[1] _History of English Poetry_ (ed. W.C. Hazlitt, 1871; iii. pp.
140-149).
[2] _Scriptorum Illustrium, cant. ix._ No. 17.
[3] Ames, _Typographical Antiquities_ (ed. W. Herbert, 1785; i. p.
294).
BRADSHAW, HENRY (1831-1886), British scholar and librarian, was born in
London on the 2nd of February 1831, and educated at Eton. He became a
fellow of King's College, Cambridge, and after a short scholastic career
in Ireland he accepted an appointment in the Cambridge university
library as an extra assistant. When he found that his official duties
absorbed all his leisure he resigned his post, but continued to give his
time to the examination of the MSS. and early printed books in the
library. There was then no complete catalogue of these sections, and
Bradshaw soon showed a rare faculty for investigations respecting old
books and curious MSS. In addition to his achievements in black-letter
bibliography he threw great light on ancient Celtic language and
literature by the discovery, in 1857, of the _Book of Deer_, a
manuscript copy of the Gospel in the Vulgate version, in which were
inscribed old Gaelic charters. This was published by the Spalding Club
in 1869. Bradshaw also discovered some Celtic glosses on the MS. of a
metrical paraphrase of the Gospels by Juvencus. He made another find in
the Cambridge library of considerable philological and historical
importance. Cromwell's envoy, Sir Samuel Morland (1625-1695), had
brought back from Piedmont MSS. containing the earliest known Waldensian
records, consisting of translations from the Bible, religious treatises
and poems. One of the poems referred the work to the beginning of the
11th century, though the MSS. did not appear to be of earlier date than
the 15th century. On this Morland had based his theory of the antiquity
of the Waldensian doctrine, and, in the absence of the MSS., which were
supposed to be irretrievably lost, the conclusion was accepted. Bradshaw
discovered the MSS. in the university library, and found in the passage
indicated traces of erasure. The original date proved to be 1400.
Incidentally the correct date was of great value in the study of the
history of the language. He had a share in exposing the frauds of
Constantine Simonides, who had asserted that the _Codex Sinaiticus_
brought by Tischendorf from the Greek monastery of Mount Sinai was a
modern forgery of which he was himself the author. Bradshaw exposed the
absurdity of these claims in a letter to the _Guardian_ (January 26,
1863). In 1866 he made a valuable contribution to the history of
Scottish literature by the discovery of 2200 lines on the siege of Troy
incorporated in a MS. of Lydgate's _Troye Booke_, and of the _Legends of
the Saints_, an important work of some 40,000 lines. These poems he
attributed, erroneously, as has since been proved, to Barbour (q.v.).
Unfortunately Bradshaw allowed his attention to be distracted by a
multiplicity of subjects, so that he has not left any literary work
commensurate with his powers. The strain upon him was increased when he
was elected (1867) university librarian, and as dean of his college
(1857-1865) and praelector (1863-1868) he was involved in further
routine duties. Besides his brilliant isolated discoveries in
bibliography, he did much by his untiring zeal to improve the standard
of library administration. He died very suddenly on the 10th of February
1886. His fugitive papers on antiquarian subjects were collected and
edited by Mr F. Jenkinson in 1889.
An excellent _Memoir of Henry Bradshaw_, by Mr G.W. Prothero, appeared
in 1888. See also C.F. Newcombe, _Some Aspects of the Work of Henry
Bradshaw_ (1905).
BRADSHAW, JOHN (1602-1659), president of the "High Court of Justice"
which tried Charles I., was the second son of Henry Bradshaw, of Marple
and Wibersley in Cheshire. He was baptized on the 10th of December 1602,
was educated at Banbury in Cheshire and at Middleton in Lancashire,
studied subsequently with an attorney at Congleton, was admitted into
Gray's Inn in 1620, and was called to the bar in 1627, becoming a
bencher in 1647. He was mayor of Congleton in 1637, and later high
steward or recorder of the borough. According to Milton he was assiduous
in his legal studies and acquired considerable reputation and practice
at the bar. On the 21st of September 1643 he was appointed judge of the
sheriff's court in London. In October 1644 he was counsel with Prynne in
the prosecution of Lord Maguire and Hugh Macmahon, implicated in the
Irish rebellion, in 1645 for John Lilburne in his appeal to the Lords
against the sentence of the Star Chamber, and in 1647 in the prosecution
of Judge Jenkins. On the 8th of October 1646 he had been nominated by
the Commons a commissioner of the great seal, but his appointment was
not confirmed by the Lords. In 1647 he was made chief justice of Chester
and a judge in Wales, and on the 12th of October 1648 he was presented
to the degree of serjeant-at-law. On the 2nd of January 1649 the Lords
threw out the ordinance for bringing the king to trial, and the small
remnant of the House of Commons which survived Pride's Purge, consisting
of 53 independents, determined to carry out the ordinance on their own
authority. The leading members of the bar, on the parliamentary as well
as on the royalist side, having refused to participate in proceedings
not only illegal and unconstitutional, but opposed to the plainest
principles of equity, Bradshaw was selected to preside, and, after some
protestations of humility and unfitness, accepted the office. The king
refused to plead before the tribunal, but Bradshaw silenced every legal
objection and denied to Charles an opportunity to speak in his defence.
He continued after the king's death to conduct, as lord president, the
trials of the royalists, including the duke of Hamilton, Lord Capel, and
Henry Rich, earl of Holland, all of whom he condemned to death, his
behaviour being especially censured in the case of Eusebius Andrews, a
royalist who had joined a conspiracy against the government. He received
large rewards for his services. He was appointed in 1649
attorney-general of Cheshire and North Wales, and chancellor of the
duchy of Lancaster, and was given a sum of L1000, together with
confiscated estates worth L2000 a year. He had been nominated a member
of the council of state on the 14th of February 1649, and on the 10th of
March became president. He disapproved strongly of the expulsion of the
Long Parliament, and on Cromwell's coming subsequently to dismiss the
council Bradshaw is said, on the authority of Ludlow, to have confronted
him boldly, and denied his power to dissolve the parliament. An ardent
republican, he showed himself ever afterwards an uncompromising
adversary of Cromwell. He was returned for Stafford in the parliament of
1654, and spoke strongly against vesting power in a single person. He
refused to sign the "engagement" drawn up by Cromwell, and in
consequence withdrew from parliament and was subsequently suspected of
complicity in plots against the government. He failed to obtain a seat
in the parliament of 1656, and in August of the same year Cromwell
attempted to remove him from the chief-justiceship of Cheshire. After
the abdication of Richard Cromwell, Bradshaw again entered parliament,
became a member of the council of state, and on the 3rd of June 1659 was
appointed a commissioner of the great seal. His health, however, was
bad, and his last public effort was a vehement speech, in the council,
when he declared his abhorrence of the arrest of Speaker Lenthall. He
died on the 31st of October 1659, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
His body was disinterred at the Restoration, and exposed on a gibbet
along with those of Cromwell and Ireton. Bradshaw married Mary, daughter
of Thomas Marbury of Marbury, Cheshire, but left no children.
BRADWARDINE, THOMAS (c. 1290-1349), English archbishop, called "the
Profound Doctor," was born either at Hartfield in Sussex or at
Chichester. He was educated at Merton College, Oxford, where he took
the degree of doctor of divinity, and acquired the reputation of a
profound scholar, a skilful mathematician and an able divine. He was
afterwards raised to the high offices of chancellor of the university
and professor of divinity. From being chancellor of the diocese of
London, he became chaplain and confessor to Edward III., whom he
attended during his wars in France. On his return to England, he was
successively appointed prebendary of Lincoln, archdeacon of Lincoln
(1347), and in 1349 archbishop of Canterbury. He died of the plague at
Lambeth on the 26th of August 1349, forty days after his consecration.
Chaucer in his _Nun's Priest's Tale_ ranks Bradwardine with St
Augustine. His great work is a treatise against the Pelagians, entitled
_De causa Dei contra Pelagium et de virtute causarum_, edited by Sir
Henry Savile (London, 1618). He wrote also _De Geometria speculativa_
(Paris, 1530); _De Arithmetica practica_ (Paris, 1502); _De
Proportionibus_ (Paris, 1495; Venice, 1505); _De Quadratura Circuli_
(Paris, 1495); and an _Ars Memorativa_, Sloane MSS. No. 3974 in the
British Museum.
