therefore, he died in the public
hospital, he probably went there for the better treatment of
his disease. His death occurred on the 10th of May 1605.
Aldrovandi was chiefly remarkable for laborious and patient
research. He seems to have been totally destitute of the
critical faculty, and hardly any attempt is made in his great
work to classify facts or to distinguish between the true and
the fabulous, the important and the trivial. Much is thus
included that is of no scientific value, but it also contains
much information of very great interest to the naturalist.
ALE, an old word for a fermented liquor obtained chiefly from
malt. In England ``ale'' is nowadays practically synonymous
with ``beer.'' Before the introduction of hops into England
from Flanders in the 16th century ale was the name exclusively
applied to malt liquor, the term beer being gradually
introduced to describe liquor brewed with an infusion of
hops. This distinction does not apply at the present time,
except in so far as the term ale is not applied to black
beers (stout and porter) nor to lager beer. In the United
States, however, it is customary to confine the designation
beer to the article obtained by the bottom fermentation
process. In former times the Welsh and Scots had two distinct
kinds of ale, called common and spiced ales, the relative
values of which were appraised by law in the following terms:
``If a farmer have no mead, he shall pay two casks of spiced
ale, or four casks of common ale, for one cask of mead.''
There are numerous varieties of English ales, such as mild
ale, which is a full, sweetish beer, of a dark colour and with
relatively little hop; pale ale, which is relatively dry, of
light colour and of a more pronounced hop flavour than the
mild ale; and bitter and stock ales, the latter term being
generally reserved for superior beers, such as are used for
bottling. The terms pale, bitter, stock, light, &c.,
are to be regarded as trade distinctions and not as exact
definitions of quality or type. (See BEER and BREWING.)
Parish Ales.--In old England an ``ale'' was synonymous with
a parish festival or merry-making at which ale was the chief
drink. The word was generally used in composition. Thus
there were leet-ales (that held on leet or manorial court day);
lamb-ales (that held at lamb-shearing); Whitsun-ales, clerk-ales,
church-ales and so on. The word bridal is really bride-ale,
the wedding feast. Bid-ales, once very common throughout
England, were ``benefit'' feasts to which a general invitation
was given, and all the neighbours attending were expected to
make some contribution to help the object of the ``benefit.''
(See ``Bidding-Weddings'' under BRIDE.) These parish festivals
were of much ecclesiastical and social importance in medieval
England. The chief purpose of church-ales and clerk-ales, at
least, was to facilitate the collection of parish-dues, or
to make an actual profit for the church from the sale of the
liquor by the church wardens. These profits kept the parish
church in repair, or were distributed as alms to the poor. At
Sygate, Norfolk, on the gallery of the church is inscribed--
God speed the plough
And give us good ale enow . . .
Be merry and glade,
With good ale was this work made.
On the beam of a screen in the church of Thorpe-le-Soken,
Essex, is the following inscription in raised Gothic
letters, on a scroll held by two angels--``This cost is the
bachelers made by ales thesn be ther med.'' The date is about
1480. The feast was usually held in a barn near the church
or in the churchyard. In Tudor times church-ales were held on
Sundays. Gradually the parish-ales were limited to the
Whitsun season, and these still have local survivals.
The colleges of the universities used formerly to brew
their own ales and hold festivals known as college-ales.
Some of these ales are still brewed and famous, like
``chancellor'' at Queen's College, and ``archdeacon'' at Morton
College, Oxford, and ``audit ale'' at Trinity, Cambridge.
See Brand's Popular Antiquities of Great
Britain (Wm. Carew Hazlitt's edition, 1905).
ALEANDRO, GIROLAMO (HIERONYMUS ALEANDER) (1480- 1542), Italian
cardinal, was born at Motta, near Venice, on the 13th of February
1480. He studied at Venice, where he became acquainted with
Erasmus and Aldus Manutius, and at an early age was reputed
one of the most learned men of the time. In 1508 he went to
Paris on the invitation of Louis XII. as professor of belles
lettres, and held for a time the position of rector in the
university. Entering the service of Eberhard, prince-bishop
of Liege, he was sent by that prelate on a mission to
Rome, where Pope Leo X. retained him, giving him (1519) the
office of librarian of the Vatican. In the following year
he went to Germany to be present as papal nuncio at the
coronation of Charles V., and was also present at the diet of
Worms, where he headed the opposition to Luther, advocating
the most extreme measures to repress the doctrines of the
reformer. His conduct evoked the fiercest denunciations of
Luther, but it also displeased more moderate men and especially
Erasmus. The edict against the reformer, which was finally
adopted by the emperor and the diet, was drawn up and proposed
by Aleandro. After the close of the diet the papal nuncio
went to the Netherlands; where he kindled the flames of
persecution, two monks of Antwerp, the first martyrs of the
Reformation, being burnt in Brussels at his instigation. In
1523 Clement VII., having appointed him archbishop of Brindisi
and Oria, sent him as nuncio to the court of Francis I. He
was taken prisoner along with that monarch at the battle of
Pavia (1525), and was released only on payment of a heavy
ransom. He was subsequently employed on various papal missions,
especially to Germany, but was unsuccessful in preventing the
German princes from making a truce with the reformers, or in
checking to any extent the progress of the new doctrines. He
was created cardinal in 1536 by Paul III. (at the same time as
Reginald Pole) and died at Rome on the 1st of February 1542.
Aleandro compiled a Lexicon Graeco-Latinum (Paris, 1512),
and wrote Latin verse of considerable merit inserted in
M. Tuscanus's Carmina Illustrium Poetarum Italiorum. The
Vatican library contains a volume of manuscript letters and
other documents written by him in connexion with his various
missions against Luther. They were utilized by Pallavicino
in his Istoria del Concilio Tridentino (i. 23-28),
who gives a very partial account of the Worms conference.
Aleandro, who is sometimes called ``the elder,'' must be
distinguished from his grand-nephew, also called Girolamo
Aleandro (1374-1629). The younger Aleandro was a very
distinguished scholar, and wrote Psalmi poenitentiales
versibus elegiacis expressi (Treves, 1593), Gaii, veteris
juris consulti Institutionum fragmenta, cum commentario
(Venice, 1600), Explicatio veteris tabulae marmorcae
solis effigie symbolisque exculptae (Rome, 1616).
ALEARDI, ALEARDO, COUNT (1812-1878), Italian poet, was
born at Verona on the 4th of November 1812, and thus soon
after his birth became an Austrian subject. Inspired from
his cradle with a hatred of the foreigner, he found himself
disqualified for the position in the public service to which
his rank would have entitled him, and unable to publish
his patriotic verses. Arnaldo da Rocca, a narrative poem,
nevertheless appeared in 1842, and the revolutionary year
1848 made an opening for his Lettere a Maria. He took an
active part in the popular uprising, and was for some time
imprisoned. In 1856 he produced the finest of his pieces,
an ode to the maritime cities of Italy, and in 1858 a poem
on his own misfortunes. After the expulsion of the Austrians
from Lombardy he returned to Verona, published his poems in
a collected edition (1862), became professor at the Academy
of Fine Art, member of the Italian parliament and eventually
senator. He died on the 17th of July 1878. Aleardi's
warmth of patriotic feeling hardly finds adequate expression
in his poetry; it is his merit to excel in description,
but his fault to substitute description for action.
ALE-CONNER, an officer appointed yearly at the court-leet of
ancient English manors for the assize of ale and ale-measures.
The gustatores cervisiae--called in different localities
by the different names ``ale-tasters,'' ``ale-founders,'' and
``ale- conners''--were sworn to examine beer and ale, to take
care that they were good and wholesome and were sold at proper
prices. In London four ale-conners, whose duty it is to examine
the measures used by beer and liquor sellers to guard against
fraud, are still chosen annually by the liverymen in common
hall assembled on Midsummer Day. Since ale and beer have become
excisable commodities the custom of appointing ale-tasters has
in most places fallen into disuse. (See also ADULTERATION.)
ALECSANDRI, or ALEXANDRI, VASILE (1821-1890), Rumanian
lyric poet, was born at Bacau in Moldavia on the 21st of July
1821. His father was the Spatar Alecsandri, of Jewish and
Italian origin, who had settled in Moldavia in the 18th
century. Vasile was educated first in Jassy and afterwards
(1834-1839) in Paris. In 1839 he started on a long journey
through the Carpathian Mountains, and was the first to
collect Rumanian popular songs, no doubt influenced by Western
examples. He first published his collection in 1844. His
Doine si Lacrimioare, lyrical poems, appeared at Paris in
1852, and in 1852-1853 he produced at Jassy a fuller collection
of popular ballads and songs. He then adapted some French plays
for the newly founded Rumanian theatre, and wrote some original
pieces. His connexion with the revolutionary movement of
1848 compelled him to seek shelter in the west of Europe,
and he visited England. where a beautifully illuminated
edition of his poems was printed in the original Rumanian
language. In 1867 he published some fugitive pieces, written
in a lighter vein, and entitled Pastele; these were followed
in 1871 by the Legende of similar character. More serious
are his dramatic writings which began with Despot Voda and
culminated in Ovid. In later life Alecsandri took an active
part in politics; he became minister for foreign affairs from
1859 to 1860, and in 1885 was appointed Rumanian minister in
Paris. He died on the 26th of August 1890 at his country seat,
Mircesti. His best title to fame consists in the fact that
he gave the first impetus to the collection of Rumanian popular
songs and first drew attention to their inimitable charm.
See L. Sainsanu, Autorii Romani moderni (1891), pp.
