Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/304

Rh 286 R A S R A S consul, and the seat of a local governor nominated by the shah. It is the centre of the silk trade, which once flourished so greatly in Persia as to show an annual export of nearly a million and a half pounds in weight, valued at 700,000. In 1882, however, the prevalence of disease among the silkworms caused many of the peasants of Gilan to abandon the culture of silk in favour of rice, which became largely exported to Russia. But the geographical position of Rasht gives it a world-wide reputation irre- spective of trade. If the roads by Trebizond, Erzeroum, and Tabriz on the one hand and by Poti, Tiflis, and Tabriz on the other can still be considered the two " commercial highways" from Europe to Persia, the line of land and water communication by Astrakhan and the south-eastern shores of the Caspian has a good claim to be called the true modern highway for travellers and diplomatists moving in the same direction. Rasht was visited in 1739 by "two English gentlemen from Petersburg, " whose narrative, published three years later, contains much interesting information on the existing relations of Gilan with Russia. It is noteworthy, but not astonishing, to find that in those days the shah (Nadir Kuli) was himself "in a manner the sole merchant or trader in all Persia." In 1744 Jonas Hanway came there also ; but no fuller account of the capital of Gilan has perhaps ever been recorded than that of Samuel Gmelin in 1771, when Hidaiyat Khan ruled the province, and Karim Khan Zend was sovereign of Persia. Gmelin was received with extraordinary honours, as an imperial officer of Russia, and every opportunity was afforded him of observing the country, its features and produce, and of acquainting himself with the manners and customs of the inhabitants. In 1882 a concession for the construction of a railway from Rasht to Teheran, via Kazvin, was granted to a M. Boital. It is probable that no more practical effect will be given to this scheme than to that of Baron de Reuter some ten years before. See A Journey throvgh Russia into Persia (London, 1742) ; Histoire des Deccm- vertes, vol. ii. (Lausanne, 1784); Eastwick, Three Years' Residence in Persia (1864) ; Telegraph and Travel (1874) ; and published official Reports (1S82). RASK, RASMUS CHRISTIAN (1787-1832), an eminent scholar and philologist, was born at Brandekilde in the Island of Fiinen or Fyen in Denmark in 1787. He studied at the university of Copenhagen, and early dis- tinguished himself by singular talent for the acquisition of languages. In the year 1 808 he was appointed assistant keeper of the university library, and some years after wards made professor of literary history. In 1811 he published, in Danish, his Introduction to the Grammar of the Icelandic and other Ancient Northern Languages, from printed and MS. materials which had been accumulated by his predecessors in the same field of research. The reputation which Rask thus acquired recommended him to the Arna-Magnaean Institution, by which he was employed as editor of the Icelandic Lexicon (1814) of Bjorn Haldor- son, which had long remained in manuscript. About the same time Rask paid a visit to Iceland, where he remained from 1813 to 18i5, and made himself completely master of the language and familiarized himself with the litera- ture, manners, and customs of the natives. To the interest with which they inspired him may probably be attributed the establishment at Copenhagen, early in 1816, of the Icelandic Literary Society, which was mainly instituted' by his exertions, and of which he was the first president. In October 1816 Rask left Denmark on a literary expedition, at the cost of the king, to prosecute inquiries into the languages of the East, and collect manuscripts for the university library at Copenhagen. He proceeded first to Sweden, where he remained two years, in the course of which he made an excursion into Finland, for the purpose of studying the language of that country. Here he published, in Swedish, his Anglo-Saxon Grammar in 1817. In 1818 there appeared at Copenhagen, in Danish, an Essay on the Origin of the Ancient Scandi- navian or Icelandic Tongue, in which he traced the affinity of that idiom to the other European languages, particu- larly to the Latin and the Greek. In the same year he brought out the first complete editions of Snorro's Edda and Saemund's Edda, in the original text, along with Swedish translations of both Eddas, the originals and the versions occupying each two volumes. From Stockholm he went in 1819 to St Petersburg, where he wrote, in German, a paper on "The Languages and Literature of Norway, Iceland, Sweden, and Finland," which was pub- lished in the sixth number of the Vienna Jahrbw-lnr. From Russia he proceeded through Tartary into Persia, and resided for some time at Tabriz, Teheran, Persepolis, and Shiraz. In about six weeks he made himself suffi- ciently master of the Persian to be able to converse freely in that language with the natives. In 1820 he embarked at Bushire for Bombay ; and during his residence in the latter city he wrote, in English, " A Dissertation on the Authenticity of the Zend Language " (Trans. Lit. Soc. of Bombay, vol. iii., reprinted with corrections and addi- tions in Trans. R. As. Soc.}^ From Bombay he proceeded through India to Ceylon, where he arrived in 1822, and soon afterwards wrote, in English, " A Dissertation respect- ing the best Method of expressing the Sounds of the Indian Languages in European Characters," which was printed in the Transactions of the Literary and Agricultural Society of Colombo. Rask returned to Copenhagen in May 1823, bringing with him a considerable number of Oriental manuscripts, Persian, Zend, Pali, Singalese, and others, which now enrich the collections of the Danish capital. He died at Copenhagen on 14th November 1832. During the period between his return from the East and his death Rask published in his native language a Spanish Grammar (1824), a Frisic Grammar (1825), an Essay on Danish Orthography (1826), a Treatise respecting the Ancient Egyptian Chronology and an Italian Grammar (1827), and the Ancient Jewish Chronology previous to Moses (1828). He likewise edited an edition of Schneider's Danish Grammar for the use of Englishmen (1830), and super- intended the English translation of his valuable Anglo-Saxon Grammar by Thorpe (1830). Rask's services to comparative philology were very great. He was the first to point out the con- nexion between the ancient Northern and Gothic on the one hand, and of the Lithuanian, Sclavonic, Greek, and Latin on the other, and he also has the credit of being the real discoverer of the so- called " Grimm's Law " for the transmutation of consonants in the transition from the old Indo-European languages to Teutonic, although he only compared Teutonic and Greek, Sanskrit being at the time unknown to him. Rask's facility in the acquisition of languages was extraordinary ; in 1822 he was master of no less than twenty -five languages and dialects, and is stated to have studied twice as many. His numerous philological manuscripts were transferred to the king's library at Copenhagen. Rask's Anglo-Saxon, Danish, and Icelandic Grammars have been given to the English public by Thorpe, Repp, and Dasent respectively. RASKOLNIKS. See RUSSIA. RASPBERRY. See HORTICULTURE, vol. xii. p. 276. RASTATT, or RASTADT, a small town in Baden, is situated on the Murg, 4 miles above its junction with the Rhine and 12 miles south-west of Carlsruhe. It is a fortress of great strength, commanding the passage through the Black Forest. The only notable building is the old palace of the margraves of Baden, a large Renais- sance edifice in red sandstone, now partly used for military purposes and containing a collection of pictures, antiquities, and trophies from the Turkish wars. The industry of Rastatt is almost confined to local needs, and the town may be said to live on the garrison, which forms nearly half of its population (1880) of 12,356. Two-thirds of the inhabitants are Roman Catholics. Previous to the close of the 17th century Rastatt was a place of no importance, but after its destruction by the French in 1689 it was rebuilt on a larger scale by Margrave Lewis, the well-known imperial general in the Turkish wars, and became the residence of the margraves of Baden down to 1771. In 1714 the preliminary articles of the peace between Austria and France, ending the "War of the Spanish Succession, were signed here. The congress of Rastatt in 1797-99 had for its object the re-arrangement of the man of Germany by providing compensation for those princes who had relinquished to France territory on the left bank of the Rhine.