See Quetif-Echard, _Script. Praedic._ (1719), i. 744; W.F. Hook,
_Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury_, vol. iv.
BRADY, NICHOLAS (1659-1726), Anglican divine and poet, was born at
Bandon, Co. Cork, on the 28th of October 1659. He received his education
at Westminster school, and at Christ Church, Oxford; but he graduated at
Trinity College, Dublin. He took orders, and in 1688 was made a
prebendary of Cork. He was a zealous promoter of the Revolution and
suffered in consequence. When the troubles broke out in Ireland in 1690,
Brady, by his influence, thrice prevented the burning of the town of
Bandon, after James II. had given orders for its destruction; and the
same year he was employed by the people of Bandon to lay their
grievances before the English parliament. He soon afterwards settled in
London, where he obtained various preferments. At the time of his death,
on the 20th of May 1726, he held the livings of Clapham and Richmond.
Brady's best-known work is his metrical version of the Psalms, in which
Nahum Tate collaborated with him. It was licensed in 1696, and largely
ousted the old version of T. Sternhold and J. Hopkins. He also
translated Virgil's _Aeneid_, and wrote several smaller poems and
dramas, as well as sermons.
BRAEKELEER, HENRI JEAN AUGUSTIN DE (1840-1888), Belgian painter, was
born at Antwerp. He was trained by his father, a _genre_ painter, and
his uncle, Baron Henri Leys, and devoted himself to scenes of everyday
Antwerp life. The first pictures he exhibited, "The Laundry" (Van Cutsem
collection, Brussels), and "The Coppersmith's Workshop" (Vleeshovwer
collection, Antwerp), were shown at the Antwerp exhibition in 1861. He
received the gold medal at Brussels in 1872 for "The Geographer" and
"The Lesson" (both in the Brussels gallery); the gold medal at Vienna in
1873 for "The Painter's Studio" and "Grandmother's Birthday"; and the
medal of honour at the Exposition Universelle at Amsterdam for "The
Pilot House." Among his more notable works are "A Shoemaker" (1862), "A
Tailor's Workroom" (1863), "A Gardener" (1864, Antwerp gallery),
"Interior of a Church" (1866), "Interior, Flanders" (1867), "Woman
spinning" (1869), "Man reading" (1871), "The rue du Serment, Antwerp"
(1875), "A Copperplate Printer," "The Sailor's Return," "The Man at the
Window" (Couteaux collection, Brussels), "The Horn-blower" (Couteaux
collection), "Man retouching a Picture" (Couteaux collection), "The
Potters" (Marlier collection, Brussels), "Staircase in the Hydraulic
House at Antwerp" (Marlier collection), and "The Brewer's House at
Antwerp" (Marlier collection). The last, better known as "A Man
sitting," is generally regarded as his masterpiece. As a lithographer
and etcher, his work resembles that of Henri Leys. Towards the end of
his life de Braekeleer did some dot painting (_pointillisme_), in which
he achieved admirable effects of light.
BRAEMAR, a district in S.W. Aberdeenshire, Scotland, extending from
Ballater in the E. to Glen Dee in the W., a distance of 24 m. with a
breadth varying from 3 to 6 m. It is drained throughout by the river
Dee, both banks of which are bounded by hills varying from 1000 to
nearly 3000 ft. in height. The whole area is distinguished by typical
Highland scenery, and is a resort alike for sportsmen and tourists. The
villages and clachans (Gaelic for hamlet) being situated at an altitude
of from 600 to more than 1000 ft. above the sea, the air is everywhere
pure and bracing. The deer forests comprise the royal forests of
Balmoral and Ballochbuie, Glen Ey Forest, Mar Forest and Invercauld
Forest. At various points on either side of the Dee, granite castles,
mansions and lodges have been built, mostly in the Scottish baronial
style, and all effectively situated with reference to the wooded hills
or the river. The chief of these are Balmoral and Abergeldie Castles
belonging to the crown, Invercauld House, Braemar Castle, Mar Lodge and
Old Mar Lodge. Castleton of Braemar is the foremost of the villages,
being sometimes styled the capital of the Deeside Highlands. Its public
buildings include halls erected by the duke of Fife and Colonel
Farquharson of Invercauld to commemorate the Victorian jubilee of 1887.
Not far from the spot where the brawling Clunie joins the Dee the earl
of Mar raised the standard of revolt in 1715. His seat, Braemar Castle,
reputed to be a hunting-lodge of Malcolm Canmore, was forfeit along with
the estates. The new castle built by the purchasers in 1720 was acquired
at a later date by Farquharson of Invercauld, who gave government the
use of it during the pacification of the Highlands after the battle of
Culloden in 1746. Population of Crathie and Braemar (1901) 1452.
BRAG, a very old game of cards, probably evolved from the ancient
Spanish _primero_, played by five or six, or more players. It is the
ancestor of poker. A full pack is used, the cards ranking as at whist,
with certain exceptions. There are no trumps. Each player receives three
cards and puts up three stakes. The last round is dealt face upwards:
the holder of the highest card irrespective of suits wins the first
stake from all the players. In the case of equality the elder hand wins,
but the ace of diamonds is always a winning card. For the second stake
the players _brag_ or bet against each other, if they hold either a
pair, or a pair-royal (three cards of the same rank). Pairs and
pairs-royal take precedence according to the value of the cards
composing them, but any pair-royal beats any pair. The knave of clubs
may be counted as any card, e.g. two twos and the knave of clubs rank as
a pair-royal in twos; two aces and the knave as a pair-royal in aces.
Sometimes the knave of diamonds is allowed the same privilege, but is
inferior to the club knave; e.g. two threes and the club would beat the
other two threes and the diamond. Players who accept another's brag must
cover his. bet and offer another. The third stake is won by the player
whose cards make 31 or are nearest to 31 by their pips, aces and court
counting ten; but the ace may by arrangement count as 1 or 11. Players
may draw from the stock, losing if they over-draw. If one player wins
all three stakes, he may receive the value of another stake, or of two
or three stakes, all round, as arranged. The deal passes as at whist.
Each player should have the same number of deals before the game is
abandoned.
BRAGA, a city of northern Portugal, formerly included in the province of
Entre Minho e Douro, situated on the right-bank of the small river Deste
near its source, and at the head of a railway from Oporto. Pop. (1900)
24,202. Braga, which ranks after Lisbon and Oporto as the third city of
the kingdom, is the capital of an administrative district, and an
archiepiscopal see. Its cathedral, founded in the 12th century, was
rebuilt during the 16th century in the blend of Moorish and florid
Gothic styles known as Manoellian. It contains several tombs of
considerable historical interest, some fine woodwork carved in the 15th
century, and a collection of ancient vestments, plate and other objects
of art. Among the other churches Santa Cruz is noteworthy for its
handsome facade, which dates from 1642. There are several convents, an
archiepiscopal palace, a library, containing many rare books and
manuscripts, an orphan asylum, and a large hospital; also the ruins of a
theatre, a temple and an aqueduct of Roman workmanship, and a great
variety of minor antiquities of different ages. The principal
manufactures are firearms, jewelry, cutlery, cloth and felt hats. Large
cattle fairs are held in June and September, for cattle-breeding and
dairy-farming are among the foremost local industries. On a hill about
3 m. E. by S. stands the celebrated sanctuary of Bom Jesus, or Bom Jesus
do Monte, visited at Whitsuntide by many thousands of pilgrims, who do
public penance as they ascend to the shrine; and about 1 m. beyond it is
Mount Sameiro (2535 ft.), crowned by a colossal statue of the Virgin
Mary, and commanding a magnificent view of the mountainous country which
culminates in the Serra do Gerez, on the north-east.
