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# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Rangpur

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​ RANGPUR, or Rungpore, a town and district of British India, in the Rajshahi division of Eastern Bengal and Assam. The town is situated on the little river Ghaghat. Pop. (1901) 15,960. There are a high school, a normal school and an industrial school. The earthquake of the 12th of June 1897 destroyed many of the public buildings and diverted the drainage channels.
The District of Rangpur, with an area of 3493 sq. m., is one vast plain. The greater part of it, particularly towards the east, is inundated during the rains, and the remainder is traversed by a network of streams which frequently break through their sandy banks and plough for themselves new channels over the fields. The river system is constituted by the Brahmaputra and its tributaries, chief of which are the Tista, Dharla, Sankos and Dudhkumar. The climate is generally malarious, owing to the numerous stagnant swamps and marshes filled with decaying vegetable matter. The annual rainfall averages 82 in. About three-fourths of the district is under continuous cultivation. Spare land can hardly be said to exist — even the patches of waste land yield a valuable tribute of reeds and cane. The staple crops are rice, oil-seeds, jute and tobacco. In 1901 the population was 2,154,181, showing an increase of 4.3% in the decade. Nearly two-thirds are Mahommedans. The Eastern Bengal railway has two branches, one of which crosses the district to the Brahmaputra, and the other runs north towards Assam.
The tract comprised within the district of Rangpur was formerly the western outpost of the ancient Hindu kingdom of Kamrup, which appears to have attained its greatest power and prosperity under Raja Nilambar, who was treacherously overthrown by Ala-uddin Hosain of Bengal at the close of the 15th century. Rangpur passed to the East India Company in 1765 under the firman of the emperor Shah Alam. Since then a great number of changes have taken place in the jurisdiction, in consequence of which the district area has been much diminished.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guglielmi, Pietro

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​GUGLIELMI, PIETRO (1727–1804), Italian composer, was born at Massa Carrara in May 1727, and died in Rome on the 19th of November 1804. He received his first musical education from his father, and afterwards studied under Durante at the Conservatorio di Santa Maria di Loreto at Naples. His first operatic work, produced at Turin in 1755, established his reputation, and soon his fame spread beyond the limits of his own country, so that in 1762 he was called to Dresden to conduct the opera there. He remained for some years in Germany, where his works met with much success, but the greatest triumphs were reserved for him in England. He went to London, according to Burney, in 1768, but according to Florimo in 1772, returning to Naples in 1777. He still continued to produce operas at an astounding rate, but was unable to compete successfully with the younger masters of the day. In 1793 he became maestro di cappella at St Peter’s, Rome. He was a very prolific composer of Italian comic opera, and there is in most of his scores a vein of humour and natural gaiety not surpassed by Cimarosa himself. In serious opera he was less successful. But here also he shows at least the qualities of a competent musician. Considering the enormous number of his works, his unequal workmanship and the frequent instances of mechanical and slip-shod writing in his music need not surprise us. The following are among the most celebrated of his operas: I Due Gemelli, La Serva inamorata, La Pastorella nobile, La Bella Peccatrice, Rinaldo, Artaserse, Didone and Enea e Lavinia. He also wrote oratorios and miscellaneous pieces of orchestral and chamber music. Of his eight sons two at least acquired fame as musicians—Pietro Carlo (1763–1827), a successful imitator of his father’s operatic style, and Giacomo, an excellent singer.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guevara, Luis Velez de

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​GUEVARA, LUIS VELEZ DE (1579–1644), Spanish dramatist and novelist, was born at Écija on the 1st of August 1579. After graduating as a sizar at the university of Osuna in 1596, he joined the household of Rodrigo de Castro, cardinal-archbishop of Seville, and celebrated the marriage of Philip II. in a poem signed “Velez de Santander,” a name which he continued to use till some years later. He appears to have served as a soldier in Italy and Algiers, returning to Spain in 1602 when he entered the service of the count de Saldaña, and dedicated himself to writing for the stage. He died at Madrid on the 10th of November 1644. He was the author of over four hundred plays, of which the best are Reinar despues de morir, Más pesa el rey que la sangre, La Luna de la Sierra and El Diablo está en Cantillana; but he is most widely known as the author of El Diablo cojuelo (1641), a fantastic novel which suggested to Le Sage the idea of his Diable boiteux.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guevara, Antonio de

