The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 210

GALGACUS, a Caledonian chief defeated by Agricola at the battle of the Grampians in 85, after a desperate resistance.

GALIA'NI, FERDINANDO, an Italian political economist, man of letters, and a wit; held with honour several important offices under the Neapolitan Government; was attache to the emba.s.sy at Paris, and the a.s.sociate of Grimm and Diderot (1728-1787).

GALICIA, 1, an old province (1,919) of Spain, formerly a kingdom in the NW. corner of it, fronting the Bay of Biscay and the Atlantic; now divided into the four minor provinces, Coruna, Lugo, Orense, Pontevedra; the county is hilly, well watered, fertile, and favoured with a fine climate, but cultivated only very partially; some mining is carried on.

2, A crownland (6,607) in the NE. of Austria, between Russia and the Carpathians; the inhabitants are mainly Slavs, but there is a goodly number of Jews, Germans, Poles, &c.; the land is fertile, consists chiefly of extensive plains, well watered by the Dneister and other large rivers, and yields abundance of cereals, while one-fourth is covered with forest; timber is largely exported, and salt; many of the useful metals are found, and productive petroleum wells; it has an independent Diet, but an Austrian governor; Austria annexed it in 1772.

GALILaeANS, a fanatical sect, followers of one Judas of Galilee, who fiercely resented the taxation of the Romans, and whose violence contributed to induce the latter to vow the extermination of the whole race.

GALILEE, the northern division of Palestine, divided into Upper, hilly, Lower, level, about 60 m. long and 30 broad.

GALILEE, SEA OF, an expansion of the Jordan, 12 m. long, and at the most 8 m. broad, enclosed by steep mountains, except on NW.

GALILEO, an ill.u.s.trious Italian mathematician, physicist, and astronomer, born at Pisa, demonstrated the isochronism of the pendulum, invented the thermometer and the hydrostatic balance, propounded the law of falling bodies, constructed the first astronomical telescope, and by means of it satisfied himself of, and proved, the truth of the Copernican doctrine, that the sun and not the earth is the centre of the planetary system, and that the earth revolves round it like the other planets which reflect its light; his insistence on this truth provoked the hostility of the Church, and an ecclesiastical decree which p.r.o.nounced the Copernican theory heresy; for the profession of it he was brought to the bar of the Inquisition, where he was compelled to forswear it by oath, concluding his recantation, it is said, with the exclamation, "still, it moves"; before his end he became blind, and died in Florence at 78, the year Newton was born (1564-1642).

GALITZIN, the name of a Russian family distinguished for their ability and success in both war and peace from the 16th century onwards.

GALL, FRANZ JOSEPH, the founder of phrenology, born at Tiefenbronn, on the borders of Baden and Wurtemberg; in 1785 he established himself as a physician in Vienna, where for many years he carried on a series of elaborate investigations on the nature of the brain and its relation to the outer cranium, visiting with that view lunatic asylums, &c.; in 1796 he gave publicity to his views in a series of lectures in Vienna, which were, however, condemned as subversive of morality and religion; being joined by Spurzheim, who adopted his theories, he undertook a lecturing tour through a large part of Europe, and eventually settled at Paris, where he published his phrenological work "Fonctions du Cerveau"; it is a curious fact that on his death his skull was found to be twice the usual thickness, and that there was a tumour in the cerebellum (1758-1828).

GALL, ST., an Irish monk who, about 585, accompanied St. Columban to France in his missionary labours, banished from which he went to Switzerland, and founded a monastery on the Lake of Constance, which bore his name; _d_. about 646.

GALLAND, ANTOINE, French Orientalist, born in Picardy, professor of Arabic in the College of France; was the first to translate the "Arabian Nights" into any European tongue (1646-1715).

GALLAS, an Ethiopian race occupying the S. and E. of Abyssinia, energetic, intelligent, and warlike; follow mostly pastoral occupations; number over four millions, and are mostly heathens.

