[1] Referring to the Japanese custom of employing a go-between to
arrange a marriage.
[2] These details are taken from _The Bonin Islands_ by Russell
Robertson, formerly H.B.M. consul in Yokohama, who visited the
islands in 1875.
BONITZ, HERMANN (1814-1888), German scholar, was born at Langensalza in
Saxony on the 29th of July 1814. Having studied at Leipzig under G.
Hermann and at Berlin under Bockh and Lachmann, he became successively
teacher at the Blochmann institute in Dresden (1836), Oberlehrer at the
Friedrich-Wilhelms gymnasium (1838) and the Graues Kloster (1840) in
Berlin, professor at the gymnasium at Stettin (1842), professor at the
university of Vienna (1849), member of the imperial academy (1854),
member of the council of education (1864), and director of the Graues
Kloster gymnasium (1867). He retired in 1888, and died on the 25th of
July in that year at Berlin. He took great interest in higher education,
and was chiefly responsible for the system of teaching and examination
in use in the high schools of Prussia after 1882. But it is as a
commentator on Plato and Aristotle that he is best known outside
Germany. His most important works in this connexion are: _Disputationes
Platonicae Duae_ (1837); _Platonische Studien_ (3rd ed., 1886);
_Observations Criticae in Aristotelis Libros Metaphysicos_ (1842);
_Observationes Criticae in Aristotelis quae feruntur Magna Moralia et
Ethica Eudemia_ (1844); _Alexandri Aphrodisiensis Commentarius in Libras
Metaphysicos Aristotelis_ (1847); _Aristotelis Metaphysica_ (1848-1849);
_Uber die Kategorien des A._ (1853); _Aristotelische Studien_
(1862-1867); _Index Aristotelicus_ (1870). Other works: _Uber den
Ursprung der homerischen Gedichte_ (5th ed., 1881); _Beitrage zur
Erklarung des Thukydides_ (1854), _des Sophokles_ (1856-1857). He also
wrote largely on classical and educational subjects, mainly for the
_Zeitschrift fur die osterreichischen Gymnasien_.
A full list of his writings is given in the obituary notice by T.
Gompertz in the _Biographisches Jahrbuch fur Altertumskunde_ (1890).
BONIVARD, FRANCOIS (1493-1570), the hero of Byron's poem, _The Prisoner
of Chillon_, was born at Seyssel of an old Savoyard family. Bonivard has
been described as "a man of the Renaissance who had strayed into the age
of the Reformation." His real character and history are, however, widely
different from the legendary account which was popularized by Byron. In
1510 he succeeded his uncle, who had educated him, as prior of the
Cluniac priory of St Victor, close to Geneva. He naturally, therefore,
opposed the attempts of the duke of Savoy, aided by his relative, the
bishop of the city, to maintain his rights as lord of Geneva. He was
imprisoned by the duke at Gex from 1519 to 1521, lost his priory, and
became more and more anti-Savoyard. In 1530 he was again seized by the
duke and imprisoned for four years underground, in the castle of
Chillon, till he was released in 1536 by the Bernese, who then wrested
Vaud from the duke. He had been imprisoned for political reasons, for he
did not become a Protestant till after his release, and then found that
his priory had been destroyed in 1534. He obtained a pension from
Geneva, and was four times married, but owing to his extravagances was
always in debt. He was officially entrusted in 1542 with the task of
compiling a history of Geneva from the earliest times. In 1551 his MS.
of the _Chroniques de Geneve_ (ending in 1530) was submitted to Calvin
for correction, but it was not published till 1831. The best edition is
that of 1867. The work is uncritical and partial, but is his best title
to fame.
BONN, a town of Germany, in the Prussian Rhine province, on the left
bank of the Rhine, 15 m. S. by E. from Cologne, on the main line of
railway to Mainz, and at the junction of the lines to the Eifel and (by
ferry) to the right bank of the Rhine. Pop. (1885) 35,989; (1905)
81,997. The river is here crossed by a fine bridge (1896-1898), 1417 ft.
in length, flanked by an embankment 2 m. long, above and parallel with
which is the Coblenzer-strasse, with beautiful villas and pretty gardens
reaching down to the Rhine. The central part of the town is composed of
narrow streets, but the outskirts contain numerous fine buildings, and
the appearance of the town from the river is attractive. There are six
Roman Catholic and two Protestant churches, the most important of which
is the Munster (minster), an imposing edifice of grey stone, in the
Romanesque and Transition styles, surmounted by five towers, of which
the central, rising to a height of 315 ft., is a landmark in the Rhine
valley. The church dates from the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries, was
restored in 1875 and following years and in 1890-1894 was adorned with
paintings. Among other churches are the Stiftskirche (monasterial
church), rebuilt 1879-1884; the Jesuitenkirche (1693); the
Minoritenkirche (1278-1318), the Herz Jesu-kirche (1862) and the
Marienkirche (1892). There is also a synagogue, and the university
chapel serves as an English church. The town also possesses a town hall
situate on the market square and dating from 1737, a fine block of
law-court buildings, several high-grade schools and a theatre.
By far the finest of the buildings, however, is the famous university,
which occupies the larger part of the southern frontage of the town. The
present establishment only dates from 1818, and owes its existence to
King Frederick William III. of Prussia; but as early as 1786 the academy
which had been founded about nine years before was raised by Archbishop
Maximilian Frederick of Cologne to the rank of a university, and
continued to exercise its functions till 1794, when it was dissolved by
the last elector. The building now occupied by the university was
originally the electoral palace, constructed about 1717 out of the
materials of the old fortifications. It was remodelled after the town
came into Prussian possession. There are five faculties in the
university--a legal, a medical, and a philosophic, and one of Roman
Catholic and another Protestant theology. The library numbers upwards of
230,000 volumes; and the antiquarian museum contains a valuable
collection of Roman relics discovered in the neighbourhood. Connected
with the university are also physiological, pathological and chemical
institutes, five clinical departments and a laboratory. An academy of
agriculture, with a natural history museum and botanic garden attached,
is established in the palace of Clemensruhe at Poppelsdorf, which is
reached by a fine avenue about a mile long, bordered on both sides by a
double row of chestnut trees. A splendid observatory, long under the
charge of Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander, stands on the south side of the
road. The Roman Catholic archiepiscopal theological college, beautifully
situated on an eminence overlooking the Rhine, dates from 1892.
Beethoven was born in Bonn, and a statue was erected to him in the
Munster-platz in 1845. B.G. Niebuhr is buried in the cemetery outside of
the Sterntor, where a monument was placed to his memory by Frederick
William IV. Here are also the tombs of A.W. von Schlegel, the
diplomatist Christian Karl von Bunsen, Robert Schumann, Karl Simrock,
E.M. Arndt and Schiller's wife. The town is adorned with a marble
monument commemorating the war of 1870-71, a handsome fountain, and a
statue of the Old Catholic bishop Reinkens. In 1889 a museum of
Beethoven relics was opened in the house in which the composer was born.
There are further a municipal museum, arranged in a private house since
1882, an academic art museum (1884), with some classic originals, a
creation of F.G. Welcker, and the provincial museum, standing near the
railway station, which contains a collection of medieval stone monuments
and works of art, besides a small picture gallery.
