Page:Imperial Dictionary of Universal Biography Volume 1.pdf/297

ATT horns and hounds in chorus," catch, three voices; "Take, oh take, those lips away!" round, three voices; "Sweet enslaver," round, three voices; "Joan said to John," catch, three voices; "Lay that sullen garland by," glee, three voices; "Come, fill the board," glee, three voices; "Oh, thou sweet bird!" glee, four voices; and "Adieu ye streams," glee, four voices. He died in 1800, during the performance of one of his benefit concerts.—E. F. R.  ATTERBURY,, father to the celebrated bishop of that name; born about 1631, in Northamptonshire; a student at Christchurch, Oxford, in the beginning of 1647; and preacher during the times of the usurpation; after the restoration, chaplain to Henry, duke of Gloucester, and rector of Milton, near Newport-Pagnell; unhappily drowned near his own house, December, 1693. His eldest son, Lewis, was likewise a student of Christchurch, D.C.L., 1687. He published several volumes of sermons, and died October 24, 1732.—T. J.  ATTERIDE, D', a Portuguese priest of noble family, a bishop and inquisitor. He was present at the council of Trent, and wrote a history of it up to the seventh session. Died 1611.  ATTERSOLL,, an English divine of the seventeenth century, wrote a popular commentary on the book of Numbers, 1618, which was translated into Dutch in 1667, in which he avers in the title that he has decided five hundred theological questions.  ATTEY,, a musician of the seventeenth century, in the service of the earl of Bridgewater. He was the author of a volume entitled "The First Booke of Ayres, of Four Parts, with Tablature for the Lute; so made that all the parts may be plaide together with the Lute, or one voyce with the Lute and Basevyoll," folio, London, 1622. He died in 1640, at Ross, in Herefordshire.—E. F. R.  ATTICUS, a Platonic philosopher of the second century. Several philosophical and historical productions are ascribed to him, six extracts from which, preserved by Eusebius, are the only remains of the works of Atticus now extant. He controverted some of the doctrines of Aristotle.  ATTICUS, patriarch of Constantinople in the fifth century, was born at Sebaste in Armenia, and died 10th October, 425. He was author of a treatise in two books, entitled "De Fide et Virginitate," composed for the daughters of the Emperor Arcadius. Some remains of his other writings are still extant.  ATTICUS,, an ancient sophist or teacher of rhetoric, lived about fifty years before the Christian era. He was a native of Pergamus, and a pupil of Apollodorus, who taught Augustus Cæsar. His real name was Dionysius, but he was surnamed Atticus on account of his having long resided in Athens.—(Strabo, lib. xiii.; Quintilian, lib. iii.)—G. M. <section end="297H" /> <section begin="297I" />ATTICUS,, a distinguished Roman, the contemporary of Cicero and Cæsar, who displayed such address and tact, that during the war between Cæsar and Pompey he managed to remain neutral; sent money to the son of Marius, while he secured the attachment of Sylla; and when Cicero and Hortensius were rivals, was equally intimate with both. When young, he resided at Athens, where he so far won the affections of the citizens, that the day of his departure from their city was one of universal mourning. He was an author and poet of no mean pretensions. He reached the age of seventy-seven years without sickness. When at last he became ill, he refused sustenance, and died 751, or two years before the Christian era. He was a disciple of Epicurus.—T. J. <section end="297I" /> <section begin="297Zcontin" />ATTILA, one of the earliest of those great Scythian conquerors who have in successive ages overrun the finest and most fertile regions of Europe and Asia, with vast armies of cavalry raised on the steppes of Central Asia, made his appearance on the frontiers of the Roman empire, which was then tottering to its fall, about the year of our Lord 430. According to the historian Priscus, as quoted by Jorvandes, bishop of Ravenna, in his history of the Goths, Attila was the son of Mandzach, a chief of the most warlike race of the Huns. The researches of Humboldt have recently shown that the Huns were of the Finnish or Uralian race; but their movement southward and westward in the beginning of the fifth century, was caused by the irruption, into their territory, of the Hiouqua, a tawny tribe of herdsmen of Turkish origin, who dwelt in tents of skins on the elevated steppe of Gobi. A portion of the race had been driven southward and westward toward the frontiers of Asia. After long wars with the tribes which were then in possession of what now forms the empire of China, the tribes thus expelled from their several pastures