Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 01.djvu/460

LEFT B, b, the second letter and the first con- sonant in the English alphabet, as it is also in the other languages of the Aryan family spoken in Europe. A sound and character corresponding to the English b and the Greek beta is the second letter and the first consonant in Phoenician, He- brew, Samaritan, AramaiC; Arabic, and Koptic. In Ethiopic, however, beth stands tenth instead of second in order. Turning next to some of the Aryan lan- guages of Asia, we find that in Arme- nian be is the 26th of the 38 letters; and in Sanskrit, Mahratta, etc., bu, or ba, is generally placed 23d in the list of consonants, where it is preceded by phu and followed by hhu. Returning again to the Semitic, beth, the name given to the second letter of the Hebrew alpha- bet, is really Aramaean. Like the corre- sponding word in Hebrew, badth, it signi- fies a house, to which it has some faint resemblance. B is a flat mute, the voice not being so entirely shut off in pronouncing it as it is when one of the sharp mutes, p or /, is uttered. The b sound is produced by compressing the lips, a vowel being added to render it audible. It is hence called a labial, from Latin labiuvi:=a. lip, plural labia=^il>s; its other associates in the same category being p, f, and v, with which it is often interchanged in the cognate languages. B, as an initial, is used — In designating university degrees: For Latin Baccalaureus, as Artium Baccalaureus=zEQ.cQov of Arts=B. A. In music: For bass. In chemistry: For the element boron. B, as a symbol, is used — In numeration, in Greek, Hebrew, Ara- bic, and even occasionally in English, for 2. But B, in Greek, js the diacritical mark for_2,000. In Latin B stands for 300, and B for 3,000. In music: As the seventh note of the diatonic scale. It answers to the Italian and French si. In Germany it is=:B flat. BAAL, the chief male divinity among the Phoenicians, as Ashtoreth was the leading female one. The Carthaginians, who sprang from the Phoenicians^ car- ried with them his worship to their new settlements, as is proved, among other evidence, by the names of some of their world-renowned heroes: thus Hannibal, written in Punic inscriptions, Hannibaal, signifi.es the grace of Baal; and Hasdru- bal, or Asdrubal, Azrubaal="Help of Baal." The worship of Baal early ex- isted among the Canaanites and the Mo- abiteSj whence it spread to the Israelites, becoming at last for a time completely dominant among the 10 tribes, and to a certain extent even among the two, in consequence of the ill-advised marriage of Ahab with Jezebel, daughter of Ethbaal (the name means "with Baal"), King of Sidon. A number of places in Palestine and the neighboring countries commence with Baal, such as Baal-gad, Baal-meon, etc. This divinity seems to have symbolized the sun, and less fre- quently the planet Jupiter. He was wor- shipped under diflFerent forms, or in dif- ferent relations: thus there were Baal- berith=the Covenant Baal, or lord; Baal-zebub=the fly-lord; Baal Peor= the Baal of Mt. Peor, or Baal of the opening; the Moabitish national divinity. There was an affinity between Baal and Moloch. The Beltein or Beltane fires, lit in early summer in Scotland and Ireland, seem to be a survival of Baal's worship. BAALBEK (ancient Heliopolis, city of the sun), a place in Syria, in a fertile valley at the foot of Antilibanus, 40 miles from Damascus, famous for its magnifi- cent ruins. Of these, the chief is the temple of the Sun, built either by An- toninus Pius or by Septimius Severus. Some of the blocks used in its construc- tion are 60 feet long by 12 thick; and its 54 columns, of which 6 are still stand- ing, were 72 feet high and 22 in cir- cumference. Near it is a temple of Jupiter, of smaller size, though still larger than the Parthenon at Athens, 370