90 and 318. A complete edition of Alecsandri's writings in
nine volumes was published at Bucharest in 1875 seq. (M. G.)
ALEMAN, LOUIS (c. 1390-1450), French cardinal, was born
of a noble family at the castle of Arbent near Bugey about the
year 1390. He was successively bishop of Maguelonne (1418),
archbishop of Arles (1423) and cardinal priest of St Cecilia
(1426). He was a prominent member of the council of Basel,
and, together with Cardinal Julian, led the party which
maintained the supremacy of general councils over the pope's
authority. In 1440 Aleman obtained the support of the emperor
Sigismund and of the duke of Milan to his views, and proclaiming
the deposition of Pope Eugenius IV., placed the tiara upon
the head of Amadeus VIII., duke of Savoy (henceforward known
as antipope Felix V.). Eugenius retorted by.excommunicating
the antipope and depriving Aleman of all his ecclesiastical
dignities. In order to make an end of the schism, Felix V.
finally abdicated on Aleman's advice, and Nicholas V., who had
succeeded in 1447, restored the cardinal to all his honours
and employed him as legate to Germany in 1449. On his return
he retired to his diocese of Arles, where he devoted himself
zealously to the instruction of his people. He died on the 16th
of September 1450, and was beatified by Pope Clement VII. in 1527.
See U. Chevalier, Repert. des sources hist. (Paris, 1905), p. 130.
ALEMAN, MATEO (1547-1609?), Spanish novelist and man of
letters, was born at Seville in 1547. He graduated at Seville
University in 1564, studied later at Salamanca and Alcala,
and from 1571 to 1588 held a post in the treasury; in 1594 he
was arrested on suspicion of malversation, but was speedily
released. In 1599 he published the first part of Guzman de
Alfarache, a celebrated picaresque novel which passed through
not less than sixteen editions in five years; a spurious sequel
was issued in 1602, but the authentic continuation did not
appear till 1604. In 1608 Aleman emigrated to America, and
is said to have carried on business as a printer in Mexico;
his Ortografia castellana (1609), published in that city,
contains ingenious and practical proposals for the reform
of Spanish spelling. Nothing is recorded of Aleman after
1609, but it is sometimes asserted that he was still living in
1617. He married, unhappily, Catalina de Espinosa in 1571,
and was constantly in money difficulties, being imprisoned
for debt at Seville at the end of 1602. He is the author
of a life (1604) of St Antony of Padua, and versions of
two odes of Horace bear witness to his taste and metrical
accomplishment. His chief title to remembrance, however,
is Guzman de Alfarache, which was translated into French
in 1600, into English in 1623 and into Latin in 1623.
See J. Hazanas y la Rua, Discursos leidos en la Real
Academia Sevillana de Buenas letras el 25 de mar zo
de 1892 (Sevilla, 1892); J. Gestoso y Perez, Nuevos
datos para`ilustrar las biografias del Maestro Juan de
Malara y de Mateo Aleman (Sevilla, 1896). (J. F.-K.)
ALEMBERT, DEAN LE ROND D' (1717-1783), French mathematician
and philosopher, was born at Paris in November 1717. He was a
foundling, having been exposed near the church of St Jean le
Rond, Paris, where he was discovered on the 17th of November.
It afterwards became known that he was the illegitimate son of
the chevalier Destouches and Madame de Tencin. The infant was
entrusted to the wife of a glazier named Rousseau who lived close
by. He was called Jean le Rond from the church near which he
was found; the surname Alembert was added by himself at a later
period. His father, without disclosing himself, having settled
an annuity on him, he was sent at four years of age to a
boarding-school. In 1730 he entered the Mazarin College
under the Jansenists, who soon perceived his exceptional
talent, and, prompted perhaps by a commentary on the Epistle
to the Romans which he produced in the first year of his
philosophical course, sought to direct it to theology. His
knowledge of the higher mathematics was acquired by his own
unaided efforts after he had left the college. This fact
naturally led to his crediting himself with many discoveries
which he afterwards found had been already established,
often by more direct and elegant processes than his own.
On leaving college he returned to the house of his foster-mother,
where he continued to live for thirty years. Having studied law,
he was admitted as an advocate in 1738, but did not enter upon
practice. He next devoted himself to medicine, but his natural
inclination proved too strong for him, and within a year he
resolved to give his whole time to mathematics. In 1741 he
received his first public distinction in being admitted a
member of the Academy of Sciences, to which he had previously
presented several papers, including a Memoire sur le calcul
integral (1739). In his Memoire sur le refraction des
corps solides (1741) he was the first to give a theoretical
explanation of the phenomenon which is witnessed when a body
passes from one fluid to another more dense in a direction
not perpendicular to the surface which separates the two
fluids. In 1743 he published his Traite de dynamique,
a work famous as developing the mechanical principle, known
as ``Alembert's Principle,'' first enunciated in 1742 (see
MECHANICS.) In 1744 Alembert applied this principle to the
theory of the equilibrium and the motion of fluids (Traite
de l'equilibre et du mouvement des fluides), and all the
problems before solved by geometricians became in some measure
its corollaries. This discovery was followed by that of the
calculus of partial differences, the first trials of which
were published in his Reflexion sur la cause generale
des vents (1747). This work was crowned by the Academy of
Berlin, and was dedicated to Frederick the Great, who made
several unsuccessful attempts to induce him to settle in
Berlin. In 1763 he visited Berlin, and on that occasion
finally refused the office of president of the Academy of
Berlin, which had been already offered to him more than
once. In 1747 he applied his new calculus to the problem
of vibrating chords, the solution of which, as well as the
theory of the oscillation of the air and the propagation of
sound, had been given but incompletely by the geometricians
who preceded him. In 1749 he furnished a method of applying
his principles to the motion of any body of a given figure;
and in 1754 he solved the problem of the precession of the
equinoxes, determined its quantity and explained the phenomenon
of the nutation of the earth's axis. In 1752 he published
an Essai d'une nouvelle theorie sur la resistance des
fluides, which contains a large number of original ideas
and new observations. In 1746 and 1748 he published in the
Memoirs of the Academy of Berlin ``Recherches sur le calcul
integral,'' a branch of mathematical science which is greatly
indebted to him. In his Recherches sur differents points
importants du systeme du monde (1754-1756) he perfected the
solution of the problem of the perturbations of the planets,
which he had presented to the academy some years before.
Alembert's association with Diderot in the preparation
of the Dictionnaire Encyclopedique led him to take a
someuhat wider range than that to which he had previously
confined himself. He wrote for that work the Discours
preliminaire on the rise, progress and affinities of the
various sciences, which he read to the French Academy on
the day of his admission as a member, the 18th of December
1754. He also wrote several literary articles for the first
two volumes of the Encyclopaedia, and to the remaining volumes
he contributed mathematical articles chiefly. One of the
few exceptions was the article on ``Geneva,'' which involved
him in a somewhat keen controversy in regard to Calvinism
and the suppression of theatrical performances within the
town. During the time he was engaged on the Encyclopaedia
he wrote a number of literary and philosophical works which
extended his reputation and also exposed him to criticism and
controversy, as in the case of his Melanges de Philosophie,
d'Histoire, et de Litterature. His Essai sur la societe
des gens de lettres avec les grands was a worthy vindication
of the independence of literary men, and a thorough exposure
of the evils of the system of patronage. He broke new ground
and showed great skill as a translator in his Traduction
de quelques morceaux choisis de Tacite. One of his most
important works was the Elements de Philosophie published in
1759, in which he discussed the principles and methods of the
different sciences. He maintained that the laws of motion were
necessary, not contingent. A treatise, Sur la destruction
des Jesuites (1765), involved him in a fresh controversy,
his own share in which was rendered very easy by the violence
and extravagance of his adversaries. The list of his more
noteworthy literary works is completed by the mention of the
Histoire des membres de l'Academie francaise, containing
biographical notices of all the members of the Academy who
died between 1700 and 1772, the year in which he himself became
secretary. Alembert was much interested in music both as
a science and as an art, and wrote Elements de musique
theorique et pratique (1779), which was based upon the system
of J. P. Rameau with important modifications and differences.
Alembert's fame spread rapidly throughout Europe and procured
for him more than one opportunity of quitting the comparative
retirement in which he lived in Paris for more lucrative and
prominent positions. The offer of Frederick the Great has
already been mentioned. In 1762 he was invited by Catherine
of Russia to become tutor to her son at a yearly salary of
100,000 francs. On his refusal the offer was repeated with
the additional inducement of accommodation for as many of
his friends as he chose to bring with him to the Russian
capital. Alembert persisted in his refusal, and the letter
of Catherine was ordered to be engrossed in the minutes
of the French Academy. In 1755, on the recommendation
of Pope Benedict XIV., he was admitted a member of the
Institute of Bologna. A legacy of L. 200 from David Hume
showed the esteem in which he was held by that philosopher.
Alembert continued to the end to lead the quiet and frugal
life dictated by his limited means as well as his simple
tastes. His later years were saddened by circumstances connected
with a romantic attachment he had formed for Mademoiselle de
Lespinasse, whose acquaintance he made at the house of Madame
du Deffand, a noted resort of literary men and savants. She
nursed him assiduously during an illness he had in 1765, and
from that period till her death in 1776 they lived in the same
house without any scandal. On her part there seems to have
been from first to last nothing more than warm friendship,
but his feelings towards her were of a stronger kind and her
death deeply affected him. He never recovered his elasticity
of spirits, though he continued to occupy himself with his
favourite pursuits, and to frequent the society of his brother
philosophers. After the death of Voltaire (1778), whose friend
and correspondent he had been for more than thirty years, he
was regarded as the leader of the philosophical party in the
Academy. He died at Paris on the 29th of October 1783.
