Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/231

ATHOL. functions being in the liands of selectmen. Popu- lation in I8OO; G319; in 11)00, 7061. Atliol was first settled in 1735 and was called Pequoig until 1762, when it was incorporated as a town under its present name. See Hhtory of Worcester County (2 vols., Boston, 1879).'

ATHOR, a'thor, ATHYR, ii'thir, or HATHOR, hil'thor ( EgA-ptian Haf-hor). An Egyp- tian goddess. The original seat of lier cult seems to have been Denderah in Upjier Egypt, where the ruins of her famous temple are still to be seen, but at a very early period her worship spread over the whole of Egj'pt. Her primitive fetish was, apparently, a buffalo's skull raised on a pole, and from this was developed the sacred Athor column, which plays an important part in Egyptian architecture, bearing, as capi- tal, a female head with the ears of a cow. The same head forms the central ornament of the si&trum, or rattle for temple music, which ap- pears among the insignia of' this goddess. In later times Athor was regarded as the goddess of music and the dance, of joy and love. By the Greeks, she was identified with Aphrodite (Venus). Earlier, however, she was conceived as a cosmical divinity, typifying the sky, and the traditional explanation of lier name as mean- ing 'the house of horns' ( i.e. of the sun ) is a result of this conception. The world is fre- quently represented in the form of her sacred animal, the cow, bearing between her horns the sun-god or his disk. In Egyptian mythological texts, Athor is sometimes called the mother of the sun, which is daily born from the sky. As the nocturnal sky, she became the goddess of the dead, and, under the latest dynasties, de- ceased women were supposed to become Athor, just as deceased men became Osiris. The repre- sentations of Athor vary greatly. Usually she is depicted in the form of a woman with a cow's head. The third month of the Egyptian year (Athor) was named for this goddess. For illustration, see Egypt.

ATH'OS (Gk. "Affus. called in modern times ''A7101' 'Opot, Hagion Oros, by the Greeks, and Monte Santo by the Italians, the name signi- fying Holy Mount). Properly the highest ele- vation on the easternmost of the three Chalci- dian peninsulas. In a broader sense of the word the whole peninsula was called Athos. The peninsula is about 40 miles long and is connected with the mainland by an isthmus hardly a mile and a half broad. It contained in ancient times several towns, and the mountain Athos (fi340 feet) is at its southern extremity. The point was a perilous one for sailors, and Xerxes, when planning the invasion of Greece, ran a canal through the isthmus, traces of which are still to be seen. Mount Athos has been since the Middle Ages the seat of a monastic republic, which, at the present time, consists of twenty monasteries and about (5000 monks. The origin of some of these religious houses is dated by legend as far back as the time of Constantine. In the Thirteenth Century they were pillaged by the Latin conquerors of Constantinople, but recovered under the succeeding emperors. In re- cent times, they have through three centuries of Moslem rule preserved their independence and former privileges. In the Middle Ages they were the centre of Greek learning and they have furnished to scholars many valuable Greek manuscripts, but at the present day there is a universal lack of learning among the monks of these establishments. Consult: Curzon, Mows- trric.i ill the Leraiit (London, 1881); A. Ney- rat. //.4/7IOS (Paris, 1880); Athelstan Riley, Athos (London, 1887); and Brockhaus. Die Kiinst ill lien Xthos-Klostern (Leipzig, 1891). ATHOS, a'tfis'. The nom-de-guerre of a character in Dumas's Musketeer romances, whose real name in the story was the Comte de la F&re. He is one of the three guardsmen with whom d'Artagnan (q.v.) associates himself — the hus- band of the infamous 'Miladi,' and father of the Vicomte de Bragelonne, who gave his name to the last book of the trilogy-.

ATH-WART', ATHWART'SHIP. See Beab- INO.

ATHYR, ii'thir. See Athor.

ATITLAN, ii't^-tliin'. A lake situated in the Department of Solola, Guatemala, 4700 feet above the sea-level, over 24 miles long and 10 miles wide, with a circumference of 64 miles (Map: Central America, B 3). It has a depth of more than a thousand feet, is surrounded by steep declivities, and has no visible outlet, though many small streams flow into it. At its southern end are two large volcanoes, San Pedro, 7000 feet high; and Atitlan, over 10,500 feet high.

ATITLAN, or SANTIAGO DE ATITLAN, siin'te-a'go da ft'te-tliin'. An Indian town on the mountain lake of Atitlan, in the Department of Solola, Guatemala, 49 miles west of the city of Guatemala. It has mineral springs and cotton-spinning is an important industrv. Population, 9000.

ATKARSK, at-karsk'. The capital of a district in the Government of Saratov, Russia; near the junction of the Medvieditza with one of its feeders (Map: Russia, F 4). It carries on a brisk trade in grain. Population, in 1897, 10,000. The settlement of Etkara is mentioned in the Fourteenth Century.

AT'KINSON, Edward (1827 — ). An American economist. He was bom in Brookline, Mass., and was educated in private schools. For many years he managed manufacturing companies and afterwards conducted a fire insurance company for the mutual insurance of factories. He invented the 'Aladdin oven,' an improved cooking apparatus. He has contributed extensively to periodicals and has published many pamphlets and books on economic subjects, banking, railways, cotton manufactures, the tariff, money, fire prevention, and the nutritive value of foods. During the Presidential campaign of 1900 he was an active opponent of the Administration's policy of expansion. Among his more extended works are: The Distribution of Products ( 1885) ; The Industrial Progress of the Xdtion (1889); and The Science of Nutrition (10th ed., 1898).

ATKINSON, George Francis (1854—). An American botanist. He was born at Raisinville, Monroe County, Mich., received his education at Olivet College, Michigan, and at Cornell University, and was made assistant professor of general zoiilogy and entomology at the University of North Carolina in 1885 and professor of botany and zoology there in 1886. In 1889 he was