One of the most conspicuous features of Bonn, viewed from the river, is
the pilgrimage (monastic) church of Kreuzberg (1627), behind and above
Poppelsdorf; it has a flight of 28 steps, which pilgrims used to ascend
on their knees. "Der alte Zoll," commanding a magnificent view of the
Siebengebirge, is the only remaining bulwark of the old fortifications,
the Sterntor having been removed in order to open up better
communication with the rapidly increasing western suburbs and the
terminus of the light railway to Cologne.
But for its university Bonn would be a place of comparatively little
importance, its trade and commerce being of moderate dimensions. Its
principal industries are jute spinning and weaving, and the manufacture
of porcelain, flags, machinery and beer, and it has some trade in wine.
There are considerable numbers of foreign residents, notably English,
attracted by the natural beauty of the place and by the educational
facilities it affords.
Bonn (_Bonna_ or _Castra Bonnensia_), originally a town of the Ubii,
became at an early period the site of a Roman military settlement, and
as such is frequently mentioned by Tacitus. It was the scene, in A.D.
70, of a battle in which the Romans were defeated by Claudius Civilis,
the valiant leader of the Batavians. Greatly reduced by successive
barbarian inroads, it was restored about 359 by the emperor Julian. In
the centuries that followed the break-up of the Roman empire it again
suffered much from barbarian attacks, and was finally devastated in 889
by bands of Norse raiders who had sailed up the Rhine. It was again
fortified by Konrad von Hochstaden, archbishop of Cologne (1238-1261),
whose successor, Engelbert von Falkenburg (d. 1274), driven out of his
cathedral city by the townspeople, established himself here (1265); from
which time until 1794 it remained the residence of the electors of
Cologne. During the various wars that devastated Germany in the 16th,
17th and 18th centuries, the town was frequently besieged and occupied
by the several belligerents, but continued to belong to the electors
till 1794, when the French took possession of it. At the peace of
Luneville they were formally recognized in their occupation; but in 1815
the town was made over by the congress of Vienna to Prussia. The
fortifications had been dismantled in 1717.
See F. Ritter, _Entstehung der drei altesten Stadte am Rhein: Koln,
Bonn und Mainz_ (Bonn, 1851); H. von Sybel, _Die Grundung der
Universitat Bonn_ (1868); and _Fuhrer von Hesse_ (10th ed., 1901).
BONNAT, LEON JOSEPH FLORENTIN (1833- ), French painter, was born at
Bayonne on the 20th of June 1833. He was educated in Spain, under
Madrazo at Madrid, and his long series of portraits shows the influence
of Velasquez and the Spanish realists. In 1869 he won a medal of honour
at Paris, where he became one of the leading artists of his day, and in
1888 he became professor of painting at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. In May
1905 he succeeded Paul Dubois as director. His vivid portrait-painting
is his most characteristic work, but his subject pictures, such as the
"Martyrdom of St Denis" in the Pantheon, are also famous.
BONNE-CARRERE, GUILLAUME DE (1754-1825), French diplomatist, was born at
Muret in Languedoc on the 13th of February 1754. He began his career in
the army, but soon entered the diplomatic service under Vergennes. A
friend of Mirabeau and of Dumouriez, he became very active at the
Revolution, and Dumouriez re-established for him the title of
director-general of the department of foreign affairs (March 1792). He
remained at the ministry, preserving the habits of the diplomacy of the
old regime, until December 1792, when he was sent to Belgium as agent of
the republic, but he was involved in the treason of Dumouriez and was
arrested on the 2nd of April 1793. To justify himself, he published an
account of his conduct from the beginning of the Revolution. He was
freed from prison in July 1794. Napoleon did not trust him, and gave him
only some unimportant missions. After 1815 Bonne-Carrere retired into
private life, directing a profitable business in public carriages
between Paris and Versailles.
BONNER, EDMUND (1500?-1569), bishop of London, was perhaps the natural
son of George Savage, rector of Davenham, Cheshire, by Elizabeth
Frodsham, who was afterwards married to Edmund Bonner, a sawyer of
Hanley in Worcestershire. This account, which was printed with many
circumstantial details by Strype (_Eccles. Mem._ III. i. 172-173), was
disputed by Strype's contemporary, Sir Edmund Lechmere, who asserted on
not very satisfactory evidence (_ib. Annals_, I. ii. 300)that Bonner was
of legitimate birth. He was educated at Broadgates Hall, now Pembroke
College, Oxford, graduating bachelor of civil and canon law in June
1519. He was ordained about the same time, and admitted D.C.L. in 1525.
In 1529 he was Wolsey's chaplain, and he was with the cardinal at Cawood
at the time of his arrest. Subsequently he was transferred, perhaps
through Cromwell's influence, to the service of the king, and in January
1532 he was sent to Rome to obstruct the judicial proceedings against
Henry in the papal curia. In October 1533 he was entrusted with the
unmannerly task of intimating to Clement VII., while he was the guest of
Francis I. at Marseilles, Henry's appeal from the pope to a general
council; but there seems to be no good authority for Burnet's story that
Clement threatened to have him burnt alive. For these and other services
Bonner had been rewarded by the grant of several livings, and in 1535 he
was made archdeacon of Leicester.
Towards the end of that year he was sent to further what he called "the
cause of the Gospel" (_Letters and Papers_, 1536, No. 469) in North
Germany; and in 1536 he wrote a preface to Gardiner's _De vera
Obedientia_, which asserted the royal, denied the papal, supremacy, and
was received with delight by the Lutherans. After a brief embassy to the
emperor in the spring of 1538, Bonner superseded Gardiner at Paris, and
began his mission by sending Cromwell a long list of accusations against
his predecessor (_ib_. 1538, ii. 144). He was almost as bitter against
Wyatt and Mason, whom he denounced as a "papist," and the violence of
his conduct led Francis I. to threaten him with a hundred strokes of the
halberd. He seems, however, to have pleased his patron, Cromwell, and
perhaps Henry, by his energy in seeing the king's "Great" Bible in
English through the press in Paris. He was already king's chaplain; his
appointment at Paris had been accompanied by promotion to the see of
Hereford, and before he returned to take possession he was translated to
the bishopric of London (October 1539).
Hitherto Bonner had been known as a somewhat coarse and unscrupulous
tool of Cromwell, a sort of ecclesiastical Wriothesley, He is not known
to have protested against any of the changes effected by his masters; he
professed to be no theologian, and was wont, when asked theological
questions, to refer his interrogators to the divines. He had graduated
in law, and not in theology. There was nothing in the Reformation to
appeal to him, except the repudiation of papal control; and he was one
of those numerous Englishmen whose views were faithfully reflected in
the Six Articles. He became a staunch Conservative, and, apart from his
embassy to the emperor in 1524-1543, was mainly occupied during the last
years of Henry's reign in brandishing the "whip with six strings."
The accession of Edward VI opened a fresh and more creditable chapter in
Bonner's career. Like Gardiner, he could hardly repudiate that royal
supremacy, in the establishment of which he had been so active an agent;
but he began to doubt that supremacy when he saw to what uses it could
be put by a Protestant council, and either he or Gardiner evolved the
theory that the royal supremacy was in abeyance during a royal minority.
The ground was skilfully chosen, but it was not legally nor
constitutionally tenable. Both he and Gardiner had in fact sought fresh
licences to exercise their ecclesiastical jurisdiction from the young
king; and, if he was supreme enough to confer jurisdiction, he was
supreme enough to issue the injunctions and order the visitation to
which Bonner objected. Moreover, if a minority involved an abeyance of
the royal supremacy in the ecclesiastical sphere, it must do the same in
the temporal sphere, and there could be nothing but anarchy. It was on
this question that Bonner came into conflict with Edward's government.
