Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/636

 632 DAGON DAHL of Constantinople. He founded several mon- asteries, which he richly endowed, including the abbey of St. Denis. The goldsmith Eligius, or loi, afterward canonized, was one of his ministers, and greatly contributed to the splen- dor of his reign. One of the king's most meri- torious acts was the revision and publication of the old national statutes, known as the Salic and the Ripuarian laws. His fame is marred by his perfidy toward some Bulgarians whom he gave an asylum within his territory, and afterward caused to be slaughtered ; and above all by his debauchery. " This Solomon of the Franks, " an old chronicler says, " entertained no less than three wives bearing the name of queens, and so many concubines that it would be too long to enumerate the same." He was buried at St. Denis. Dagobert II., the last Merovin- gian king of Austrasia, son of Sigebert II. and grandson of the preceding, born in 652, was secretly sent to Ireland in 659 by Grimoald, mayor of the palace, afterward lived in Eng- land, was restored by his subjects in 674, and was assassinated by Martin and Pepin of He- ristal in 679. DAGON (Heb. dag, fish), a national divinity of the Philistines, believed to have personified the reproductive power of nature. Dagon was represented with the upper part of a man and the hind part of a fish. The Philistines offered a great sacrifice to him in his temple at Gaza, when Samson was delivered into their hands. Another principal temple was in Ashdod; this was destroyed by Jonathan the Asmonean. DAGUERRE, Lonis Jacques Mande, one of the inventors of the process called after his name, born at Cormeilles, department of Seine-et- Oise, France, in 1789, died at Petit-Brie-sur- Marne, July 12, 1851. He commenced his ca- reer in Paris as a scene painter, and rivalled the best of his contemporaries in the brilliancy and novelty of his effects. Having assisted M. Prevost in painting his panoramas of Rome, London, Naples, and other great cities, he con- ceived the idea of heightening the effect of such views by throwing colored lights and shadows upon them, so as to produce the various changes of the day and season. This invention, called the diorama, was perfected by Daguerre and Bouton in 1822, and for many years the former was busily employed in preparing pictures for exhibition in the buildings erected for that pur- pose in Paris and London. In 1839 he sustained a great loss by the burning of his establishment in Paris. ^ Several years previous Joseph Nic6- phore Niepce and Daguerre had each begun independently to make experiments for the purpose of discovering a method of obtaining permanent facsimile copies of objects by the chemical action of the sun. A process by which that result could be obtained having been discovered by Niepce, he and Daguerre, on Dec. 14, 1829, united to develop and perfect it. After the death of Niepce in 1833 Daguerre prosecuted his researches alone, and made such great improvements in the process that Niepce's son consented that the invention should be known by Daguerre's name only, instead of the names of both, as had been agreed. The in- vention was announced at the session of the academy of sciences in January, 1839, by Ara- go, and excited a profound interest, which was heightened by the exhibition soon after of a number of pictures taken by the new process. The same year Daguerre offered the French government to make the invention public for an annuity of 4,000 francs to Niepce's son and one of equal amount to himself. The offer was accepted, but Daguerre's annuity was made 6,000 francs upon his agreeing to make public also such information as he possessed in regard to dioramas and any further improvements he should make in the daguerreotype. He was also made an officer of the legion of honor, of which he was previously a member. To the close of his life he continued to labor on the improvement of the daguerreotype. His Hi&- torique et description des precedes du daguer- reotype et du diorama (1840) passed through many editions, and was translated into Eng- lish. (See PHOTOGEAPHY.) DAGUIN, Pierre Adolphe, a French physicist, born at Poitiers in 1814. He is a professor in the faculty of sciences, director of the observa- tory, and member of the academy of sciences of Toulouse. His principal work is Traite element aire de physique theorique et experi- mentale, avec les applications d la meteorologie et aux arts industriels (3 vols., 1856-'9 ; 3d revised ed., 4 vols., 1867). DAHL, Johaiin Kristen Clausen, a Norwegian landscape painter, born in Bergen, Feb. 24, 1788, died in Dresden, Oct. 14, 1857. He had resided in Dresden since 1818. In 1820-'21 he visited the Tyrol, Naples, and Rome, in com- pany with Christian VIII. of Denmark. His works include a " Coast View of Bergen," " The Shipwreck," "Saxon Switzerland," and a great "Winter Landscape in Seeland." DAHL, Mikael, a Swedish portrait painter, born in Stockholm in 1656, died in London in 1743. In 1688, having studied in France and Italy, he went to London, where he was pat- ronized by Queen Anne and the prince con- sort. At Hampton court are several of his portraits of admirals. His equestrian portrait of Charles IX. of Sweden is at Windsor, and some of his whole-length representations of ladies are at Petworth. He also painted a por- trait of Lady Walpole, which is at Houghton. DAHL, Vladimir IvanOYitch, popularly known under his nom de plume KOSAK LTJGANSKI, a Russian author, born in St. Petersburg about 1802, died in 1872. He was educated in the naval academy, and served in 1819 on board the Black sea fleet. He subsequently studied medicine at Dorpat, and was attached as phy- sician to the army in the Polish campaign of 1831, and in 1839 to that under Perovski oper- ating against Khiva. He held various offices, and travelled extensively through the empire.