Braga is the Roman _Bracara Augusta_, capital of the _Callaici
Bracarii_, or _Bracarenses_, a tribe who occupied what is now Galicia
and northern Portugal. Early in the 5th century it was taken by the
Suevi; but about 485 it passed into the hands of the Visigothic
conquerors of Spain, whose renunciation of the Arian and Priscillianist
heresies, at two synods held here in the 6th century, marks the origin
of its ecclesiastical greatness. The archbishops of Braga retain the
title of primate of Portugal, and long claimed supremacy over the
Spanish church also; but their authority was never accepted throughout
Spain. From the Moors, who captured Braga early in the 8th century, the
city was retaken in 1040 by Ferdinand I., king of Castile and Leon; and
from 1093 to 1147 it was the residence of the Portuguese court.
The administrative district of Braga coincides with the central part of
the province of Entre Minho e Douro (q.v.). Pop. (1900) 357,159. Area,
1040 sq. m.
BRAGANZA (_Braganca_), the capital of an administrative district
formerly included in the province of Traz-os-Montes, Portugal; situated
in the north-eastern extremity of the kingdom, on a branch of the river
Sabor, 8 m. S. of the Spanish frontier. Pop. (1900) 5535. Braganza is an
episcopal city. It consists of a walled upper town, containing the
cathedral college and hospital, and of a lower or modern town. Large
tracts of the surrounding country are uncultivated, partly because
railway communication is lacking and the roads are bad. Except farming,
the chief local industry is silkworm-rearing and the manufacture of
silk. The administrative district of Braganza coincides with the eastern
part of Traz-os-Montes (q.v.). Pop. (1900) 185,162; area, 2513 sq. m.
The city gave its name to the family of Braganza, members of which were
rulers of Portugal from 1640 to 1853, and emperors of Brazil from 1822
to 1889. This family is descended from Alphonso (d. 1461), a natural son
of John I., king of Portugal (d. 1433), who was a natural son of King
Peter I., and consequently belonged to the Portuguese branch of the
Capetian family. Alphonso was made duke of Braganza in 1442, and in 1483
his grandson, Duke Ferdinand II., lost his life through heading an
insurrection against King John II. In spite of this Ferdinand's
descendants acquired great wealth, and several of them held high office
under the kings of Portugal. Duke John I. (d. 1583) married into the
royal family, and when King Henry II. died without direct heirs in 1580,
he claimed the crown of Portugal in opposition to Philip II. of Spain.
John, however, was unsuccessful, but, when the Portuguese threw off the
Spanish dominion in 1640, his grandson, John II., duke of Braganza,
became king as John IV. In 1807, when Napoleon declared the throne of
Portugal vacant, King John VI. fled to Brazil; but he regained his
inheritance after the fall of Napoleon in 1814, although he did not
return to Europe until 1821, when he left his elder son Peter to govern
Brazil. In 1822 a revolution established the independence of Brazil with
Peter as emperor. In 1826 Peter became king of Portugal on the death of
his father; but he at once resigned the crown to his young daughter
Maria, and appointed his brother Miguel to act as regent. Miguel soon
declared himself king, but after a stubborn struggle was driven from the
country in 1833, after which Maria became queen. Maria married for her
second husband Ferdinand (d. 1851), son of Francis, duke of Saxe-Coburg;
and when she died in 1853 the main Portuguese branch of the family
became extinct. Maria was succeeded by her son Louis I., father of
Charles I., who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1889. The empire of
Brazil descended on the death of Peter I. to his son Peter II., who was
expelled from the country in 1889. When Peter died in 1891 this branch
of the family also became extinct in the male line. His only child,
Isabella, married Louis Gaston of Orleans, count of Eu. The exiled king,
Miguel, founded a branch of the family of Braganza which settled in
Bavaria, and various noble families in Portugal are descended from
cadets of this house. The title of duke of Braganza is now borne by the
eldest son of the king of Portugal.
BRAGG, BRAXTON (1817-1876), American soldier, was born in Warren county,
North Carolina, on the 22nd of March 1817. He graduated at the United
States military academy in 1837, and as an artillery officer served in
the Seminole wars of 1837 and 1841, and under General Taylor in Mexico.
For gallant conduct at Fort Brown, Monterey and Buena Vista, he received
the brevets of captain, major and lieutenant-colonel. He resigned from
the regular army on the 3rd of January 1856, and retired to his
plantation in Louisiana. From 1859 to 1861 he was commissioner of the
board of public works of the state. When in 1861 the Civil War began,
Bragg was made a brigadier-general in the Confederate service, and
assigned to command at Pensacola. In February 1862, having meanwhile
become major-general, he took up a command in the Army of the
Mississippi, and he was present at the battle of Shiloh (April). The
vacancy created by the death of Sidney Johnston at that battle was
filled by the promotion of Bragg to full general's rank, and he
succeeded General Beauregard when that officer retired from the Western
command. In the autumn of 1862 he led a bold advance from Eastern
Tennessee across Kentucky to Louisville, but after temporary successes
he was forced to retire before Buell, and after the battle of Perryville
(8th October) retired into Tennessee. Though the material results of his
campaign were considerable, he was bitterly censured, and his removal
from his command was urged. But the personal favour of Jefferson Davis
kept him, as it had placed him, at the head of the central army, and on
the 31st of December 1862 and 2nd of January 1863 he fought the
indecisive battle of Murfreesboro (or Stone river) against Rosecrans,
Buell's successor. In the campaign of 1863 Rosecrans constantly
outmanoeuvred the Confederates, and forced them back to the border of
Georgia. Bragg, however, inflicted a crushing defeat on his opponent at
Chickamauga (September 19-20) and for a time besieged the Union forces
in Chattanooga. But enormous forces under Grant were concentrated upon
the threatened spot, and the great battle of Chattanooga (November
23-25) ended in the rout of the Confederates. Bragg was now deprived of
his command, but President Davis made him his military adviser, and in
that capacity he served during 1864. In the autumn of that year he led
an inferior force from North Carolina to Georgia to oppose Sherman's
march. In February 1865 he joined Johnston, and he was thus included in
the surrender of that officer to Sherman. After the war he became chief
engineer to the state of Alabama, and supervised improvements in Mobile
harbour. He died suddenly at Galveston, Texas, on the 27th of September
1876. General Bragg, in spite of his want of success, was unquestionably
a brave and skilful officer. But he was a severe martinet, and rarely in
full accord with the senior officers under his orders, the consequent
friction often acting unfavourably on the conduct of the operations.
His brother, THOMAS BRAGG (1810-1872), was governor of North Carolina
1855-1859, U.S. senator 1859-1861, and attorney-general in the
Confederate cabinet from Nov. 1861 to March 1862.
BRAGI, in Scandinavian mythology, the son of Odin, and god of wisdom,
poetry and eloquence. At the Scandinavian sacrificial feasts a horn
consecrated to Bragi was used as a drinking-cup by the guests, who then
vowed to do some great deed which would be worthy of being immortalized
in verse.
BRAHAM, JOHN (c. 1774-1856), English vocalist, was born in London about
1774, of Jewish parentage, his real name being Abraham. His father and
mother died when he was quite young. Having received lessons in singing
from an Italian artist named Leoni, he made his first appearance in
public at Covent Garden theatre on the 21st of April 1787, when he sang
"The soldier tired of war's alarms" and "_Ma chere arrive_." On the
breaking of his voice, he had to support himself by teaching the
pianoforte. In a few years, however, he recovered his voice, which
proved to be a tenor of exceptionally pure and rich quality. His second
debut was made in 1794 at the Bath concerts, to the conductor of which,
Rauzzini, he was indebted for careful training extending over a period
of more than two years. In 1796 he reappeared in London at Drury Lane in
Storace's opera of _Mahmoud_. Such was his success that he obtained an
engagement the next year to appear in the Italian opera house in
Gretry's _Azor et Zemire_. He also sang in oratorios and was engaged for
the Three Choir festival at Gloucester. With the view of perfecting
himself in his art he set out for Italy in the autumn of 1797. On the
way he gave some concerts at Paris, which proved so successful that he
was induced to remain there for eight months. His career in Italy was
one of continuous triumph; he appeared in all the principal
opera-houses, singing in Milan, Genoa, Leghorn and Venice. His compass
embraced about nineteen notes, his management of the falsetto being
perfect. In 1801 he returned to his native country, and appeared once
more at Covent Garden in the opera _Chains of the Heart_, by Mazzinghi
and Reeve. So great was his popularity that an engagement he had made
when abroad to return after a year to Vienna was renounced, and he
remained henceforward in England. In 1824 he sang the part of Max in the
English version of Weber's _Der Freischutz_, and he was the original Sir
Huon in that composer's _Oberon_ in 1826. Braham made two unfortunate
speculations on a large scale, one being the purchase of the Colosseum
in the Regent's Park in 1831 for L40,000, and the other the erection of
the St James's theatre at a cost of L26,000 in 1836. In 1838 he sang the
part of William Tell at Drury Lane, and in 1839 the part of Don
Giovanni. His last public appearance was at a concert in March 1852. He
died on the 17th of February 1856. There is, perhaps, no other case upon
record in which a singer of the first rank enjoyed the use of his voice
so long; between Braham's first and last public appearances considerably
more than sixty years intervened, during forty of which he held the
undisputed supremacy alike in opera, oratorio and the concert-room.
