OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Africanus, Sextus Julius

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​AFRICANUS, SEXTUS JULIUS, a Christian traveller and historian of the 3rd century, was probably born in Libya, and may have served under Septimius Severus against the Osrhoenians in A.D. 195. Little is known of his personal history, except that he lived at Emmaus, and that he went on an embassy to the emperor Heliogabalus to ask for the restoration of the town, which had fallen into ruins. His mission succeeded, and Emmaus was henceforward known as Nicopolis. Dionysius bar-Salibi makes him a bishop, but probably he was not even a presbyter. He wrote a history of the world (Χρονογραφίαι, in five books) from the creation to the year A.D. 221, a period, according to his computation, of 5723 years. He calculated the period between the creation and the birth of Christ as 5499 years, and ante-dated the latter event by three years. This method of reckoning became known as the Alexandrian era, and was adopted by almost all the eastern churches. The history, which had an apologetic aim, is no longer extant, but copious extracts from it are to be found in the Chronicon of Eusebius, who used it extensively in compiling the early episcopal lists. There are also fragments in Syncellus, Cedrenus and the Paschale Chronicon. Eusebius (Hist. Ecc. i. 7, cf. vi. 31) gives some extracts from his letter to one Aristides, reconciling the apparent discrepancy between Matthew and Luke in the genealogy of Christ by a reference to the Jewish law, which compelled a man to marry the widow of his deceased brother, if the latter died without issue. His terse and pertinent letter to Origen, impugning the authority of the apocryphal book of Susanna, and Origen’s wordy and uncritical answer, are both extant. The ascription to Africanus of an encyclopaedic work entitled Κεστοί (embroidered girdles), treating of agriculture, natural history, military science, &c., has been needlessly disputed on account of its secular and often credulous character. Neander suggests that it was written by Africanus before he had devoted himself to religious subjects. For a new fragment of this work see Oxyrhynchus Papyri (Grenfell and Hunt), iii. 36 ff.
Authorities.—Edition in M. J. Routh, Rel. Sac. ii. 219-509; translation in Ante-Nicene Fathers (S. D. F. Salmond) vi. 125-140; See H. Gelzer, Sex. Jul. Africanus und die byzant. Chronographie, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1880–1885); G. Kruger, Early Christian Literature, 248-253; A. Harnack, Altchristl. Litt. Gesch. i. 507, ii. 70.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aga

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​AGA, or Agha, a word, said to be of Tatar origin, signifying a dignitary or lord. Among the Turks it is applied to the chief of the janissaries, to the commanders of the artillery, cavalry and infantry, and to the eunuchs in charge of the seraglio. It is also employed generally as a term of respect in addressing wealthy men of leisure, landowners, &c.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Afzelius, Adam

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​AFZELIUS, ADAM (1750–1837), a Swedish botanist, was born at Larf, Vestergötland, in 1750. He was appointed teacher of oriental languages at Upsala in 1777, and in 1785 demonstrator of botany. From 1792 he spent some years on the west coast of Africa, and in 1797–1798 acted as secretary of the Swedish embassy in London. Returning to Sweden, he founded the Linnaean institute at Upsala in 1802, and in 1812 became professor of materia medica at the university. He died at Upsala in 1837. In addition to various botanical writings, he published the autobiography of Linnaeus in 1823.
His brother, Johann Afzelius (1753–1837), known as Arvidson, was professor of chemistry at Upsala; and another brother, Per Af (1760–1843), who became professor of medicine at Upsala in 1801, was distinguished as a medical teacher and practitioner.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Agaiambo

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​AGAIAMBO, or Agaumbu, a race of dwarf marsh-dwellers in British New Guinea, now almost extinct. In his annual report for 1904 the acting administrator of British New guinea stated that on a visit he paid to their district, he saw six males and four females. The Agaiambo live in huts erected on piles in the lakes and marshes. Dwarfish in stature but broadly built, they are remarkable for the shortness of their legs. They live almost entirely in their “dug-outs” or canoes, or actually wading in the water. Their food consists of sago, the roots of water-lily and fish. The Agaiambo are believed to have been formerly numerous, but within the last few years have suffered from the raids of their cannibalistic Papuan neighbours. In features, colour and hair they closely resemble the true Papuans.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Agalmatolite