He resisted the visitation of August 1547, and was committed to the
Fleet; but he withdrew his opposition, and was released in time to take
an active part against the government in the parliament of November
1547. In the next session, November 1548-March 1549, he was a leading
opponent of the first Act of Uniformity and Book of Common Prayer. When
these became law, he neglected to enforce them, and on the 1st of
September 1549 he was required by the council to maintain at St Paul's
Cross that the royal authority was as great as if the king were forty
years of age. He failed to comply, and after a seven days' trial he was
deprived of his bishopric by an ecclesiastical court over which Cranmer
presided, and was sent to the Marshalsea. The fall of Somerset in the
following month raised Bonner's hopes, and he appealed from Cranmer to
the council. After a struggle the Protestant faction gained the upper
hand, and on the 7th of February 1550 Bonner's deprivation was confirmed
by the council sitting in the Star Chamber, and he was further condemned
to perpetual imprisonment.
He was released by Mary's accession, and was at once restored to his
see, his deprivation being regarded as invalid and Ridley as an
intruder. He vigorously restored Roman Catholicism in his diocese, made
no difficulty about submitting to the papal jurisdiction which he had
forsworn, and in 1555 began the persecution to which he owes his fame.
His apologists explain that his action was merely "official," but Bonner
was one of those who brought it to pass that the condemnation of
heretics to the fire should be part of his ordinary official duties. The
enforcement of the first Book of Common Prayer had also been part of his
official duties; and the fact that Bonner made no such protest against
the burning of heretics as he had done in the former case shows that he
found it the more congenial duty. Tunstal was as good a Catholic as
Bonner; he left a different repute behind him, a clear enough indication
of a difference in their deeds.
On the other hand, Bonner did not go out of his way to persecute; many
of his victims were forced upon him by the council, which sometimes
thought that he had not been severe enough (see _Acts of the P.C.
1554-1556_, pp. 115, 139; _1556-1558_, pp. 18, 19, 216, 276). So
completely had the state dominated the church that religious
persecutions had become state persecutions, and Bonner was acting as an
ecclesiastical sheriff in the most refractory district of the realm.
Even Foxe records instances in which Bonner failed to persecute. But he
had no mercy for a fallen foe; and he is seen at his worst in his
brutal jeers at Cranmer, when he was entrusted with the duty of
degrading his former chief. It is a more remarkable fact that, in spite
of his prominence, neither Henry VIII. nor Mary should ever have
admitted him to the privy council. He seems to have been regarded by his
own party as a useful instrument, especially in disagreeable work,
rather than as a desirable colleague.
On her accession Elizabeth refused to allow him to kiss her hand; but he
sat and voted in the parliament and convocation of 1559. In May he
refused to take the oath of supremacy, acquiring like his colleagues
consistency with old age. He was sent to the Marshalsea, and a few years
later was indicted on a charge of praemunire on refusing the oath when
tendered him by his diocesan, Bishop Horne of Winchester. He challenged
the legality of Horne's consecration, and a special act of parliament
was passed to meet the point, while the charge against Bonner was
withdrawn. He died in the Marshalsea on the 5th of September 1569, and
was buried in St George's, Southwark, at midnight to avoid the risk of a
hostile demonstration.
See _Letters and Papers of Henry VIII._ vols. iv.-xx.; _Acts of the
Privy Council_ (1542-1569); _Lords' Journals_, vol. i.; Wilkins'
_Concilia_; Foxe's _Acts and Monuments_, ed. Townsend; Burnet, ed.
Pocock; Strype's Works; Gough's _Index to Parker Soc. Publ._; S.R.
Maitland's _Essays on the Ref._; Froude's and R.W. Dixon's
_Histories_; Pollard's _Cranmer_ and _England under Somerset_; other
authorities cited in _Dict. Nat. Biogr_. (A. F. P.)
BONNET, CHARLES (1720-1793), Swiss naturalist and philosophical writer,
was born at Geneva on the 13th of March 1720, of a French family driven
into Switzerland by the religious persecution in the 16th century. He
made law his profession, but his favourite pursuit was the study of
natural science. The account of the ant-lion in N.A. Pluche's _Spectacle
de la nature_, which he read in his sixteenth year, turned his attention
to insect life. He procured R.A.F. de Reaumur's work on insects, and
with the help of live specimens succeeded in adding many observations to
those of Reaumur and Pluche. In 1740 Bonnet communicated to the academy
of sciences a paper containing a series of experiments establishing what
is now termed parthenogenesis in _aphides_ or tree-lice, which obtained
for him the honour of being admitted a corresponding member of the
academy. In 1741 he began to study reproduction by fusion and the
regeneration of lost parts in the freshwater hydra and other animals;
and in the following year he discovered that the respiration of
caterpillars and butterflies is performed by pores, to which the name of
_stigmata_ has since been given. In 1743 he was admitted a fellow of the
Royal Society; and in the same year he became a doctor of laws--his last
act in connexion with a profession which had ever been distasteful to
him.
His first published work appeared in 1745, entitled _Traite
d'insectologie_, in which were collected his various discoveries
regarding insects, along with a preface on the development of germs and
the scale of organized beings. Botany, particularly the leaves of
plants, next attracted his attention; and after several years of
diligent study, rendered irksome by the increasing weakness of his
eyesight, he published in 1754 one of the most original and interesting
of his works, _Recherches sur l'usage des feuilles dans les plantes_; in
which among other things he advances many considerations tending to show
(as has quite recently been done by Francis Darwin) that plants are
endowed with powers of sensation and discernment. But Bonnet's eyesight,
which threatened to fail altogether, caused him to turn to philosophy.
In 1754 his _Essai de psychologie_ was published anonymously in London.
This was followed by the _Essai analytique sur les facultes de l'ame_
(Copenhagen, 1760), in which he develops his views regarding the
physiological conditions of mental activity. He returned to physical
science, but to the speculative side of it, in his _Considerations sur
les corps organises_ (Amsterdam, 1762), designed to refute the theory of
epigenesis, and to explain and defend the doctrine of pre-existent
germs. In his _Contemplation de la nature_ (Amsterdam, 1764-1765;
translated into Italian, German, English and Dutch), one of his most
popular and delightful works, he sets forth, in eloquent language, the
theory that all the beings in nature form a gradual scale rising from
lowest to highest, without any break in its continuity. His last
important work was the _Palingenesie philosophique_ (Geneva, 1769-1770);
in it he treats of the past and future of living beings, and supports
the idea of the survival of all animals, and the perfecting of their
faculties in a future state.
Bonnet's life was uneventful. He seems never to have left Switzerland,
nor does he appear to have taken any part in public affairs except for
the period between 1752 and 1768, during which he was a member of the
council of the republic. The last twenty five years of his life he spent
quietly in the country, at Genthod, near Geneva, where he died after a
long and painful illness on the 20th of May 1793. His wife was a lady of
the family of De la Rive.
They had no children, but Madame Bonnet's nephew, the celebrated H.B. de
Saussure, was brought up as their son.
