Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/859

 DIARMAID

775

DIASPORA

Diario Romano for 1908; Chandlery, Pilgrim Walks in Rome (St. Louis, Mo., and London, 1905); Bellesheiu in Kirchenlex., s. v.; Salvatorianer, Die ewige Stadt (Rome, 1904): Gsell-Fells. Rom und die Campagna (1887); de Bleser, Rome et ses monuments (Louvain, 1866).

Francis Mershman.

Diannaid, Saint, b. in Ireland, date unknown ; d. in 851 or 8512. He was made Archbishop of Armagh in 834, but was driven from his see by thc^ usurper For- lunaii in 8.S5. However, he claimed his rights and 3oll(>cted his ce.ss in Connacht, in 830, as primate. He lived in a stonny age, as the Scandinavian rovers under Turge.sius seized Annagh, in 841, and levelled the churches. The "Annals of Ulster" (ed. B. Mc- Carthy, Dublin, 1887, I, 361) describe him as "the (vi-sest of the doctors of Europe". His feast is cele- brateil 24 April.

Saint Diarmaid, sumamed the Just, a famous frisli confe.ssor of the mid-sixth century; d. 542. His name i.s associated with the great monastery of Inis- jlothran (Iniscleraun) on Lough Ree, in the Diocese af Anlagh, which he foimded about the year 530. He was of [irincely origin and a native of Connacht. Wish- ing to foimd an oratory far from the haunts of men, he selected the beautiful but lonely island associated with the inemoiy of Queen Meave, now known as Quaker [sland. Here his fame soon attracted disciples, and imong them St. Ciaran of Clonmacnoise. He was not jnly a good teacher, but also a distinguished writer incl poet. On the island seven churches are tradi- tionally said to have been erected, and the traces of six are still in evidence, including Tcdtnjml Diarmada, 3r the church of St. Diarmaid, the saint's own church — an oratory eight feet by seven. His feast is cele- brated 10 Januai-y. After his death the monastic school kept up its reputation for fully six centuries, \\u\ i\u: islantl itself was famous for pilgrimages in pre-Ueformati(9n days.

Murliirology of Donegal (Dublin, 1864); O'HanLON, Lives of ' Iriih Saints (Dublin, 1875), IV. 476; I, 152; Stuart, Hi

'oru of Annagh, ed. Coleman (Dublin, 19(X)); Acta SS., April, [If; CoLGAN, Ada SS. Hibemice (Louvain, 1645): Bigger, cloOirann, its History and Antiquities (Dublin, 1900);

■Stokes and Straciian, Thesaurus Palceohibemicus (Cambridge, 1903).

W. H. Grattan-Flood.

Dias, Bartolomeu, a famous Portuguese naviga- tor of tlie fifteenth century, discoverer of the Cape of Good Hope; d. at sea, 29 May, 1500. Several Port u- ^lese historians state that he was a relative or descend- ant of Joao Dias who sailed around Cape Bojador in 1434, and of Diniz Dias who is said to have discovered the (':ipe Verde Islands. As early as 1481 Bartolo- meu Di:is h.ad accompanied Diogo d'Azambuja on an ?xpedition to the Gold Coa.st. Dias was a cavalier of the royal court, superintendent of the royal ware- liouses and sailing-master of the man-of-war "San ''liristovao", when King John CJoao) II appointed liini on 10 Oct., 1486,astheheadof an expedition which R'a.s to endeavour to sail around the southern end of Africa. Its chief purpo.se was to find the country of the Christian African king known as Prcster John, concerning whom recent reports had arrived (14SG) (hrougli Joao .Vlfon.so d'.\veiro, and with whom the Portuguese wi.shed to enter into friendly relations.