Braham was the composer of a number of vocal pieces, which being sung by
himself had great temporary popularity, though they had little intrinsic
merit, and are now deservedly forgotten. A partial exception must be
made in favour of "The Death of Nelson," originally written in 1811 as a
portion of the opera _The American_; this still keeps its place as a
standard popular English song.
BRAHE, PER, COUNT (1602-1680), Swedish soldier and statesman, was born
on the island of Rydboholm, near Stockholm, on the 18th of February
1602. He was the grandson of Per Brahe (1520-1590), one of Gustavus I.'s
senators, created count of Visingsborg by Eric XIV., known also as the
continuator of Peder Svart's chronicle of Gustavus I., and author of
_Oeconomia_ (1585), a manual for young noblemen. Per Brahe the younger,
after completing his education by several years' travel abroad, became
in 1626 chamberlain to Gustavus Adolphus, whose lasting friendship he
gained. He fought with distinction in Prussia during the last three
years of the Polish War (1626-1629) and also, as colonel of a regiment
of horse, in 1630 in Germany. After the death of Gustavus Adolphus in
1632 his military yielded to his political activity. He had been elected
president (_Landsmarskalk_) of the diet of 1629, and in the following
year was created a senator (_Riksrad_). In 1635 he conducted the
negotiations for an armistice with Poland. In 1637-1640 and again in
1648-1654 he was governor-general in Finland, to which country he
rendered inestimable services by his wise and provident rule. He
reformed the whole administration, introduced a postal system, built ten
new towns, improved and developed commerce and agriculture, and very
greatly promoted education. In 1640 he opened the university of Abo, of
which he was the founder, and first chancellor. After the death of
Charles X. in 1660, Brahe, as _rikskansler_ or chancellor of Sweden,
became one of the regents of Sweden for the second time (he had held a
similar office during the minority of Christina, 1632-1644), and during
the difficult year 1660 he had entire control of both foreign and
domestic affairs. He died on the 2nd of September 1680, at his castle
at Visingsborg, where during his lifetime he had held more than regal
pomp.
His brother, NILS BRAHE (1604-1632), also served with distinction under
Gustavus Adolphus. He took part in the siege and capture of Riga in
1621, served with distinction in Poland (1626-1627) and assisted in the
defence of Stralsund in 1628. In 1630 he accompanied Gustavus into
Germany, and in 1631 was appointed colonel of "the yellow regiment," the
king's world-renowned life-guards, at the head of which he captured the
castle of Wurzburg on the 8th of October 1631. He took part in the long
duel between Gustavus and Wallenstein round Nuremberg as general of
infantry, and commanded the left wing at Lutzen (November 6, 1632),
where he was the only Swedish general officer present. At the very
beginning of the fight he was mortally wounded. The king regarded Brahe
as the best general in the Swedish army after Lennart Torstensen.
A direct descendant of Nils, MAGNUS BRAHE (1790-1844), fought in the
campaign of 1813-14, under the crown prince Bernadotte, with whom, after
his accession to the throne as Charles XIV., he was in high favour. He
became marshal of the kingdom, and, especially from 1828 onwards,
exercised a preponderant influence in public affairs.
See Martin Veibull, _Sveriges Storhetstid_, vol. iv. (Stockholm,
1881); _Letters to Axel Oxenstjerna_ (Swed.) 1832-1851 (Stockholm,
1890); Petrus Nordmann, _Per Brahe_ (Helsingfors, 1904). (R. N. B.)
BRAHE, TYCHO (1546-1601), Danish astronomer, was born on the 14th of
December 1546 at the family seat of Knudstrup in Scania, then a Danish
province. Of noble family, he was early adopted by his uncle, Jorgen
Brahe, who sent him, in April 1559, to study philosophy and rhetoric at
Copenhagen. The punctual occurrence at the predicted time, August 21st,
1560, of a total solar eclipse led him to regard astronomy as "something
divine"; he purchased the _Ephemerides_ of Johann Stadius (3rd ed.,
1570), and the works of Ptolemy in Latin, and gained some insight into
the theory of the planets. Entered as a law-student at the university of
Leipzig in 1562, he nevertheless secretly prosecuted celestial studies,
and began continuous observations with a globe, a pair of compasses and
a "cross-staff." He quitted Leipzig on the 17th of May 1565, but his
uncle dying a month later, he repaired to Wittenberg, and thence to
Rostock, where, in 1566, he lost his nose in a duel, and substituted an
artificial one made of a copper alloy. In 1569 he matriculated at
Augsburg, and devoted himself to chemistry for two years (1570-1572). On
his return to Denmark, in 1571, he was permitted by his maternal uncle,
Steno Belle, to instal a laboratory at his castle of Herritzvad, near
Knudstrup; and there, on the 11th of November 1572, he caught sight of
the famous "new star" in Cassiopeia. He diligently measured its
position, and printed an account of his observations in a tract entitled
_De Nova Stella_ (Copenhagen, 1573), a facsimile of which was produced
in 1901, as a tercentenary tribute to the author's memory.
Tycho's marriage with a peasant-girl in 1573 somewhat strained his
family relations. He delivered lectures in Copenhagen by royal command
in 1574; and in 1575 travelled through Germany to Venice. The execution
of his design to settle at Basel was, however, anticipated by the
munificence of Frederick II., king of Denmark, who bestowed upon him for
life the island of Hveen in the Sound, together with a pension of 500
thalers, a canonry in the cathedral of Roskilde, and the income of an
estate in Norway. The first stone of the magnificent observatory of
Uraniborg was laid on the 8th of August 1576; it received the finest
procurable instrumental outfit; and was the scene, during twenty-one
years, of Tycho's labours in systematically collecting materials--the
first made available since the Alexandrian epoch--for the correction of
astronomical theories. James VI. of Scotland, afterwards James I. of
England, visited him at Uraniborg on the 20th of March 1590. But by that
time his fortunes were on the wane; for Frederick II. died in 1588, and
his successor, Christian IV., was less tolerant of Tycho's arrogant and
insubordinate behaviour. His pension and fief having been withdrawn, he
sailed for Rostock in June 1597, and re-commenced observing before the
close of the year, in the castle of Wandsbeck near Hamburg. He spent
the following winter at Wittenberg, and reached Prague in June 1599,
well assured of favour and protection from the emperor Rudolph II. That
monarch, accordingly, assigned him the castle of Benatky for his
residence, with a pension of 3000 florins; his great instruments were
moved thither from Hveen, and Johannes Kepler joined him there in
January 1600. But this phase of renewed prosperity was brief. After
eleven days' illness, Tycho Brahe died on the 24th of October 1601, at
Benatky, and was buried in the Teynkirche, Prague.