Bonnet's philosophical system may be outlined as follows. Man is a
compound of two distinct substances, mind and body, the one immaterial
and the other material. All knowledge originates in sensations;
sensations follow (whether as physical effects or merely as sequents
Bonnet will not say) vibrations in the nerves appropriate to each; and
lastly, the nerves are made to vibrate by external physical stimulus. A
nerve once set in motion by a particular object tends to reproduce that
motion; so that when it a second time receives an impression from the
same object it vibrates with less resistance. The sensation accompanying
this increased flexibility in the nerve is, according to Bonnet, the
condition of memory. When reflection--that is, the active element in
mind--is applied to the acquisition and combination of sensations, those
abstract ideas are formed which, though generally distinguished from,
are thus merely sensations in combination only. That which puts the mind
into activity is pleasure or pain; happiness is the end of human
existence. Bonnet's metaphysical theory is based on two principles
borrowed from Leibnitz--first, that there are not successive acts of
creation, but that the universe is completed by the single original act
of the divine will, and thereafter moves on by its own inherent force;
and secondly, that there is no break in the continuity of existence. The
divine Being originally created a multitude of germs in a graduated
scale, each with an inherent power of self-development. At every
successive step in the progress of the universe, these germs, as
progressively modified, advance nearer to perfection; if some advanced
and others did not there would be a gap in the continuity of the chain.
Thus not man only but all other forms of existence are immortal. Nor is
man's mind alone immortal; his body also will pass into the higher
stage, not, indeed, the body he now possesses, but a finer one of which
the germ at present exists within him. It is impossible, however, to
reach absolute perfection, because the distance is infinite. In this
final proposition Bonnet violates his own principle of continuity, by
postulating an interval between the highest created being and the
Divine. It is also difficult to understand whether the constant advance
to perfection is performed by each individual, or only by each race of
beings as a whole. There seems, in fact, to be an oscillation between
two distinct but analogous doctrines--that of the constantly increasing
advancement of the individual in future stages of existence, and that of
the constantly increasing advancement of the race as a whole according
to the successive evolutions of the globe.
Bonnet's complete works appeared at Neuchatel in 1779-1783, partly
revised by himself. An English translation of certain portions of the
_Palingenesie philosophique_ was published in 1787, under the title,
_Philosophical and Critical Inquiries concerning Christianity_. See
also A. Lemoine, _Charles Bonnet_ (Paris, 1850); the duc de Caraman,
_Charles Bonnet, philosophe et naturaliste_ (Paris, 1859); Max Offner,
_Die Psychologie C. B._ (Leipzig, 1893); Joh. Speck, in _Arch. f.
Gesch. d. Philos._ x. (1897), xi. (1897), pp. 58 foll., xi. (1898) pp.
1-211; J. Trembley, _Vie privee et litteraire de C. B._ (Bern, 1794).
BONNET (from Lat. _bonetum_, a kind of stuff, then the cap made of this
stuff), originally a soft cap or covering for the head, the common term
in English till the end of the 17th century; this sense survives in
Scotland, especially as applied to the cap known as a "glengarry." The
"bonnet" of a ship's sail now means an additional piece laced on to the
bottom, but it seems to have formerly meant a piece laced to the top,
the term "to vail the bonnet" being found at the beginning of the 16th
century to mean "strike sail" (from the Fr. _avaler_), to let down. In
modern times "bonnet" has come to be used of a type of head-covering for
women, differentiated from "hat" by fitting closely to the head and
often having no brim, but varying considerably in shape according to the
period and fashion. The term, by a natural extension, is also applied to
certain protective devices, as in a steam-engine or safety-lamp, or in
slang use to a gambler's accomplice, a decoy.
BONNEVAL, CLAUDE ALEXANDRE, COMTE DE (1675-1747), French adventurer,
known also as AHMED PASHA, was the descendant of an old family of
Limousin. He was born on the 14th of July 1675, and at the age of
thirteen joined the Royal Marine Corps. After three years he entered the
army, in which he rose to the command of a regiment. He served in the
Italian campaigns under Catinat, Villeroi and Vendome, and in the
Netherlands under Luxemburg, giving proofs of indomitable courage and
great military ability. His insolent bearing towards the minister of war
was made matter for a court-martial (1704). He was condemned to death,
but saved himself by flight to Germany. Through the influence of Prince
Eugene he obtained a general's command in the Austrian army, and fought
with great bravery and distinction against France, and afterwards
against Turkey. He was present at Malplaquet, and was severely wounded
at Peterwardein. The proceedings against him in France were then allowed
to drop, and he visited Paris, and married a daughter of Marshal de
Biron. He returned, however, after a short time to the Austrian army,
and fought with distinction at Belgrade. He might now have risen to the
highest rank, had he not made himself disagreeable to Prince Eugene, who
sent him as master of the ordnance to the Low Countries. There his
ungovernable temper led him into a quarrel with the marquis de Prie,
Eugene's deputy governor in the Netherlands, who answered his challenge
by placing him in confinement. A court-martial was again held upon him,
and he was condemned to death; but the emperor commuted the sentence to
one year's imprisonment and banishment. Bonneval, soon after his
release, offered his services to the Turkish government, professed the
Mahommedan faith, and took the name of Ahmed. He was made a pasha, and
appointed to organize and command the artillery. He rendered valuable
services to the sultan in his war with Russia, and with the famous Nadir
Shah. As a reward he received the governorship of Chios, but he soon
fell under the suspicion of the Porte, and was banished for a time to
the shores of the Black Sea. He was meditating a return to Europe and
Christianity when he died at Constantinople on the 23rd of March 1747.
The _Memoirs_ published under his name are spurious. See Prince de
Ligne, _Memoire sur le comte de Bonneval_ (Paris, 1817); and A.
Vandal, _Le Pacha Bonneval_ (Paris, 1885).
BONNEVILLE, BENJAMIN L.E. (1795-1878), American military engineer and
explorer, was born in France about 1795. He emigrated to the United
States in early youth, and graduated at the United States Military
Academy at West Point in 1815. He was engaged in the construction of
military roads in the south-west, and became a captain of infantry in
1825. In 1831-1836, having obtained leave of absence from the army, he
conducted, largely on his own responsibility, an exploring expedition to
the Rocky Mountains, proceeding up the Platte river through parts of the
later states of Colorado and Wyoming into the Great Salt Lake basin and
thence into California. After being absolutely cut off from civilization
for several years, and having his name struck from the army list, he
returned with an interesting and valuable account of his adventures,
which was edited and amplified by Washington Irving and published under
the title _The Rocky Mountains: or Scenes, Incidents, and Adventures in
the Far West; from the Journal of Captain Benjamin L.E. Bonneville of
the Army of the United States_ (2 vols., 1837), subsequent editions
bearing the title _The Adventures of Captain Bonneville, U.S.A., in the
Rocky Mountains and the Far West._ Bonneville became a major in 1845,
and was breveted lieutenant-colonel for gallantry in the battles of
Contreras and Churubusco during the Mexican War. He became a colonel in
1855, commanded the Gila river expedition against the Apaches in 1857,
and from 1858 to 1861 commanded the department of New Mexico. He was
retired in 1861, but served during the Civil War as recruiting officer
and commandant of barracks at St Louis, Missouri, receiving the brevet
rank of brigadier-general in 1865. He died at Fort Smith, Arkansas, on
the 12th of June 1878. The extinct glacial lake which once covered what
is now north-western Utah has been named in his honour.
