OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Python (mythology)

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​PYTHON, in Greek mythology, son of Gaea, an enormous serpent, said to have been produced from the mud after the flood of Deucalion. Its haunt was a cavern near Mt Parnassus. Four days after its birth it was slain by Apollo (Apollodorus i. 4), who was hence surnamed Pythius. According to Ephorus (in Strabo ix. 646), Python, surnamed Dracon (serpent), was a brigand near Delphi. The python in reality represents the pestilential vapours rising from stagnant lakes and pools, which are dispersed by Apollo and his arrows—that is, the shafts of the sun. The old derivation (Homeric Hymn to Apollo, 571), according to which Delphi was originally called Pytho, because the slain serpent was left there to “rot” (πίθεσθαι), points to this explanation.
see C. Pascal, Studii di antichità e mitologia (1896).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pélissier, Aimable Jean Jacques

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​PÉLISSIER, AIMABLE JEAN JACQUES (1794–1864), duke of Malakoff, marshal of France, was born on the 6th of November 1794 at Maromme (Seine Inférieure), of a family of prosperous artisans or yeoman, his father being employed in a powder-magazine. After attending the military college of La Flèche and the special school of St Cyr, he in 1815 entered the army as sub-lieutenant in an artillery regiment. A brilliant examination in 1819 secured his appointment to the staff. He served as aide-de-camp in the Spanish campaign of 1823, and in the expedition to the Morea in 1828–29. In 1839 he took part in the expedition to Algeria, and on his return was promoted to the rank of chef d’escadron. After some years’ staff service in Paris he was again sent to Algeria as chief of staff of the province of Oran with the rank of lieutenant-colonel, and remained there till the Crimean War, taking a prominent part in many important operations. The severity of his conduct in suffocating a whole Arab tribe in the Dahra or Dahna caves, near Mustaganem, where they had taken refuge (June 18, 1845), awakened such indignation in Europe that Marshal Soult, the minister of war, publicly expressed his regret; but Marshal Bugeaud, the governor-general of Algeria, not only gave it his approval, but secured for Pélissier the rank of general of brigade, which he held till 1850, when he was promoted general of division. After the battles of October and November 1854 before Sevastopol, Pélissier was sent to the Crimea, where on the 16th of May 1855 he succeeded Marshal Canrobert as commander-in-chief of the French forces before Sevastopol (see Crimean War). His command was marked by relentless pressure of the enemy and unalterable determination to conduct the campaign without interference from Paris. His perseverance was crowned with ​success in the storming of the Malakoff on the 8th of September. On the 12th he was promoted to be marshal. On his return to Paris he was named senator, created duke of Malakoff (July 22, 1856), and rewarded with a grant of 100,000 francs per annum. From March 1858 to May 1859 he was French ambassador in London, whence he was recalled to take command of the army of observation on the Rhine. In the same year he became grand chancellor of the Legion of Honour. In 1860 he was appointed governor-general of Algeria, and he died there on the 22nd of May 1864.
See Marbaud, Le Maréchal Pélissier (1863), Castille, Portraits historiques, 2nd series (1859)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pérez Galdós, Benito

