Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume II.djvu/789

 BOCCAGE BOCHOLT 769 of Blandford, for the enormous sum of 2,260. His works in the Italian language have been carefully collected and published in 17 vols. 8vo (Florence, 1827-'34). Boccaccio's La, Te- seide is written in the ottava rima, of which he is usually considered as the inventor, and is the first Italian poem which presents a specimen of the epopee. Chaucer borrowed from this poem his " Knight's Tale," and Shakespeare a part of his "Midsummer Night's Dream." The great English dramatist also availed himself of Boccaccio's Decamerone in "Cymholine" and "All's Well that Ends Well." BOCCAGE, or Boeagc, Manoel Maria Bnrbosa tin. a Portuguese poet of French descent, born at Setubal, Sept. 17, 1766, died in 1805 or 1806. He was expelled from the marines and banish- ed to India for a sarcasm on the minister of the navy, and also driven from Macao for a similar offence against the governor general. A Goa merchant enabled him to return to Lisbon. In 1797 and 1798 he was arrested for sympathiz- ing with French revolutionary ideas. He trans- lated into Portuguese the Colombiade of his relative Mme. du Boccage, Le Sage's Gil Bias, Delille's poems, several of Ovid's Metamor- phoses, and other works. His poems, being melodious and characteristic of popular feeling, though without depth of thought, were imitated by several poets who were called, after his as- sumed name of Elmano, the Elmanistas, and were the forerunners of the present national school of Portuguese poetry. A complete edi- tion of his poems was published after his death (5 vols., Lisbon, 1806-'14). BOCCAGE, Marie Anne Le Page, a French poet- ess, born in Rouen, Oct. 22, 1710, died Aug. 8, 1802. She married a literary man of the name of Fiquet du Boccage. At the age of 36 she wrote a poem which obtained the first prize from the Eouen academy. She afterward pub- lished a French " Paradise Lost " (Paris, 1748), an imitation of Gessner's "Death of Abel," an epic poem called La Colombiade (1756), a tragedy, and minor pieces. Her collected works ran through four editions and were translated into several languages. She also wrote letters of travel through England, Holland, and Italy. BOCCANERA. I. Simone, a nobleman of Genoa, first doge of that republic, born about 1300, poi- soned in 1363. Weary of the quarrels and vio- lence of the great noble families, Guelphic and Ghibelline, the people in 1339 made Boccanera doge by acclamation. He carried on war suc- cessfully against the Turks, Tartars, and Moors ; but the Guelphic nobles, suspending their mu- tual animosities, combined against him and laid siege to Genoa. Compelled to treat with them, Boceanera abdicated in 1344, and lived in exile in Pisa for 12 years, when he returned and freed Genoa from Milanese domination. He was anew made doge Nov. 14, 1356, and remained such for several years, until he was poisoned in Genoa at a banquet given to the king of Cyprus. II. Gille, a Genoese sailor, brother of the preceding, died in 1373. He distinguish- ed himself as admiral of the Castilian fleet against the Moors under Alfonso XL, defeated the king of Morocco in two naval battles, par- ticipated in 1344 in the capture of Algeciras, and was made count of Palma. Under Hen- ry II. of Castile he defeated the Portuguese fleet in 1371 ; and aided the French by achiev- ing a brilliant victory over the English fleet sent for the relief of La Rochello in 1372, cap- turing its admiral, the earl of Pembroke. BOCCHERINI, Lnigl, an Italian composer, born at Lucca, Jan. 14, 1740, died in Madrid in 1806. He wrote 93 quintets for two violins, viola, and two violoncellos, in which he commonly as- signed the principal part to the first violon- cello. His Stabat Mater is his only church composition. BOCCONE, Paolo, afterward Silvio, a Sicilian naturalist, born at Palermo, April 24, 1633, died Dec. 22, 1704. He was a Cistercian monk, and to study natural history visited Italy, France, England, Germany, and many other countries. He left a great number of works, the most important of which is his leones et Descriptiones variarum Plantarum Sicilia, Melitce, Gallice, et Italiie (4to, Lyons and Ox- ford, 1674). BOCHART, Samnel, a French oriental and Biblical scholar, born in Rouen, May 30, 1599, died at Caen, May 16, 1667. He belonged to a Huguenot family, and became like his father and his uncle, the famous Pierre du Moulin, a Calvinistic minister. At 14 years of age he wrote freely in Greek verse, specimens of which were published by Dempster in the preface to his "Roman Antiquities" (1615). He studied philosophy at Sedan, and followed Cameron into England in the civil troubles of 1620. He next went to Leyden, where he studied Arabic. Returning to France, he was appointed pastor at Caen, and here in 1628 he held a public disputation with the Jesuit Veron, which was interrupted by Bochart's sickness, but was continued in epistolary essays for nearly three years, upon the principal topics of controversy between the Protestant and Eoman Catholic churches. In 1646 he published his celebrated Oeographia Sacra. Next followed his Hiero- zoicon, or treatise on the animals of the Bible ; and he was collecting materials for similar treatises on the minerals and plants of the Bi- ble, when he died while speaking at Caen. BOCHNIA, a town of Austria, in Galicia, on the TTswica, a tributary of the Vistula, 21 m. E. S. E. of Cracow ; pop. in 1870, 7,480. The town is chiefly built of wood, and it has celebrated salt mines, adjoining those of Wieliczka. They yield annually about 300,000 quintals of differ- ent kinds of salt, and have been worked since the 13th century. In the vicinity of the town are extensive quarries of gypsum. BOCHOLT, a town of Prussia, in the province of Westphalia, on the Aa, 44 m. W. S. W. of Mflnster ; pop. in 1871, 6,125. It has a castle belonging to the prince of Salm-Salm, and in the vicinity is a large iron mine.