BONNEY, THOMAS GEORGE (1833- ), English geologist, eldest son of the
Rev. Thomas Bonney, master of the grammar school at Rugeley, was born in
that town on the 27th of July 1833. Educated at Uppingham and St John's
College, Cambridge, he graduated as 12th wrangler in 1856, and was
ordained in the following year. From 1856 to 1861 he was mathematical
master at Westminster school, and geology was pursued by him only as a
recreation, mainly in Alpine regions. In 1868 he was appointed tutor at
St John's College and lecturer in geology. His attention was specially
directed to the study of the igneous and metamorphic rocks in Alpine
regions and in various parts of England, in the Lizard, at Salcombe, in
Charnwood Forest, in Wales and the Scottish Highlands. In 1877 he was
chosen professor of geology in University College, London. He became
secretary and afterwards president of the Geological Society
(1884-1886), secretary of the British Association (1881-1885), president
of the Mineralogical Society and of the Alpine Club. He was also in 1887
appointed honorary canon of Manchester. His purely scientific works are:
_Cambridgeshire Geology_ (1875); _The Story of our Planet_ (1893);
_Charles Lyell and Modern Geology_ (1895); _Ice Work, Past and Present_
(1896); _Volcanoes_ (1899). In addition to many papers published in the
_Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society_ and _Geological Magazine_,
he wrote several popular works on Alpine Regions, on English and Welsh
scenery, as well as on theological subjects.
See _Geological Magazine_ for September 1901 (with bibliography).
BONNIER, ANGE ELISABETH LOUIS ANTOINE (1749-1799), French diplomatist,
was a member of the Legislative Assembly and of the Convention, where he
voted with the majority. During the Directory he was charged with
diplomatic missions, first to Lille and then to the congress of Rastadt
(October 1797), where the negotiations dragged wearily along and were
finally broken. On the 28th of April 1799 the plenipotentiaries on
leaving Rastadt were assailed at the gates of the town by Hungarian
hussars, probably charged to secure their papers. Bonnier and one of his
colleagues, Claude Roberjot, were killed. The other, Jean Debry, was
wounded.
See Huefer, _Der Rastadtergesandtenmord_ (Bonn, 1896).
BONNIVET, GUILLAUME GOUFFIER, SEIGNEUR DE (c. 1488-1525), French
soldier, was the younger brother of Artus Gouffier, seigneur de Boisy,
tutor of Francis I. of France. Bonnivet was brought up with Francis, and
after the young king's accession he became one of the most powerful of
the royal favourites. In 1515 he was made admiral of France. In the
imperial election of 1519 he superintended the candidature of Francis,
and spent vast sums of money in his efforts to secure the votes of the
electors, but without success. He was the implacable enemy of the
constable de Bourbon and contributed to his downfall. In command of the
army of Navarre in 1521, he occupied Fuenterrabia and was probably
responsible for its non-restoration and for the consequent renewal of
hostilities. He succeeded Marshal Lautrec in 1523 in the command of the
army of Italy and entered the Milanese, but was defeated and forced to
effect a disastrous retreat, in which the chevalier Bayard perished. He
was one of the principal commanders of the army which Francis led into
Italy at the end of 1524, and died at the battle of Pavia on the 24th of
February 1525. Brantome says that it was at Bonnivet's suggestion that
the battle of Pavia was fought, and that, seeing the disaster he had
caused, he courted and found death heroically in the fight. In spite of
his failures as a general and diplomatist, his handsome face and
brilliant wit enabled him to retain throughout his life the intimacy and
confidence of his king. He was a man of licentious life. According to
Brantome he was the successful rival of the king for the favours of
Madame de Chateaubriand, and if we may believe him to have been--as is
very probable--the hero of the fourth story of the _Heptameron_,
Marguerite d'Angouleme had occasion to resist his importunities.
AUTHORITIES.--Bonnivet's correspondence in the Bibliotheque Nationale,
Paris; memoirs of the time; complete works of Brantome, vol. iii.,
published by Ludovic Lalanne for the Societe de l'Histoire de France
(1864 seq.). See also Ernest Lavisse, _Histoire de France_, vol. v.,
by H. Lemonnier (1903-1904).
BONOMI, GIUSEPPI (1739-1808), English architect, was born at Rome on the
19th of January 1739. After attaining a considerable reputation in
Italy, he came in 1767 to England, and finally settled in practice
there. He was the innocent cause of the retirement of Sir Joshua
Reynolds from the presidency of the Royal Academy. Sir Joshua wished him
to become a full Academician, regarding him as a fitting occupant of the
then vacant chair of perspective. But the majority of the Academicians
were opposed to this suggestion, and Bonomi was elected an associate
only, and that merely by the president's casting vote. Bonomi was
largely responsible for the revival of classical architecture in
England. His most famous work was the Italian villa at Roseneath,
Dumbartonshire, designed for the duke of Argyll. In 1804 he was
appointed honorary architect to St Peter's at Rome. He died in London on
the 9th of March 1808.
His son, GIUSEPPI BONOMI (1796-1878), studied art in London at the Royal
Academy, and became a sculptor, but is best known as an illustrator of
the leading Egyptological publications of his day. From 1824 to 1832 he
was in Egypt, making drawings of the monuments in the company of Burton,
Lane and Wilkinson. In 1833 he visited the mosque of Omar, returning
with detailed drawings, and from 1842 to 1844 was again in Egypt,
attached to the Prussian government exploration expedition under
Lepsius. He assisted in the arrangement of the Egyptian court at the
Crystal Palace in 1853, and in 1861 was appointed curator of the Soane
Museum. He died on the 3rd of March 1878.
BONONCINI (or BUONONCINI), GIOVANNI BATTISTA (1672?-1750?), Italian
musical composer, was the son of the composer Giovanni Maria Bononcini,
best known as the author of a treatise entitled _Il Musico Prattico_
(Bologna, 1673), and brother of the composer Marc' Antonio Bononcini,
with whom he has often been confused. He is said to have been born at
Modena in 1672, but the date of his birth must probably be placed some
ten years earlier. He was a pupil of his father and of Colonna, and
produced his first operas, _Tullo Ostilio_ and _Serse_, at Rome in 1694.
In 1696 he was at the court of Berlin, and between 1700 and 1720 divided
his time between Vienna and Italy. In 1720 he was summoned to London by
the Royal Academy of Music, and produced several operas, enjoying the
protection of the Marlborough family. About 1731 it was discovered that
he had a few years previously palmed off a madrigal by Lotti as his own
work, and after a long correspondence he was obliged to leave the
country. He remained for several years in France, and in 1748 was
summoned to Vienna to compose music in honour of the peace of
Aix-la-Chapelle. He then went to Venice as a composer of operas, and
nothing more is known of his life.
Bononcini's rivalry with Handel will always ensure him immortality, but
he was in himself a musician of considerable merit, and seems to have
influenced the style, not only of Handel but even of Alessandro
Scarlatti. Either he or his brother (our knowledge of the two composers'
lives is at present not sufficient to distinguish their works clearly)
was the inventor of that sharply rhythmical style conspicuous in _Il
Trionfo di Camilla_ (1697), the success of which at Naples probably
induced Scarlatti to adopt a similar type of melody. It is noticeable in
the once popular air of Bononcini, _L'esperto nocchiero_, and in the air
_Vado ben spesso_, long attributed to Salvator Rosa, but really by
Bononcini.