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​GUEVARA, ANTONIO DE (c. 1490–1544), Spanish chronicler and moralist, was a native of the province of Alava, and passed some of his earlier years at the court of Isabella, queen of Castile. In 1528 he entered the Franciscan order, and afterwards accompanied the emperor Charles V. during his journeys to Italy and other parts of Europe. After having held successively the offices of court preacher, court historiographer, bishop of Guadix and bishop of Mondoñedo, he died in 1544. His earliest work, entitled Reloj de principes, published at Valladolid in 1529, and, according to its author, the fruit of eleven years’ labour, is a didactic novel, designed, after the manner of Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, to delineate, in a somewhat ideal way for the benefit of modern sovereigns, the life and character of an ancient prince, Marcus Aurelius, distinguished for wisdom and virtue. It was often reprinted in Spanish; and before the close of the century had also been translated into Latin, Italian, French and English, ​an English translation being by J. Bourchier (London, 1546) and another being by T. North. It is difficult now to account for its extraordinary popularity, its thought being neither just nor profound, while its style is stiff and affected. It gave rise to a literary controversy, however, of great bitterness and violence, the author having ventured without warrant to claim for it an historical character, appealing to an imaginary “manuscript in Florence.” Other works of Guevara are the Decada de los Césares (Valladolid, 1539), or “Lives of the Ten Roman Emperors,” in imitation of the manner of Plutarch and Suetonius; and the Epistolas familiares (Valladolid, 1539–1545), sometimes called “The Golden Letters,” often printed in Spain, and translated into all the principal languages of Europe. They are in reality a collection of stiff and formal essays which have long ago fallen into merited oblivion. Guevara, whose influence upon the Spanish prose of the 16th century was considerable, also wrote Libro de los inventores del arte de marear (Valladolid, 1539, and Madrid, 1895).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guibert of Nogent

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​GUIBERT (1053–1124), of Nogent, historian and theologian, was born of noble parents at Clermont-en-Beauvoisis, and dedicated from infancy to the church. He received his early education at the Benedictine abbey of Flavigny (Flaviacum) or St Germer, where he studied with great zeal, devoting himself at first to the secular poets, an experience which left its imprint on his works; later changing to theology, through the influence of Anselm of Bec, afterwards of Canterbury. In 1104, he was chosen to be head of the abbey of Notre Dame de Nogent and henceforth took a prominent part in ecclesiastical affairs. His autobiography (De vita sua, sive monodiarum), written towards the close of his life, gives many picturesque glimpses of his time and the customs of his country. The description of the commune of Laon is an historical document of the first order. The same local colour lends charm to his history of the first crusade (Gesta Dei per Francos) written about 1110. But the history is largely a paraphrase, in ornate style, of the Gesta Francorum of an anonymous Norman author (see Crusades); and when he comes to the end of his authority, he allows his book to degenerate into an undigested heap of notes and anecdotes. At the same time his high birth and his position in the church give his work an occasional value.
Bibliography.—Guibert’s works, edited by d’Achery, were first published in 1651, in 1 vol. folio, at Paris (Venerabilis Guiberti abbatis B. Mariae de Novigento opera omnia), and republished in Migne’s Patrologia Latina, vols. clvi. and clxxxiv. They include, besides minor works, a treatise on homiletics (“Liber quo ordine sermo fieri debeat”); ten books of Moralia on Genesis, begun in 1084, but not completed until 1116, composed on the model of Gregory the Great’s Moralia in Jobum; five books of Tropologiae on Hosea, Amos and the Lamentations; a treatise on the Incarnation, against the Jews; four books De pignoribus sanctorum, a remarkably free criticism on the abuses of saint and relic worship; three books of autobiography, De vita sua, sive monodiarum; and eight books of the Historia quae dicitur Gesta Dei per Francos, sive historia Hierosolymitana (the ninth book is by another author). Separate editions exist of the last named, in J. Bongars, Gesta Dei per Francos, i., and Recueil des historiens des croisades, hist. Occid., iv. 115–263. It has been translated into French in Guizot’s Collection, ix. 1-338. See H. von Sybel, Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzuges (Leipzig, 1881); B. Monod, Le Moine Guibert et son temps (Paris, 1905); and Guibert de Nogent; histoire de sa vie, edited by G. Bourgin (Paris, 1907).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guettard, Jean Étienne