The chief features of Alembert's character were benevolence,
simplicity and independence. Though his income was never
large, and during the greater part of his life was very meagre,
he contrived to find means to support his foster-mother in
her old age, to educate the children of his first teacher,
and to help various deserving students during their college
career. His cheerful conversation, his smart and lively
sallies, a singular mixture of malice of speech with goodness
of heart, and of delicacy of wit with simplicity of manners,
rendered him a pleasing and interesting companion; and
if his manner was sometimes plain almost to the extent of
rudeness, it probably set all the better an example of a
much-needed reform to the class to which he belonged. The
controversy as to the nature of his religious opinions,
arising as it did chiefly out of his connexion with the
Encyclopaedia, has no longer any living interest now that
the Encyclopaedists generally have ceased to be regarded
with unqualified suspicion by those who count themselves
orthodox. It is to be observed, moreover, that as Alembert
confined himself chiefly to mathematical articles, his work
laid him less open to charges of heresy and infidelity than
that of some of his associates. The fullest revelation of
his religious convictions is given in his correspondence
with Voltaire, which was published along with that with
Frederick the Great in Bossange's edition of his works.
The scientific works of Alembert have never been published in a
collected form. The most important of them have been mentioned
above, with the exception of the Opuscules mathematiques
(1761-1780), 8 vols. 4to. His literary and philosophical
works were collected and edited by Bastien (Paris, 1805,
18 vols. 8vo). A better edition by Bossange was published
at Paris in 1821 (5 vols. 8vo). The best account of the
life and writings of Alembert is contained in Condorcet's
Eloge, presented to the Academy and published in 1784.
ALEMBIC (Arab. al, definite article, anbiq, a still;
cognate to the Gr. ambix, a cup), an apparatus for
distillation, used chiefly by the alchemists, and now superseded
by the retort and the worm-still. It varied considerably
in form and construction, but consisted essentially of three
parts--a vessel containing the material to be distilled and
called, from its gourd-like shape, the cucurbit or mattrass;
a vessel to receive and condense the vapour, called the head
or capital; and a receiver for the spirit, connected by a
pipe with the capital. The entire apparatus was sometimes
constructed of glass, but it was more usual to make the cucurbit
of copper or earthenware, and the capital alone of glass.
ALEMTEJO (i.e. ``Beyond the Tagus''), an ancient province of
central and southern Portugal; bounded on the N. by Beira, E. by
Spanish Estremadura and Andalusia, S. by Algarve and W. by the
Atlantic Ocean and Portuguese Estremadura. Pop. (1900) 416,105;
area 9219 sq. m. Alemtejo is traversed by several mountain
ranges, whose height does not generally rise much above 2000
ft. The low and sandy coast has a length of less than 25 m.
and includes no harbour, except at the unimportant town of Villa
Nova de Milfontes (pop. 1900, 825), which overlooks the Mira
estuary. The principal rivers are the Tagus, which divides
Alemtejo from Beira; its tributary the Zatas, or Sorraia, fed
by a whole system of lesser affluents; the Guadiana, which,
crossing the Spanish frontier, flows southwards through the
province; the Sado, which rises in the Serra de Monchique,
and flows to the north; and the Mira, which waters the valley
between the Caldeirao and Monchique ranges. There are
several extensive plains, notably those of Alemtejo, lying
south-west of the Serra de Portalegre; of Beja, between the
Sado and Guadiana; and of Ourique, farther south between the
same rivers. Some portions of these plains are fruitful,
others marshy, while large tracts are mere desolate wastes.
The climate in the lower parts of the country is exceedingly
hot and is rendered unhealthy in summer by the stagnant
marshes. Towards the Spanish frontier the soil is fertile,
and in the south the country is covered by extensive forests of
oak, pine, chestnut, cork and ilex, especially on the sides
of the Mezquita and Caldeirao ranges. In the more fertile
parts, grapes, figs, citrons, pomegranates and other fruits are
produced. Wheat, maize and rice are grown, and some attention
is given to the rearing of mules, asses, goats, cattle and
sheep; while the Alter breed of horses, named after the villages
of Alter do Chao and Alter Pedroso (3971), near Portalegre,
is often accounted the best in the kingdom. Agriculture,
however, is in a backward state, the sparse population being
mostly concentrated in the towns, leaving extensive districts
uncultivated and almost uninhabited. Droves of swine are
fed on the waste lands, growing to a great size and affording
excellent hams. The mineral wealth of Alemtejo is little
exploited, although there are copper and iron mines and marble
quarries. Medicinal springs exist at Aljustrel (3790),
Castello de Vide (5192), Mertola (3873), Portalegre, Vimieiro
(1838) and elsewhere. Chief among the local industries
are the preparation of exceptionally fine olive oil, and
the manufacture of cloth, pottery and leather. Alemtejo is
traversed by three very important main lines of railway, the
Madrid-Caceres-Lisbon, Madrid-Badajoz-Lisbon and Lisbon-Faro;
while the two last are connected by a branch line from Casa
Branca to Evora and Elvas. For administrative purposes the
province is divided into the districts of Portalegre in the
north, Evora in the central region and Beja in the south;
but the titles of these new districts have not superseded the
ancient name of Alemtejo in ordinary usage. The chief towns
Beja (8885), Elvas (13,981), Estremoz (7920), Evora (16,020)
and Portalegre (11,820) are described in separate articles.
ALENCON, COUNTS AND DUKES OF. The first line of the counts
of Alencon was founded by Yves, lord of Bellesme, who in the
middle of the 10th century possessed and fortified the town of
Alencon. His successors, involved in all the wars of the
kings of England in Normandy, were alternately deprived and
repossessed of their domains, according to the fluctuations
of fortune between the rival parties. Mabille, countess
of Alencon and heiress of this family (d. 1082 ), married
Roger of Montgomery, and from them descended a second house
of Alencon which became extinct in the person of Robert
IV.; the county of Alencon was then joined to the royal
domain. It was successively granted as an appanage to
Peter, son of St Louis (1268), and to Charles, count of
Valois, brother of Philip the Fair (1293). The third house
of Alencon sprang from Charles, second son of the count of
Valois, who was killed at the battle of Crecy in 1346. The
countship of Alencon was raised to a peerage in 1367 and into
a dukedom in 1414. John, 1st duke of Alencon, was killed
at Agincourt on the 25th of October 1415, after having with
his own hand slain the duke of York. His son, also named
John, was dispossessed of his duchy by the king of England,
but reconquered it in 1449. In 1524 the dukedom of Alencon
reverted to the crown, in consequence of the death of the
duke Charles IV. without issue of his marriage with Margaret,
sister of Francis I. It was given as a jointure to Catherine
de'Medici in 1559, and as an appanage to her son Francis in
1566. It was pawned by Henry IV. to the duke of Wurttemberg,
and subsequently it passed to Gaston, duke of Orleans, by
grant of Louis XIII.; to Elizabeth of Orleans, duchess of
Guise; to Charles, duke of Berry, grandson of Louis XIV.
(1710); and to Monsieur (Louis XVIII.), brother of Louis XVI.
The title of duc d'Alencon was given to Ferdinand of Orleans, son
of the duc de Nemours, and grandson of Louis-Philippe. (M. P.*)
ALENCON, a town of north-western France, capital of the
department of Orne, 36 m. N. of Le Mans on a branch line
of the Western railway. Pop (1906) 14,378. Alencon, a
clean, regularly built town with broad handsome streets,
is situated in a wide and fertile plain, on the Sarthe
at its confluence with the Briante. The only remains of
the ancient castle of Alencon are two towers of the 15th
century, which serve as a prison, and a third of the 14th
century known as the Tour Couronnee, to which they are
united. Notre-Dame, the chief church, dates from the 15th
century. It is remarkable for a porch ornamented in the
richest Gothic style, and for its stained windows of the 16th
century. Alencon has a large circular corn-market and a cloth-
market. The manufacture of the point d'Alencon lace has
greatly diminished. The weaving and bleaching of cloth,
which is of less importance than formerly, the manufacture of
vehicles, and tanning are carried on; there is a large trade
in the horses of the district, and granite is worked in the
neighbourhood. Alencon is the seat of a prefect and
a court of assizes. It has tribunals of first instance
and of commerce, a board of trade-arbitrators, a lycee,
training-colleges and a chamber of arts and manufactures.
ALENIO, GIULIO (1582-1649), Italian Jesuit missionary, was
born at Brescia. He entered the Society of Jesus and was sent
to the East. He landed at Macao in 1610, and while waiting a
favourable opportunity to penetrate into China busied himself
for three years in teaching mathematics. His thirty years'
residence in China was marked by unceasing zeal and considerable
success. He adopted the dress and manners of the country,
was the first Christian missionary in Kiang-si, and built
several churches in Fo-Kien. He wrote in Chinese a Life of
Christ (Pekin, 1635-1637, 8 vols.; often reprinted, e.g.
in 1887 in 3 vols., and used even by Protestant missionaries)
and a cosmography (Iche fang wai ki Hang-chow, 1623, 6
vols.), which was translated into Manchu under the title The
True Origin of 10,000 Things, a copy of which was sent
from Pekin to Paris in 1789. Alenio died at Fu-chow in 1649.