Tycho's principal work, entitled _Astronomiae Instauratae Progymnasmata_
(2 vols., Prague, 1602-1603) was edited by Kepler. The first volume
treated of the motions of the sun and moon, and gave the places of 777
fixed stars (this number was increased to 1005 by Kepler in 1627 in the
"Rudolphine Tables"). The second, which had been privately printed at
Uraniborg in 1588 with the heading _De Mundi Aetherei recentioribus
Phaenomenis_, was mainly concerned with the comet of 1577, demonstrated
by Tycho from its insensible parallax to be no terrestrial exhalation,
as commonly supposed, but a body traversing planetary space. It
included, besides, an account of the Tychonic plan of the cosmos, in
which a _via media_ was sought between the Ptolemaic and Copernican
systems. The earth retained its immobility; but the five planets were
made to revolve round the sun, which, with its entire cortege, annually
circuited the earth, the sphere of the fixed stars performing meanwhile,
as of old, its all-inclusive diurnal rotation (see ASTRONOMY:
_History_). Under the heading _Astronomiae Instauratae Mechanica_, Tycho
published at Wandsbeck, in 1598, a description of his instruments,
together with an autobiographical account of his career and discoveries,
including the memorable one of the moon's "variation" (see MOON). The
book was reprinted at Nuremberg in 1602 (cf. Hasselberg,
_Vierteljahrsschrift Astr. Ges._ xxxix. iii. 180). His _Epistolae
Astronomicae_, printed at Uraniborg in 1596 with a portrait engraved by
Geyn of Amsterdam in 1586, were embodied in a complete edition of his
works issued at Frankfort in 1648. Tycho vastly improved the art of
astronomical observation. He constructed a table of refractions, allowed
for instrumental inaccuracies, and eliminated by averaging accidental
errors. He, moreover, corrected the received value of nearly every
astronomical quantity; but the theoretical purpose towards which his
practical reform was directed, was foiled by his premature death.
See J.L.E. Dreyer's _Tycho Brahe_ (Edinburgh, 1890), which gives full
and authentic information regarding his life and work. Also Gassendi's
_Vita_ (Paris, 1654); _Lebensbeschreibung_, collected from various
Danish sources, and translated into German by Philander von der
Weistritz (Copenhagen and Leipzig, 1756); _Tyge Brahe_, by F.R. Friis
(Copenhagen, 1871); _Prager Tychoniana_, collected by Dr F.I.
Studnicka (Prague, 1901), a description of the scanty Tychonian relics
which survived the Thirty Years' War and are still preserved at
Prague. (A. M. C.)
BRAHMAN, a Sanskrit noun-stem which, differently accented, yields in the
two nominatives _Brahma_ (neut.) and _Brahma_ (masc.), the names of two
deities which occupy prominent places in the orthodox system of Hindu
belief. Brahma (n.) is the designation generally applied to the Supreme
Soul (_paramatman_), or impersonal, all-embracing divine essence, the
original source and ultimate goal of all that exists; Brahma (m.), on
the other hand, is only one of the three hypostases of that divinity
whose creative activity he represents, as distinguished from its
preservative and destructive aspects, ever apparent in life and nature,
and represented by the gods Vishnu and Siva respectively. The history of
the two cognate names reflects in some measure the development of Indian
religious speculation generally.
The neuter term _brahma_ is used in the _Rigveda_ both in the abstract
sense of "devotion, worship," and in the concrete sense of "devotional
rite, prayer, hymn." The spirit of Vedic worship is pervaded by a devout
belief in the efficacy of invocation and sacrificial offering. The
earnest and well-expressed prayer or hymn of praise cannot fail to draw
the divine power to the worshipper and make it yield to his
supplication; whilst offerings, so far from being mere acts of devotion
calculated to give pleasure to the god, constitute the very food and
drink which render him vigorous and capable of battling with the enemies
of his mortal friend. It is this intrinsic power of fervent invocation
and worship which found an early expression in the term _brahma_; and
its independent existence as an active moral principle in shaping the
destinies of man became recognized in the Vedic pantheon in the
conception of a god _Brihaspati_ or _Brahmanaspati_, "lord of prayer or
devotion," the divine priest and the guardian of the pious worshipper.
By a natural extension of the original meaning, the term _brahma_, in
the sense of sacred utterance, was subsequently likewise applied to the
whole body of sacred writ, the _tri-vidya_ or "triple lore" of the Veda;
whilst it also came to be commonly used as the abstract designation of
the priestly function and the Brahmanical order generally, in the same
way as the term _kshatra_, "sway, rule," came to denote the aggregate of
functions and individuals of the Kshatriyas or Rajanyas, the nobility or
military class.
The universal belief in the efficacy of invocation as an indispensable
adjunct to sacrifices and religious rites generally, could not fail to
engender and maintain in the minds of the people feelings of profound
esteem and reverence towards those who possessed the divine gift of
inspired utterance, as well as for those who had acquired an intimate
knowledge of the approved forms of ritual worship. A common designation
of the priest is brahman (nom. _brahma_), originally denoting, it would
seem, "one who prays, a worshipper," perhaps also "the composer of a
hymn" (_brahman_, n.); and the same term came subsequently to be used
not only for one of the sacerdotal order generally, but also, and more
commonly, as the designation of a special class of priests who
officiated as superintendents during sacrificial performances, the
complicated nature of which required the co-operation of a whole staff
of priests, and who accordingly were expected to possess a competent
knowledge of the entire course of ritual procedure, including the
correct form and mystic import of the sacred texts to be repeated or
chanted by the several priests. The Brahman priest (_brahma_) being thus
the recognized head of the sacerdotal order (_brahma_), which itself is
the visible embodiment of sacred writ and the devotional spirit
pervading it (_brahma_), the complete realization of theocratic
aspirations required but a single step, which was indeed taken in the
theosophic speculations of the later Vedic poets and the authors of the
Brahmanas (q.v.), viz. the recognition of this abstract notion of the
Brahma as the highest cosmic principle and its identification with the
pantheistic conception of an all-pervading, self-existent spiritual
substance, the primary source of the universe; and subsequently coupled
therewith the personification of its creative energy in the form of
Brahma, the divine representative of the earthly priest, who was made to
take the place of the earlier conception of _Prajapati_, "the lord of
creatures" (see BRAHMANISM). By this means the very name of this god
expressed the essential oneness of his nature with that of the divine
spirit as whose manifestation he was to be considered. In the later
Vedic writings, especially the Brahmanas, however, Prajapati still
maintains throughout his position as the paramount personal deity; and
Brahma, in his divine capacity, is rather identified with Brihaspati,
the priest of the gods. Moreover, the exact relationship between
Prajapati and the Brahma (n.) is hardly as yet defined with sufficient
precision; it is rather one of simple identification: in the beginning
the Brahma was the All, and Prajapati is the Brahma. It is only in the
institutes of Manu, where we find the system of castes propounded in its
complete development, that Brahma has his definite place assigned to him
in the cosmogony. According to this work, the universe, before
undiscerned, was made discernible in the beginning by the sole,
self-existent lord Brahma (n.). He, desirous of producing different
beings from his own self, created the waters by his own thought, and
placed in them a seed which developed into a golden egg; therein was
born Brahma (m.), the parent of all the worlds; and thus "that which is
the undiscrete Cause, eternal, which is and is not, from it issued that
male who is called in the world Brahma." Having dwelt in that egg for a
year, that lord spontaneously by his own thought split that egg in two;
and from the two halves he fashioned the heaven and the earth, and in
the middle, the sky, and the eight regions (the points of the compass),
and the perpetual place of the waters. This theory of Brahma being born
from a golden egg is, however, a mere adaptation of the Vedic conception
of _Hiranya-garbha_ ("golden embryo"), who is represented as the supreme
god in a hymn of the tenth (and last) book of the _Rigveda_. Another
still later myth, which occurs in the epic poems, makes Brahma be born
from a lotus which grew out of the navel of the god Vishnu whilst
floating on the primordial waters. In artistic representations, Brahma
usually appears as a bearded man of red colour with four heads crowned
with a pointed, tiara-like head-dress, and four hands holding his
sceptre, or a sacrificial spoon, a bundle of leaves representing the
Veda, a bottle of water of the Ganges, and a string of beads or his bow
Parivita. His vehicle (_vahana_) is a goose or swan (_hamsa_), whence he
is also called _Hamsavhana_; and his consort is Sarasvati, the goddess
of learning.
