Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 05.djvu/852

* DAHLMANN. 736 DAHOMEY. DAHLMANN, diU'iiian, Feiedbich Chbistoph (1785-1860). A German historian and states- man, born May 13. ITS."), at Wismar. His ear- lier studies in Copenhagen and Halle were devoted to archieology and philology, but his attention was subsequently directed to political science and history. In 1812 he was made a professor in the University of Kiel, and in 1815 became secretary of the permanent committee of the Schleswig-Holstein clergy and nobility, in which capacit}' he opposed the Danish policy concerning those duchies. He published several historical works, and in 1829 was appointed pro- fessor of political science in Gottingen, where he published his valuable work, Quellenkunde der devtschen Geschichte (1st ed. 1830; reedited by Weitz. 1875. and subsequent editions). Dis- missed from the university in 1837, with six of his colleagues, by King Ernest Augustus, on ac- count of their protest against the abrogation of the Hanoverian Constitution, he went to Leipzig and afterwards to .Jena, where he Wrote his admirable Geschichte von Diinemark (Hamburg, 1840-43). In 1842 he became professor of his- tory and political science at Bonn, and later on took a prominent part in the political affairs of Germany. At the outbreak of the Revolution, in 1848. he was appointed deputy of Prussia in the Germanic Diet, and was the principal mem- ber of the committee appointed to draft a new German constitution. He exerted his influence in the Frankfort Parliament in favor of an heredi- tary' German empire, the dignity to inhere in the King of Prussia, but his views were not ac- cepted, either by King Frederick William IV. or the majority of the Parliament. After a less conspicuous parliamentary activity at Erfurt and Berlin. Dahlmann returned to his academic duties, to which he devoted himself till his death, December 5. 1860. Besides the works mentioned above, he was the author of important histories of the English and French revolutions, of a work in two volumes on early Germanic history, and the editor of the Ditmarsh Chionicle. Consult: Springer. F. C. D'lhlinaiin (Leipzig. 1870-72) ; Nasse. F. ('. Dii)ihiiaiiii. an inaugural lecture (Kiel, 1885). DAHLONEGA, dii'16-ne'ga (from American Indian Tmihuiiicni. yellow gold). A town and the county-seat of Lumpkin County, Ga., 78 miles northeast of Atlanta (ilap: Georgia, B 1). It is situated among the foothills of the southern portion of the Blue Ridge fountains in a gold- mining region, and has gold-mills, concentrators, and an extensive clilorination plant. Until the Civil War. a United States branch mint was situated here. Dahlonega is the seat of the North Georgia Agricultural College, a department of the State University. The Cherokee Indians called the place Dah-lo-ne-ga, meaning yellow money. Settled in I83I. it was incorporated in the fol- lowing year, and at the present time is governed bv a mavor. elected bienniallv. and a eitv coun- cil. Population, in 1800. 896; in 1900, 1255. DAHLSTJERNA, diil'sher-na, Gunno Euke- LITJS (1661-1709). A Swedish poet, born at Ohr. September 7, 1061. He was an intense patriot, and beguiled the tedium of surveying ex- peditions in Sweden. Livonia, and Pomerania, by composing songs that are at times the best of his epoch, and again nearly the worst in their pathetic puerility. He had the misfortune to choo.se bad models, the Silesian poets of the school of Lohenstein and the Italians of the school of Marini. But their florid pomposity could not always smother his true poetic fire, and his "Elegy on the Death of Charles XL" (1697) (Kungaskald) is sometimes sublime, while his "Goth's Battle Song" (1701) is an admirable popular ballad, an exulting defiance of the Rus- sians, whose triumpli at Poltava Dahlstjerna could not survive. He was a man of varied gifts, distinguished as a cartographer, and as the au- thor of a number of scientific papers. He died in Pomerania, September 7, 1709. DAHN, dan. Feux (1834 — ). An historian, jurist, and novelist. He was born in Hamburg, February 9, 1834. His parents were celebrated actors, his early training classic. He studied history and law in Munich and Berlin, became privat-docent in Munich in 1857 and professor of law there in 1862. He has since occupied the same position in Wurzburg (1863), KCmigsberg (1872). and Breslau since 1888. To histoiy he has contributed Die Konige dcr Oermanen (1861- 97) and Urgeschichte dcr germunischrn. und ro- TOa)n'sc/ien'F67A-er(1878etseq.) : to jurisprudence, Die Vernunft im Recht (1879) ; to poetry, col- lections of Poems, Ballads, and Songs (1857, 1873, 1875, 1878, 1892). He has also written many dramas, of which Markgraf Riideger von Bechelaren (1875) is typical. Dahn is most widely known, and deservedly, for his historical novels, Axhich deal mainly with the primitive Germanic peoples, from the Vikings of Norway to the Goths of Italy, and from prehistoric times to the Crusades. Of these there are more than twenty, the chief of which are Odhins Trost (1880) and the longest and best of all, Ein Eampf urn Rom (1876). This latter work ha-s an epic breadth and an artistic unity that makes it one of the most strik- ing historical novels of recent times. It is an epitome of the history of the German invasion of Italy, involving immense learning, borne so lightly by the author that it never oppresses the reader. The period is that of Justinian and Theodora, of the Gothic kings Theodoric, Totila. Vitiges, and Teja. Through the four volumes the interest never flags, and the dread of im- pending fate increases to the tragic close. Dahn's shorter stories of the migration, Felici- tas (1883). Bissula (1884), Frrdiiiididis (1885), Attila (1888), and Stilicho (1900), are also wortliy of mention; but facility of composition has liecii DaliTi's snare. DAHOMEY, da-ho'mi or da'ho'mil'. For- merly a negro kingdom of West Africa, now a French colony, comprising with its dependencies all the French possessions in the region bounded bv the military territories of French Sudan on the north (near latitude 14° N.), the Britisli colonies of Nigeria and Lagos on the east, the Gulf of Guinea on the south, and the German col- ony of Togo on the west (ilap: Africa, E 4). The total area is estimated at nearly 60.000 square miles, the territories of Kwala and Say having been added in 1899. There are 70 miles of coast. The surface is low and sandy along the Gulf, which is bordered by lagoons. The country is very hilly in the northern and more extended part, which includes the Mahe highlands. In the interior there are savannas, and large dis- tricts having a rather luxuriant flora; and