For bibliography see de Backer and Sommervogel,
Bibl. de la Cie. de Jesus, i. 158-160.
ALEPPO (native Haleb.) (1) A vilayet of Asiatic Turkey,
comprising N. Syria and N.W. Mesopotamia, with an extension N.
of Taurus to the neighbourhood of Gorun. It comprises three
sanjaks, Aleppo, Marash and Urfa. About half is mountain, but
there are fertile plains of great extent N. of Antakia, S. of
Marash and around the city of Aleppo (see below). The only
seaport of importance is Alexandretta (q.v..) The exports
are, on the average, over one million sterling, and imports
about double in value. The settled population is barely a
million; but there is a considerable unsettled element in the
S.E. which cannot well be estimated. The Christians, mainly
Jacobite Syrian, but including also Armenians of several
denominations (e.g. those of Marash and Zeitun), Maronites
and Greeks, form about one-fifth. There are some 20,000
Jews, resident chiefly in the provincial capital; and of the
Moslem majority the bulk is Arab, Turkoman and Ansarieh.
In the N.W. and N. is a considerable Kurdish population.
(2) The provincial capital (anc. Khalep; Gr. Chaljbon-
Beroea), situated on a plateau in the valley of the
Kuwaik (anc. Chalus) about 10 m. above its dissipation
in the great salt-marsh of Matkh. Pop. about 130,000,
three-quarters Moslem. Aleppo is about midway between
the sea and the Euphrates, a little nearer the latter.
The modern city stands on both banks of the Kuwaik, and the
older portions are contained within a Saracenic wall, 3 1/2 m. in
circuit with seven gates. The European residents and Christians
live outside in the Kitab and new Azizieh quarters, and the
Jews in that of Bahsita. A modern citadel occupies the N.W.,
the medieval castle on its mound (partly artificial and not a
strong position, according to Istakhri) being almost deserted
but still forbidden to visitors. There are two mosques of
special interest--the Umawi (or Zakaria) on the site of
a church ascribed to the empress Helena and containing a tomb
reputed to be that of the Baptist's father, and the Kakun.
Many minor ones serve the needs of a population traditionally
fanatical. Gardens extend for miles along the river, and
the bazaars and khans are unusually large. The climate is
cold, dry and healthy, despite the prevalence of the famous
``Aleppo button,'' a swelling which appears either on the
face or on the hands, and breaks into an ulcer which lasts
a year and leaves a permanent scar. It has been ascribed
to a fly, to the water and to other causes; but it is not
peculiar to Aleppo, being rife also at Aintab, Bagdad, &c.
The attempt made by the British Euphrates expedition in
1841 to connect Aleppo with the sea by steamer through the
nearest point on the Euphrates, Meskine, failed owing to
the obstructed state of the stream and the insecurity of the
riparian districts. The latter drawback has been minimized
by the continued success of the Aleppo administration in
inducing the Anazeh Bedouins to become fellahin; but river
traffic has not been resumed. A railway, however, connects
southward with the Beirut-Damascus line at Rayak. Aleppo is
an important consular station for all European powers, the
residence of the Greek and Armenian Patriarchs of Antioch,
and of Jacobite and Maronite bishops, and a station of Roman
Catholic and Protestant missions. It is the emporium of N.
Syria, and manufactures textiles in silk, cotton and wool,
carpets and leather commodities, besides being the centre of
a large district growing cereals, pistachios and fruit. The
Turks regard it as one of the strongholds of their dominion and
faith, and a future capital of their empire should they be
forced into Asia. As a centre from which good natural roads
lead N., N.E., W. and S., Aleppo would make a good capital.
History and Remains.--The site lies high (1400 ft.) on eight
hillocks in a fertile oasis plain, beyond which stretch on the
S. and S.E. grassy steppes merging ere long into desert, and
on the other quarters rather sterile downs. It has superseded
Antioch as the economic centre of N. Syria, and Palmyra as
the great road-station for eastern caravans. But it is rather
a revived than a new capital; Khalep was a very ancient
Syrian and probably ``Hittite'' city of importance, known from
Babylonian, Assyrian and Egyptian records. Seleucus Nicator
gave it a Macedonian name, Beroea; but Chalcis, some distance
S., was the capital of the province, Chalcidice (later,
Kinnasrin), in which it lay, and the centre of that hellenized
region, now a vast field of ruins, which stretches W. to the
Orontes. Khalep-Beroea, we may infer, remained a native
town and a focus of Aramaic influence, a fact which will
explain the speedy oblivion of its Macedonian name and the
permanent revival of its ancient title, even by Greeks.
As Beroea we hear of the place in Seleucid wars and
dissensions. There Menelaus, the fomenter of war with the
Asmoneans, was put to death by Lysias in 164 B. C., ``as the
manner is in that place'' (Macc. ii. 13. 4), being thrown
into a lofty tower full of cinders. There Heracleon, the court
favourite and murderer of Antiochus Grypus, was born and made
himself a principality (96 B.C.); and there the son of the
latter king besieged his brother Philip in the last struggle
for the heritage of Seleucus. As Chalybon, the town is
called by Ptolemy head of a district, Chalybonitis; but
we continue to hear of it as Beroea up to the Arab conquest,
e.g. in the history of Julian's eastward march in A.D.
363, and in that of the Persian raid of 540. It was occupied
in 611 by Chosroes II. Overwhelmed by the Saracen flood in
A.D. 638, Beroea disappears, and as Moslem society settles
down Halep emerges again as the great gathering-place of
caravans passing from Asia Minor and Syria to Mesopotamia,
Bagdad and the Persian and Indian kingdoms. Like Antioch
it suffered from earthquakes, and late in the 12th century,
after a terrible shock, had to be rebuilt by Nur ed-Din.
But neither earthquakes nor the plague, to which it was also
peculiarly liable, could divert trade and prosperity from
it. It belonged to the Eastern Caliphate (the Hanidanids)
until temporarily reoccupied by John Zimisces, emperor of
Byzantium and a native of neighbouring Hierapolis (q.v.),
A.D. 974, after an abortive attempt by Nicephorus thirteen
years earlier. Thirteen years later it recognized and
received the Fatimites, and passed under various Moslem
dynasties, forming part of the Seljuk dominion from 1090 to
1117. The crusading princes of Antioch never held the place,
though they attacked it in 1124; and Saladin, who took it in
1183, made it a stronghold against them and the northern capital
of himself and his successors until the Tatar invasion of
1260. Thereafter the Mamelukes took and kept possession,
despite the renewed Tatar inroad of 1401, until the final
conquest by the Ottomans in 1517. Under the strong hand of
the latter the trade of Aleppo with the East revived. One of
the first provincial factories and consulates of the British
Turkey (Levant) Company was established there in the reign of
James I.; and a British agent had been in residence there even
in Elizabeth's time. As the eastern outpost of the company's
operations, it was connected with the western outpost of the
East India Company in Bagdad by a private postal service,
and its name became very familiar in England from the part
that its merchants (largely Jewish) bore in the transmission
of Eastern products to Europe (cf., e.g. Shakespeare,
Macb. i. 3. 7; Oth. v. 2. 352). Through it passed the
silks of Bambyce, called bombazines, the light textiles
of Mosul (mosulines--muslins) and many other commodities
for the wealthy and luxurious. The first blow was struck at
this trade by the discovery of the Cape route to India; the
second by the opening of a land route through Egypt to the
Red Sea; the third and final one by the making of the Suez
Canal. Long ere this last event, however, Aleppo had been
declining from internal causes. In the latter part of the
18th century and the first years of the 19th it was constantly
the scene of bloody dissensions between two rival parties,
one led by the local janissaries, the other by the sherifs
(religious); and the Ottoman governors took the side, now
of one, now of the other, in order to plunder a distracted
city, too far removed from the centre to be controlled by the
sultans, and too near the rebellious pashalik of Acre and
the unsettled district of Lebanon not to be affected by the
disorders natural to a frontier province. This state of things
led to the suspension of the British consulate by the Turkey
Company in 1791; and it was not revived till 1800, after which
date till 1825 it was maintained jointly by the East India
Company. In 1803 Jezzar of Acre advanced as near as Hamah;
but his death occurred in the following year; and after a
sanguinary rising in 1805, Aleppo settled down, but was not at
peace, even after a local janissary massacre in 1814, till
Mahmud II. had dealt finally with the corps at headquarters
(1826). Meanwhile there had been a frightful earthquake in
1822, and a visitation of cholera in the following year. More
cholera in 1827 and 1832 and another earthquake in 1830 had
left the place a wreck, with only half its former population,
when Mehemet Ali of Cairo invaded and took Syria. Aleppo
shared, and to some extent headed, the Syrian discontent
with Egyptian rule, and was strongly held by troops whose
huge barracks are still one of the sights of the city. Ready
to rise behind Ibrahim Pasha in 1839, it was only prevented
by the news of Nezib. Tumults and massacres of Christians
occurred in 1850 and 1862, accompanied by great destruction
of property; but on the whole, since the consolidation of
Ottoman rule over Syria by Abdul Mejid's ministers, Aleppo has
been reviving, although its trade is more local than of old.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--F. R. Chesney, The Euphrates Expedition (1850)
H. Guys, Statistique du Pachalik d'Alep (1853), and Esquisse de
l'etat de la Syrie (1862); E. B. B. Barker, Syria and Egypt
(1876); W. F. Ainsworth, Personal Narrative of the Euphrates
Expedition (1888); E. R. Bevan, Heuse of Seleucas (1902); G.
le Strange, Palestine under the Moslems (1890). (D. G. H.)
