Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 15.djvu/310

Rh 292 M A H M A H The next collision happened in 1803. The peshwa had fallen into grave difficulties with some of the principal members of the Mahratta confederation, namely Sindhia, Holkar, and the Bhonsla raja of Nagpur. He therefore placed himself under British protec tion, and this led to the great Mahratta war, in which the Marquis Wellesley displayed those talents for military and political combina tion which have rendered him illustrious. It was during the cam paigns which ensued that General Arthur Wellesley defeated Holkar and the Bhousla raja at Assaye, and General Lake won the victories of Farrukhabad, Dig, and Laswari over Sindhia and Holkar. The three confederates, Sindhia, Holkar, and the Bhonsla, concluded peace with the British Government, after making large sacrifices of territory in favour of the victor, and submitting to British control politically. Thus the Mahratta empire was broken up. It was during these events that the British won the province of Orissa, the old Hindustan now known as the North-Western Provinces, and a part of the western coast comprising Gujerat. The third collision came to pass between 1816 and 1818, through the conduct, not only of the confederates, but also of the peshwa himself. During the previous war the peshwa had been the protege and ally of the British ; and since the war he had fallen more completely than before under British protection and guidance, British political officers and British troops being stationed at his capital. He apparently felt encouraged by circumstances to rebel. Holkar and the Bhonslas committed hostile acts. The predatory Pindaris offered a formidable resistance to the British troops. So the peshwa ventured to take part in the combination against the British power, which even yet the Mahrattas did not despair of overthrowing. After long-protracted menaces, he attacked the British at Kirki, but failed utterly, and fled a ruined man. Ulti mately he surrendered to Sir John Malcolm, and was sent as a state pensioner to Bithur, near Cawnpur. Thus tl:e last vestige of the Mahratta empire disappeared. The British, however, released the raja of Sattara from the captivity in which he had been kept during the peshwa s time, and reinstated him on the throne. Owing to these events the British Government became possessed of the Con- can and of the greater part of the Deccan. It remain? to mention briefly the fortunes of each remaining member of the once imperial confederation. The principality of Sattara was held to have lapsed in 1849 by the death of the raja without lineal heirs, and was annexed by the British Government. The Bhonsla raja of Nagpur and Berar was obliged to surrender Berar to the nizam, as the ally of the British, in 1803. Berar then remained under the nizam till 1854, when it came under British administration, though it is still included in the nizam s dominions. The raja of Nagpur died without lineal heirs in 1853, and his terri tory, being held to have lapsed, was annexed to the British territories. The house of Holkar has, during the last sixty years, remained faithful to its engagements with the British Government, and its position as a feudatory of the empire is well maintained. In Sindhia s territory, by reason of internal feuds, the British had to undertake measures which were successfully terminated after the battles of Maharajpur and Panniar in 1843. But on the whole the house of Sindhia has remained faithful. Sindhia himself was actively loyal during the war of the mutinies. The gaekwar gradually fell under British control towards the close of last cen tury, and his house has never engaged in hostilities with the British Government. The gaekwar Khande Rao signalized himself by loyalty during the war of the mutinies. His successor, Malhar Eao, has recently been deposed by the British Government on account of gross maladministration. The ex-peshwa lived to old age at Bithur, and died in 1851. His adopted son grew up to be the Nana Sahib, of infamous memory, who took a leading part in the war of the mutinies. (R. T. ) MAHZOR (litHP), or MAHAZOR, 1 as some write the word (from the root &quot;itn, to go round, to return), signifies a cycle. The term is used by the Jews in a threefold sense : (1) astronomically, as Mahzor Katan for the cycle of nineteen years, Mahzor Gadol for that of twenty-eight years, Mahzor Gadol lallebanah 2 for the Metonic cycle; (2) liturgically, for the &quot;Larger Prayer- Book,&quot; whether in its narrower or its wider meaning (see below); and (3) ritually, for a book containing religious laws and directions, as, for example, Mahzor Vitri by R. Simhah b. Shemuel of Vitri-le-FranQais, Mahzor Rabbenu Tarn by R. Yaakob b. Meir of Rameru, &c. In the first sense the plural is either Mahazoroth? 