The Nuttall Encyclopædia/Ab

Abaca, Manila hemp, or the plant, native to the Philippines, which yield it in quantities.

Abacus, a tablet crowning a column and its capital.

Abaddon, the bottomless pit, or the angel thereof.

Abarim, a mountain chain in Palestine, NE. of the Dead Sea, the highest point being Mount Nebo.

Abatement, a mark of disgrace in a coat of arms.

Abauzit, Firmin, a French Protestant theologian and a mathematician, a friend of Newton, and much esteemed for his learning by Rousseau and Voltaire (1679-1767).

Abbadie, two brothers of French descent, Abyssinian travellers in the years 1837-1848; also a French Protestant divine (1658-1727).

Abbas, uncle of Mahomet, founder of the dynasty of the Abbasides (566-652).

Abbas Pasha, the khedive of Egypt, studied five years in Vienna, ascended the throne at eighteen, accession hailed with enthusiasm; shows at times an equivocal attitude to Britain; b. 1874.

Abbas the Great, shah of Persia, of the dynasty of the Sophis, great alike in conquest and administration (1557-1628).

Abbas-Mirza, a Persian prince, a reformer of the Persian army, and a leader of it, unsuccessfully, however, against Russia (1783-1833).

Abbasides, a dynasty of 37 caliphs who ruled as such at Bagdad from 750 to 1258.

Ab`bati, Niccolo dell', an Italian fresco-painter (1512-1571).

Abbé, name of a class of men who in France prior to the Revolution prepared themselves by study of theology for preferment in the Church, and who, failing, gave themselves up to letters or science.

Abbeville (19), a thriving old town on the Somme, 12 m. up, with an interesting house architecture, and a cathedral, unfinished, in the Flamboyant style.

Abbot, head of an abbey. There were two classes of abbots: Abbots Regular, as being such in fact, and Abbots Commendatory, as guardians and drawing the revenues.

Abbot, George, archbishop of Canterbury in the reigns of James I. and Charles I., and one of the translators of King James's Bible; an enemy of Laud's, who succeeded him (1562-1633).

Abbot of Misrule, a person elected to superintend the Christmas revelries.

Abbotsford, the residence of Sir Walter Scott, on the Tweed, near Melrose, built by him on the site of a farm called Clarty Hole.

Abbott, Edwin, a learned Broad Church theologian and man of letters; wrote, besides other works, a volume of sermons "Through Nature to Christ"; esteemed insistence on miracles injurious to faith; b. 1838.

Abdal`lah, the father of Mahomet, famed for his beauty (545-570); also a caliph of Mecca (622-692).

Abdalrah`man, the Moorish governor of Spain, defeated by Charles Martel at Tours in 732.

Abdals (lit. servants of Allah), a set of Moslem fanatics in Persia.

Abd-el-Ka`dir, an Arab emir, who for fifteen years waged war against the French in N. Africa, but at length surrendered prisoner to them in 1847. On his release in 1852 he became a faithful friend of France (1807-1883).

Abde`ra, a town in ancient Thrace, proverbial for the stupidity of its inhabitants.

Abdications, of which the most celebrated are those of the Roman Dictator Sylla, who in 70 B.C. retired to Puteoli; of Diocletian, who in A.D. 305 retired to Salone; of Charles V., who in 1556 retired to the monastery St. Yuste; of Christina of Sweden, who in 1654 retired to Rome, after passing some time in France; of Napoleon, who in 1814 and 1815 retired first to Elba and then died at St. Helena; of Charles X. in 1830, who died at Goritz, in Austria; and of Louis Philippe, who in 1848 retired to end his days in England.

Abdiel, one of the seraphim, who withstood Satan in his revolt against the Most High.

Abdul-Aziz, sultan of Turkey from 1861, in succession to Abdul-Medjid (1830-1876).

Abdul-Aziz, sultan of Morocco, was only fourteen at his accession; b. 1880.

Abdul-Ha`mid II., sultan of Turkey in 1876, brother to Abdul-Aziz, and his successor; under him Turkey has suffered serious dismemberment, and the Christian subjects in Armenia and Crete been cruelly massacred; b. 1842.

Abd-ul-Med`jid, sultan, father of the two preceding, in whose defence against Russia England and France undertook the Crimean war (1823-1861).

Abdur-Rah`man, the ameer of Afghanistan, subsidised by the English; b. 1830.

À'Becket, Gilbert, an English humourist, who contributed to Punch and other organs; wrote the "Comic Blackstone" and comic histories of England and Rome (1811-1856).

À'Becket, A. W., son of the preceding, a littérateur and journalist; b. 1844.

Abel, the second son of Adam and Eve; slain by his brother. The death of Abel is the subject of a poem by Gessner and a tragedy by Legouvé.

Abel, Sir F. A., a chemist who has made a special study of explosives; b. 1827.

Abel, Henry, an able Norwegian mathematician, who died young (1802-1828).

Ab`elard, Peter, a theologian and scholastic philosopher of French birth, renowned for his dialectic ability, his learning, his passion for Héloïse, and his misfortunes; made conceivability the test of credibility, and was a great teacher in his day (1079-1142).

Abelli, a Dominican monk, the confessor of Catharine de Medici (1603-1691).

