Encyclopaedia Britannica Volume 4, Slice 1 Part 31

BLUMENBACH, JOHANN FRIEDRICH (1752-1840), German physiologist and anthropologist, was born at Gotha on the 11th of May 1752. After studying medicine at Jena, he graduated doctor at Gottingen in 1775, and was appointed extraordinary professor of medicine in 1776 and ordinary professor in 1778. He died at Gottingen on the 22nd of January 1840. He was the author of _Inst.i.tutiones Physiologicae_ (1787), and of a _Handbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie_ (1804), both of which were very popular and went through many editions, but he is best known for his work in connexion with anthropology, of which science he has been justly called the founder. He was the first to show the value of comparative anatomy in the study of man's history, and his craniometrical researches justified his division of the human race into several great varieties or families, of which he enumerated five--the Caucasian or white race, the Mongolian or yellow, the Malayan or brown race, the Negro or black race, and the American or red race. This cla.s.sification has been very generally received, and most later schemes have been modifications of it. His most important anthropological work was his description of sixty human crania published originally in _fasciculi_ under the t.i.tle _Collectionis suae craniorum diversarum gentium ill.u.s.tratae decades_ (Gottingen, 1790-1828).

BLUMENTHAL, LEONHARD, COUNT VON (1810-1900), Prussian field marshal, son of Captain Ludwig von Blumenthal (killed in 1813 at the battle of Dennewitz), was born at Schwedt-on-Oder on the 30th of July 1810.

Educated at the military schools of Culm and Berlin, he entered the Guards as 2nd lieutenant in 1827. After serving in the Rhine provinces, he joined the topographical division of the general staff in 1846. As lieutenant of the 31st foot he took part in 1848 in the suppression of the Berlin riots, and in 1849 was promoted captain on the general staff.

The same year he served on the staff of General von Bonin in the Schleswig-Holstein campaign, and so distinguished himself, particularly at Fredericia, that he was appointed chief of the staff of the Schleswig-Holstein army. In 1850 he was general staff officer of the mobile division under von Tietzen in Hesse-Ca.s.sel. He was sent on a mission to England in that year (4th cla.s.s of Red Eagle), and on several subsequent occasions. Having attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel, he was appointed personal adjutant to Prince Frederick Charles in 1859. In 1860 he became colonel of the 31st, and later of the 71st, regiment. He was chief of the staff of the III. army corps when, on the outbreak of the Danish War of 1864, he was nominated chief of the general staff of the army against Denmark, and displayed so much ability, particularly at Duppel and the pa.s.sage to Alsen island, that he was promoted major-general and given the order _pour le merite_. In the war of 1866 Blumenthal occupied the post of chief of the general staff to the crown prince of Prussia, commanding the 2nd army. It was upon this army that the brunt of the fighting fell, and at Koniggratz it decided the fortunes of the day. Blumenthal's own part in these battles and in the campaign generally was most conspicuous. On the field of Koniggratz the crown prince said to his chief of staff, "I know to whom I owe the conduct of my army," and Blumenthal soon received promotion to lieutenant-general and the oak-leaf of the order _pour le merite_. He was also made a knight of the Hohenzollern Order. From 1866 to 1870 he commanded the 14th division at Dusseldorf. In the Franco-German War of 1870-71 he was chief of staff of the 3rd army under the crown prince.

Blumenthal's soldierly qualities and talent were never more conspicuous than in the critical days preceding the battle of Sedan, and his services in the war have been considered as scarcely less valuable and important than those of Moltke himself. In 1871 Blumenthal represented Germany at the British manoeuvres at Chobham, and was given the command of the IV. army corps at Magdeburg. In 1873 he became a general of infantry, and ten years later he was made a count. In 1888 he was made a general field marshal, after which he was in command of the 4th and 3rd army inspections. He retired in 1896, and died at Quellendorf near Kothen on the 21st of December 1900.

Blumenthal's diary of 1866 and 1870-1871 has been edited by his son, Count Albrecht von Blumenthal (_Tagebuch des G.F.M. von Blumenthal_), 1902; an English translation (_Journals of Count von Blumenthal_) was published in 1903.