One could hardly expect that a colourless deity of this description, so
completely the product of priestly speculation, could ever have found a
place in the hearts of the people generally, And indeed, whilst in
theoretic theology Brahma has retained his traditional place and
function down to our own days, his practical cult has at all times
remained extremely limited, the only temple dedicated to the worship of
this god being found at Pushkar (Pokhar) near Ajmir in Rajputana. On the
other hand, his divine substratum, the impersonal Brahma, the
world-spirit, the one and only reality, remains to this day the ultimate
element of the religious belief of intelligent India of whatever sect.
Being devoid of all attributes, it can be the object only of meditation,
not of practical devotional rites; and philosophy can only attempt to
characterize it in general and vague terms, as in the favourite formula
which makes it to be _sachchidananda_, i.e. being (_sat_), thinking
(_chit_), and bliss (_ananda_). (J. E.)
BRAHMANA, the Sanskrit term applied to a body of prose writings appended
to the collections (_samhita_) of Vedic texts, the meaning and ritual
application of which they are intended to elucidate, and like them
regarded as divinely revealed. From a linguistic point of view, these
treatises with their appendages, the more mystic and recondite Aranyakas
and the speculative Upanishads, have to be considered as forming the
connecting link between the Vedic and the classical Sanskrit. The exact
derivation and meaning of the name is somewhat uncertain. Whilst the
masculine term _brahmana_ (nom. _brahmanas_), the ordinary Sanskrit
designation of a man of the Brahmanical caste, is clearly a derivative
of _brahman_ (nom. _brahma_), a common Vedic term for a priest (see
BRAHMAN), thus meaning the son or descendant of a Brahman, the neuter
word _brahman_ (nom. _brahmanam_) on the other hand, with which we are
here concerned, admits of two derivations: either it is derived from the
same word _brahman_, and would then seem to mean a _dictum_ or
observation ascribed to, or intended for the use of, a Brahman, or
superintendent priest; or it has rather to be referred to the neuter
noun _brahman_ (nom. _brahma_), in the sense of "sacred utterance or
rite," in which case it might mean a comment on a sacred text, or
explanation of a devotional rite, calculated to bring out its spiritual
or mystic significance and its bearing on the Brahma, the world-spirit
embodied in the sacred writ and ritual. This latter definition seems on
the whole the more probable one, and it certainly would fit exactly the
character of the writings to which the term relates. It will thus be
seen that the term _brahmanam_ applies not only to complete treatises of
an exegetic nature, but also to single comments on particular texts or
rites of which such a work would be made up.
The gradual elaboration of the sacrificial ceremonial, as the
all-sufficient expression of religious devotion, and a constantly
growing tendency towards theosophic and mystic speculation on the
significance of every detail of the ritual, could not fail to create a
demand for explanatory treatises of this kind, which, to enhance their
practical utility, would naturally deal with the special texts and rites
assigned in the ceremonial to the several classes of officiating
priests. At a subsequent period the demand for instruction in the
sacrificial science called into existence a still more practical set of
manuals, the so-called _Kalpa-sutras_, or ceremonial rules, detailing,
in succinct aphorisms, the approved course of sacrificial procedure,
without reference to the supposed origin or import of the several rites.
These manuals are also called _Srauta-sutras_, treating as they do, like
the Brahmanas, of the Srauta rites--i.e. the rites based on the _sruti_
or revelation--requiring at least three sacrificial fires and a number
of priests, as distinguished from the _grihya_ (domestic) or _smarta_
(traditional) rites, supposed to be based on the _smriti_ or tradition,
which are performed on the house-fire and dealt with in the
_Grihya-sutras_.
The ritual recognizes four principal priests (_ritvij_), each of whom is
assisted by three subordinates: viz. the _Brahman_ or superintending
priest; the _Hotri_ or reciter of hymns and verses; the _Udgatri_ or
chanter; and the _Adhvaryu_ or offerer, who looks after the details of
the ceremonial, including the preparation of the offering-ground, the
construction of fire-places and altars, the making of oblations and
muttering of the prescribed formulae. Whilst the two last priests have
assigned to them special liturgical collections of the texts to be used
by them, the _Samaveda-samhita_ and _Yajurveda-samhita_ respectively,
the Hotri has to deal entirely with hymns and verses taken from the
_Rigveda-samhita_, of which they would, however, form only a
comparatively small portion. As regards the Brahman, he would doubtless
be chosen from one of those other three classes, but would be expected
to have made himself thoroughly conversant with the texts and ritual
details appertaining to all the officiating priests. It is, then, to one
or other of those three collections of sacred texts and the respective
class of priests, that the existing Brahmanas attach themselves. At a
later period, when the Atharvan gained admission to the Vedic canon, a
special connexion with the Brahman priest was sometimes claimed, though
with scant success, for this fourth collection of hymns and spells, and
the comparatively late and unimportant Gopatha-brahmana attached to it.
The Udgatri's duties being mainly confined to the chanting of hymns made
up of detached groups of verses of the _Rigveda_, as collected in the
Samaveda-samhita, the more important Brahmanas of this sacerdotal class
deal chiefly with the various modes of chanting, and the modifications
which the verses have to undergo in their musical setting. Moreover, the
performance of chants being almost entirely confined to the
Soma-sacrifice, it is only a portion, though no doubt the most important
portion, of the sacrificial ceremonial that enters into the subject
matter of the Samaveda Brahmamas.
As regards the Brahmanas of the _Rigveda_, two of such works have
been handed down, the _Aitareya_ and the _Kaushitaki_ (or
_Sankhayana)-Brahmanas_, which have a large amount of their material in
common. But while the former work (transl. into English by M. Haug) is
mainly taken up with the Soma-sacrifice, the latter has in addition
thereto chapters on the other forms of sacrifice. Being intended for the
Hotri's use, both these works treat exclusively of the hymns and verses
recited by that priest and his assistants, either in the form of
connected litanies or in detached verses invoking the deities to whom
oblations are made, or uttered in response to the solemn hymns chanted
by the Udgatris.
It is, however, to the Brahmanas and Sutras of the _Yajurveda_, dealing
with the ritual of the real offering-priest, the Adhvaryu, that we have
to turn for a connected view of the sacrificial procedure in all its
material details. Now, in considering the body of writings connected
with this Veda, we are at once confronted by the fact that there are two
different schools, an older and a younger one, in which the traditional
body of ritualistic matter has been treated in a very different way. For
while the younger school, the _Vajasaneyins_, have made a clear
severance between the sacred texts or mantras and the exegetic
discussions thereon--as collected in the _Vajasaneyi-samhita_ and the
_Satapatha-Brahmana_ (trans. by J. Eggeling, in _Sacred Books of the
East_) respectively--arranged systematically in accordance with the
ritual divisions, the older school on the other hand present their
materials in a hopelessly jumbled form; for not only is each type of
sacrifice not dealt with continuously and in orderly fashion, but short
textual sections of mantras are constantly followed immediately by their
dogmatic exegesis; the term _brahmana_ thus applying in their case only
to these detached comments and not to the connected series of them. Thus
the most prominent subdivision of the older school, the _Taittiriyas_,
in their _Samhita_, have treated the main portion of the ceremonial in
this promiscuous fashion, and to add to the confusion they have, by way
of supplement, put forth a so-called _Taittiriya-brahmana_, which, so
far from being a real Brahmana, merely deals with some additional rites
in the same confused mixture of sacrificial formulae and dogmatic
explanations. It is not without reason, therefore, that those two
schools, the older and the younger, are commonly called the Black
(_krishna_) and the White (_sukla_) Yajus respectively.