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​PÉREZ GALDÓS, BENITO (1845–), was born at Las Palmas, in the Canary Islands, on the 10th of May 1845. In 1863 he was sent to Madrid to study law, drifted into literature, and was speedily recognized as one of the most promising recruits on the Liberal side. Shortly after the Revolution of 1868 he abandoned journalism, and employed fiction as the vehicle for propagating advanced opinions. His first novel La Fontana de oro, was printed in 1871, and later in the same year appeared El Audaz. The reception given to these early essays encouraged the writer to adopt novel-writing as a profession. He had already determined upon the scheme of his Episodios nacionales, a series which might compare with the Comédie humaine. Old charters, old letters, old newspapers were collected by him with the minuteness of a German archivist; no novelist was ever more thoroughly equipped as regards the details of his period. Trafalgar, the first volume of the Episodios nacionales, appeared in 1879; the remaining books of this first series are entitled La Cort de Carlos IV., El 19 de marzo y el 2 de mayo, Bailén, Napoleón en Chamartin, Zaragoza, Gerona, Cadiz, Juan Martin el Empecinado and La Batalla de Arpiles. As the titles suffice to show, the author’s aim was to write the national epic of the 19th century in prose; and he so completely succeeded that, long before the first series ended in 1881, he took rank among the foremost novelists of his time. A second series of Episodios nacionales, beginning with El Equipage del rey José and ending with a tenth volume, Un Faccioso más y algunas frailes menos, was brought to a close in 1883, and was, like its predecessor, a monument of industry and exact knowledge, of realism and romantic conception; and he carried on the Episodios nacionales into a fourth series, raising the total of volumes to forty. In fecundity and in the power of creating characters, Pérez Galdós vies with Balzac. Parallel with his immense achievement in historical fiction, Pérez Galdós published a collection of romances dealing with contemporay life, its social problems and religious difficulties. Of these the best known, and perhaps the best, are Doña Perfecta (1876); Gloria (1877); La Familia de Léon Roch (1878); Marianela (1878); Fortunata y Jacinta (1887); and Angel Guerra (1891). Nor does this exhaust his prodigious activity. Besides adapting several of his novels for stage purposes, he wrote original dramas such as La Loca de la casa (1893), San Quintín (1894), Electra (1900) and Mariucha (1904); but his diffuse, exuberant genius ​was scarcely accommodated to the convention of theatrical form. Pérez Galdós became a member of the Spanish Academy, and was also elected to the Cortes; but it is solely as a romancer that his name is familiar wherever Spanish is spoken, as a national novelist of fertile talent, and a most happy humorist who in his eccentricities and oddities is hardly inferior to Dickens. (J. F.-K.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pâtenôtre des Noyers, Jules

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​PÂTENÔTRE DES NOYERS, JULES (1845–), French diplomatist, was born at Baye (Marne) on the 20th of April 1845. Educated at the Ecole Normale Superieure, he taught for some years in the lycée at Algiers before he joined the diplomatic service in 1871. His most important mission was in 1884, when he was sent as French minister to China to regularize the French dominion in Annam. After arranging at Hue with the king of Annam the condition of the French protectorate, he proceeded to Shanghai to settle with China the difficulties which had arisen over the evacuation of Tongking by the Chinese troops. The negotiation failed, and the French admiral resumed hostilities against China in August. Next year Pâtenôtre signed with Li Hung Chang a treaty of peace at Tien-tsin, by which the French protectorate in Annam and Tongking was recognized, and both parties agreed to remain within their own borders in the future. After serving as minister plenipotentiary in Morocco (1888–1891), M. Pâtenôtre was sent to Washington, where he was raised to the rank of ambassador in 1893. He was ambassador at Madrid from 1897 to 1902.
Pierre Loti in Au Maroc has described his diplomacy in Morocco. M. Pâtenôtre himself published some reminiscences in the Revue des deux mondes.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pyx

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PYX (Gr. πνξίς a box or chest), a term for various forms of receptacle. In ecclesiastical usage it is the sacred vase or tabernacle in which the Host is reserved. In the English Mint the pyx is the chest in which are placed one coin from even 15 lb of newly coined gold and one from every 60 lb of newly coined silver to await the "trial of the pyx" (see MlNT). This chest was formerly kept in the Chapel of the Рyx in Westminster Abbey.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pécaut, Felix

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​PÉCAUT, FELIX (1828–1898), French educationalist, a member of an old Huguenot family, was born at Salies de Béarn, in 1828. He was for some months evangelical pastor at Salies, but he had no pretence of sympathy with ecclesiastical authority ​He was consequently compelled to resign his pastorate, and for some years occupied himself by urging the claims of a liberal Christianity. In 1879 he conducted a general inspection of primary education for the French government, and several similar missions followed. His fame chiefly rests in his successful organization of the training school for women teachers at Fontenoy-aux-Roses, to which he devoted fifteen years of ceaseless toil. He died on the 31st of July 1898.
A summary of his educational views is given in his Public Education and National Life (1897).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Pécs