BLUNDERBUSS (a corruption of the Dutch _donder_, thunder, and the Dutch _bus_; cf. Ger. _Buchse_, a box or tube, hence a thunder-box or gun), an obsolete muzzle-loading firearm with a bell-shaped muzzle. Its calibre was large so that it could contain many b.a.l.l.s or slugs, and it was intended to be fired at a short range, so that some of the charge was sure to take effect. The word is also used by a.n.a.logy to describe a blundering and random person or talker.

BLUNT, JOHN HENRY (1823-1884), English divine, was born at Chelsea in 1823, and before going to the university of Durham in 1850 was for some years engaged in business as a manufacturing chemist. He was ordained in 1852 and took his M.A. degree in 1855, publis.h.i.+ng in the same year a work on _The Atonement_. He held in succession several preferments, among them the vicarage of Kennington near Oxford (1868), which he vacated in 1873 for the crown living of Beverston in Gloucesters.h.i.+re. He had already gained some reputation as an industrious theologian, and had published among other works an annotated edition of the Prayer Book (1867), a _History of the English Reformation_ (1868), and a _Book of Church Law_ (1872), as well as a useful _Dictionary of Doctrinal and Historical Theology_ (1870). The continuation of these labours was seen in a _Dictionary of Sects and Heresies_ (1874), an _Annotated Bible_ (3 vols., 1878-1879), and a _Cyclopaedia of Religion_ (1884), and received recognition in the shape of the D.D. degree bestowed on him in 1882. He died in London on the 11th of April 1884.

BLUNT, JOHN JAMES (1794-1855), English divine, was born at Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffords.h.i.+re, and educated at St John's College, Cambridge, where he took his degree as fifteenth wrangler and obtained a fellows.h.i.+p (1816). He was appointed a Wort's travelling bachelor 1818, and spent some time in Italy and Sicily, afterwards publis.h.i.+ng an account of his journey. He proceeded M.A. in 1819, B.D.

1826, and was Hulsean Lecturer in 1831-1832 while holding a curacy in Shrops.h.i.+re. In 1834 he became rector of Great Oakley in Ess.e.x, and in 1839 was appointed Lady Margaret professor of divinity at Cambridge. In 1854 he declined the see of Salisbury, and he died on the 18th of June 1855. His chief book was _Undesigned Coincidences in the Writings both of the Old and New Testaments_ (1833; fuller edition, 1847). Some of his writings, among them the _History of the Christian Church during the First Three Centuries_ and the lectures _On the Right Use of the Early Fathers_, were published posthumously.

A short memoir of him appeared in 1856 from the hand of William Selwyn, his successor in the divinity professors.h.i.+p.

BLUNT, WILFRID SCAWEN (1840- ), English poet and publicist, was born on the 17th of August 1840 at Petworth House, Suss.e.x, the son of Francis Scawen Blunt, who served in the Peninsular War and was wounded at Corunna. He was educated at Stonyhurst and Oscott, and entered the diplomatic service in 1858, serving successively at Athens, Madrid, Paris and Lisbon. In 1867 he was sent to South America, and on his return to England retired from the service on his marriage with Lady Anne Noel, daughter of the earl of Lovelace and a grand-daughter of the poet Byron. In 1872 he succeeded, by the death of his elder brother, to the estate of Crabbet Park, Suss.e.x, where he established a famous stud for the breeding of Arab horses. Mr and Lady Anne Blunt travelled repeatedly in northern Africa, Asia Minor and Arabia, two of their expeditions being described in Lady Anne's _Bedouins of the Euphrates_ (2 vols., 1879) and _A Pilgrimage to Nejd_ (2 vols., 1881). Mr Blunt became known as an ardent sympathizer with Mahommedan aspirations, and in his _Future of Islam_ (1888) he directed attention to the forces which afterwards produced the movements of Pan-Islamism and Mahdism. He was a violent opponent of the English policy in the Sudan, and in _The Wind and the Whirlwind_ (in verse, 1883) prophesied its downfall. He supported the national party in Egypt, and took a prominent part in the defence of Arabi Pasha. _Ideas about India_ (1885) was the result of two visits to that country, the second in 1883-1884. In 1885 and 1886 he stood unsuccessfully for parliament as a Home Ruler; and in 1887 he was arrested in Ireland while presiding over a political meeting in connexion with the agitation on Lord Clanricarde's estate, and was imprisoned for two months in Kilmainham. His best-known volume of verse, _Love Sonnets of Proteus_ (1880), is a revelation of his real merits as an emotional poet. _The Poetry of Wilfrid Blunt_ (1888), selected and edited by W.E. Henley and Mr George Wyndham, includes these sonnets, together with "Worth Forest, a Pastoral," "Griselda" (described as a "society novel in rhymed verse"), translations from the Arabic, and poems which had appeared in other volumes.