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​AGALMATOLITE (from Gr. ἄγαλμα, statue, and λίθος, stone), a soft species of mineral, also called pagodite, used by the Chinese for carving, especially into grotesque figures (whence called “figure-stone”).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aurillac

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​AURILLAC, a town of central France, capital of the department of Cantal, 140 m. N.N.E. of Toulouse, on the Orléans railway between Figeac and Murat. Pop. (1906) 14,097. Aurillac stands on the right bank of the Jordanne, and is dominated from the north-west by the Roc Castanet, crowned by the castle of St Etienne, the keep of which dates from the 11th century. Its streets are narrow and uninteresting, with the exception of one which contains, among other old houses, that known as the Maison des Consuls, a Gothic building of the 16th century, decorated with sculptured stone-work. Aurillac owes its origin to an abbey founded in the 9th century by St Géraud, and the abbey-church, rebuilt in the 17th century in the Gothic style, is the chief building in the town. The former college, which dates from the 17th century, is now occupied by a museum and a library. There is a statue of Pope Silvester II., born near Aurillac in 930 and educated in the abbey, which soon afterwards became one of the most famous schools of France. Aurillac is the seat of a prefect, and its public institutions include tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a chamber of commerce, a lycée, training-colleges and a branch of the Bank of France. The chief manufactures are wooden shoes and umbrellas, and there is trade in cheese and in the cattle and horses reared in the neighbourhood.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aureola

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​AUREOLA, Aureole (diminutive of Lat. aura, air), the radiance of luminous cloud which, in paintings of sacred personages, is represented as surrounding the whole figure. In the earliest periods of Christian art this splendour was confined to the figures of the persons of the Godhead, but it was afterwards extended to the Virgin Mary and to several of the saints. The aureola, when enveloping the whole body, is generally oval or elliptical in form, but is occasionally circular or quatrefoil. When it is merely a luminous disk round the head, it is called specifically a nimbus, while the combination of nimbus and aureole is called a glory. The strict distinction between nimbus and aureole is not commonly maintained, and the latter term is most frequently used to denote the radiance round the heads of saints, angels or persons of the Godhead. The nimbus in Christian art appeared first in the 5th century, but practically the same device was known still earlier, though its history is obscure, in non-Christian art. Thus (though earlier Indian and Bactrian coins do not show it) it is found with the gods on some of the coins of the Indian kings Kanishka, Huvishka and Vasudeva, 58 B.C. to A.D. 41 (Gardner’s Cat. of Coins of Greek and Scythic Kings of Bactria and India, Brit. Mus. 1886, plates 26-29). And its use has been traced through the Egyptians to the Greeks and Romans, representations of Trajan (arch of Constantine) and Antoninus Pius (reverse of a medal) being found with it. In the circular form it constitutes a natural and even primitive use of the idea of a crown, modified by an equally simple idea of the emanation of light from the head of a superior being, or by the meteorological phenomenon of a halo. The probability is that all later associations with the symbol refer back to an early astrological origin (cf. Mithras), the person so glorified being identified with the sun and represented in the sun’s image; so the aureole is the Hvarenō of Mazdaism. From this early astrological use the form of “glory” or “nimbus” has been adapted or inherited under new beliefs.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Auriga