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​PÉCS (Ger. Fünfkirchen), a town of Hungary, capital of the country of Baranya, 160 m. S.S.W. of Budapest by rail. Pop. (1900), 42,252. It lies on the outskirts of the Mecsek Hills, and is composed of the inner old town, which is laid out in an almost regular square, and four suburbs. Pécs is the see of a Roman Catholic bishop, and its cathedral, reputed one of the oldest churches in Hungary, is also one of the finest medieval buildings in the country. It was built in the 11th century in the Romanesque style with four towers, and completely restored in 1881–1891. In the Cathedral Square is situated the Sacellum, a subterranean brick structure, probably a burial-chapel, dating from the end of the 4th or the beginning of the 5th century. Other noteworthy buildings are the parish church, formerly a mosque of the Turkish period; the hospital church, also a former mosque, with a minaret 88 ft. high, and another mosque, the bishop’s palace, and the town and county hall. Pécs has manufactories of woollens, porcelain, leather and paper, and carries on a considerable trade in tobacco, gall-nuts and wine. The hills around the town are covered with vineyards, which produce one of the best wines in Hungary. In the vicinity are valuable coal-mines, which since 1858 are worked by the Danube Steamship Company.
According to tradition Pécs existed in the time of the Romans under the name of Sompiana, and several remains of the Roman and early Christian period have been found here. In the Frankish-German period it was known under the name of Quinque ecclesiae; its bishopric was founded in 1009. King Ludwig I. founded here in 1367 a university, which existed until the battle of Mohács. In 1543 it was taken by the Turks, who retained possession of it till 1686.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Hemicycle

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​HEMICYCLE (Gr. ἡμι-, half, and κύκλος, circle), a semicircular recess of considerable size which formed one of the most conspicuous features in the Roman Thermae, where it was always covered with a hemispherical vault. A small example exists in Pompeii, in the street of tombs, with a seat round inside, where those who came to pay their respects to the departed could rest. An immense hemicycle was designed by Bramante for the Vatican, where it constitutes a fine architectural effect at the end of the great court.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Helyot, Pierre

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​HELYOT, PIERRE (1660–1716), Franciscan friar and historian, was born at Paris in January 1660, of supposed English ancestry. After spending his youth in study, he entered in his twenty-fourth year the convent of the third order of St Francis, founded at Picpus, near Paris, by his uncle Jérôme Helyot, canon of St Sepulchre. There he took the name of Père Hippolyte. Two journeys to Rome on monastic business afforded him the opportunity of travelling over most of Italy; and after his final return he saw much of France, while acting as secretary to various provincials of his order there. Both in Italy and France he was engaged in collecting materials for his great work, which occupied him about twenty-five years, L’Histoire des ordres monastiques, religieux, et militaires, et des congrégations séculières, de l’un et de l’autre sexe, qui ont été établies jusqu’à présent, published in 8 volumes in 1714–1721. Helyot died on the 5th of January 1716, before the fifth volume appeared, but his friend Maximilien Bullot completed the edition. Helyot’s only other noteworthy work is Le Chrétien mourant (1695).
The Histoire is a work of first importance, being the great repertory of information for the general history of the religious orders up to the end of the 17th century. It is profusely illustrated by large plates exhibiting the dress of the various orders, and in the edition of 1792 the plates are coloured. It was translated into Italian (1737) and into German (1753). The material has been arranged in dictionary form in Migne’s Encyclopédie théologique, under the title “Dictionnaire des orders religieux” (4 vols., 1858).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Hemerobaptists