BLUNTSCHLI, JOHANN KASPAR (1808-1881), Swiss jurist and politician, was born at Zurich on the 7th of March 1808, the son of a soap and candle manufacturer. From school he pa.s.sed into the _Politische Inst.i.tut_ (a seminary of law and political science) in his native town, and proceeding thence to the universities of Berlin and Bonn, took the degree of _doctor juris_ in the latter in 1829. Returning to Zurich in 1830, he threw himself with ardour into the political strife which was at the time unsettling all the cantons of the Confederation, and in this year published _uber die Verfa.s.sung der Stadt Zurich_ (On the Const.i.tution of the City of Zurich). This was followed by _Das Volk und der Souveran_ (1830), a work in which, while pleading for const.i.tutional government, he showed his bitter repugnance of the growing Swiss radicalism. Elected in 1837 a member of the Grosser Rath (Great Council), he became the champion of the moderate conservative party.

Fascinated by the metaphysical views of the philosopher Friedrich Rohmer (1814-1856), a man who attracted little other attention, he endeavoured in _Psychologische Studien uber Staat und Kirche_ (1844) to apply them to political science generally, and in particular as a panacea for the const.i.tutional troubles of Switzerland. Bluntschli, shortly before his death, remarked, "I have gained renown as a jurist, but my greatest desert is to have comprehended Rohmer." This philosophical essay, however, coupled with his uncompromising att.i.tude towards both radicalism and ultramontanism, brought him many enemies, and rendered his continuance in the council, of which he had been elected president, impossible. He resigned his seat, and on the overthrow of the Sonderbund in 1847, perceiving that all hope of power for his party was lost, took leave of Switzerland with the pamphlet _Stimme eines Schweizers uber die Bundesreform_ (1847), and settled at Munich, where he became professor of const.i.tutional law in 1848.

At Munich he devoted himself with energy to the special work of his chair, and, resisting the temptation to identify himself with politics, published _Allgemeines Staatsrecht_ (1851-1852); _Lehre vom modernen Staat_ (1875-1876); and, in conjunction with Karl Ludwig Theodor Brater (1819-1869), _Deutsches Staats-worterbuch_ (II vols., 1857-1870: abridged by Edgar Loening in 3 vols., 1869-1875). Meanwhile he had a.s.siduously worked at his code for the canton of Zurich, _Privatrechtliches Gesetzbuch fur den Kanton Zurich_ (4 vols., 1854-1856), a work which was much praised at the time, and which, particularly the section devoted to contracts, served as a model for codes both in Switzerland and other countries. In 1861 Bluntschli received a call to Heidelberg as professor of const.i.tutional law (Staatsrecht), where he again entered the political arena, endeavouring in his _Geschichte des allgemeinen Staatsrechts und der Politik_ (1864) "to stimulate," as he said, "the political consciousness of the German people, to cleanse it of prejudices and to further it intellectually."

In his new home, Baden, he devoted his energies and political influence, during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, towards keeping the country neutral. From this time Bluntschli became active in the field of international law, and his fame as a jurist belongs rather to this province than to that of const.i.tutional law. His _Das moderne Kriegsrecht_ (1866); _Das moderns Volkerrecht_ (1868), and _Das Beuterecht im Krieg_ (1878) are likely to remain invaluable text-books in this branch of the science of jurisprudence. He also wrote a pamphlet on the "Alabama" case.

Bluntschli was one of the founders, at Ghent in 1873, of the Inst.i.tute of International Law, and was the representative of the German emperor at the conference on the international laws of war at Brussels. During the latter years of his life he took a lively interest in the _Protestantenverein_, a society formed to combat reactionary and ultramontane views of theology. He died suddenly at Karlsruhe on the 21st of October 1881. His library was acquired by Johns Hopkins University at Baltimore, U.S.A.