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​GUETTARD, JEAN ÉTIENNE (1715–1786), French naturalist and mineralogist, was born at Étampes, on the 22nd of September 1715. In boyhood he gained a knowledge of plants from his grandfather, who was an apothecary, and later he qualified as a doctor in medicine. Pursuing the study of botany in various parts of France and other countries, he began to take notice of the relation between the distribution of plants and the soils and subsoils. In this way his attention came to be directed to minerals and rocks. In 1746 he communicated to the Academy of Sciences in Paris a memoir on the distribution of minerals and rocks, and this was accompanied by a map on which he had recorded his observations. He thus, as remarked by W. D. Conybeare, “first carried into execution the idea, proposed by [Martin] Lister years before, of geological maps.” In the course of his journeys he made a large collection of fossils and figured many of them, but he had no clear ideas about the sequence of strata. He made observations also on the degradation of mountains by rain, rivers and sea; and he was the first to ascertain the existence of former volcanoes in the district of Auvergne. He died in Paris on the 7th of January 1786.
His publications include: Observations sur les plantes (2 vols., 1747); Histoire de la découverte faite en France de matières semblables à celles dont la porcelaine de la Chine est composée (1765); Mémoires sur différentes parties des sciences et arts (5 vols., 1768–1783); Mémoire sur la minéralogie du Dauphiné (2 vols., 1779). See The Founders of Geology, by Sir A. Geikie (1897).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Gueux, Les

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​GUEUX, LES, or “The Beggars,” a name assumed by the confederacy of nobles and other malcontents, who in 1566 opposed Spanish tyranny in the Netherlands. The leaders of the nobles, who signed a solemn league known as “the Compromise,” by which they bound themselves to assist in defending the rights and liberties of the Netherlands against the civil and religious despotism of Philip II., were Louis, count of Nassau, and Henry, count of Brederode. On the 5th of April 1566 permission was obtained for the confederates to present a petition of grievances, called “the Request,” to the regent, Margaret, duchess of Parma. About 250 nobles marched to the palace accompanied by Louis of Nassau and Brederode. The regent was at first alarmed at the appearance of so large a body, but one of her councillors, Berlaymont by name, was heard to exclaim, “What, madam, is your highness afraid of these beggars (ces gueux)?” The appellation was not forgotten. At a great feast held by some 300 confederates at the Hôtel Culemburg three days later, Brederode in a speech declared that if need be they were all ready to become “beggars” in their country’s cause. The words caught on, and the hall resounded with loud cries of “Vivent les gueux!” The name became henceforward a party appellation. The patriot party adopted the emblems of beggarhood, the wallet and the bowl, as trinkets to be worn on their hats or their girdles, and a medal was struck having on one side the head of Philip II., on the other two clasped hands with the motto “Fidèle au roy, jusques à porter la besace.” The original league of “Beggars” was short-lived, crushed by the iron hand of Alva, but its principles survived and were to be ultimately triumphant.
In the year 1569 the prince of Orange, who had now openly placed himself at the head of the party of revolt, granted letters of marque to a number of vessels manned by crews of desperadoes drawn from all nationalities. These fierce corsairs under the command of a succession of daring and reckless leaders—the best-known of whom is William de la Marek, lord of Lumey—were called “Gueux de mer,” or “Sea Beggars.” At first they were content with plundering both by sea and land and carrying their booty to the English ports where they were able to refit and replenish their stores. This went on till 1572, when Queen Elizabeth suddenly refused to admit them to her harbours. Having no longer any refuge, the Sea Beggars in desperation made an attack upon Brill, which they seized by surprise in the absence of the Spanish garrison on the 1st of April 1572. Encouraged by their unhoped-for success, they now sailed to Flushing, which was also taken by a coup de main. The capture of these two towns gave the signal for a general revolt of the northern Netherlands, and is regarded as the real beginning of the War of Dutch Independence.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Guiart, Guillaume