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​HEMEROBAPTISTS, an ancient Jewish sect, so named from their observing a practice of daily ablution as an essential part of religion. Epiphanius (Panarion, i. 17), who mentions their doctrine as the fourth heresy among the Jews, classes the Hemerobaptists doctrinally with the Pharisees (q.v.) from whom they differed only in, like the Sadducees, denying the resurrection of the dead. The name has been sometimes given to the Mandaeans on account of their frequent ablutions; and in the Clementine Homilies (ii. 23) St John the Baptist is spoken of as a Hemerobaptist. Mention of the sect is made by Hegesippus (see Euseb. Hist. Eccl. iv. 22) and by Justin Martyr in the Dialogue with Trypho, § 80. They were probably a division of the Essenes.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Hemichorda

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​HEMICHORDA, or Hemichordata, a zoological term introduced by W. Bateson in 1884, without special definition, as equivalent to Enteropneusta, which then included the single genus Balanoglossus, and now generally employed to cover a group of marine worm-like animals believed by many zoologists to be related to the lower vertebrates and so to represent the invertebrate stock from which Vertebrates have been derived. Vertebrates, or as they are sometimes termed Chordates, are distinguished from other animals by several important features. The chief of these is the presence of an elastic rod, the notochord, which forms the longitudinal axis of the body, and which persists throughout life in some of the lowest forms, but which appears only in the embryo of the higher forms, being replaced by the jointed backbone or vertebral column. A second feature is the development of outgrowths of the pharynx which unite with the skin of the neck and form a series of perforations leading to the exterior. These structures are the gill-slits, which in fishes are lined with vascular tufts, but which in terrestrial breathing animals appear only in the embryo. The third feature of importance is the position of structure of the central nervous system, which in all the Chordates lies dorsally to the alimentary canal and is formed by the sinking in of a longitudinal media dorsal groove. Of these structures the Vertebrata or Craniata possess all three in a typical form; the Cephalochordata (see Amphioxus) also possess them, but the notochord extends throughout the whole length of the body to the extreme tip of the snout; the Urochordata (see Tunicata) possess them in a larval condition, but the notochord is present only in the tail, whilst in the adult the notochord disappears and the nervous system becomes profoundly modified; in the Hemichorda, the respiratory organs very closely resemble gill-slits, and structures comparable with the notochord and the tubular dorsal nervous system are present.
The Hemichorda include three orders, the Phoronidea (q.v.), the Pterobranchia (q.v.) and the Enteropneusta (see Balanoglossus), ​but the relationship to the Chordata expressed in the designation Hemichordata cannot be regarded as more than an attractive theory with certain arguments in its favour.  (P. C. M.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Hemimerus

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​HEMIMERUS, an Orthopterous or Dermapterous insect, the sole representative of the family Hemimeridae, which has affinities with both the Forficulidae (earwigs) and the Blattidae (cockroaches). Only two species have been discovered, both from West Africa. The better known of these (H. hanseni) lives upon a large rat-like rodent (Cricetomys gambianus) feeding perhaps upon its external parasites, perhaps upon scurf and other dermal products. Like many epizoic or parasitic insects, Hemimerus is wingless, eyeless and has relatively short and strong legs. Correlated also with its mode of life is the curious fact that it is viviparous, the young being born in an advanced stage of growth.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Helvidius Priscus

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​HELVIDIUS PRISCUS, Stoic philosopher and statesman, lived during the reigns of Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius and Vespasian. Like his father-in-law, Thrasea Paetus, he was distinguished for his ardent and courageous republicanism. Although he repeatedly offended his rulers, he held several high offices. During Nero's reign he was quaestor of Achaea and tribune of the plebs (A.D. 56); he restored peace and order in Armenia, and gained the respect and confidence of the provincials. His declared sympathy with Brutus and Cassius occasioned his banishment in 66. Having been recalled to Rome by Galba in 68, he at once impeached Eprius Marcellus, the accuser of Thrasea Paetus, but dropped the charge, as the condemnation of Marcellus would have involved a number of senators. As praetor elect he ventured to oppose Vitellius in the senate (Tacitus, Hist. ii. 91), and as praetor (70) he maintained, in opposition to Vespasian, that the management of the finances ought to be left to the discretion of the senate; he proposed that the capitol, which had been destroyed in the Neronian conflagration, should be restored at the public expense; he saluted Vespasian by his private name, and did not recognize him as emperor in his praetorian edicts. At length he was banished a second time, and shortly afterwards was executed by Vespasian's order. His life, in the form of a warm panegyric, written at his widow's request by Herennius Senecio, caused its author's death in the reign of Domitian.
Tacitus, Hist. iv. 5, Dialogus, 5; Dio Cassius lxvi. 12, lxvii. 13; Suetonius, Vespasian, 15; Pliny, Epp. vii. 19.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Hemel Hempstead