Among his works, other than those before mentioned, may be cited _Deutsches Privatrecht_ (1853-1854); _Deutsche Staatslehre fur Gebildete_ (1874); and _Deutsche Staatslehre und die heutige Staatenwelt_ (1880).

For notices of Bluntschli's life and works see his interesting autobiography, _Denkwurdiges aus meinem Leben_ (1884); von Holtzendorff, _Bluntschli und seine Verdienste um die Staatswissenschaften_ (1882); Brockhaus, _Konversations-Lexicon_ (1901); and a biography by Meyer von Kronau, in _Allgemeine deutsche Biographie_.

BLYTH, a market town and seaport of Northumberland, England, in the parliamentary borough of Morpeth, 9 m. E.S.E. of that town, at the mouth of the river Blyth, on a branch of the North Eastern railway. Pop. of urban district (1901) 5472. This is the port for a considerable coal-mining district, and its harbour, on the south side of the river, is provided with mechanical appliances for s.h.i.+pping coal. There are five dry docks, and upwards of 1 m. of quayage. Timber is largely imported.

Some s.h.i.+pbuilding and the manufacture of rope, sails and s.h.i.+p-fittings are carried on, and the fisheries are valuable. Blyth is also in considerable favour as a watering-place; there are a pleasant park, a pier, protecting the harbour, about 1 m. in length, and a sandy beach affording sea-bathing. The river Blyth rises near the village of Kirkheaton, and has an easterly course of about 25 m. through a deep, well-wooded and picturesque valley.

B'NAI B'RITH (or SONS OF THE COVENANT), INDEPENDENT ORDER OF, a Jewish fraternal society. It was founded at New York in 1843 by a number of German Jews, headed by Henry Jones, and is the oldest as well as the largest of the Jewish fraternal organizations. Its members.h.i.+p in 1908 was 35,870, its 481 lodges and 10 grand lodges being distributed over the United States, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Rumania, Egypt and Palestine. Its objects are to promote a high morality among Jews, regardless of differences as to dogma and ceremonial customs, and especially to inculcate the supreme virtues of charity and brotherly love. Political and religious discussions were from the first excluded from the debates of the order. In 1851 the first grand lodge was established at New York; in 1856, the number of district lodges having increased, the supreme authority was vested in a central body consisting of one member from each lodge; and by the present const.i.tution, adopted in 1868, this authority is vested in a president elected for five years, an executive committee and court of appeals (elected as before). The first lodge in Germany was inst.i.tuted at Berlin in 1883. A large number of charitable and other public inst.i.tutions have been established in the United States and elsewhere by the order, of which may be mentioned the large orphan asylum in Cleveland, the home for the aged and infirm at Yonkers, N.Y., the National Jewish hospital for consumptives at Denver, and the Maimonides library in New York City. The B'nai B'rith society has also co-operated largely with other Jewish philanthropic organizations in succouring distressed Israelites throughout the world.

See the _Jewish Encyclopaedia_ (1902), s.v.

BOA, a name formerly applied to all large serpents which, devoid of poison fangs, kill their prey by constriction; but now confined to that subfamily of the _Boidae_ which are devoid of teeth in the praemaxilla and are without supraorbital bones. The others are known as pythons (q.v.). The true boas comprise some forty species; most of them are American, but the genus _Eryx_ inhabits North Africa, Greece and south-western Asia; the genus _Enygrus_ ranges from New Guinea to the Fiji; _Casarea dussumieri_ is restricted to Round Island, near Mauritius; and two species of _Boa_ and one of _Corallus_ represent this subfamily in Madagascar, while all the other boas live in America, chiefly in tropical parts. All _Boidae_ possess vestiges of pelvis and hind limbs, appearing externally as claw-like spurs on each side of the vent, but they are so small that they are practically without function in climbing. The usually short tail is prehensile.