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​GUIART (or Guiard), GUILLAUME (d. c. 1316), French chronicler and poet, was probably born at Orleans, and served in the French army in Flanders in 1304. Having been disabled by a wound he began to write, lived at Arras and then in Paris, thus being able to consult the large store of manuscripts in the abbey of St Denis, including the Grandes chroniques de France. Afterwards he appears as a ménestrel de bouche. Guiart’s poem Branche des royaulx lignages, was written and then rewritten between 1304 and 1307, in honour of the French king Philip IV., and in answer to the aspersions of a Flemish poet. Comprising over 21,000 verses it deals with the history of the French kings from the time of Louis VIII.; but it is only really important for the period after 1296 and for the war in Flanders from 1301 to 1304, of which it gives a graphic account, and for which it is a high authority. It was first published by J. A. Buchon (Paris, 1828), and again in tome xxii. of the Recueil des historiens des Gaules et de la France (Paris, 1865).
See A. Molinier, Les Sources de l’histoire de France, tome iii. (Paris, 1903).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Metrocles

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​METROCLES, a Greek philosopher of the Cynic school, was a contemporary of Crates, under whose persuasion he deserted the views of Theophrastus. It was his sister, Hipparchia, whose romantic attachment to Crates is a fascinating sidelight on the almost truculent asceticism of the Cynics. He was a man of peculiar strength of character, and esteemed the joys of life so low that he was deterred from an early suicide only by the influence of Crates. His philosophical views, which were identical with those of Crates (q.v.), he expounded by precept and example with great success, and had among his pupils ​Menippus of Sinope. Having weighed the probable pains and pleasures of approaching old age, he decided that life had nothing left for which he greatly cared, and drowned himself. He is said to have written several works, which he afterwards burnt. Of one, entitled Χρείαι, Diogenes preserves a single line (vi. 6).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Metrodorus