ALES (ALESIUS), ALEXANDER (1500-1565), Scottish divine
of the school of Augsburg, whose family name was ALANE,
was born at Edinburgh on the 23rd of April 1500. He studied
at St Andrews in the newly-founded college of St Leonard's,
where he graduated in 1515. Some time afterwards he was
appointed a canon of the collegiate church, and at first
contended vigorously for the scholastic theology as against
the doctrines of the Reformers. His views were entirely
changed, however, on the execution of Patrick Hamilton, abbot
of Fern, in 1528. He had been chosen to meet Hamilton in
controversy, with a view to convincing him of his errors,
but the arguments of the Scottish proto-martyr, and above
all the spectacle of his heroism at the stake, impressed
Alesius so powerfully that he was entirely won over to the
cause of the Reformers. A sermon which he preached before
the Synod at St Andrews against the dissoluteness of the
clergy gave great offence to the provost, who cast him into
prison, and might have carried his resentment to the extremest
limit had not Alesius contrived to escape to Germany in
1532. After travelling in various countries of northern
Europe, he settled down at Wittenberg, where he made the
acquaintance of Luther and Melanchthon, and signed the Augsburg
confession. Meanwhile he was tried in Scotland for heresy and
condemned without a hearing. In 1533 a decree of the Scottish
clergy, prohibiting the reading of the New Testament by the
laity, drew from Alesius a defence of the right of the people,
in the form of a letter to James V. A reply to this by John
Cochlaeus, also addressed to the Scottish king, occasioned
a second letter from Alesius, in which he not only amplifies
his argument with great force, but enters into more general
questions connected with the Reformation. In August 1534
he and a few others were excommunicated at Holyrood by the
deputy of the archbishop of St Andrews. When Henry VIII.
broke with the church of Rome Alesius was induced to go to
England, where he was very cordially received (August 1535)
by the king and his advisers Cranmer and Thomas Cromwell.
After a short residence at Lambeth he was appointed, through
the influence of Cromwell, then chancellor of the university,
to lecture on theology at Cambridge; but when he had delivered
a few expositions of the Hebrew psalms, he was compelled by
the opposition of the papal party to desist. Returning to
London he supported himself for some time by practising as a
physician. In 1537 he attended a convocation of the clergy,
and at the request of Cromwell conducted a controversy with
Stokesley, bishop of London, on the nature of the sacraments.
His argument was afterwards published under the title Of
the Auctorite of the Word of God concerning the number of
the Sacraments. In 1539 Alesius was compelled to flee for
the second time to Germany, in consequence of the enactment
of the statute of the Six Articles. He was appointed to a
theological chair in the university of Frankfort-on-Oder,
where he was the first professor who taught the reformed
doctrines. In 1543 he quitted Frankfort for a similar
position at Leipzig, his contention that it was the duty of
the civil magistrate to punish fornication, and his sudden
departure, having given offence to the authorities of the
former university. He was in England again for a short
time during Edward VI.'s reign, and was commissioned by
Cranmer to make a Latin version of the First Prayer-Book
(1549) for the information of Bucer, whose opinion was
desired. He died at Leipzig on the 17th of March 1565.
Alesius was the author of a large number of exegetical,
dogmatic and polemical works, of which over twenty are
mentioned by Bale in his List of English Writers. (See also
the British Museum catalogue.) In his controversial works he
upholds the synergistic views of the Scottish theologian John
Major. He displayed his interest in his native land by the
publication of a Cohortatio ad Concordiam Pietatis, missa in
Patriam suam (1544), which had the express approval of Luther,
and a Cohortatio ad Pietatis Concordiam ineundam (1559).
The best early account of Alesius is the Oratio de Alexandro
Alesio of Jacob Thomasius (April 1661), printed in the
latter's Orationes (No. XIV., Leipzia, 1683): the best
modern account is by Dr A. W. Ward in the Dictionary of
National Biography. See also A. F. Mitchell's introduction
to Gau's Richt Vay (Scottish Text Society, 1888).
ALESIA, the ancient name for a hill in central France, now
Alise-Ste-Reine (department Cote d'Or), where in 52 B.C.
Caesar besieged the Gaulish national leader Vercingetorix
within enormous entrenchments, forced him to surrender, and thus
practically ended his conquest of Gaul. The siege-works have
been excavated by Napoleon III. and others, down to the present
day. The site seems to have been inhabited also during the
Roman empire, but its importance is limited to Caesar's siege.
ALESSANDRI, ALESSANDRO (ALEXANDER AB ALEXANDRO) (1461-1523),
Italian jurist, was born at Naples about the year 1461.
He studied law at Naples and Rome, and afterwards practised
for a time as advocate in both cities. He is said to have
been royal proto-notary at Naples in 1490. Dissatisfied,
according to his own account, with the corrupt administration
of justice, he at length quitted the bar and devoted himself
entirely to literary pursuits, especially to the study of
philology and antiquities. A sinecure appointment, which
he owed to the favour of the pope, enabled him to lead a
life of learned leisure at Rome, where he died on the 2nd
of October 1523. His work entitled Dies Geniales appeared
at Rome in 1522, and was constructed after the model of the
Noctes Atticae of Aulus Gellius, and the Saturnalia of
Macrobius. It consists of a confused mass of heterogeneous
materials relating to philology, antiquities, law, dreams,
spectres, &c., and is characterized by considerable credulity.
ALESSANDRIA, a city and episcopal see of Piedmont, Italy,
capital of a province which bears its name, situated on the
river Tanaro, 57 m. E. by S. of Turin by rail. Pop. (1901)
71,298, of which about half reside in the actual town: the
rest are distributed over the suburbs. Alessandria was founded
in 1168 by the inhabitants of the district in order to defend
themselves against the marquis of Monferrato and the town of
Pavia, at whose request it was besieged in 1174 by Frederick
Barbarossa for six months, but without success. The Lombard
League now included it among the allied cities and named it
Alessandria, after Pope Alexander III. The traditional account
of its foundation by the Lombard League has been disproved
by F. Graf, Die Grundung Alessandrias: ein Beitrag zur
Geschichte des Lombardenbunides (1888). After falling
into various hands, it was ceded to Savoy by the peace of
Utrecht in 1713, and its citadel was begun in 1728. During
the French occupation (1800-1814), which began after the
battle of Marengo, it was still more strongly fortified; the
works were entirely destroyed by the Austrians in 1815, but
were afterwards reconstructed, and Alessandria is still an
important fortress and the headquarters of the second army
corps. The citadel is on the left bank of the Tanaro, the
town being on the right bank. It is regularly built and
contains few buildings of architectural interest, but is a
flourishing and important commercial town, not merely owing
to its own manufactures (which are miscellaneous) but for
the products of the district, and one of the greatest railway
centres in Italy. Lines diverge from it to Turin via Asti,
to Valenza (and thence to Vercelli, Mortara--for Novara or
Milan--and Pavia), to Tortona, to Novi, to Acqui and to Bra.
ALESSI, GALEAZZO (1512-1572), Italian architect, was born
at Perugia, and was probably a pupil of Caporali. He was an
enthusiastic student of ancient architecture, and his style gained
for him a European reputation. Genoa is indebted to him for
a number of its most magnificent palaces, and specimens of his
skill may be seen in the churches of San Paolo and Santa Vittoria
at Milan, in certain parts of the Escurial, and in numerous
churches and palaces throughout Sicily, Flanders and Germany.
See Rossi, Di Galeazzo Alessi memorie (Perugia, 1873).
ALETHIOLOGY (from the Gr. aletheia, truth), an
uncommon expression for the doctrine of truth, used by Sir
William Hamilton in his philosophic writings when treating
of the rules for the discrimination of truth and error.
ALETRIUM (mod. Alatri), a town of the Hernici, about 6
m. due N. of Frusino, Italy, mentioned in 306 B.C. for its
fidelity to Rome. In Cicero's time it was a municipium,
and continued in this position throughout the imperial
period. It is chiefly remarkable for its finely preserved
fortifications constructed of tetrahedral and polygonal blocks
of local limestone well jointed, with maximum dimensions
of about 3 by 1 1/2 ft.; the outer circuit of the city wall
measures about 2 1/2 m. It is almost entirely an embanking
wall, as is the rule in the cities of this part of Italy, with
a maximum height, probably, of about 30 ft. Two of the gates
(of which there were perhaps five) are still to some extent
preserved, and three posterns are to be found. In the centre
of the city rises a hill (1647 ft.) which was adopted as the
citadel. Remains of the fortifications of three successive
periods can be traced, of which the last, perhaps a little more
recent than that of the city wall, is the best preserved. In
the first two periods the construction is rough, while in the
third the blocks are very well and finely jointed, and the
faces smoothed; they are mostly polygonal in form and are much
larger (the maximum about 10 by 6 ft.) than those of the city
wall. A flat surface was formed partly by smoothing off the
rock and partly by the erection of huge terrace walls which
rise to a height of over 50 ft., enclosing a roughly rectangular
area of 235 by 115 yds. Two approaches to the citadel were
constructed, both passing through the wall; the openings of
both are rectangular. The architrave of the larger, known
as Porta di Civita, measures about 17 ft. in length, 5 ft.
in height, 6 ft. in thickness; while that of the smaller
is decorated with three phalli in relief. Later, though
probably in ancient times, a ramp was added on the northern
side. In the centre of the arx was a building on the site
of the present cathedral, of which only a small portion is
preserved. Remains of a high-pressure aqueduct, which
supplied the town with water and was constructed with other
public buildings (Corp. Inscr. Lat. x., Berlin, 1883,
p. 5807) by L. Betilienus Varus, may still be traced. A
temple was excavated in 1889 about 1/2 m. to the north of
the town and many fragments of the painted terra-cottas
with which it was decorated were found. A reconstruction of
it has been erected in the Museo di Villa Giulia at Rome.