One of the commonest species of the genus _Boa_ is the _Boa constrictor_, which has a wide range from tropical Mexico to Brazil. The head is covered with small scales, only one of the preoculars being enlarged. The general colour is a delicate pale brown, with about a dozen and a half darker cross-bars, which are often connected by a still darker dorso-lateral streak, enclosing large oval spots. On each side is a series of large dark brown spots with light centres. On the tail the markings become bolder, brick red with black and yellow. The under parts are yellowish with black dots. This species rarely reaches a length of more than 10 ft. It climbs well, prefers open forest in the neighbourhood of water, is often found in plantations where it retires into a hole in the ground, and lives chiefly on birds and small mammals.

Like most true boas, it is of a very gentle disposition and easily domesticates itself in the palm or reed thatched huts of the natives, where it hunts the rats during the night.

The term "boa" is applied by a.n.a.logy to a long article of women's dress wound round the neck.

BOABDIL (a corruption of the name Abu Abdullah), the last Moorish king of Granada, called _el chico_, the little, and also _el zogoybi_, the unfortunate. A son of Muley Abu'l Ha.s.san, king of Granada, he was proclaimed king in 1482 in place of his father, who was driven from the land. Boabdil soon after sought to gain prestige by invading Castile. He was taken prisoner at Lucena in 1483, and only obtained his freedom by consenting to hold Granada as a tributary kingdom under Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Castile and Aragon. The next few years were consumed in struggles with his father and his uncle Abdullah ez Zagal.

In 1491 Boabdil was summoned by Ferdinand and Isabella to surrender the city of Granada, and on his refusal it was besieged by the Castilians.

Eventually, in January 1492, Granada was surrendered, and the king spent some time on the lands which he was allowed to hold in Andalusia.

Subsequently he crossed to Africa, and is said to have been killed in battle fighting for his kinsman, the ruler of Fez. The spot from which Boabdil looked for the last time on Granada is still shown, and is known as "the last sigh of the Moor" (_el ultimo suspire del Moro_).

See J.A. Conde, _Dominacion de los Arabes en Espana_ (Paris, 1840), translated into English by Mrs J. Foster (London, 1854-1855); Was.h.i.+ngton Irving, _The Alhambra_ (New York, ed. 1880).

BOADICEA, strictly BOUDICCA, a British queen in the time of the emperor Nero. Her husband Prasutagus ruled the Iceni (in what is now Norfolk) as an autonomous prince under Roman suzerainty. On his death (A.D. 61) without male heir, his dominions were annexed, and the annexation was carried out brutally. He had by his will divided his private wealth between his two daughters and Nero, trusting thereby to win imperial favour for his family. Instead, his wife was scourged (doubtless for resisting the annexation), his daughters outraged, his chief tribesmen plundered. The proud, fierce queen and her people rose, and not alone.

With them rose half Britain, enraged, for other causes, at Roman rule.

Roman taxation and conscription lay heavy on the province; in addition, the Roman government had just revoked financial concessions made a few years earlier, and L. Annaeus Seneca, who combined the parts of a moralist and a money-lender, had abruptly recalled large loans made from his private wealth to British chiefs. A favourable chance for revolt was provided by the absence of the governor-general, Suetonius Paulinus, and most of his troops in North Wales and Anglesey. All south-east Britain joined the movement. Paulinus rushed back without waiting for his troops, but he could do nothing alone. The Britons burnt the Roman munic.i.p.alities of Verulam and Colchester, the mart of London, and several military posts, ma.s.sacred "over 70,000" Romans and Britons friendly to Rome, and almost annihilated the Ninth Legion marching from Lincoln to the rescue. At last Paulinus, who seems to have rejoined his army, met the Britons in the field. The site of the battle is unknown.

One writer has put it at Chester; others at London, where King's Cross had once a narrow escape of being christened Boadicea's Cross, and actually for many years bore the name of Battle Bridge, in supposed reference to this battle. Probably, however, it was on Watling Street, between London and Chester. In a desperate soldiers' battle Rome regained the province. Boadicea took poison; thousands of Britons fell in the fight or were hunted down in the ensuing guerrilla. Finally, Rome adopted a kindlier policy, and Britain became quiet. But the scantiness of Romano-British remains in Norfolk may be due to the severity with which the Iceni were crushed.

See Tacitus, _Annals_, xiv.; _Agric_. xv.; Dio lxii. The name Boudicca seems to mean in Celtic much the same as Victoria. (F. J. H.)

BOAR (O. Eng. _bar_; the word is found only in W. Ger. languages, cf.