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​AURIGA (the “charioteer” or “waggoner”), in astronomy, a constellation of the northern hemisphere, found in the catalogues of Eudoxus (4th century B.C.) and Aratus (3rd century B.C.). It was symbolized by the Greeks as an old man in a more or less sitting posture, with a goat and her kids in his left hand, and a bridle in his right. The ancient Greeks associated this constellation with many myths. Some assume it to be Erichthonius, son of Athena and Hephaestus, who was translated to the skies by Zeus on account of his invention of chariots or coaches. Others assume it to be Myrtilus, a son of Hermes and Clytic, and charioteer to Oenomaus, who was placed in the heavens by Hermes. Another myth has it to be Olenus, a son of Hephaestus, and father of Aega and Helice, two nymphs who nursed Zeus. Ptolemy catalogued fourteen stars, Tycho Brahe twenty-seven, and Hevelius forty in this constellation. Interesting stars are: α Aurigae or Capella (the goat), one of the brightest stars in the heavens, determined by Newall and Campbell to be a spectroscopic binary; β Aurigae, a star of the second magnitude also a spectroscopic binary; ε Aurigae, an irregularly variable star; and Nova Aurigae, a “new” star discovered by Anderson in 1892, and afterwards found on a photographic plate exposed at Harvard in December 1891. Several fine star clusters also appear in this constellation.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Auricle

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​AURICLE (from Lat. diminutive of auris, ear), the external ear in animals, or an analogous part in plants, &c. From a supposed resemblance to the ear of a dog, the term was applied to the upper cavities of the heart. The adjective “auricular” is more specially used in the phrase “auricular confession” (see Confession), i.e. private.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aurifaber

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​AURIFABER (the latinized form of Goldschmidt), a surname borne by three prominent men of the Reformation period in Germany.
1. Andreas (1514–1559) was a physician of some repute, but through his influence with Albert of Brandenburg, last grand-master of the Teutonic order, and first Protestant duke of Prussia, became an outstanding figure in the controversy associated with Andreas Osiander (q.v.) whose daughter he had married.
2. Joannes (Vratislaviensis; 1517–1568), the younger brother of Andreas, was born at Breslau on the 30th of January 1517, and educated at Wittenberg, where he formed a close and lasting friendship with Melanchthon. After graduating in 1538 he spent twelve years as docent at the university, and having then received his doctorate of divinity, was appointed professor of divinity and pastor of the church of St Nicholas at Rostock. He distinguished himself by his conciliatory disposition, earned the special confidence of Duke John Albert of Mecklenburg, and took a leading part in 1552 in drawing up the constitution of the Mecklenburg church. He also settled some religious disputes in the town of Lübeck. In 1553 Duke Albert of Prussia, anxious to heal the differences in the Prussian church caused by the discussion of Osiander’s doctrines, invited him to Königsberg, and in the following year appointed him professor of divinity and president of the Samland diocese. Joannes, however, found it impossible to conciliate all parties, and in 1565 returned to Breslau, where, in 1567, he became pastor in the church of St Elizabeth and inspector of the Lutheran churches and schools. He died on the 19th of October 1568.
3. Joannes (Vinariensis; 1519–1575), was born in the county of Mansfeldt in 1519. He studied at Wittenberg where he heard the lectures of Luther, and afterwards became tutor to Count Mansfeldt. In the war of 1544–45 he accompanied the army as field-preacher, and then lived with Luther as his famulus or private secretary, being present at his death in 1546. In the following year he spent six months in prison with John Frederick, elector of Saxony, who had been captured by the emperor, Charles V. He held for some years the office of court-preacher at Weimar, but owing to theological disputes was compelled to resign this office in 1561. In 1566 he was appointed to the Lutheran church at Erfurt, and there remained till his death ​in November 1575. Besides taking a share in the first collected or Jena edition of Luther’s works (1556), Aurifaber sought out and published at Eisleben in 1564–1565 several writings not included in that edition. He also published Luther’s Letters (1556, 1565), and Table Talk (1566). This popular work, which has given him most of his fame, is unfortunately but a second or third hand compilation.
See G. Kawerau’s art. in Herzog-Hauck’s Realencyk. für prot. Theologie, and the literature there cited.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aurispa, Giovanni