The present town (pop. in 1901, 15,322) has a picturesque
aspect, and contains many buildings in the Gothic style.
See R. Bassel, Centralblatt der Bauverwaltung, 1881, 121,
p. 134; H. Winnefeld, Romische Mitteilungen, 1889, 126;
G. Fiorelli in Notizie degli Scavi, 1882, 417. (T. As.)
ALEURITES (Gr. aleuritus, pertaining to aleuron, ground
meal, from alein, to grind), a genus of trees belonging
to the natural order Euphorbiaceae. Aleurites moluccana,
or triloba, is widely cultivated throughout the tropical
and sub-tropical parts of the world for its fruit, which
is about the size of a walnut, and contains several seeds
which are rich in oil. The oil is extracted and used
for food and light; it is known in India as kekuna, and
the tree as the ``candle-nut.'' In the Sandwich Islands
the nuts are strung upon strips of wood and used as
torches. The oil is exported to Europe for candle-making.
A. cordata flourishes in China, where it is known as the
varnish- tree, on account of the lac contained in its seeds.
ALEUTIAN ISLANDS (possibly from Chukchi aliat, ``island''),
a chain of small islands situated in the Northern Pacific
Ocean, and extending about 1200 m. westward from the
extremity of the Alaskan peninsula toward the peninsula of
Kamchatka; they constitute part of the District of Alaska,
U.S.A. The islands, of which an alternative collective
name is the Catherine Archipelago, comprise four groups--the
Fox, Andreanof, Rat and Near Islands. They are all included
between 52 deg. and 55 deg. N. lat. and 172 deg. E. and 163 deg. W. long.
The axis of the archipelago near the mainland of Alaska
has a S.W. trend, but near the 129th meridian its direction
changes to the N.W. This change of direction corresponds
to a curve in the line of volcanic fissures which have
contributed their products to the building of the islands.
Such curved chains are repeated about the Pacific Ocean in
the Kurile Islands, the Japanese chain, the Philippines,
&c. The general elevation is greatest in the eastern islands
and least in the western. The island chain is really a
western continuation of the Aleutian Range on the mainland.
The great majority of the islands bear evident marks of
volcanic origin, and there are numerous volcanic cones on
the north side of the chain, some of them active; many of
the islands, however, are not wholly volcanic, but contain
crystalline or sedimentary rocks, and also amber and beds of
lignite. The coasts are rocky and surf-worn and the
approaches are exceedingly dangerous, the land rising
immediately from the coasts to steep, bold mountains.
The climate of the islands is oceanic, with moderate and
fairly uniform temperatures and heavy rainfall. Fogs are
almost constant. The summers are much cooler than on the
mainland at Sitka (q.v.), but the winter temperature of
the islands and of south-eastern Alaska is very nearly the
same. The mean annual temperature for Unalaska, the most
important island of the group, is about 38 deg. F.; being about
30 deg. for January and about 52 deg. for August. The highest
and lowest temperatures recorded on the islands are 78 deg. and
5 deg. . The average annual amount of rainfall is about 80 in.,
and Unalaska, with about 250 rainy days per year, is said
to be the rainiest place within the territory of the United
States. The growing season lasts about 135 days, from early
in May till late in September, but agriculture is limited
to the raising of a few vegetables. With the exception of
some stunted willows the islands are practically destitute of
trees, but are covered with a luxuriant growth of herbage,
including grasses, sedges and many flowering plants. On the
less mountainous islands the raising of sheep and reindeer
is believed to be practicable. The principal occupations
of the natives have always been fishing and hunting, and the
women weave basketry of exquisite fineness. From the end
of the 18th century the Russian fur traders had settlements
here for the capture of the seal and the sea otter and the
blue and the Arctic fox. Under the American regime seal
fishing off the Aleutians save by the natives has never been
legal, but the depletion of the Pribilof herd, the almost
complete extinction of the sea otter, and the rapid decrease
of the foxes and other fur animals, have threatened the
Aleuts (as the natives are commonly called) with starvation.
In recent years enterprising traders have raised foxes by
culture and by especially protecting certain small islands,
and this has furnished employment to whole communities of
natives. Fish and sea-fowl are extremely abundant.
The natives are rather low in stature, but plump and well
shaped, with short necks, swarthy faces, black eyes and long
black hair. They are a branch of the Esquimauan family, but
differ greatly from the Eskimo of the mainland in language,
habits, disposition and mental ability. They were good
fighters until they were cowed by the treatment of the Russians,
who practically reduced them to slavery. Sporadic efforts
to Christianize the Aleuts were made in the latter half of
the 18th century, but little impression was made before the
arrival in 1824 of Father Ivan Venyaminov, who in 1840 became
the first Greek bishop of Alaska. While the missionaries
of the Greek Church have nominally converted the natives to
Christianity, white adventurers have more effectually converted
them to various bad habits. In dress and mode of life they
have adopted outwardly civilized customs. From the position
of the Aleutian islands, stretching like a broken bridge
from Asia to America, some ethnologists have supposed that by
means of them America was first peopled. Raised shore-lines,
occasional earthquakes, and slow measurable elevation of the
land about active volcanoes, indicate that elevation is now in
progress, but the geological evidence shows no sign of former
submergence of a connecting isthmus. There is granite at the
core of the Shaler range of mountains in southern Unalaska.
It is stated that before the advent of the Russians there were
25,000 Aleuts on the archipelago, but that the barbarities of the
traders eventually reduced the population to one-tenth of this
number. The number of Aleuts in 1890 was reported as 968;
the total population of the archipelago in 1900 was 2000.
The principal settlements are on the Unalaska Island. Of
these Iliuliuk (also called Unalaska), the oldest, settled in
1760-1775, has a custom house, a Russian-Greek Church, and a
Methodist Mission and orphanage, and is the headquarters for
a considerable fleet of United States revenue cutters which
patrol the sealing grounds of the Pribilofs; adjacent is Dutch
Harbor (so named, it is said, because a Dutch vessel was the
first to enter it), which is an important port for Bering Sea
commerce. The volcano Makushin (5691 ft.) is visible from
Iliuliuk, and the volcanic islets Bogoslof and Grewingk, which
rose from the sea in 1796 and 1883 respectively, lie about 30
m. W. of the bay. The latter is still active; in 1906 a new
cone rose between the two earlier islets, and in 1907 still
another: these were nearly demolished by an explosive eruption
on the 1st of September 1907. The population of Unalaska
Island in 1900 was 575 Aleuts and 66 whites. The Commander
Islands group near the Asiatic coast is geographically,
but since the acquisition of the Russian possessions in
America not politically, a part of the Aleutian system.
In 1741 the Russian government sent out Vitus Bering, a
Dane, and Alexei Chirikov, a Russian, in the ships ``Saint
Peter'' and ``Saint Paul'' on a voyage of discovery in
the Northern Pacific. After the ships were separated by a
storm, Chirikov discovered several eastern islands of the
Aleutian group, and Bering discovered several of the western
islands, finally being wrecked and losing his life on the
island of the Commander group that now bears his name.
The survivors of Bering's party reached Kamchatka in a boat
constructed from the wreckage of their ship, and reported
that the islands were rich in fur-bearing animals. Siberian
fur hunters at once flocked to the Commander Islands and
gradually moved eastward across the Aleutian Islands to the
mainland. In this manner Russia gained a foothold on the
north-western coast of North America. The Aleutian Islands
consequently belonged to Russia, until that country in 1867
transferred to the United States all its possessions in
America. During his third and last voyage, in 1778, Captain
James Cook surveyed the eastern portion of the Aleutian
archipelago, accurately determined the position of some of
the more important islands and corrected many errors of former
navigators. Some preliminary surveys have been made by the United
States government with a view to establishing a naval station
on the island Kiska, in the western part of the Aleutian Chain.
ALEXANDER (ALEXANDER OF BATTENBERG) (1857-1893), first
prince of Bulgaria, was the second son of Prince Alexander
of Hesse and the Rhine by his morganatic marriage with
Julia, countess von Hauke. The title of princess of
Battenberg, derived from an old residence of the grand-dukes
of Hesse, was conferred, with the prefix Durchlaucht or
``Serene Highness,'' on the countess and her descendants in
1858. Prince Alexander, who was born on the 5th of April
1857, was nephew of the tsar Alexander II., who had married
a sister of Prince Alexander of Hesse; his mother, a daughter
of Count Moritz von Hauke, had been lady-in-waiting to the
tsaritsa. In his boyhood and early youth he was frequently
at St Petersburg, and he accompanied his uncle, who was
much attached to him, during the Bulgarian campaign of
1877. When Bulgaria under the Berlin Treaty was constituted
an autonomous principality under the suzerainty of Turkey, the
tsar recommended his nephew to the Bulgarians as a candidate
for the newly created throne, and Prince Alexander was elected
prince of Bulgaria by unanimous vote of the Grand Sobranye
(April 29, 1879). He was at that time serving as a lieutenant
in the Prussian life-guards at Potsdam. Before proceeding
to Bulgaria, Prince Alexander paid visits to the tsar at
Livadia, to the courts of the great powers and to the sultan;
he was then conveyed on a Russian warship to Varna, and after
taking the oath to the new constitution at Tirnova (July
8, 1879) he repaired to Sofia, being everywhere greeted with
immense enthusiasm by the people. (For the political history
of Prince Alexander's reign, see BULGARIA.) Without any
previous training in the art of government, the young prince
from the outset found himself confronted with difficulties
which would have tried the sagacity of an experienced ruler.