traversed the great plains of Central Asia for a distance of more than three thousand miles, urging forward the Finnish tribes from the sources of the Ural. From these wild regions poured forth bands of Huns, Avars, Chasars, and a numerous mixture of Asiatic races. "Warlike bodies of Huns," says Humboldt, "first appeared on the Volga, next in Pannonia, then on the Marne and the banks of the Po, laying waste those richly cultivated tracts, where, since the time of Antenor, men's creative art had piled monument on monument. Thus swept a pestilential breath from the Mongolian deserts over the fair Cisalpine soil, stifling the tender, long-cherished blossoms of art." The time was most favourable for such an irruption, for the powerful and most warlike tribes of Germany had abandoned their original homes, and were pressing forward into the Roman empire—the Goths into Spain, the Vandals into Africa, the Lombards into Italy, the Franks and Burgundians into Gaul, the Saxons, Angles, and Frisians into Britain. Hence the resistance of the Germanic tribes was comparatively feeble, and thus, in the language of Jorvandes, the most valiant race of the Huns ruled the empire of Scythia and of Germany, never before united under one chief; and, with an army of 700,000 men, threatened and laid waste the Roman empire, west and east, from the mouth of the Rhine to the banks of the Euphrates, and gave law more than once to the Franks and the Burgundians, at the same time that they crossed the Caucasus, and invaded the empire of Persia. The power of Attila thus extended from the swampy wilds of Scythia to the banks of the Rhine, and from the forests of Scandinavia and the shores of the Baltic, to the head of the Adriatic, and the desert valley of the Danube. The royal village or camp was on the north banks of the Danube, in the country which still bears the name of Hungary. Attila and his brother Bleda obtained the command of the Hunnish tribes and armies, about the year 403, on the death of their uncle Kirgilas. The power of the Huns had already become formidable to the degenerate Romans, both of the Eastern and the Western empires; and the first act of Attila was to receive the ambassadors of Theodosius, the emperor of the East, whose dominions the Huns had recently ravaged, and to dictate his own terms of peace and submission to the successor of Constantine. This interview was held on horseback, on the great plain of Upper Mæsia, near the city of Margeros. By this treaty Theodosius conceded to the Huns a safe and plentiful market on the shores of the Danube; agreed to pay to Attila a yearly tribute of seven hundred pounds weight of gold, and a fine of eight pieces of gold for every Roman captive who might escape from slavery amongst the Huns; to surrender all Hunnish fugitives who had taken refuge in the court and provinces of Theodosius; and to renounce all treaties and engagements with the enemies of the Huns. The provision of the treaty promising the surrender of all Hunnish fugitives, was carried out by the giving up of certain youths of the royal race of the Huns, who had taken refuge with the emperor, and they were crucified on the Roman territory as soon as surrendered. After inflicting this signal disgrace on the emperor of the East, Attila allowed a short respite to the Roman empire, whilst he more firmly consolidated his own power by the conquest of the remaining tribes of Scythia and Germany, which had not submitted to his arms, and freed himself from a rival by murdering his brother Bleda. He had not only the skill to reconcile the Huns to this crime, but also to persuade them that he himself possessed the sword of the Scythian Mars, and, in right of it, the dominion of the whole world. The finding of the sword of Mars occurred in this manner:—A herdsman seeing a heifer of his herd lame and bleeding, and not knowing how she had been wounded, followed the track of her blood, until he discovered a sword which she had trodden on in grazing. This he took to Attila, who received it with great exultation, declaring that it was the sword of Mars, and secured to its possessor universal dominion. The first expedition of Attila did not give much encouragement to these hopes of universal empire. Having collected an immense army, he led his forces through the passes of mount Caucasus, with the intention of conquering the Persian empire; but the Persian cavalry, which had more than once defeated the Roman legions, proved itself more than a match for the wild horsemen of the steppes, and Attila, after sustaining a great defeat on the plains of Media, was compelled to retreat, leaving Persia unconquered. The news of this defeat was received with great exultation at <section end="297Zcontin" />