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​AURISPA, GIOVANNI (c. 1370–1459), one of the learned Italians of the 15th century, who did so much to promote the revival of the study of Greek in Italy, was born at Noto in Sicily. In 1418 he visited Constantinople, where he remained for some years, perfecting his knowledge of Greek and searching for ancient MSS. His efforts were rewarded by the acquisition of some 250 MSS., with which he returned to Venice. Here he is said to have been obliged to pawn his treasures for 50 gold florins to provide for his immediate wants. Cosimo de’ Medici, hearing of his embarrassment, redeemed the MSS. and summoned the owner to Florence. In 1438, at the council of Basel, Aurispa attracted the attention of Pope Eugenius IV., who made him his secretary; he held a similar position under Nicholas V., who presented him to two lucrative abbacies. He died at Ferrara. Considering his long life and reputation Aurispa produced little: Latin translations of the commentary of Hierocles on the golden verses of Pythagoras (1474) and of Philisci Consolatoria ad Ciceronem from Dio Cassius (not published till 1510); and, according to Gesner, a translation of the works of Archimedes. Aurispa’s reputation rests upon the extensive collection of MSS. copied and distributed by him, and his persistent efforts to revive and promote the study of ancient literature.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aurora (Illinois)

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​AURORA, a city of Kane county, Illinois, U.S.A., in the N.E. part of the state, on the Fox river, about 37 m. W. of Chicago. Pop. (1890) 19,688; (1900) 24,147, of whom 5075 were foreign-born; (1910) 29,807. Aurora is served by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, the Chicago & North-Western, the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern, and the Illinois, Iowa and Minnesota railways, and is connected with Chicago by an electric line. The city has a soldiers’ memorial hall, erected by popular subscription, and a Carnegie library. Aurora is an important manufacturing centre; among its manufactures are railway cars—the shops of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy railway being here—flour and cotton, carriages, hardware specialties, corsets, suspenders, stoves and silver-plate. In 1905 the city’s factory products were valued at $7,329,028, an increase of 30% in 5 years. The municipality owns and operates the water-works and electric-lighting plants. The first settlement in the vicinity of Aurora was made in 1834. In 1845 the village of East Aurora was incorporated, and West Aurora was incorporated nine years later. In 1853 the two villages were united under a city charter, which was superseded by a revised charter in 1887.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Aurich

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​AURICH, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Hanover, chief town of the district of East Friesland, on the Ems-Jade canal, 18 m. N.W. from Emden by rail. Pop. (1900) 6013. It is built in the Dutch style, and lies in a sandy but fertile plain, surrounded by pleasant promenades which have taken the place of the old fortifications. It has a palace, formerly the residence of the counts of East Friesland and now used as government offices, a Roman Catholic and two Protestant churches, a gymnasium, and four libraries. There are breweries ​and small manufactories of paper and tobacco. Close by is the Upstallsboom, the hill of oath and liberty, where every year at Whitsuntide representatives of the seven Frisian coast lands assembled to deliberate.
See Wiarda, Bruchstücke zur Geschichte der Stadt Aurich (Emden, 1835).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Artedi, Peter

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​ARTEDI, PETER (1705–1735), Swedish naturalist, was born in the province of Angermania, in Sweden, on the 22nd of February 1705. Intending to become a clergyman, he went, in 1724, to study theology at Upsala, but he turned his attention to medicine and natural history, especially ichthyology, upon the study of which he exercised great influence (see Ichthyology). In 1728 his countryman Linnaeus arrived in Upsala, and a lasting friendship was formed between the two. In 1732 both left Upsala, Artedi for England, and Linnaeus for Lapland; but before parting they reciprocally bequeathed to each other their manuscripts and books in the event of death. He was accidentally drowned on the 27th of September 1735 at Amsterdam, where he was engaged in cataloguing the collections of Albert Seba, a wealthy Dutchman, who had formed what was perhaps the richest museum of his time. According to agreement, his manuscripts came into the hands of Linnaeus, and his Bibliotheca Ichthyologica and Philosophia Ichthyologica, together with a life of the author, were published at Leiden in the year 1738.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Artega

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​ARTEGA, a tribe of African “Arabs,” said to be descendants of a sheik of that name who came from Hadramut in pre-Islamic days, settling near Tokar. The name is said to be “patrician,” and the Artega may be regarded as the most ancient stock in the Suakin district. They are now an inferior mixed race. They were all followers of the mahdi and khalifa in the Sudan wars (1883–1898).
See Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, edited by Count Gleichen (London, 1905).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Arta

