Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/409

BABOON. well. In 1902 several of them were to be seen in the New York Zoölogical Park.

Five other species of baboons are limited in their range to West Africa. One is the olive-green (Cynocephalus anubis), which is the species reported by Hanno, about B.C. 500, under the name 'gorilla'; another is the edible  (Cynocephalus babuin); a third the reddish-brown ' Guinea Baboon (Cynocephalus sphinx), long familiar in the hands of showmen, yet almost unknown in its native state; the others are the hideous, short-tailed drills.

The (Cynocephalus mormon) is the largest of all baboons, has comparatively short limbs, a mere stump of a tail carried erect above scarlet callosities, and a nuissive and powerful body. The head is of enormous size, crested and bearded, and there is scarcely any forehead, while the deeply sunken eyes give a morose expression. The fur about the head, rising into a crest upon the occiput, is greenish black, but the beard is orange yellow, and between them is a huge nose. vastly swollen on each side, folded into ribs colored light blue and divided and tipped with scarlet. The ugliness of its aspect is borne out by the disposition of this brute, which is one of the most formidable and ferocious creatures of the Gaboon forests. Another West Africa baboon is the (Cynocephalus leucophæus) , which is somewhat less in size than the mandrill, and lacks the colors and great swellings of the nose, but is otherwise similar to it.

The 'baboon' is a large, maned monkey (Theropithecus gelada), of southern Abyssinia, which has the appearance of a black, clipped French poodle, and the habits and temperament of a true baboon. See Ape; Monkey; and plate of Baboons.

BA'BRIUS. A Hellenistic fabulist. He was probably of Italian origin, as his name and Latinisms indicate. Toward the end of the First or during the Second Century he worked over a large collection of Æsopic fables in choliambic metre. In the later centuries of antiquity and the earlier Byzantine period, this compilation was very popular, and supplanted all previous collec- tions. Suidas, about the Tenth Century, possessed the work in ten books, but his text was more cor- rupt than that which we now have. During the Renaissance and modern times, the work existed only in paraphrases and fragments, which were current under the name of Æsop's Fables. Tyr- whitt, in his Dissertatio de Babri (1776), pub- lished a number of verses recovered from the pro- saic paraphrases of Suidas; and in 1842 a Greek, Minoides Minas, discovered a manuscript in the monastery on Mount Athos which contained 123 fables, arranged in alphabetical order, show- ing that at least one-third the original collection had been lost. Fifteen years later Minas brought out 95 additional fables, which are now uni- versally recognized as forgeries. In 1877 Knöll recovered a considerable number of new fables from a manuscript in the Vatican Library; and in 1891, Van Assendelft secured in Palmyra seven wax tablets containing fables not hither- to known. These are now in the library at Leyden. Of editions the best is by Crusius (Leipzig, 1897; edited also by Rutherford (London, 1883).

BABUYAN (ba'booyan) IS'LANDS (Malay, 'pig' islands). A group of islands in the Pacific, forming a portion of the northern part of the Philippine Archipelago. They are situated be- tween Luzon and the Batan group, between 18° 40' and 19° 40' north latitude and 121° and 122' east longitude. The chief islands of the group are: Kamiguin, 54 square miles; Babuyan Claro, 36 square miles; Calayán, 37 square miles; Dalu- piri, 20 square miles; and Fuga. 21 square miles. They are of volcanic origin, with partly extinct volcanoes on the first two. Including the Batan group, the population, according to estimates made by military authorities, in 1899, was 9500. The natives, Ibanags or Cagaynes, are the finest races of the Islands. Tobacco is the chief product.

BAB'YLAS, or BAB'YLLUS, ( ?-250). A bishop of Antioeh, from about 237 to 250. He refused to admit to public worship the Emperor Philip, who, to obtain the throne, had murdered the young Gordianus. In the persecutions under Decius, he was cast into prison and there died. His day in the Roman calendar is January 24, and in the Greek, September 4.

BAB'YLON (Gk. Βαβυλών). The Hebrew form and general designation of the city in Mesopotamia, which, from about B.C. 2300, was the capital of the country known as Babylonia (Map: Turkey in Asia, L 6). The etymology proposed for Babylon in the eleventh chapter of Genesis connects it with a stem signifying 'to confuse.' In reality, Babylon is a combination of two words, bab = gate and ilu = god, and hence appears in Babylonian inscriptions as Bab-ili — i.e. 'gate of God' (or, perhaps, 'gate of the gods'). How much older Babylon is than the date above given, we do not know; but it appears certain that it is far from being the oldest city in Babylonia.

It comes into prominence with the union of the South Mesopotamian States under one head, c. 2300 B.C. This was accomplished by Hammurabbi, the sixth member of a dynasty which had its seat in the city of Babylon. From this time on, Babylon becomes the most important centre in the Euphrates valley, and the political supremacy leads also to making the pa.can god of Babylon, Marduk, the head of the Babylonian pantheon. The period of greatest glory of Babylon is between B.C. 1800 and the fall of the Neo-Babylonian Monarchy (B.C. 538). During this period, rulers vied with one another in beautifying the city by structures within the religious precinct, and in fortifying it by strengthening its walls. The general building material being clay, repairs in the temples, palaces, and walls became frequently necessary. The chief temple was that sacred to Marduk; but grouped around the seven-staged tower E-temen-anki, 'foundation-stone of heaven and earth,' and the temple known as E-sagila, 'the lofty house,' were shrines and sanctuaries of numerous other gods.

In B.C. 689, Sennacherib, the King of Assyria, destroyed the city, but under Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar it rose to new glory. It is this second Babylon that became the famous city celebrated by classical writers, aroubd which legends cluster. Extensive mounds covering the site of ancient Babylon are situated about 50 miles south of Bagdad, on the east bank of the Euphrates. They consist of four distinct por-