Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/40

Rh P R Y P S A on committees, and was chairman of the committee of supply in July, and again in April 1664. In the third session Prynne was once more, 13th May 1664, censured for altering the draft of a Bill relating to public-houses after commitment, but the House again, upon his submission, while taking severe notice of an irregu- larity committed by "so ancient and knowing a member," remitted the offence, and he again appears on the com- mittee of privileges in November and afterwards. In 1665 and 1666 he published the second and first volumes respectively of the Exact Chronological Vindication and Historical Demonstration of the supreme ecclesiastical juris- diction exercised by the English kings from the original planting of Christianity to the death of Richard I. In the latter year especially he was very busy with his pen against the Jesuits. In January 1667 he was one of three appointed to manage the evidence at the hearing of the impeachment of Lord Mordaunt, and in November of the same year spoke in defence of Clarendon, so far as the sale of Dunkirk was concerned ; and this appears to have been the last time that he addressed the House. In 1668 was published his Aurum Reginx or Records concerning Queen-gold, the Brief Animadversions on Coke's Institutes in 1669, and the History of King John, Henry III., and Edward I., in which the power of the crown over ecclesi- astics was maintained, in 1670. The date of the Abridg- ment of the Records of the Tower of London is doubtful, though the preface is dated 1656/57. Prynne died in his lodgings at Lincoln's Inn, 24th October 1669, and was buried in the walk under the chapel there, which stands upon pillars. His will, by which he gave one portion of his books to Lincoln's Inn and another to Oriel College, is dated llth August 1669. Prynne was never married. The following curious account of his habits is given by Wood. "His custom when he studied was to put on a long quilted cap which came an inch over his eyes, serving as an umbrella to defend them from too much light ; and, seldom eating a dinner, would every three hours or more be munching a roll of bread, and now and then refresh his exhausted spirits with ale brought to him by his servant." There is a portrait of him in Oriel College, Oxford, and Wood mentions one by Hollar, and an engraving by Stent, as the best extant. (S. R. G. 0. A.) PRYTANIS (pi. prytaneis) was the title of certain officials in Greek states. They appear to have succeeded the kings at the time when the monarchical form of government was abolished throughout Greece. At Rhodes they continued to be the chief magistrates as late as the 1st century B.C., but in other states their functions dwindled. Though they were not priests, they had the charge of certain public sacrifices. Their headquarters were in the " pryta- neum" or town-hall, the central point of a Greek state, where a fire was kept perpetually burning on the public hearth. When a colony was founded the fire in the prytaneum of the new city was kindled from the fire in the prytaneum of the mother-city, and if this colonial fire ever happened to be extinguished it was rekindled from the same source. At Athens in classical times the prytaneis were those fifty members of the council of five hundred who presided at the council meetings as well as at the popular assemblies. They consisted of the fifty members who represented one of the ten tribes on the council. The office was held for a tenth of a year and passed in rotation to the representa- tives of each of the ten tribes. During their term of office the prytaneis were maintained at the public expense in the tholos or rotunda (not, as is sometimes stated, in the prytaneum). As the highest mark of honour, distinguished citizens and their descendants were sometimes maintained for life in the prytaneum. Here, too, ambassadors were entertained. There was further a court of justice at Athens called the "court in the prytaneum"; it tried murderers who were not to be found, and also lifeless instruments which had been the cause of death, an institution prob- ably existing from a very remote antiquity. PRZEMYSL, one of the principal towns of Galicia, Austria, and the seat of a Roman Catholic and of a Greek bishop, is picturesquely situated on the river San, about 140 miles to the east of Cracow. It contains several churches, of which the two cathedrals are the most inter- esting, and numerous convents, schools, and seminaries. Among its manufactures are wooden wares, linen, leather, and liqueur, and a brisk trade is carried on in these articles and in agricultural produce. The trade is mostly in the hands of Jews, who form fully a third of the population. On the hill above the town are the ruins of an old castle, said to have been founded by Casimir the Great. Since 1874 Przemysl has been strongly fortified. The population of the town proper in 1880 was 9244, of the commune 20,040. Przemysl, one of the oldest towns in Galicia, claims to have been founded in the 8th century, and was at one time capital of a large independent principality. Casimir the Great ami other Polish princes endowed it with privileges similar to those of Cracow, and it attained a high degree of prosperity. In the 17th century its im- portance was destroyed by inroads of Tatars, Cossacks, and Swedes. PSALMANAZAR, GEORGE (c. 1679-1763), the assumed name of a pretended native of Formosa, who was in reality a Frenchman, and was born about 1679, probably in Languedoc. According to his own account he was sent in his seventh year to a free school taught by two Franciscan monks, after which he was educated in a Jesuit college "in an archiepiscopal city." On leaving college he was recommended as tutor to a young gentleman, but soon fell into a lazy and idle life and became involved in pecuniary difficulties. This induced him to assume various personations in order to obtain a supply of ready money, his first being that of a pilgrim on the journey to Rome. Afterwards he travelled through Germany, Brabant, and Flanders in the character of a Japanese convert. At Liege he enlisted in the Dutch service, shortly after which he altered his character to that of an unconverted Japanese. At Sluys he made the acquaintance of a Scotch chaplain, by whom he was brought over to England and introduced to the bishop of London. Having undergone conversion to Christianity, he was employed by the bishop to translate the church catechism into what was supposed to be the Formosan language. In 1704 he published a fictitious Historical and Geographical Description of Formosa, and was shortly afterwards sent to complete his studies at the university of Oxford. The work of course was founded on previous publications, but the compilation was done with great cleverness, in addition to which he printed a so-called Formosan alphabet, and specimens of the language accompanied with translations. In 1707 he published Dialogue between a Japanese and a Formosan. There also appeared without date An Inquiry into the Objections against George Psalmanazar of Formosa, with George Psalmanazar's Ansiver. To add to his income he also joined another person in promoting the sale of a sort of white japan, the art of painting which he professed to have brought from Formosa. His pretensions Avere from the beginning doubted by many, and when exposure was inevitable he made a full confession of his guilt. Through- out the rest of his life he not only exhibited a seemingly conscientious regard for truth but according to Dr Samuel Johnson, as reported by Mrs Piozzi, "a piety, penitence, and virtue exceeding almost what we read as wonderful in the lives of the saints." Dr Johnson used to discuss theo- logical and literary matters with him in an alehouse in the city, and cherished so high an opinion of his character and talents that he asserted he would " as soon think of contradicting a bishop." Psalmanazar obtained a comfort- able living by writing for the booksellers. He published