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​ARTA (Narda, i.e. ἐν Ἄρδα, or Zarta, i.e. εἰς Ἄρτα), a town of Greece, in the province of Arta, 59 m. N.N.W. of Mesolonghi. Pop. about 7000. It is built on the site of the ancient Ambracia (q.v.), its present designation being derived from a corruption of the name of the river Arachthus (Arta) on which it stands. This enters the Gulf of Arta some distance south of the town. The river forms the frontier between Greece and Turkey, and is crossed by a picturesque bridge, which is neutral ground. There are a few remains of old cyclopean walls. The town contains also a Byzantine castle, built on the lofty site of the ancient citadel; a palace belonging to the Greek metropolitan; a number of mosques, synagogues and churches, the most remarkable being the church of the Virgin of Consolation, founded in 819. The streets of the town were widened and improved in 1869. Manufacture of woollens, cottons, Russia leather and embroidery is carried on, and there is trade in cattle, wine, tobacco, hemp, hides and grain. Much of the neighbouring plain is very fertile, and the town is surrounded with gardens and orchards, in which orange, lemon and citron come to great perfection. In 1083 Arta was taken by Bohemund of Tarentum; in 1449 by the Turks; in 1688 by the Venetians. In 1797 it was held by the French, but in the following year, 1798, Ali Pasha of Iannina captured it. During the Greek War of Independence it suffered severely, and was the scene of several conflicts, in which the ultimate success was with the Turks. An insurrection in 1854 was at once repressed. It was ceded to Greece in 1881. In the Greco-Turkish War of 1897 the Greeks gained some temporary successes at Arta during April and May.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Arta, Gulf of

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​ARTA, GULF OF (anc. Sinus Ambracius), an inlet of the Ionian Sea, 25 m. long and 10 broad, most of the northern shores of which belong to Turkey, the southern and eastern to Greece. Its only important affluent, besides the Arta, is the Luro (anc. Charadra), also from the north. The gulf abounds with mullets, soles and eels. Around its shores are numerous ruins of ancient cities: Actium at the entrance, where the famous battle was fought in 31 B.C.; Nicopolis, Argos, Limnaea and Olpae; and several flourishing towns, such as Preveza, Arta (anc. Ambracia), Karavasara or Karbasaras, and Vonitza.
The river Arta (anc. Arachthus or Aratthus, in Livy xxxviii. 3, Aretho) is the chief river of Epirus, and is said to have been navigable in ancient times as far as Ambracia. Below this town it flows through a marshy plain, consisting mainly of its own alluvium; its upper course is through the territory of the Molossians; its total length is about 80 m.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Art and Part

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​ART AND PART, a term used in Scots law to denote the aiding or abetting in the perpetration of a crime,—the being an accessory before or at the perpetration of the crime. There is no such offence recognized in Scotland as that of being an accessory after the fact.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Artaphernes

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​ARTAPHERNES, more correctly Artaphrenes, brother of Darius Hystaspis, and satrap of Sardis. It was he who received the embassy from Athens sent probably by Cleisthenes (q.v.) in 507 B.C., and subsequently warned the Athenians to receive back the “tyrant” Hippias. Subsequently he took an important part in suppressing the Ionian revolt (see Ionia, Aristagoras, Histiaeus), and after the war compelled the cities to make agreements by which all differences were to be settled by reference. He also measured out their territories in parasangs and assessed their tributes accordingly (Herod, vi. 42). In 492 he was superseded in his satrapy by Mardonius (Herodotus v. 25, 30-32, 35, &c.; Diod. Sic. x. 25). His son, of the same name, was appointed (490), together with Datis, to take command of the expedition sent by Darius to punish Athens and Eretria for their share in the Ionian revolt. After the defeat of Marathon he returned to Asia. In the expedition of Xerxes, ten years later, he was in command of the Lydians and Mysians (Herod, vi. 94, 119; vii. 74, Aesch. Persae, 21).
Aeschylus in his list of Persian kings (Persae, 775 ff.), which is quite unhistorical, mentions two kings with the name Artaphrenes, who may have been developed out of these two Persian commanders. (Ed. M.)