GALLE or POINT DE GALLE (33), fortified seaport town, prettily situated on a rocky promontory in the SW. of Ceylon; there is a good harbour, but the s.h.i.+pping, which at one time was extensive, has declined since the rise of Colombo.

GALLICAN CHURCH, the Catholic Church in France which, while sincerely devoted to the Catholic faith and the Holy See, resolutely refused to concede certain rights and privileges which belonged to it from the earliest times; it steadfastly contended that infallibility was vested not in the Pope alone, but in the entire episcopal body under him as its head; maintained the supreme authority of general councils and that of the holy canons in the government of the Church, and insisted that there was a distinction between the temporal and the spiritual power; contentions summed up in a declaration of the French clergy in 1682, the body of whom opposed to which are known by the name of "Ultramontanists."

GALLICANISM, the name given to the contention of the GALLICAN CHURCH (q. v.).

GALLIENUS, PUBLIUS LICINIUS, Roman Emperor from 260 to 268, and for seven years (253-260) a.s.sociated in the government with his father, the Emperor Valerian; under his lax rule the empire was subjected to hostile inroads on all sides, while in the provinces a succession of usurpers, known as the Thirty Tyrants, sprang up, disowning allegiance, and aspiring to the t.i.tle of Caesar; in his later years he roused himself to vigorous resistance, but in 268 was murdered by his own soldiers whilst pressing the rebel Aureolus at the siege of Milan.

GALLIGANTUA, the wizard giant slain by Jack the Giant-killer.

GALLIO, the Roman proconsul of Achaia in the days of St. Paul, before whom the Jews of Corinth brought an appeal against the latter, but which he treated with careless indifference as no affair of his, in consequence of which his name has become the synonym of an easy-going ruler or prince.

GALLIPOLI, 1, a fortified seaport town (8) in Southern Italy, 59 m.

S. of Brindisi; stands on a rocky islet in the Gulf of Taranto, close to the mainland, with which it is connected by a bridge of 12 arches; a fine cathedral and huge tanks hewn out of the solid rock for the storage of olive-oil are objects of interest. 2, A seaport (15) of Turkey in Europe, stands on a peninsula of the same name at the western end of the Sea of Marmora, at the mouth of the Dardanelles, 90 m. S. of Adrianople; it was the first city captured by the Turks in Europe (1356), and is now the naval a.r.s.enal of Turkey and head-quarters of the Turkish navy.

GALLOWAY, a district in the SW. of Scotland, co-extensive with Wigtown and Kirkcudbright, though formerly of considerably greater extent; the lack of mineral wealth has r.e.t.a.r.ded its development, and the industry of the population is limited chiefly to agriculture, the rearing of sheep and cattle, and fis.h.i.+ng, and it is still noted for a small but hardy breed of horses called Galloways; the province derives its name from Gall-Gael, or foreign Gaels, as the early inhabitants were called, who up to the time of the Reformation maintained the characteristics, language, &c., of a distinct people; in 1455 Galloway ceased to exist as a separate lords.h.i.+p; in the extreme S. of Wigtown is the bold and rocky promontory, the MULL OF GALLOWAY, the extremity of the peninsula called the Rhinns of Galloway; the Mull, which is the most southerly point in Scotland, rises to a height of 210 ft., and is crowned by a powerful lighthouse.

GALSWINTHE, the sister of Brunhilda and the second wife of Chilperic I.; was strangled to death in 568.

GALT, JOHN, Scotch novelist, born at Irvine; educated at Greenock, where he held a post in the Custom-house for a time; essayed literature, wrote "The Ayrs.h.i.+re Legatees," "The Annals of the Parish," "Sir Andrew Wylie," "The Entail," and "The Provost"; died of paralysis at Greenock; Carlyle, who met him in London in 1832, says, "He had the air of a broad, gaucie, Greenock burgher; mouth indicating sly humour and self-satisfaction; eyes, old and without lashes, gave me a _wae_ interest for him; says little, but that little peaceable, clear, and _gutmuthig_"

(1779-1839).

GALVANISED IRON, plate-iron coated with zinc, which renders it less liable to be affected by moisture and subject to corrosion.