On the one hand he was exposed to numberless humiliations on
the part of the representatives of official Russia, who made
it clear to him that he was expected to play the part of a
roi faineant; on the other he was compelled to make terms
with the Bulgarian politicians, who, intoxicated with newly won
liberty, prosecuted their quarrels with a crude violence which
threatened to subvert his authority and to plunge the nation in
anarchy. After attempting to govern under these conditions
for nearly two years, the prince, with the consent of the tsar
Alexander III., assumed absolute power (May 9, 1881), and a
suspension of the ultra-democratic constitution for a period
of seven years was voted by a specially convened assembly
(July 13). The experiment, however, proved unsuccessful; the
Bulgarian Liberal and Radical politicians were infuriated, and
the real power fell into the hands of two Russian generals,
Sobolev and Kaulbars, who had been specially despatched from St
Petersburg. The prince, after vainly endeavouring to obtain
the recall of the generals, restored the constitution with the
concurrence of all the Bulgarian political parties (September
18, 1883). A serious breach with Russia followed, which was
widened by the part which the prince subsequently played in
encouraging the national aspirations of the Bulgarians. The
revolution of Philippopolis (September 18, 1885), which brought
about the union of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria, was carried
out with his consent, and he at once assumed the government of
the revolted province. In the anxious year which followed, the
prince gave evidence of considerable military and diplomatic
ability. He rallied the Bulgarian army, now deprived of
its Russian officers, to resist the Servian invasion, and
after a brilliant victory at Slivnitza (November 19) pursued
King Milan into Servian territory as far as Pirot, which he
captured (November 27). Although Servia was protected from the
consequences of defeat by the intervention of Austria, Prince
Alexander's success sealed the union with Eastern Rumelia,
and after long negotiations he was nominated governor-general
of that province for five years by the sultan (April 5,
1886). This arrangement, however, cost him much of his
popularity in Bulgaria, while discontent prevailed among a
certain number of his officers, who considered themselves
slighted in the distribution of rewards at the close of the
campaign. A military conspiracy was formed, and on the night
of the 20th of August the prince was seized in the palace at
Sofia, and compelled to sign his abdication; he was then
hurried to the Danube at Rakhovo, transported on his yacht to
Reni, and handed over to Russian authorities, by whom he was
allowed to proceed to Lemberg. He soon, however, returned to
Bulgaria, owing to the success of the counter- revolution led
by Stamboloff, which overthrew the provisional government set
up by the Russian party at Sofia. But his position had become
untenable, partly owing to an ill-considered telegram which
he addressed to the tsar on his return; partly in consequence
of the attitude of Prince Bismarck, who, in conjunction
with the Russian and Austrian governments, forbade him to
punish the leaders of the military conspiracy. He therefore
issued a manifesto resigning the throne, and left Bulgaria
on the 8th of September 1886. He now retired into private
life. A few years later he married Fraulein Loisinger, an
actress, and assumed the style of Count Hartenau (February 6,
1889). The last years of his life were spent principally at
Gratz, where he held a local command in the Austrian army.
Here, after a short illness, he died on the 23rd of October
1893. His remains were brought to Sofia, where they received
a public funeral, and were eventually deposited in a mausoleum
erected in his memory. Prince Alexander possessed much
charm and amiability of manner; he was tall, dignified and
strikingly handsome. His capabilities as a soldier have been
generally recognized by competent authorities. As a ruler
he committed some errors, but his youth and inexperience and
the extreme difficulty of his position must be taken into
consideration. He was not without aptitude for diplomacy,
and his intuitive insight and perception of character
sometimes enabled him to outwit the crafty politicians by
whom he was surrounded. His principal fault was a want
of tenacity and resolution; his tendency to unguarded
language undoubtedly increased the number of his enemies.
See Drandar, Le Prince Alexandre de Battenberg en Bulgarie
(Paris, 1884); Koch, Furst Alexander von Bulgarien
(Darmstadt, 1887); Matveyev, Bulgarien nach dem Berliner
Congress (Petersburg, 1887); Bourchier, ``Prince Alexander of
Battenberg,'' in Fortnightly Review, January 1894. (J. D. B.)
ALEXANDER I., king of Epirus about 342 B.C., brother of
Olympias the mother of Alexander the Great, and son-in-law
of Philip of Macedon, whose daughter Cleopatra he married
(336). In 332 he crossed over to Italy to assist the
Tarentines against the Lucanians, Bruttians and Samnites.
He gained considerable successes and made an arrangement
with the Romans for a joint attack upon the Samnites; but
the Tarentines, suspecting him of the design of founding
an independent kingdom, turned against him. Although the
advantage at first rested with Alexander, he gradually lost
it, and his supporters dwindled away. In 330 (or earlier)
he was defeated at Pandosia and slain by a Lucanian emigrant.
See Justin viii. 6, ix. 6, xii. 2; Livy viii. 3, 17, 24;
Aulus Gellius xvii. 21; and article MACEDONIAN EMPIRE.
ALEXANDER II., king of Epirus, succeeded his father Pyrrhus,
272 B.C. He attacked Antigonus Gonatas and conquered the
greater part of Macedonia, but was in turn driven out of both
Epirus and Macedonia by Demetrius the son of Antigonus. He
subsequently recovered his kingdom by the aid of the Acarnanians
and Aetolians. He died about 260 (Polybius ii. 45, ix. 34;
Plutarch, Pyrrhus, 9; Justin xviii. 1, xxvi. 2, xxviii. 1).
See Thirlwall, History of Greece, vol. viii.;
Droysen, Hellenismus; B. Niese, Gesch. d. griech. u.
maked. Staaten; J. Beloch, Griech. Gesch. vol. iii.
ALEXANDER III., known as THE GREAT1 (356-323 B.C.),
king of Macedon, was the son of Philip II. of Macedon, and
Olympias, an Epirote princess. His father was pre-eminent
for practical genius, his mother a woman of half-wild blood,
weird, visionary and terrible; and Alexander himself is singular
among men of action for the imaginative splendours which guided
him, and among romantic dreamers for the things he achieved.
Youth.
We was born in 356 B.C., probably about October (Hogarth,
pp. 284 ff.). The court at which he grew up was the focus
of great activities, for Philip, by war and diplomacy, was
raising Macedon to the headship of the Greek states, and
the air was charged with great ideas. To unite the Greek
race in a war against the Persian empire was set up as the
ultimate mark for ambition, the theme of idealists. The
great literary achievements of the Greeks in the 5th century
lay already far enough behind to have become invested with a
classical dignity; the meaning of Hellenic civilization had
been made concrete in a way which might sustain enthusiasm for
a body of ideal values, authoritative by tradition. And upon
Alexander in his fourteenth year this sum of tradition was
brought to bear through the person of the man who beyond all
others had gathered it up into an organic whole: in 343-342
Aristotle (q.v.) came to Pella at Philip's bidding to
direct the education of his son. We do not know what faculty
the master-thinker may have had for captivating this ardent
spirit; at any rate Alexander carried with him through life
a passion for Homer, however he may have been disposed to
greyer philosophic theory. But his education was not all from
books. The coming and going of envoys from many states, Greek
and Oriental, taught him something of the actual conditions
of the world. He was early schooled in war. At the age of
sixteen he commanded in Macedonia during Philip's absence
and quelled a rising of the hill-tribes on the northern
border; in the following year (338) he headed the charge
which broke the Sacred Band at Chaeronea. Then came family
dissensions such as usually vex the polygamous courts of the
East. In 337 Philip repudiated Olympias for another wife,
Cleopatra, Alexander went with his mother to her home in Epirus,
and, though he soon returned and an outward reconciliation
between father and son was contrived, their hearts were
estranged. The king's new wife was with child; her kinsmen
were in the ascendant; the succession of Alexander was
imperilled. Some negotiations which Pixodarus, the satrap
of Caria, opened with the Macedonian court with a view to
effecting a marriage alliance between his house and Philip's,
brought Alexander into fresh broils. In 336 Philip was
suddenly assassinated whilst celebrating at Aegae the marriage
of his daughter to Alexander I. of Epirus in the presence of
a great concourse from all the Greek world. It is certain
that the hand of the assassin was prompted by some one in the
background; suspicion could not fail to fall upon Alexander among
others. But guilt of that sort would hardly be consistent
with his character as it appears in those early day's.
Accession.
Alexander was not the only claimant to the vacant throne,
but, recognized by the army, he soon swept all rivals from
his path. The newly born son of Philip by Cleopatra, and
Alexander's cousin Amyntas, were put to death, and Alexander
took up the interrupted work of his father. That work was on
the point of opening its most brilliant chapter by an invasion
of the great king's dominions; the army was concentrated
and certain forces had already been sent on to occupy the
opposite shore of the Hellespont. The assassination of
Philip delayed the blow, for it immediately made the base,
Macedonia, insecure, and in such an enterprise, plunging into
the vast territories of the Persian empire, a secure base was
everything. Philip's removal had made all the hill-peoples
of the north and west raise their heads and set the Greek
states free from their fears. A demonstration in Greece,
led by the new king of Macedonia, momentarily checked the
agitation, and at the diet at Corinth Alexander was recognized
as captain-general (egemon autokrator) of the Hellenes
against the barbarians, in the place of his father Philip.