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​METRODORUS, the name of five philosophers.
1. Metrodorus of Athens was a philosopher and painter who flourished in the 2nd century B.C. It chanced that Paullus Aemilius, visiting Athens on his return from his victory over Perseus in 168 B.C., asked for a tutor for his children and a painter to glorify his triumph. The inhabitants suggested Metrodorus as capable of discharging both duties, and it is recorded that Aemilius was entirely satisfied (see Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxv. 135).
2. Metrodorus of Chios was an important member of the Atomistic school. A pupil of Nessus, or, as some accounts prefer, of Democritus himself, he was a complete sceptic. He accepted the Democritean theory of atoms and void and the plurality of worlds, but held a theory of his own that the stars are formed from day to day by the moisture in the air under the heat of the sun. His radical scepticism is seen in the first sentence of his Περὶ φύσεως, quoted by Cicero in the Academics ii. 23 § 73. He says, “We know nothing, no, not even whether we know or not!" and maintains that everything is to each person only what it appears to him to be. Metrodorus is especially interesting as the teacher of Anaxarchus, the friend of Pyrrho, and, therefore, as the connecting link between atomism proper and the later scepticism. It cannot be decided whether a work entitled the Τρωϊκά quoted by Athenaeus (iv. 184 a) is by this, or another, Metrodorus. The same difficulty is found in the case of the Περὶ ἱστορίας referred to by the scholiast on Apollonius.
3. Metrodorus of Lampsacus was the disciple and intimate friend of Epicurus, and is described by Cicero (de Fin. ii. 28. 92) as “almost a second Epicurus.” He died in 277 B.C. at the age of fifty-three, seven years before his master, who adopted his children and in his will commended them to the care of his pupils. The wife of Metrodorus was Leontion, herself, like many other women of the time, a member of the Epicurean society. Athenaeus (vii. 279 F.) quotes from the words of Metrodorus showing that he was in entire agreement with Epicurus, and Was, if possible, even more dogmatic in his doctrine of pleasure. He censures his brother, Timocrates, who, though professedly Epicurean, maintained the existence of pleasures other than those of the body.
4. Another Metrodorus of Lampsacus was a pupil of Anaxagoras, and one of the earliest to attempt to interpret Homer allegorically. He explained not only the gods but also the heroes Agamemnon, Achilles, Hector, as representing primary elements and natural phenomena.
5. Metrodorus of Stratonice was a pupil, first of Apollodorus, and later of Carneades. He flourished about 110 B.C., and is reputed to have been an orator of great power. His defection from the Epicurean school is almost unique. It is explained by Cicero as being due to his theory that the scepticism of Carneades was merely a means of attacking the Stoics on their own ground. Metrodorus held that Carneades was in reality a loyal follower of Plato.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Metropolis

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​METROPOLIS (Gr. μήτηρ, mother, πόλις, city), properly a mother-city, and so the name of the parent state from which colonies were founded in ancient Greece (see Greece, sect. History, Ancient). The word was used in post-classical Latin for the chief city of a province, the seat of the government, and in particular ecclesiastically for the seat or see of a metropolitan bishop (see Metropolitan). It is thus used now for the capital of a country, which contains the various official buildings of the administrative departments, the Houses of Parliament, &c. In the case of London, the term “metropolitan” is sometimes applied to the whole area including the “City of London,” e.g. “Metropolitan Asylums Board”; and sometimes, as in “Metropolitan Police,” excludes the City, which has its own police force (see London).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Metropolitan

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​METROPOLITAN (Lat. metropolitanus, Gr. μητροπολίτης in the Christian church, the title of a bishop who has the oversight over bishops of subordinate sees. In the Western church ​the metropolitan is practically the same as the archbishop (q.v.); in the Eastern church he ranks above the archbishop, but below the patriarch (q.v.). Metropolitans first appear in the East in the 4th century as presiding over a province (provincia or ἐπαρχία), and their see is fixed in the principal town (μητροπόλις) of the province, which remains the normal custom both in East and West. In Africa, however, the metropolitan jurisdiction was exercised by the senior bishop (primas, primae sedis episcopus, senex) for the time being, a custom which prevailed for a time also in Spain. Thus, too, in the Scottish Episcopal Church and the Protestant Episcopal Church of America there are no metropolitans, the primas being the senior bishop.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Meudon

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​MEUDON, a town of northern France, in the department of Seine-et-Oise, 6 m. E. of Versailles by rail and about 21/2 m. S.W. of Paris. Pop. (1906), 9597. The remains of a castle (17th century) burned during the siege of Paris in 1871 have since been adapted as an observatory. Its terrace commands a fine view of Paris. The handsome Galliera Institutions, on the hill of Fleury, were founded by the duchess of Galliera for the reception of aged persons and orphans. The buildings were completed in 1885, at a cost of £560,000 The town has a monument of Rabelais, who was curé there in 1553, and manufactures munitions of war for the artillery, and in the neighbouring park of Chalais is the Government military ballooning establishment. In the 16th century the cardinal, Charles of Lorraine, built at Meudon a magnificent château, which was destroyed in 1803. The present remains belong to a building erected by the dauphin, son of Louis XIV. The wood of Meudon lies for the most part to the west of the town.