BONONIA (mod. _Bologna_), the chief town of ancient Aemilia (see
AEMILIA, VIA), in Italy. It was said by classical writers to be of
Etruscan origin, and to have been founded, under the name Felsina, from
Perusia by Aucnus or Ocnus. Excavations of recent years have, however,
led to the discovery of some 600 ancient Italic (Ligurian?) huts, and of
cemeteries of the same and the succeeding (Umbrian) periods (800-600?
B.C.), of which the latter immediately preceded the Etruscan
civilization (c. 600-400 B.C.). An extensive Etruscan necropolis, too,
was discovered on the site of the modern cemetery (A. Zannoni, _Scavi
della Certosa_, Bologna, 1876), and others in the public garden and on
the Arnoaldi Veli property (_Notizie degli Scavi, indice_ 1876-1900,
s.v. "Bologna"). In 196 B.C., when the town first appears in history,
it was already in the possession of the Boii, and had probably by this
time changed its name, and in 189 B.C. it became a Roman colony. After
the conquest of the mountain tribes, its importance was assured by its
position on the Via Aemilia, by which it was connected in 187 B.C. with
Ariminum and Placentia, and on the road, constructed in the same year,
to Arretium; while another road was made, perhaps in 175 B.C., to
Aquilelia. It thus became the centre of the road system of north Italy.
In 90 B.C. it acquired Roman citizenship. In 43 B.C. it was used as his
base of operations against Decius Brutus by Mark Antony, who settled
colonists here; Augustus added others later, constructing a new aqueduct
from the Letta, a tributary of the Rhenus, which was restored to use in
1881 (G. Gozzadini in _Notizie degli Scavi_, 1881, 162). After a fire in
A.D. 53 the emperor Claudius made a subvention of 10 million sesterces
(L1,087,500). Bononia seems, in fact, to have been one of the most
important cities of ancient Italy, as Bologna is of modern Italy. It was
able to resist Alaric in 410 and to preserve its existence during the
general ruin. It afterwards belonged to the Greek exarchate of Ravenna.
Of remains of the Roman period, however, there are none above ground,
though various discoveries have been made from time to time within the
city walls, the modern streets corresponding more or less, as it seems,
with the ancient lines. Remains of the bridge of the Via Aemilia over
the Rhenus have also been found--consisting of parts of the parapets on
each side, in brick-faced concrete which belong to a restoration, the
original construction (probably by Augustus in 2 B.C.) having been in
blocks of Veronese red marble--and also of a massive protecting wall
slightly above it, of late date, in the construction of which a large
number of Roman tombstones were used. The bed of the river was found to
have risen at least 20 ft. since the collapse of this bridge (about A.D.
1000), the total length of which must have been about 650 ft. and the
width between the parapets 38-1/2 ft.
See E. Brizio in _Notizie degli Scavi_ (1896), 125, 450; (1897) 330;
(1898) 465; (1902) 532. (T. As.)
BONPLAND, AIME JACQUES ALEXANDRE (1773-1858), French traveller and
botanist, whose real name was GOUJAND, was born at La Rochelle on the
22nd of August 1773. After serving as a surgeon in the French army and
studying under J.N. Corvisart at Paris, he accompanied A. von Humboldt
during five years of travel in Mexico, Colombia and the districts
bordering on the Orinoco and Amazon. In these explorations he collected
and classified about 6000 plants till then mostly unknown in Europe,
which he afterwards described in _Plantes equinoxiales_, &c. (Paris,
1808-1816). On returning to Paris he received a pension and the
superintendence of the gardens at Malmaison, and published _Monographie
des Melastomees_ (1806), and _Description des plantes rares de Navarre_
(1813). In 1816 he set out, taking with him various European plants, for
Buenos Aires, where he was elected professor of natural history, an
office which he soon quitted in order to explore central South America.
While journeying to Bolivia he was arrested in 1821, by command of Dr
Francia, the dictator of Paraguay, who detained him until 1831. On
regaining liberty he resided at San Borga in the province of Corrientes,
until his removal in 1853 to Santa Anna, where he died on the 4th of May
1858.
BONSTETTEN, CHARLES VICTOR DE (1745-1832), Swiss writer, an excellent
type of a liberal patrician, more French than Swiss, and a good
representative of the Gallicized Bern of the 18th century. By birth a
member of one of the great patrician families of Bern, he was educated
in his native town, at Yverdon, and (1763-1766) at Geneva, where he came
under the influence of Rousseau and of Charles Bonnet, and imbibed
liberal sentiments. Recalled to Bern by his father, he was soon sent to
Leiden, and then visited (1769) England, where he became a friend of the
poet Gray. After his father's death (1770) he made a long journey in
Italy, and on his return to Bern (1774) entered political life, for
which he was unfitted by reason of his liberal ideas, which led him to
patronize and encourage Johannes Muller, the future Swiss historian. In
1779 he was named the Bernese bailiff of Saanen or Gessenay (here he
wrote his _Lettres pastorales sur une contree de la Suisse_, published
in German in 1781), and in 1787 was transferred in a similar capacity to
Nyon, from which post he had to retire after taking part (1791) in a
festival to celebrate the destruction of the Bastille. From 1795 to 1797
he governed (for the Swiss Confederation) the Italian-speaking districts
of Lugano, Locarno, Mendrisio and Val Maggia, of which he published
(1797) a pleasing description, and into which he is said to have
introduced the cultivation of the potato. The French revolution of 1798
in Switzerland drove him again into private life. He spent the years
1798 to 1801 in Denmark, with his friend Fredirika Brun, and then
settled down in 1803 in Geneva for the rest of his life. There he
enjoyed the society of many distinguished persons, among whom was
(1809-1817) Madame de Stael. It was during this period that he published
his most celebrated work, _L'Homme du midi et l'homme du nord_ (1824), a
study of the influence of climate on different nations, the north being
exalted at the expense of the south. Among his other works are the
_Recherches sur la nature et les lois de l'imagination_ (1807), and the
_Etudes de l'homme, ou Recherches sur les facultes de penser et de
sentir_ (1821), but he was better as an observer than as a philosopher.
Lives by A. Steinlen (Lausanne, 1860), by C. Morell (Winterthur,
1861), and by R. Willy (Bern, 1898). See also vol. xiv. of
Sainte-Beuve's _Causeries du Lundi_. (W. A. B. C.)
BONUS (a jocular application of the Lat. _bonus_, for _bonum_, "a good
thing"), a sum paid to shareholders in a joint-stock company, as an
addition to the ordinary dividend, and generally given out of
accumulated profits, or out of profits gained from exceptional
transactions. As used by insurance companies, the word denotes the
addition made to the amount of a policy by a distribution _pro rata_ of
accumulated profits or surplus. In a more general sense, bonus is any
payment or remuneration over and above what is due and promised.
BONZE (from Japanese _bonzo_, probably a mispronunciation of Chinese
_fan sung_, "religious person"), the European name for the members of
the Buddhist religious orders of Japan and China. The word is loosely
used of all the Buddhist priests in those and the neighbouring
countries.
BOOK, the common name for any literary production of some bulk, now
applied particularly to a printed composition forming a volume, or, if
in more than one volume, a single organic literary work. The word is
also used descriptively for the internal divisions or sections of a
comprehensive work.
The word "book" is found with variations of form and gender in all the
Teutonic languages, the original form postulated for it being a strong
feminine _Boks_, which must have been used in the sense of a
writing-tablet. The most obvious connexion of this is with the old
English _boc_, a beech tree, and though this is not free from
philological difficulties, no probable alternative has been suggested.