Leader of the Hellenes.
In the spring of 335 he went out from Macedonia northwards,
struck across the Balkans, probably by the Shipka Pass,
frustrating the mountain warfare of its tribes by a precision
of discipline which, probably, no other army of the time could
have approached, and traversed the land of the Triballians
(Rumelia) to the Danube. To gratify his own imagination or
strike the imagination of the world he took his army over
the Danube and burnt a settlement of the Getae upon the other
side. Meanwhile the Illyrians had seized Pelion (Pliassa),
which commanded the passes on the west of Macedonia, and from
the Danube Alexander marched straight thither over the hills.
He had hardly restored Macedonian prestige in this quarter
when he heard that Greece was aflame. Thebes had taken up
arms. By a forced march he took the Thebans completely by
surprise, and in a few days the city, which a generation before
had won the headship of Greece, was taken. There were to
be no half-measures now; the city was wiped out of existence
with the exception of its temples and the house which had been
Pindar's. Greece might now be trusted to lie quiet for some
time to come. The Panhellenic alliance (from which Sparta
still stood aloof) against the barbarians was renewed. Athens,
although known to be hostile at heart to the cities of Macedonian
power, Alexander treated all through with eager courtesy.
Invasion of Asia Minor.
In the spring of 334, Alexander crossed with an army of between
30,000 and 40,000 men, Macedonians, Illyrians, Thracians and
the contingents of the Greek states, into Asia. The place of
concentration was Arisbe on the Hellespont. Alexander himself
first visited the site of Troy and there went through those
dramatic acts of sacrifice to the Ilian Athena, assumption
of the shield believed to be that of Achilles; and offerings
to the great Homeric dead, which are significant of the
poetic glamour shed, in the young king's mind, over the whole
enterprise, and which men will estimate differently according
to the part they assign to imagination in human affairs.
Battle of Granicus.
To meet the invader the great king had in Asia Minor an
army slightly larger, it would seem, than Alexander's,
gathered under the satraps of the western provinces at
Zeleia. He had also, what was more serious, command of the
Aegean. Alexander could communicate with his base only by
the narrow line of the Hellespont, and ran the risk, if he
went far from it, of being cut off altogether. To draw him
after them, while avoiding a conflict, was sound strategy
for the Persian generals. It was urged upon them by their
colleague the Rhodian Memnon. But strategic considerations
were cancelled by the Persian barons' code of chivalry, and
Alexander found them waiting for him on the banks of the
Granicus. It was a cavalry melee, in which the common code
of honour caused Macedonian and Persian chieftains to engage
hand to hand, and at the end of the day the relics of the
Persian army were in flight, leaving the high-roads of Asia
Minor clear for the invader. Alexander could now accomplish
the first part of the task belonging to him as captain-general
to the Hellenes, that liberation of the Greek cities of Asia
Minor, for which Panhellenic enthusiasts had cried out so
long. He first went to take possession of the old Lydian capital
Sardis, the headquarters of the Persian government on this
side of the Taurus, and the strong city surrendered without a
blow. And now in all the Greek cities of Aeolis and Ionia
the oligarchies or tyrants friendly to Persia fell, and
democracies were established under the eye of Alexander's
officers. Only where the cities were held by garasons in
the Persian service, garrisons composed mainly of Greek
mercenaries, was the liberator likely to meet with any
resistance. From Ephesus indeed the garrison fled upon
the news of Granicus, but Miletus required a siege. The
Persian fleet in vain endeavoured to relieve it, and Miletus
did not long hold out against Alexander's attack. It was
at Halicarnassus that Alexander first encountered stubborn
resistance, at Halicarnassus where Memnon and the satraps of
Caria had rallied what land-forces yet belonged to Persia in the
west. When winter fell, Alexander had captured indeed the city
itself, but the two citadels still held out against his blockade.
Meanwhile Alexander was making it plain that he had come not
merely as captain-general for a war of reprisals, but to take
the Persian's place as king of the land. The conquered provinces
were organized under Macedonian governors and in Caria a
dethroned princess of the native dynasty, Ada, was restored to
power. In the winter, whilst Parmenio advanced upon the central
plateau to make the occupation of Phrygia effective, Alexander
himself passed along the coast to receive the submission of the
Lycians and the adherence of the Greek cities of the Pamphylian
sea-board. The hills inland were the domain of fighting
tribes which the Persian government had never been able to
subdue. To conquer them, indeed, Alexander had no time, but
he stormed some of their fortresses to hold them in check,
and marched through their territory when he turned north from
Pamphylia into the interior. The point of concentration for
next year's campaign had been fixed at Gordium, a meeting-place
of roads in Northern Phrygia. The story of Alexander's cutting
the fatal ``Gordian knot'' on the chariot of the ancient
Phrygian king Gordius is connected with his stay in this place.
Extension of Alexander's power.
Whilst Alexander had been grounding his power in Asia Minor,
he had run a narrow risk of losing his base in Europe. He had
after the siege of Miletus disbanded the Graeco- Macedonian
fleet, surrendering for the time all attempts to challenge
the command of the Aegean. Memnon the Rhodian, now in supreme
command of the Persian fleet, saw the European coasts exposed
and set out to raise Greece, where discontent always smouldered
in Alexander's rear. But Memnon died at the critical moment
whilst laying siege to Mytilene and the great plan collapsed.
A Persian fleet still held the sea, but it effected little, and
presently fresh Graeco-Macedonian squadrons began to hold it in
check. It was, however, the need to ensure command of the sea
and free all lines of communication behind him that determined
Alexander's plan for the next campaign. If he mastered the
whole coast-line of the Levant, the enemy's fleet would find
itself left in the air. The Syrian coast was accordingly
his immediate objective when he broke up from Gordium for the
campaign of 333. He was through the Cicilian Gates before the
Persian king, Darius III., had sent up a force adequate to hold
them. His passage through Cilicia was marked by a violent
fever that arrested him for a while in Tarsus, and meantime
a great Persian army was waiting for him in northern Syria
under the command of Darius himself. In the knot of mountains
which close in about the head of the Gulf of Alexandretta,
Alexander, following hard by the coast, marched past the
Persian army encamped on the plains to the east. To cut
Alexander's communications with the rear, Darius now committed
the error of entangling his large force in the mountain defiles.
Battle of Issus.
Alexander turned, and near the town of Issus fought his second
pitched battle, sending Darius and the relic of his army in
wild flight back to the east.2 It was an incident which did
not modify Alexander's plan. He did not press the pursuit
far, although the great king's camp with his harem fell into his
hands. The chivalrous courtesy which he showed to the captive
princesses was a favourite theme for later rhetoricians.
He went on his way to occupy Syria and Phoenicia. It is now
that we get definite evidence as to the reach of Alexander's
designs; for Darius opened negotiations in which he ultimately
went so far as to offer a partition of the empire, all west
of the Euphrates, to be Alexander's. Alexander refused the
bargain and definitely claimed the whole.3 The conquest
of the Phoenician coast was not to be altogether easy, for
Tyre shut its gates and for seven months Alexander had to
sit before it--one of those obstinate sieges which mark the
history of the Semitic races. When it fell, Alexander had
the old Tyrian people scattered to the winds, 30,000 sold as
slaves. Gaza offered a resistance equally heroic, lasting
two months, and here too the old population was dispersed.
The occupation of the rest of Syria and Palestine proceeded
smoothly, and after the fall of Gaza Alexander's way lay
open into Egypt.4 Egypt was the last of the Mediterranean
provinces to be won, and here no defence was made. To the
native Egyptians Alexander appeared as a deliverer from the
Persian tyranny, and he sacrificed piously to the gods of
Memphis. The winter (332-331) which Alexander spent in Egypt
saw two memorable actions on his part. One was the expedition
(problematic in its motive and details) to the oracle of Zeus
Ammon (Oasis of Siwa), where Alexander was hailed by the priest
as son of the god, a belief which the circle of Alexander,
and perhaps Alexander himself, seem hereafter to have liked to
play with in that sort of semi-serious vein which still allowed
him in the moments of every-day commonplace to be the son of
Philip. The other action was the foundation of Alexandria
at the Canopic mouth of the Nile, the place destined to
be a new commercial centre for the eastern Mediterranean
world which Alexander had now taken in possession, to rise
to an importance which the founder, although obviously
acting with intention, can hardly have foreseen (E. Keller,
Alex. d. Grosse nach der Schlacht bei Issus, 1904).
Invasion of Persia.
In the spring of 331 Alexander could at last leave the
Mediterranean to strike into the heart of the Persian empire,
for by his occupation of the Coasts the Persian command of the
sea had inevitably collapsed. Returning through Syria, and
stopping at Tyre to make final arrangements for the conquered
provinces, he traversed Mesopotamia and struck the Tigris some
four marches above the site of Nineveh. It was near Nineveh
that Darius was waiting with the immense host which a supreme
effort could muster from all parts of the empire. The happy
coincidence of a lunar eclipse gives us the 20th of September
331 as the exact day upon which the Macedonian army crossed the
Tigris. Alexander came within sight of the Persian host without
having met with any opposition since he quitted Tyre. He had
now to settle the most serious problem which had yet faced
him, for in the plains the Persian army was formidable by sheer
bulk. But the day showed the Macedonian army equal to the task.
Battle of Arbela.