After ten months of preparation Dias left Lisbon the hitter part of July or the beginning of August, 1487, with two armed caravels of fifty tons each and one supply-.ship. Among his companions were Pero d'.\l<Mn(iuer, who wrote a description of Vasco da Gam;i's first voyage, I^eitao, Joao Infante, Alvaro M:irtins, and Joao (Irego. The supply-ship was com- manded by Bartoloineu's brother, Pero Dias. There were also two negroes and four negresses on board who were to be set ,a.sliore at suitable spots to explain to the natives the purpose of the expedition. Dias sailed first towards the mouth of the Congo, discovered the year before by Cao and Behaim, then following the

African coast, he entered Walfisch Bay, and probably erected the first of his stone columns near the present Angra Pequeiia. From 29° south Latitude (Port Nol- loth) he lost sight of the coast and was driven by a violent storm, which lasted thirteen il;iys, far beyond the cape to the south. When calm weather returned he sailed again in an easterly direction and, when no land appeared, turned northward, landing in the Bahia dos Vaqueiros (Mossel Bay). Following the coast he reached Algoa Bay, and t^ien the limit of his exploration, the Great Fi.sh River, which lie named after the commander of the accompanying vessel, Rio Infante. It wa.s only on his return viiy:ige th.at he discovered the Cape, to which, accnnhiig to Harros, he gave the name of Cabo Tormentoso. King John, in view of the success of the expedition, is said to have proposed the name it h.a.s since borne. Cape of Good Hope. In December, 1488, Dias returned to Lisbon after an ab.sence of sixteen months and seventeen days. He had shown the way to Vasco da Gama whom in 1497 he accompanied, but in a subordinate position, as far as the Cape Verde Islands.

In 1500 Dias commanded a .ship in the expedition of Cabral (q. v.); his vessel, however, was one of those wrecked not far from the Cape of Good Hojie, which he had discovered thirteen years before. An official report of the expedition to the cape h.as not yet been found. Besides the account by Barros there is a note written on the margin of page 13 of a maiuiscript copy of Cardinal Pierre d'.Ailly's "Imago Mundi", which is of importance, as this copy was once the property of Christopher Columbus. Ravenstein h;us attempted, and not unsuccessfully, by the aid of contemporary charts to reconstruct the entire voyage with the dif- ferent stopping-points of the route.

Barros, Decadas da Asia, Dec. I, bk. III. iv; Kavenstein, The Voyages of Diogo Cao and Barlhulumt-w Dins in The Geo- araphical Journal (London, 1900), XVI, 6'.'.'")-6.5.5; Behkens, Die erste Vmsegelung des Kaps der Gnten Hoffnung, durch Bar' tholomeu Diasm Die Nalur (Halle, 1901), L 7-9, 15-19.

Otto Hartig.

Diaspora (or Dispersion) was the name given to the coimtries (outside of Palestine) through which the Jews were dispersed, and secondarily to the Jews liv- ing in those coimtries. The Greek tenn, Siatrwopd, corresponds to the Hebrew DvJ, "exile" (cf. Jer., xxiv, 5). It occurs in the Greek version of the Old Testament, e. g. Deut., xxviii, 25; xxx, 4, where the dispersion of the Jews among the nations is foretold as the punishment of their apostasy. In John, vii, 35, the word is used implying disdain: "The Jews there- fore said among themselves: Whither will he go, that we shall not find him? Will he go unto the dispersed among the Gentiles?" Two of the Catholic Epistles, viz. that of James and I Peter, are addressed to the neophytes of the Diaspor;i. In Acts, ii, are enumer- ated the princip:d countries from which the Jews came who heard the .Vpostles pre:icli :it Pentecost, everyone "in his own tongue". The Dia.spora w;is the result of the various deportations of Jews which invariably followed the inva.sion or contpiest of Palestine. The first deportation took place after the capture of Samaria by Shalmane.ser (Salmanasar) and Sargon, when a portion of the Ten Tribes were carried into the regions of the Euphrates and into Media, 721 B. c. (IV Kings, xvii). In 587 B. c. the Kingdom of Juda was transported into Mesopotamia. When, about fifty years later, Cyrus .allowed the Jews to return to their country, only the poorer and more fer\'ent availed themselves of the permission. The richer families remained in Baliylonia forming the beginning of a numerous and influential comnnmity. The con- quests of Alex:inder the Great cau.sed the spreading of of Jews throughout Asia and Syria. Seleuois Nicator made the Jews citizens in the cities he built in hia dominions, and gave them equal rights with tho Greeks and Macedonians. (Josephus, Antiquities,