As early as 2400 B.C., in Babylonia, legal decisions, revenue accounts,
&c. were inscribed in cuneiform characters on clay tablets and placed in
jars, arranged on shelves and labelled by clay tablets attached by
straws. In the 7th century B.C. a library of literary works written on
such tablets existed at Nineveh, founded by Sargan (721-705 B.C.). As in
the case of the "Creation" series at the British Museum the narrative
was sometimes continued from one tablet to another, and some of the
tablets are inscribed with entries forming a catalogue of the library.
These clay tablets are perhaps entitled to be called books, but they are
out of the direct ancestry of the modern printed book with which we are
here chiefly concerned. One of the earliest direct ancestors of this
extant is a roll of eighteen columns in Egyptian hieratic writing of
about the 25th century B.C. in the Musee de Louvre at Paris, preserving
the maxims of Ptah-hetep. Papyrus, the material on which the manuscript
(known as the Papyrus Prisse) is written, was made from the pith of a
reed chiefly found in Egypt, and is believed to have been in use as a
writing material as early as about 4000 B.C. It continued to be the
usual vehicle of writing until the early centuries of the Christian era,
was used for pontifical bulls until A.D. 1022, and occasionally even
later; while in Coptic manuscripts, for which its use had been revived
in the 7th century, it was employed as late as about A.D. 1250. It was
from the name by which they called the papyrus, [Greek: bublos] or
[Greek: biblos], that the Greeks formed [Greek: biblion], their word for
a book, the plural of which (mistaken for a feminine singular) has given
us our own word Bible. In the 2nd century B.C. Eumenes II., king of
Pergamus, finding papyrus hard to procure, introduced improvements into
the preparations of the skins of sheep and calves for writing purposes,
and was rewarded by the name of his kingdom being preserved in the word
_pergamentum_, whence our "parchment," by which the dressed material is
known. In the 10th century the supremacy which parchment had gradually
established was attacked by the introduction from the East of a new
writing material made from a pulp of linen rags, and the name of the
vanquished papyrus was transferred to this new rival. Paper-mills were
set up in Europe in the 12th century, and the use of paper gained
ground, though not very rapidly, until on the invention of printing, the
demand for a cheap material for books, and the ease with which paper
could be worked on a press, gave it a practical monopoly. This it
preserved until nearly the end of the 19th century, when substances
mainly composed of wood-pulp, esparto grass and clay largely took its
place, while continuing, as in the transition from papyrus to
linen-pulp, to pass under the same name (see PAPER).
So long as the use of papyrus was predominant the usual form of a book
was that of the _volumen_ or roll, wound round a stick, or sticks. The
modern form of book, called by the Latins _codex_ (a word originally
used for the stump of a tree, or block of wood, and thence for the
three-leaved tablets into which the block was sawn) was coming into
fashion in Martial's time at Rome, and gained ground in proportion as
parchment superseded papyrus. The _volumen_ as it was unrolled revealed
a series of narrow columns of writing, and the influence of this
arrangement is seen in the number of columns in the earliest codices.
Thus in the Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus of the Bible, both of
the 4th century, there are respectively four and three columns to a
page; in the Codex Alexandrinus (5th century) only two; in the Codex
Bezae (6th century) only one, and from this date to the invention of
printing, while there were great changes in handwriting, the arrangement
of books changed very little, single or double columns being used as was
found convenient. In the external form of books there was much the same
conservatism. In the Codex Amiatinus written in England in the 8th
century one of the miniatures shows a book in a red leather cover, and
the arrangement of the pattern on this curiously resembles that of the
15th-century red leather bindings predominant in the Biblioteca
Laurenziana at Florence, in which the codex itself is preserved. In the
same way some of the small stamps used in Oxford bindings in the 15th
century are nearly indistinguishable from those used in England three
centuries earlier. Much fuller details as to the history of written
books in these as well as other respects will be found in the article
MANUSCRIPT, to which the following account of the fortunes of books
after the invention of printing must be regarded as supplementary.
Between a manuscript written in a formal book-hand and an early printed
copy of the same work, printed in the same district as the manuscript
had been written, the difference in general appearance was very slight.
The printer's type (see TYPOGRAPHY) would as a rule be based on a
handwriting considered by the scribes appropriate to works of the same
class; the chapter headings, headlines, initial-letters, paragraph
marks, and in some cases illustrations, would be added by hand in a
style which might closely resemble the like decorations in the
manuscript from which the text was being printed; there would be no
title-page, and very probably no statement of any kind that the book was
printed, or as to where, when or by whom it was produced. Information as
to these points, if given at all, was reserved for a paragraph at the
end of the book, called by bibliographers a colophon (q.v.), to which
the printer often attached a device consisting of his arms, or those of
the town in which he worked, or a fanciful design. These devices are
sometimes beautiful and often take the place of a statement of the
printer's name. Many facsimiles or copies of them have been
published.[1] The first dated title-page known[2] is a nine-line
paragraph on an otherwise blank page giving the title of the book,
_Sermo ad populum predicabilis in festo presentacionis Beatissime Marie
Semper Virginis_, with some words in its praise, the date 1470 in roman
numerals, and a reference to further information on the next page. The
book in which this title-page occurs was printed by Arnold ther Hoernen
at Cologne. Six years later Erhard Ratdolt and his partners at Venice
printed their names and the date, together with some verses describing
the book, on the title-page of a Latin calendar, and surrounded the
whole with a border in four pieces. For another twenty years, however,
when title-pages were used at all, they usually consisted merely of the
short title of the book, with sometimes a woodcut or the printer's
(subsequently the publisher's) device beneath it, decoration being more
often bestowed on the first page of text, which was sometimes surrounded
by an ornamental border. Title-pages completed by the addition of the
name and address of printer or publisher, and also by the date, did not
become common till about 1520.
While the development of the title-page was thus slow the completion of
the book, independently of handwork, in other respects was fairly rapid.
Printed illustrations appear first in the form of rude woodcuts in some
small books produced at Bamberg by Albrecht Pfister about 1461.
Pagination and headlines were first used by ther Hoernen at Cologne in
1470 and 1471; printed signatures to guide binders in arranging the
quires correctly (see BIBLIOGRAPHY AND BIBLIOLOGY) by Johann Koelhoff,
also at Cologne in 1472. Illustrations abound in the books printed at
Augsburg in the early 'seventies, and in the 'eighties are common in
Germany, France and the Low Countries, while in Italy their full
development dated from about 1490. Experiments were made in both Italy
and France with illustrations engraved on copper, but in the 15th
century these met with no success.
Bound with wooden boards covered with stamped leather, or with half of
the boards left uncovered, many of the earliest printed books are
immensely large and heavy, especially the great choir-books, the Bibles
and the Biblical and legal commentaries, in which a great mass of notes
surrounds the text. The paper on which these large books were printed
was also extraordinarily thick and strong. For more popular books small
folio was at first a favourite size, but towards the end of the century
small thin quartos were much in vogue. Psalters, books of hours, and
other prayer-books were practically the only very small books in use.
Owing to changes, not only in the value of money but in the coinage, the
cost of books in the 15th century is extremely difficult to ascertain. A
vellum copy of the first printed Bible (Mainz, c. 1455) in two large
folio volumes, when rubricated and illuminated, is said to have been
worth 100 florins. In 1467 the bishop of Aleria writing to Pope Paul II.
speaks of the introduction of printing having reduced prices to
one-fifth of what they had previously been. Fifteen "Legends" bequeathed
by Caxton to St Margaret's, Westminster, were sold at prices varying
from 6s. 8d. to 5s. This would be cheap for a large work like the
_Golden Legend_, but the bequest was more probably of copies of the
Sarum _Legenda_, or Lectionary, a much smaller book.