1 Targum Yonathan on Genesis i. 14 ({ &quot;&quot;yiTntt l), which is the plural of Mahazoro, and mediately of Mahazor. 2 This must not be mistaken for Mahzor Gadol shel Lebanah, which consists of twenty-one years. See Pireke R. Eliezer, cap. vii. or Mahzorim,* or Mahazor in; 5 in the second and third it is exclusively Mahzorim. As most ancient prayer- books contain more or less fully elaborate &quot; tables,&quot; ex hibiting calendar matter, in connexion with the fixing of feasts and fasts and of the lescons from the Pentateuch and the Prophets, we cannot be in doubt as to the true cause of the application of the word Mahzor to the &quot; Lirger Prayer- Book.&quot; It is not applied because it is the equivalent of the Syriac hudrd, as some think, but simply because Mahzor is the equivalent of the Greek cyclos (KVKO&amp;lt;;). Q The Mahzor, meaning prayer-book, is capable of division from different points of view. According to its contents we may divide it into two parts, the Smaller and the Larger. The Smaller Mahzor contains the ordinary prayers, together with the poetical insertions and the lessons from the Pentateuch and the Prophets used on the Yamim Noraim, or &quot; Awe-inspiring Days &quot; (i.e., New Year and the Day of Atonement), and those used on the Yamim Tobim, the three principal festivals (Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles). The Larger Mahzor is, indeed, the only one which really deserves this name, since it embodies the ordinary prayers, together with the poetical insertions for the whole year, and the lessons from the Pentateuch and the Prophets for all feasts and fasts and the other extra ordinary occasions. According to its various &quot; uses &quot; the Mahzor may be divided into the Rabbauite and the Anti- Rabbanite. The Anti-Rabbanite Mahzor comprises the Karaite, 7 used by the so-called Karaites, or Scripturalists, inhabiting Russia (especially the Crimea), Galizia( Austrian Poland), Egypt, Palestine, &c,, and the Semi- Karaite, adopted by the so-called &quot; Reformed Jews &quot; of England, in reality the &quot;Congregations of British Jews&quot; of London, Manchester, and Bradford. 8 The Rabbanite Mahzor may be divided into that of the Ashkenazim, the Sepharadim, and the Italiani. The Italian Mahzor, though embodying large Ashkenazic and Sepharadic elements, is yet a distinct &quot; use.&quot; It branches out at home into three subdivisions (1) the Roman, 9 (2) the Neapolitan 10 (now extinct), and (3) the Italian proper; 11 and abroad into (4) the Greek Rites of Kaffa, 12 Crete, &c. (Crete having very early received a large influx of immigrants from France and Germany, but chiefly from Italy), and (5) the Romanian, 13 i.e, the &quot; use&quot; obtaining, among others, at Constantinople and other Byzantine cities. The Italians who, long before the year 1000, had given Jewish learning and poetry, not merely to 4 See Pireke R. EU ezer, cap. vi. 5 See note * above. 6 For the sake of completeness we may mention the term &quot; Mahazor- to,&quot; which occurs in the Massoreth. It is not so called, as some have thought, because the Mahzor Vitri (or, indeed, any other Mahzor), ever gave the text of the whole Bible. The Mahazorto was a pattern codex of the Bible, and got its name simply from its containing the cycle of the sacred Scriptures, the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagio- grapha. It (or a similar codex) is also sometimes called Mahazoro Rubbo, in contradistinction to smaller codices, which contained only some part of the Bible. It should be also borne in mind that the Babylonian Jews (as we are distinctly told of those of Nehardea) used in olden times to read on Sabbaths in the synagogue not merely, as nowadays, the Pentateuch and portions of the Prophets, but, in the afternoon service, portions of the Hagiographa also (T. B., Shalbath, 1166). 7 See Daily and Festival Prayers, in 4 vols., Venice, 1 528-29, 4to ; in 3 vols., Kale, 1806, 4to ; in 4 vols., Eupatoria, 1836, 4to; do., Vienna, 1854, 8vo. 8 Forms of Prayer, &c., in 5 vols., London, 1841-43, 8vo. 9 Soncinati, Soncino, Casal Maggiore, 1485-86, Bologna, 1540, both in folio. 10 Cambridge MS. Acid. 491.^ 11 Prayers, &c., Venice, 1545, 16mo, &c. 12 Cambridge MS. Add. 542. 13 layers for the Whole Tear, &c., in 2 vols., Venice, 151 /-49, folio ; Constantinople, 1573-76, folio. The copies of both editions in the Cambridge University Library are, so far as we know, the finest to be found in England.
 * See Pirekz R. Elfezer, cap. vi.