Although the ritualistic discussions of the Brahmanas are for the most
part of a dry and uninteresting nature to an even greater degree than is
often the case with exegetic theological treatises, these works are
nevertheless of considerable importance both as regards the history of
Indian institutions and as "the oldest body of Indo-European prose, of a
generally free, vigorous, simple form, affording valuable glimpses
backwards at the primitive condition of unfettered Indo-European talk"
(Whitney). Of especial interest in this respect are the numerous myths
and legends scattered through these works. From the archaic style in
which these mythological tales are usually composed, as well as from the
fact that not a few of them are found in Brahmanas of different schools
and Vedas, though often with considerable variations, it seems pretty
evident that the groundwork of them must go back to times preceding the
composition or final redaction of the existing Brahmanas. In the case of
some of these legends--as those of Sunah-Sepha, and the fetching of Soma
from heaven--we can even see how they have grown out of germs contained
in some of the Vedic hymns. If the literary style in which the exegetic
discussion of the texts and rites is carried on in the Brahmanas is, as
a rule, of a very bald and uninviting nature, it must be borne in mind
that these treatises are of a strictly professional and esoteric
character, and in no way lay claim to being considered as literary
compositions in any sense of the word. And yet, notwithstanding the
general emptiness of their ritualistic discussions and mystic
speculations, "there are passages in the Brahmanas full of genuine
thought and feeling, and most valuable as pictures of life, and as
records of early struggles, which have left no trace in the literature
of other nations" (M. Muller).
The chief interest, however, attaching to the Brahmanas is doubtless
their detailed description of the sacrificial system as practised in the
later Vedic ages; and the information afforded by them in this respect
should be all the more welcome to us, as the history of religious
institutions knows of no other sacrificial ceremonial with the details
of which we are acquainted to anything like the same extent. An even
more complete and minutely detailed view of the sacrificial system is no
doubt obtained from the ceremonial manuals, the Kalpa-sutras; but it is
just by the speculative discussions of the Brahmanas--the mystic
significance and symbolical colouring with which they invest single
rites--that we gain a real insight into the nature and gradual
development of this truly stupendous system of ritual worship.
The sacrificial ritual recognizes two kinds of _srauta_ sacrifices, viz.
_haviryajnas_ (meat-offerings), consisting of oblations (_ishti_) of
milk, butter, cereals or flesh, and _somayagas_ or oblations of the
juice of the soma plant. The setting up, by a householder, of a set of
three sacrificial fires of his own constitutes the first ceremony of the
former class, the _Agny-adhana_ (or (?) _Agny-adheya_). The first of the
three fires laid down is the _garhapatya_, or householder's fire, so
called because, though not taken from his ordinary house-fire, but as a
rule specially produced by friction, it serves for cooking the
sacrificial food, and thus, as it were, represents the domestic fire.
From it the other two fires, the _anavaniya_, or offering fire, and the
_dakshinagni_, or southern fire, used for certain special purposes, are
taken. The principal other ceremonies of this class are the new and full
moon offerings, the oblations made at the commencement of the three
seasons, the offering of first-fruits, the animal sacrifice, and the
_Agnihotra_, or daily morning and evening oblation of milk, which,
however, is also included amongst the _grihya_, or domestic rites, as
having to be performed daily on the domestic fire by the householder who
keeps no regular set of sacrificial fires.
Of a far more complicated nature than these offerings are the
Soma-sacrifices, which, besides the simpler ceremonies of this class,
such as the _Agnishtoma_ or "Praise of Agni," also include great state
functions, such as the _Rajasuya_ or consecration of a king, and the
_Asvamedha_ or horse-sacrifice, which, in addition to the sacrificial
rites, have a considerable amount of extraneous, often highly
interesting, ceremonial connected with them, which makes them seem to
partake largely of the nature of public festivals. Whilst the oblations
of Soma-juice, made thrice on each offering-day, amidst chants and
recitations, constitute the central rites of those services, their
ritual also requires numerous single oblations of the _ishti_ kind,
including at least three animal offerings, and in some cases the
immolation of many hecatombs of victims. Moreover, a necessary
preliminary to every Soma-sacrifice is the construction, in five layers,
of a special fire-altar of large dimensions, consisting of thousands of
bricks, formed and baked on the spot, to each, or each group, of which a
special symbolic meaning is attached. The building of this altar is
spread over a whole year, during which period the sacrificer has to
carry about the sacrificial fire in an earthen pan for at least some
time each day, until it is finally deposited on the completed altar to
serve as the offering-fire for the Soma oblations. The altar itself is
constructed in the form of a bird, because Soma was supposed to have
been brought down from heaven by the metre Gayatri which had assumed the
form of an eagle. Whilst the Soma-sacrifice has been thus developed by
the Brahmanas in an extraordinary degree, its essential identity with
the Avestan Haoma-cult shows that its origin goes back at all events to
the Indo-Iranian period.
Among the symbolic conceits in which the authors of the Brahmanas so
freely indulge, there is one overshadowing all others--if indeed they do
not all more or less enter into it--which may be considered as the sum
and substance of these speculations, and the esoteric doctrine of the
sacrifice, involved by the Brahmanical ritualists. This is what may
conveniently be called the Prajapati theory, by which the "Lord of
Creatures," the efficient cause of the universe, is identified with both
the sacrifice (_yajna_) and the sacrificer (_yajamana_). The origin of
this theory goes back to the later Vedic hymns. In the so-called
Purusha-sukta (_Rigv._ x. 90) in which the supreme spirit is conceived
of as _the_ person or man (_purusha_), born in the beginning, and
consisting of "whatever hath been and whatever shall be," the creation
of the visible and invisible universe is represented as originating from
an "all-offered" (holocaust) sacrifice in which the Purusha himself
forms the offering-material (_havis_), or, as we might say, the victim.
In this primeval, or rather timeless because ever-proceeding, sacrifice,
time itself, in the shape of its unit the year, is made to take its
part, inasmuch as the three seasons--spring, summer and autumn--of which
it consists, constitute the ghee (clarified butter), the offering-fuel
and the oblation respectively. These speculations may be said to have
formed the foundation on which the theory of the sacrifice, as
propounded in the Brahmanas, has been reared. Prajapati--who (probably
for practical considerations, as better representing the sacrificer, the
earthly ruler, or "lord of the creatures") here takes the place of the
Purusha, the world-man or all-embracing personality--is offered up anew
in every sacrifice; and inasmuch as the very dismemberment of the lord
of creatures, which took place at that archtypal sacrifice, was in
itself the creation of the universe, so every sacrifice is also a
repetition of that first creative act. Thus the periodical sacrifice is
nothing else than a microcosmic representation of the ever-proceeding
destruction and renewal of all cosmic life and matter. The ritualistic
theologians, however, go an important step further by identifying
Prajapati with the performer, or patron, of the sacrifice, the
sacrificer; every sacrifice thus becoming invested--in addition to its
cosmic significance--with the mystic power of regenerating the
sacrificer by cleansing him of all guilt and securing for him a seat in
the eternal abodes.
Whilst forming the central feature of the ritualistic symbolism, this
triad--Prajapati, sacrifice (oblation, victim), sacrificer--is extended
in various ways. An important collateral identification is that of
Prajapati (and the sacrificer) with Agni, the god of fire, embodied not
only in the offering-fire, but also in the sacred Soma-altar, the
technical name of which is _agni_. For this reason the altar, as
representative of the universe, is built in five layers, representing
earth, air and heaven, and the intermediate regions; and in the centre
of the altar-site, below the first layer, on a circular gold plate (the
sun), a small golden man (_purusha_) is laid down with his face looking
upwards. This is Prajapati, and the sacrificer, who when regenerated
will pass upwards through the three worlds to the realms of light,
naturally perforated bricks being for this purpose placed in the middle
of the three principal altar-layers. One of the fourteen sections of the
Satapatha-brahmana, the tenth, called _Agni-rahasya_ or "the mystery
of Agni (the god and altar)," is entirely devoted to this feature of the
sacrificial symbolism. Similarly the sacrificer, as the human
representatiye of the Lord of Creatures, is identified with Soma (as the
supreme oblation), with Time, and finally with Death: by the sacrificer
thus becoming Death himself, the fell god ceases to have power over him
and he is assured of everlasting life. And now we get the Supreme Lord
in his last aspect; nay, his one true and real aspect, in which the
sacrificer, on shuffling off this mortal coil, will himself come to
share--that of pure intellectuality, pure spirituality--he is Mind: such
is the ultimate source of being, the one Self, the Purusha, the Brahman.