GALVANISM, the mere contact with two dissimilar metals, the science of what is now called Voltaic or current electricity, produced, as in the above instance, from the contact of dissimilar metals, especially that of acids on metals.

GALVANI, LUIGI, an Italian physician, born at Bologna; celebrated for his discoveries in animal magnetism called after him Galvanism, due to an observation he made of the convulsive motion produced in the leg of a recently-killed frog (1737-1798).

GALVESTON (38), the chief seaport of Texas, situated on a low island of the same name at the entrance of Galveston Bay into the Gulf of Mexico; it has a splendid harbour, and is an important centre of the cotton trade, ranking as the third cotton port of the world; the city is well laid out, and is the see of a Roman Catholic bishop; it has a medical college and several foundries.

GALWAY (215), a maritime county in the W. of Ireland, in the province of Connaught; Lough Corrib (25 m. long) and Lough Mask (12 m.

long), stretching N. and S., divide the county into East and West districts; the former is boggy, yet arable; the latter, including the picturesque district known as CONNEMARA, is wild and hilly, and chiefly consists of bleak mora.s.s and bogland; its rocky and indented coast affords excellent harbourage in many places; the Suck, Shannon, and Corrib are the chief rivers; the Slieve Boughta Mountains in the S. and in the W. the Twelve Pins (2395 ft.) are the princ.i.p.al mountains; fis.h.i.+ng, some agriculture, and cattle-rearing are the chief employments; it contains many interesting cromlechs and ruins.

GALWAY (14), the capital of Connaught and of the county of that name; is situated on the N. side of Galway Bay, at the mouth of the Corrib River, 50 m. NW. of Limerick; it is divided into the old and new town, and contains several interesting ecclesiastical buildings, e. g.

the cruciform church of St. Nicholas (1320), and is the seat of a Queen's College; fis.h.i.+ng is an important industry, while wool and black marble are exported.

GAMA, VASCO DA, a famous Portuguese navigator, the discoverer of the route to India round the Cape of Good Hope, born at Sines, in Portugal, of good family; he seems to have won the favour of King Emmanuel at an early age, and already an experienced mariner, was in 1497 despatched on his celebrated voyage, in which he rounded the Cape; on that occasion he made his way to Calicut, in India, where he had to contend with the enmity of the natives, stirred against him by jealous Arabian merchants; in 1499 he returned to Lisbon, was received with great honour, and had conferred on him an array of high-sounding t.i.tles; three years later he was appointed to the command of an expedition to Calicut to avenge the ma.s.sacre of a small Portuguese settlement founded there a year previous by Cabrat; in connection with this expedition he founded the colonies of Mozambique and Sofala, and after inflicting a cruel punishment upon the natives of Calicut, he returned to Lisbon in 1503; the following 20 years of his life were spent in retirement at Evora, but in 1524 he was appointed viceroy of Portuguese India, a position he held only for a short time, but sufficiently long to re-establish Portuguese power in India; he died at Cochin; the incidents of his famous first voyage round the Cape are celebrated in Camoens' memorable poem "The Lusiad"

(1469-1525).

GAMALIEL, a Jewish rabbi, the instructor of St. Paul in the knowledge of the law, and distinguished for his tolerant spirit and forbearance in dealing with the Apostles in their seeming departure from the Jewish faith.

GAMBETTA, LeON MICHEL, a French republican leader, born at Cahors, of Italian descent; intended for the Church, to which he evinced no proclivity; he early showed a _penchant_ for politics and adopted the profession of law, in the prosecution of which he delivered a speech which marked him out as the coming man of the French republic, from the spirit of hostility it manifested against the Empire; at the fall of the Empire he stood high in public regard, a.s.sumed the direction of affairs, and made desperate attempts to repel the invading Germans; though he failed in this, he never ceased to feel the shame of the loss of Alsace and Lorraine, and strove hard to recover them, but all his efforts proved ineffectual, and he died in Dec. 31, to the grief of the nation (1838-1882).