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​HEMEL HEMPSTEAD, a market-town and municipal borough in the Watford parliamentary division of Hertfordshire, England, 25 m. N.W. from London, with a station on a branch of the Midland railway from Harpenden, and near Boxmoor station on the London and North Western main line. Pop. (1891) 9678; (1901) 11,264. It is pleasantly situated in the steep-sided valley of the river Gade, immediately above its junction with the Bulbourne, near the Grand Junction canal. The church of St Mary is a very fine Norman building with Decorated additions. Industries include the manufacture of paper, iron founding, brewing and tanning. Boxmoor, within the parish, is a considerable township of modern growth. Hemel Hempstead is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 7184 acres.
Settlements in the neighbourhood of Hemel Hempstead (Hamalamstede, Hemel Hampsted) date from pre-Roman times, and a Roman villa has been discovered at Boxmoor. The manor, royal demesne in 1086, was granted by Edmund Plantagenet in 1285 to the house of Ashridge, and the town developed under monastic protection. In 1539 a charter incorporated the bailiff and inhabitants. A mayor, aldermen and councillors received governing power by a charter of 1898. The town has never had parliamentary representation. A market on Thursday and a fair on the feast of Corpus Christi were conferred in 1539. A statute fair, for long a hiring fair, originated in 1803.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Saalfeld

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​SAALFELD, a town of Germany, in the duchy of Saxe-Meiningen, picturesquely situated on the left bank of the Saale, 24 m. S. of Weimar and 77 S.W. of Leipzig by rail. Pop. (1905) 13,245. One of the most ancient towns in Thuringia, Saalfeld, once the capital of the extinct duchy of Saxe-Saalfeld, is still partly surrounded by old walls and bastions, and contains some interesting medieval buildings, among them being a palace, built in 1679 on the site of the Benedictine abbey of St Peter, which was destroyed during the Peasants' War. Other notable edifices are the Gothic church of St John, dating from the beginning of the 13th century; the Gothic town hall, completed in 1537; and, standing on an eminence above the river, the Kitzerstein, a palace said to have been originally erected by the German king Henry I., although the present building is not older than the 16th century. But perhaps the most interesting relic of the past in Saalfeld is the striking ruin of the Hoher Schwarm, called later the Sorbenburg, said to have been erected in the 7th century. Saalfeld is situated in one of the busiest parts of Meiningen and has a number of prosperous industries, including the manufacture of machinery, bricks, colours, malt, cigars, hosiery and vinegar. Other industries are brewing, printing and iron-founding, and there are ochre and iron mines in the neighbourhood.
Saalfeld grew up around the abbey founded in 1075 by Anno, archbishop of Cologne, and the palace built by the emperor Frederick I. In 1389 it was purchased by the landgrave of Thuringia, and with this district it formed part of Saxony. In 1680 it became the capital of a separate duchy, but in 1699 it was united with Saxe-Coburg, passing to Saxe-Meiningen in 1826. On the 10th of October 1806 a battle took place near Saalfeld between the French and the Prussians, during which Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia was killed.
See Wagner and Grobe, Chronik der Stadt Saalfeld (Saalfeld, 1865–1867), and Thümmel, Kriegstage aus Saalfelds Vergangenheit (Berlin, 1882).