Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/653

 CtTRUBIS

575

CUSPINIAN

with Mary's mourning beneath the Cross and of her ("onception. This work he has undertaken.

In to English Tongue to rode

For the love of English lede [fieople]

English lede of England

For the common [folk] to understand.

This ambitious programme is faithfully carried out with considerable literary skill and a devotional feel- ing quite out of the common. The author shows him- self to have l)een a man of wide reading. Although his main authority is the "Historia Scholastica" of Peter Comestor he has made himself acquainted with a number of other books in English, French, and Latin, and his work may be regarded as a storehouse of leg- ends not all of which have been traced to their original sources. Special prominence is given throughout the work to the history of the Cross which for some reason (possibly because St. Helena, the mother of Constan- tine, was reputed to have been of British birth) was always exceptionally popular in England.

After commending the author's "keen eye for the picturesque", a recent critic, in the "Cambridge His- tory of English Literature'', remarks, "The strong humanity which runs through the whole work is one of its most attractive featvires and shows that the writer was full of sympathy for his fellow-men."

The main authority upon the Cursor Miindi is the elaborate edition of the noem edited hv Dr. Richard Morris for the Early English Text Society (iST4-lS93. 3 vols.), with appen- dixes and critical appreciations by several other scholars. The Cursor Mundi also receives full attention in all modern histories of English literature, of which the best is the Cambridge History, edited bj; A. W. \Vari\ Cambridge, 1907). See also especially Kaluza in Englische Studien, Vol. XI.

Herbert Thurston.

Curubis, a titular see of Africa Proeon.sularis. The town was fortified about 46 B. c. by P. Attius Varus and C. t.'onsidius Longus, generals of Pompey, and jiroclaimed by Csesar a Roman colony under the name of Colonia Julia Curubis. It is mentioned in Pliny, Ptolemy, "The Itinerary of Antoninus", etc. In 257 St. Cyprian was exiled to Curubis for refusing to sacrifice to the gods (Vita Pontii, c. xii, ed. Hartel, III, and the year following he was called thence to Carthage to be put to death. Four bishops are known (one Donatist). from 411 to 646 (Morcelli, Africa Christiana, I, 149). Curubis is to-day Kourba, a little village on the coast, ca.st of Tunis, between Cape Mustapha and Ras Mamoura. The region is hilly and woody; it has always been inhabited by more or less savage ]x^ople, for which reason the Christians wi re often exiled there. S. Vailhe.

Cusack, Thomas F. See New York, Archdio-

OSF. OF.

Cusse, a titular see of Egypt. The Coptic name of this town was KOsko; in Greek it becomes Kousos, Akouasa, .■Vkoussa, Kousis, Kousai, Khousai; in Latin we find Cussa, Cusip. Chusse, etc. It is now the fellah- town, El-Kousiyet ( Alquoussiah , AJ-Ku^^ije , El-Kusiye, Qossieh), on the western bank of the Nile, inland be- tween the railway stations Dt'rtit esh-Sherif and Mont- falut. Near it stands Deir-el-Moharag, the largest, richest, and most peopled of the seven great Coptic monasteries; the Holy Family is said to have .so- journed there and it is the centre of an important ]iili:rimage. The city figures in the "Synecdemus" of Ilierocles (730, 9), Georgius Cy^jrius (764), and Parthey's "Notitia Prima" (about 840). It was a saffragan of Antinoc in Thcbais Prima. Lequien (II, 597) mentions two bishops, Achilles, a Meletian, in 325, and Theonas, present at Constantinople in .553. CusiE is to be distinguished from Kysis in the southern part of the Great Oasis, now Dil.sh el-Kal'a.

Brcosch, (leogr. dfii nltm Aegypten-t, X, 222; Baedeker, Aeamten (1891), part II, 45; JnLUEN, L'Egyple. Souvenirs bibliquo) H chrUiewi (Lille, 1896), 249.

S. Petrides.

Cush (son of Cham; D. V. Chus), like the other names of the ethnological table of Genesis, x, is the name of a race, but it h;>s generally been tmderstood to designate also an individual, the progenitor of the nations and tribes known in the ancient world as Cushites. The list of those descendants of Cush is given in Gen., x, 7-8. The country known to the Greeks as Ethiopia is calleii Cush (Heb. A'us) in the Bible. In its broadest extension the term designated the region south of Assuan, on the ITpper Nile, now known as Nubia, Senaar, Kardofan, and Northern Abyssinia. This region is referred to in Egyptian inscriptions as Kes or Kas. More often, however, the name Cush was given to a part of the territory just mentioned, called by the Greeks the Ivingdom of Meroe. at the confluence of the Nile and the Astaboras (now Tacassi). It is from this kingdom that came the eunuch of Candace, Queen of Ethiopia (Acts, viii, 26-40). Cush was long a powerful nation. In the course of the eighth century, b. c, its Kings became rulers of Egypt. Shabitku, one of them, was the prin- cipal opponent of the great Sennacherib, King of Assyria. It was in vain that Isaias warned his people not to place their trust in such princes (Is., xviii, 1; XX, 3, 5).

The African Cush is best known; but there were Cushites in Asia. The "land of Cush" of Gen., ii, 13 (Heb. text), watereil by the Gehon, one of the four rivers of Paradise, was doubtless in Asia. Regiua, Saba, and Dadan (Gen., x, 7) were in Arabia. The Madianite w'ife of Moses, Sephora, is called a Cushite (Ex., ii, 16, 21; Num., xii, 1 — Heb. te.xt). Nemrod, son of Cush, rules over cities in the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris (Gen., x, 8-12). This text points to the foundation of the first empire in this region by Cushites. It is chiefly the relics of a Semitic civiliza- tion that have been brought to light by archaeological discoveries. But traces are not lacking, according to competent scholars, of an older civilization.

Rawlinson. Five Great Monarilnis (London. 1879), I, iii; Maspero. Histoire ancienne des peuples del'Orieiit (Paris, 1905).

W. S. Reilly.

Cuspinian (properly Spieshatm or Spiesham), Jo- hannes, distinguished humanist and statesman, b. at Schweinfurt, Lower Franconia, in 147.S; <1. at Vieima, 19 .\pril, 1529. In 1490 he matriculated at the Uni- versity of Leipzig, went to the University of Vienna (1493) to continue his humanistic studies, and in 1494 entered there on a cotirse of medicine. At this early age he edited the " Liber Hymnorum" of Prudentius, and made a reputation by his lectures on Virgil, Hor- ace, Sallust, and Cicero. He was acquainted with Emperor Frederick III. In 1493, in reward for a panegj-ric on the life of St. Leopold of Austria, he was crowiied as poet laureate and received the title of Mas- ter of Arts from Maximilian. Soon after this he was matle a doctor of medicine, and in 1500 rector of the university. Maximilian made him his confidential councillor and appointed him curator of the univer- sity for life. Cuspinian also recsivetl the position of chief librarian of the Imperial Library, and superin- tendent of the archives of the imperial family. As curator of the university he cxerci.sed great influence on its development, although he was not able to pre- vent the decline caused by the political and religious disturbances of the second decade of the sixteenth century. He w^as on terms of friendsliip with the most noted humanists and scholars; the calling of his friend Celtes (q. v.) to Vienna is especially due to him. Celtes and he were the leading spirits of the literary association called the "Sodalitas Litterarum Danu- biana". In 1515 Cuspinian was prefect of the city of Vienna. Emperor Maximilian, also Charles V at a later date, sent him on numerous diplomatic missions to Ilungary, Bohemia, and Poland. He brought about a settlement of the disputed succession between