Abencerra`ges, a powerful Moorish tribe in Grenada, whose fate in the 15th century has been the subject of interesting romance.

Aben-Ez`ra, a learned Spanish Jew and commentator on the Hebrew scriptures (1090-1168).

Abera`von (6), a town and seaport in Glamorganshire, with copper and iron works.

Abercrombie, Sir Ralph, a distinguished British general of Scottish birth, who fell in Egypt after defeating the French at Aboukir Bay (1731-1801).

Aberdeen (124), the fourth city in Scotland, on the E. coast, between the mouths of the Dee and Don; built of grey granite, with many fine public edifices, a flourishing university, a large trade, and thriving manufactures. Old Aberdeen, on the Don, now incorporated in the municipality, is the seat of a cathedral church, and of King's College, founded in 1404, united with the university in the new town.

Aberdeen, Earl of, a shrewd English statesman, Prime Minister of England during the Crimean war (1784-1860).—Grandson of the preceding, Gov.-Gen. of Canada; b. 1847.

Aberdeenshire (281), a large county in NE. of Scotland; mountainous in SW., lowland N. and E.; famed for its granite quarries, its fisheries, and its breed of cattle.

Abernethy, a small burgh in S. Perthshire, with a Pictish round tower, and once the capital of the Pictish kingdom.

Aberration of light, an apparent motion in a star due to the earth's motion and the progressive motion of light.

Aberyst` with (16), a town and seaport in Cardiganshire, Wales, with a university.

Ab`gar XIV., a king of Edessa, one of a dynasty of the name, a contemporary of Jesus Christ, and said to have corresponded with Him.

Abhorrers, the Royalist and High Church party in England under Charles II., so called from their abhorrence of the principles of their opponents.

Abigail, the widow of Nabal, espoused by David.

Abich, W. H., a German mineralogist and traveller (1806-1886).

Abingdon (6), a borough in Berks, 6 m. S. of Oxford.

Abiogenesis, the doctrine of spontaneous generation.

Abipones, a once powerful warlike race in La Plata, now nearly all absorbed.

Able man, man with "a heart to resolve, a head to contrive, and a hand to execute" (Gibbon).

Abner, a Hebrew general under Saul; assassinated by Joab.

Abo, the old capital of Finland and seat of the government, on the Gulf of Bothnia.

Ab`omey, the capital of Dahomey, in W. Africa.

Abou`kir, village near Alexandria, in Egypt, on the bay near which Nelson destroyed the French fleet in 1799; where Napoleon beat the Turks, 1799; and where Abercrombie fell, 1801.

About, Edmond, spirited French littérateur and journalist (1828-1885).

Abraham, the Hebrew patriarch, ancestor of the Jews, the very type of an Eastern pastoral chief at once by his dignified character and simple faith.

Abraham, the plains of, a plain near Quebec.

Abraham-men, a class of lunatics allowed out of restraint, at one time, to roam about and beg; a set of impostors who wandered about the country affecting lunacy.

Abran`tes, a town in Portugal, on the Tagus; taken by Marshal Junot, 1807, and giving the title of Duke to him.

Abraxas stones, stones with cabalistic figures on them used as talismans.

Abruz`zi, a highland district in the Apennines, with a pop. of 100,000.

Absalom, a son of David, who rebelled against his father, and at whose death David gave vent to a bitter wail of grief. A name given by Dryden to the Duke of Monmouth, son of Charles II.

Absolute, The, the philosophical name for the uncreated Creator, or creating cause of all things, dependent on nothing external to itself.

Absyrtus, a brother of Medea, whom she cut in pieces as she fled with Jason, pursued by her father, throwing his bones behind her to detain her father in his pursuit of her by stopping to pick them up.

Abt, Franz, a German composer of song-music (1819-1885).

Abu, a mountain (6000 ft.) in Rajputana, with a footprint of Vishnu on the top, and two marble temples half-way up, held sacred by the Jains.

Ab`ubekr, as the father of Ayesha, the father-in-law of Mahomet, the first of the caliphs and the founder of the Sunnites; d. 634.

Ab`u-klea, in the Soudan, where the Mahdi's forces were defeated by Sir H. Stewart in 1885.

A`bul-faraj, a learned Armenian Jew, who became bishop of Aleppo, and wrote a history of the world from Adam onwards (1226-1286).

Abul-fazel, the vizier of the great Mogul emperor Akbar, and who wrote an account of his reign and of the Mogul empire; he was assassinated in 1604.

Abul-feda, a Moslem prince of Hamat in Syria, who in his youth took part against the Crusaders, and wrote historical works in Arabic (1273-1331).

Abu-Tha`leb, uncle of Mahomet, and his protector against the plots of his enemies the Koreish.

Aby`dos, a town on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont, famous as the home of Leander, who swam the Hellespont every night to visit Hero in Sestos, and as the spot where Xerxes built his bridge of boats to cross into Europe in 480 B.C.; also a place of note in Upper Egypt.

Abyssin`ia, a mountainous country SE. of Nubia, with an area of 200,000 sq. m., made up of independent states, and a mixed population of some four millions, the Abyssinians proper being of the Semite stock. It is practically under the protectorate of Italy.