_16th Century._--The popularization of the small octavo by Aldus at
Venice in 1501 and the introduction in these handy books of a new type,
the italic, had far-reaching consequences. Italics grew steadily in
favour during the greater part of the century, and about 1570 had almost
become the standard vernacular type of Italy. In France also they were
very popular, the attempt to introduce a rival French cursive type
(_lettres de civilite_) attaining no success. In England they gained
only slight popularity, but roman type, which had not been used at all
in the 15th century, made steady progress in its contest with black
letter, which by the end of the century was little used save for Bibles
and proclamations. The modern practice in the use of i and j, u and v
dates from about 1580, though not firmly established till the reign of
Charles I.
In the second quarter of the 16th century the French printers at Paris
and Lyons halved the size of the Aldine octavos in their small
sextodecimos, which found a ready market, though not a lasting one, the
printers of Antwerp and Leiden ousting them with still smaller books in
24mo or small twelves. These little books were printed on paper much
thinner than had previously been used. The size and weight of books was
also reduced by the substitution of pasteboards for wooden sides. Gold
tooling came into use on bindings, and in the second half of the century
very elaborate decoration was in vogue in France until checked by a
sumptuary law. On the other hand a steady decline in the quality of
paper combined with the abandonment of the old simple outline woodcuts
for much more ambitious designs made it increasingly difficult for
printers to do justice to the artists' work, and woodcuts, at first in
the Low Countries and afterwards in England and elsewhere, were
gradually superseded by copper-plates printed separately from the text.
At the beginning of this century in England a ballad or Christmas carol
sold for a halfpenny and thin quarto chapbooks for 4d. (a price which
lasted through the century), the Great Bible of 1541 was priced at 10s.
in sheets and 12s. bound, Edward VI.'s prayer-book (1549) at 2s. 2d.
unbound, and 3s. 8d. in paste or boards; Sidney's _Arcadia_ and other
works in 1598 sold for 9s.
_17th Century._--Although the miniature editions issued by the Elzevirs
at Leiden, especially those published about 1635, have attracted
collectors, printing in the 17th century was at its worst, reaching its
lowest depths in England in the second quarter. After this there was a
steady improvement, partly due to slight modifications of the old
printing presses, adopted first in Holland and copied by the English
printers. In the first half of the century many English books, although
poorly printed, were ornamented with attractive frontispieces, or
portraits, engraved on copper. During the same period, English
prayer-books and small Bibles and New Testaments were frequently covered
with gay embroideries in coloured silks and gold or silver thread. In
the second half of the century the leather bindings of Samuel Mearne, to
some extent imitated from those of the great French binder Le Gascon,
were the daintiest England had yet produced. For trade bindings rough
calf and sheepskin were most used, and the practice of lettering books
on the back, instead of on the sides or fore-edges or not at all, came
gradually into favour. Owing to the increase of money, and in some cases
to the action of monopolists, in others to the increased payments made
to authors, book-prices rather rose than fell. Thus church Bibles, which
had been sold at 10s. in 1541, rose successively to 25s., 30s. and (in
1641) to 40s. Single plays in quarto cost 6d. each in Shakespeare's
time, 1s. after the Restoration. The Shakespeare folio of 1623 is said
to have been published at L1. Bishop Walton's polyglot Bible in six
large volumes was sold for L10 to subscribers, but resulted in a heavy
loss. Izaak Walton's _Compleat Angler_ was priced at 1s. 6d. in
sheepskin, _Paradise Lost_ at 3s., _The Pilgrim's Progress_ at 1s. 6d.;
Dryden's _Virgil_ was published by subscription at L5:5s. It was a
handsome book, ornamented with plates; but in the case of this and other
subscription books a desire to honour or befriend the author was mainly
responsible for the high price.
_18th Century._--During this century there was a notable improvement
alike in paper, type and presswork in both France and England, and
towards the end of the century in Germany and Italy also. Books became
generally neat and sometimes elegant. Book-illustration revived with the
French _livres-a-vignettes_, and English books were illustrated by
Gravelot and other French artists. In the last quarter of the century
the work of Bewick heralded a great revival in woodcut illustrations, or
as the use of the graver now entitled them to be called, wood
engravings. The best 18th-century binders, until the advent of Roger
Payne, were inferior to those of the 17th century, but the technique of
the average work was better. In trade bindings the use of sheepskin and
calf became much less common, and books were mostly cased in paper
boards. The practice of publishing poetry by subscription at a very high
price, which Dryden had found lucrative, was followed by Prior and Pope.
Single poems by Pope, however, were sold at 1s. and 1s. 6d. Novels were
mostly in several volumes. The price at the beginning of the century was
mostly 1s. 6d. each. It then remained fairly steady for many years, and
at the close of the century rose again. Thus Miss Burney's _Evelina_ (3
vols., 1778) sold for 7s. 5d., her _Cecilia_ (5 vols., 1782) for 12s.
6d., and her _Camilla_ (5 vols., 1796) for L1:1s. Johnson's _Dictionary_
(2 vols. folio, 1755) cost L4:4s. in sheets, L4:15s. in boards.
_19th Century._--great change in the appearance of books was caused by
the use first of glazed calico (about 1820), afterwards (about 1830) of
cloth for the cases of books as issued by their publishers. At first the
lettering was printed on paper labels, but soon it was stamped in gilt
on the cloth, and in the last quarter of the century many very beautiful
covers were designed for English and American books. The designs for
leather bindings were for many years chiefly imitated from older work,
but towards the end of the 'eighties much greater originality began to
be shown. Book illustrations passed through many phases. As subsidiary
methods colour-prints, line engravings, lithographs and etchings were
all used during the first half of the century, but the main reliance was
on wood-engraving, in which extraordinary technical skill was developed.
In the 'sixties and the years which immediately preceded and followed
them many of the chief English artists supplied the engravers with
drawings. In the last decade of the century wood-engraving was
practically killed by the perfection attained by photographic methods of
reproduction (see PROCESS), the most popular of these methods entailing
the use of paper heavily coated with china clay. During the century
trade-printing, both in England and America, steadily improved, and the
work done by William Morris at his Kelmscott Press (1891-1896), and by
other amateur printers who imitated him, set a new standard of beauty of
type and ornament, and of richness of general effect. On the other hand
the demand for cheap reprints of famous works induced by the immense
extension of the reading public was supplied by scores of pretty if
flimsy editions at 1s. 6d. and 1s. and even less. The problem of how to
produce books at moderate prices on good paper and well sewn, was left
for the 20th century to settle. About 1894 the number of such
medium-priced books was greatly increased in England by the substitution
of single-volume novels at 6s. each (subject to discount) for the
three-volume editions at 31s. 6d. The preposterous price of 10s. 6d. a
volume had been adopted during the first popularity of the _Waverly
Novels_, and despite the example of France, where the standard price was
3 fr. 50, had continued in force for the greater part of the century.
Even after novels were sold at reasonable rates artificial prices were
maintained for books of travel and biographies, so that the circulating
libraries were practically the only customers for the first editions.
(See PUBLISHING and BOOKSELLING). (A. W. Po.)