As the sum total of the wisdom propounded in the mystery of Agni, the
searcher after truth is exhorted to meditate on that Self, made up of
intelligence, endowed with a body of spirit, a form of light, and of an
ethereal nature; holding sway over all the regions and pervading this
All, being itself speechless and devoid of mental states; and by so
doing he shall gain the assurance that "even as a grain of rice, or the
smallest granule of millet, so is the golden Purusha in my heart; even
as a smokeless light, it is greater than the sky, greater than the
ether, greater than the earth, greater than all existing things;--that
Self of the Spirit is my Self; on passing away from hence, I shall
obtain that Self. And, verily, whosoever has this trust, for him there
is no uncertainty." (J. E.)
BRAHMANISM, a term commonly used to denote a system of religious
institutions originated and elaborated by the _Brahmans_, the sacerdotal
and, from an early period, the dominant caste of the Hindu community
(see BRAHMAN). In like manner, as the language of the Aryan Hindus has
undergone continual processes of modification and dialectic division, so
their religious belief has passed through various stages of development
broadly distinguished from one another by certain prominent features.
The earliest phases of religious thought in India of which a clear idea
can now be formed are exhibited in a body of writings, looked upon by
later generations in the light of sacred writ, under the collective name
of _Veda_ ("knowledge") or _Sruti_ ("revelation"). The Hindu scriptures
consist of four separate collections, or _Samhitas_, of sacred texts, or
_mantras_, including hymns, incantations and sacrificial forms of
prayer, viz. the _Rich_ (nom. sing. _rik_) or _Rigveda_, the _Saman_ or
_Samaveda_, the _Yajus_ or _Yajurveda_, and the _Atharvan_ or
_Atharvaveda_. Each of these four text-books has attached to it a body
of prose writings, called _Brahmanas_ (see BRAHMANA), intended to
explain the ceremonial application of the texts and the origin and
import of the sacrificial rites for which these were supposed to have
been composed. Usually attached to these works, and in some cases to the
Samhitas, are two kinds of appendages, the Aranyakas and Upanishads, the
former of which deal generally with the more recondite rites, while the
latter are taken up chiefly with speculations on the problems of the
universe and the religious aims of man--subjects often touched upon in
the earlier writings, but here dealt with in a more mature and
systematic way. Two of the _Samhitas_, the _Saman_ and the _Yajus_,
owing their existence to purely ritual purposes, and being, besides, the
one almost entirely, the other partly, composed of verses taken from the
_Rigveda_, are only of secondary importance for our present inquiry. The
hymns of the _Rigveda_ constitute the earliest lyrical effusions of the
Aryan settlers in India which have been handed down to posterity. They
are certainly not all equally old; on the contrary they evidently
represent the literary activity of many generations of bards, though
their relative age cannot as yet be determined with anything like
certainty. The tenth (and last) book of the collection, however, at any
rate has all the characteristics of a later appendage, and in language
and spirit many of its hymns approach very nearly to the level of the
contents of the _Atharvan_. Of the latter collection about one-sixth is
found also in the _Rigveda_, and especially in the tenth book; the
larger portion peculiar to it, though including no doubt some older
pieces, appears to owe its origin to an age not long anterior to the
composition of the _Brahmanas_.
The state of religious thought among the ancient bards, as reflected in
the hymns of the _Rigveda_, is that of a worship of the grand and
striking phenomena of nature regarded in the light of personal conscious
beings, endowed with a power beyond the control of man, though not
insensible to his praises and actions. It is a nature worship purer than
that met with in any other polytheistic form of belief we are acquainted
with--a mythology still comparatively little affected by those
systematizing tendencies which, in a less simple and primitive state of
thought, lead to the construction of a well-ordered pantheon and a
regular organization of divine government. To the mind of the early
Vedic worshipper the various departments of the surrounding nature are
not as yet clearly defined, and the functions which he assigns to their
divine representatives continually flow into one another. Nor has he yet
learned to care to determine the relative worth and position of the
objects of his adoration; but the temporary influence of the phenomenon
to which he addresses his praises bears too strongly upon his mind to
allow him for the time to consider the claims of rival powers to which
at other times he is wont to look up with equal feelings of awe and
reverence. It is this immediateness of impulse under which the human
mind in its infancy strives to give utterance to its emotions that
imparts to many of its outpourings the ring of monotheistic fervour.
The generic name given to these impersonations, viz. _deva_ ("the
shining ones"), points to the conclusion, sufficiently justified by the
nature of the more prominent objects of Vedic adoration as well as by
common natural occurrences, that it was the striking phenomena of light
which first and most powerfully swayed the Aryan mind. In the primitive
worship of the manifold phenomena of nature it is not, of course, so
much their physical aspect that impresses the human heart as the moral
and intellectual forces which are supposed to move and animate them. The
attributes and relations of some of the Vedic deities, in accordance
with the nature of the objects they represent, partake in a high degree
of this spiritual element; but it is not improbable that in an earlier
phase of Aryan worship the religious conceptions were pervaded by it to
a still greater and more general extent, and that the Vedic belief,
though retaining many of the primitive features, has on the whole
assumed a more sensuous and anthropomorphic character. This latter
element is especially predominant in the attributes and imagery applied
by the Vedic poets to _Indra_, the god of the atmospheric region, the
favourite figure in their pantheon.
While the representatives of the prominent departments of nature appear
to the Vedic bard as co-existing in a state of independence of one
another, their relation to the mortal worshipper being the chief subject
of his anxiety, a simple method of classification was already resorted
to at an early time, consisting in a triple division of the deities into
gods residing in the sky, in the air, and on earth. It is not, however,
until a later stage,--the first clear indication being conveyed in a
passage of the tenth book of the _Rigveda_--that this attempt at a
polytheistic system is followed up by the promotion of one particular
god to the dignity of chief guardian for each of these three regions. On
the other hand, a tendency is clearly traceable in some of the hymns
towards identifying gods whose functions present a certain degree of
similarity of nature; attempts which would seem to show a certain
advance of religious reflection, the first steps from polytheism towards
a comprehension of the unity of the divine essence. Another feature of
the old Vedic worship tended to a similar result. The great problems of
the origin and existence of man and the universe had early begun to
engage the Hindu mind; and in celebrating the praises of the gods the
poet was frequently led by his religious, and not wholly disinterested,
zeal to attribute to them cosmical functions of the very highest order.
At a later stage of thought, chiefly exhibited in the tenth book of the
_Rigveda_ and in the _Atharvaveda_, inquiring sages could not but
perceive the inconsistency of such concessions of a supremacy among the
divine rulers, and tried to solve the problem by conceptions of an
independent power, endowed with all the attributes of a supreme deity,
the creator of the universe, including the gods of the pantheon. The
names under which this monotheistic idea is put forth are mostly of an
attributive character, and indeed some of them, such as _Prajapati_
("lord of creatures"), _Visvakarman_ ("all-worker"), occur in the
earlier hymns as mere epithets of particular gods. But to other minds
this theory of a personal creator left many difficulties unsolved. They
saw, as the poets of old had seen, that everything around them, that man
himself, was directed by some inward agent; and it needed but one step
to perceive the essential sameness of these spiritual units, and to
recognize their being but so many individual manifestations of one
universal principle or spiritual essence. Thus a pantheistic conception
was arrived at, put forth under various names, such as _Purusha_
("soul"), _Kama_ ("desire"), _Brahman_ (neutr.; nom. sing. _brahma_)
("devotion, prayer"). Metaphysical and theosophic speculations were thus
fast undermining the simple belief in the old gods, until, at the time
of the composition of the _Brahmanas_ and _Upanishads_, we find them in
complete possession of the minds of the theologians. Whilst the theories
crudely suggested in the later hymns are now further matured and
elaborated, the tendency towards catholicity of formula favours the
combination of the conflicting monotheistic and pantheistic conceptions;
this compromise, which makes _Prajapati_, the personal creator of the
world, the manifestation of the impersonal _Brahma_, the universal
self-existent soul, leads to the composite pantheistic system which
forms the characteristic dogma of the Brahmanical period (see BRAHMAN).