Chapter 2

HisLifewas written, from a sympathetic point of view, with much interesting detail as to the history of secularism, by his daughter, Mrs Bradlaugh Bonner, and J.M. Robertson (1894).

HisLifewas written, from a sympathetic point of view, with much interesting detail as to the history of secularism, by his daughter, Mrs Bradlaugh Bonner, and J.M. Robertson (1894).

BRADLEY, GEORGE GRANVILLE(1821-1903), English divine and scholar, was born on the 11th of December 1821, his father, Charles Bradley, being at that time vicar of Glasbury, Brecon. He was educated at Rugby under Thomas Arnold, and at University College, Oxford, of which he became a fellow in 1844. He was an assistant master at Rugby from 1846 to 1858, when he succeeded G.E.L. Cotton as headmaster at Marlborough. In 1870 he was elected master of his old college at Oxford, and in August 1881 he was made dean of Westminster in succession to A.P. Stanley, whose pupil and intimate friend he had been, and whose biographer he became. Besides hisRecollections of A.P. Stanley(1883) andLife of Dean Stanley(1892), he publishedAids to writing Latin Prose CompositionandLectures on Job(1884) andEcclesiastes(1885). He took part in the coronation of Edward VII., resigned the deanery in 1902, and died on the 13th of March 1903.

Dean Bradley’s family produced various other members distinguished in literature. His half-brother,Andrew Cecil Bradley(b. 1851), fellow of Balliol, Oxford, became professor of modern literature and history (1881) at University College, Liverpool, and in 1889 regius professor of English language and literature at Glasgow University; and he was professor of poetry at Oxford (1901-1906). Of Dean Bradley’s own children the most distinguished in literature were his son,Arthur Granville Bradley(b. 1850), author of various historical and topographical works; and especially his daughter, MrsMargaret Louisa Woods(b. 1856), wife of the Rev. Henry George Woods, president of Trinity, Oxford (1887-1897), and master of the Temple (1904), London. Mrs Woods became well known for her accomplished verse (Lyrics and Ballads, 1889), largely influenced by Robert Bridges, and for her novels, of which herVillage Tragedy(1887) was the earliest and strongest.

BRADLEY, JAMES(1693-1762), English astronomer, was born at Sherborne in Gloucestershire in March 1693. He entered Balliol College, Oxford, on the 15th of March 1711, and took degrees of B.A. and M.A. in 1714 and 1717 respectively. His early observations were made at the rectory of Wanstead in Essex, under the tutelage of his uncle, the Rev. James Pound (1669-1724), himself a skilled astronomer, and he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society on the 6th of November 1718. He took orders on his presentation to the vicarage of Bridstow in the following year, and a small sinecure living in Wales was besides procured for him by his friend Samuel Molyneux (1689-1728). He, however, resigned his ecclesiastical preferments in 1721, on his appointment to the Savilian professorship of astronomy at Oxford, while as reader on experimental philosophy (1729-1760) he delivered 79 courses of lectures in the Ashmolean museum. His memorable discovery of the aberration of light (seeAberration) was communicated to the Royal Society in January 1729 (Phil. Trans.xxxv. 637). The observations upon which it was founded were made at Molyneux’s house on Kew Green. He refrained from announcing the supplementary detection of nutation (q.v.) until the 14th of February 1748 (Phil. Trans.xlv. 1), when he had tested its reality by minute observations during an entire revolution (18.6 years) of the moon’s nodes. He had meantime (in 1742) been appointed to succeed Edmund Halley as astronomer royal; his enhanced reputation enabled him to apply successfully for an instrumental outfit at a cost of £1000; and with an 8-foot quadrant completed for him in 1750 by John Bird (1700-1776), he accumulated at Greenwich in ten years materials of inestimable value for the reform of astronomy. A crown pension of £250 a year was conferred upon him in 1752. He retired in broken health, nine years later, to Chalford in Gloucestershire, and there died on the 13th of July 1762. The printing of his observations was delayed by disputes about their ownership; but they were finally issued from the Clarendon Press, Oxford, in two folio volumes (1798, 1805). The insight and industry of F.W. Bessel were, however, needed for the development of their fundamental importance.

Rigaud’s Memoir prefixed toMiscellaneous Works and Correspondence of James Bradley, D.D.(Oxford, 1832), is practically exhaustive. Other sources of information are:New and General Biographical Dictionary, xii. 54 (1767);Biog. Brit.(Kippis); Fouchy’s “Éloge,”Paris Memoirs(1762), p. 231 (Histoire); Delambre’sHist. de l’astronomie au 18mesiècle, p. 413.

Rigaud’s Memoir prefixed toMiscellaneous Works and Correspondence of James Bradley, D.D.(Oxford, 1832), is practically exhaustive. Other sources of information are:New and General Biographical Dictionary, xii. 54 (1767);Biog. Brit.(Kippis); Fouchy’s “Éloge,”Paris Memoirs(1762), p. 231 (Histoire); Delambre’sHist. de l’astronomie au 18mesiècle, p. 413.

BRADSHAW, GEORGE(1801-1853), English printer and publisher, was born at Windsor Bridge, Pendleton, Lancashire, on the 29th of July 1801. On leaving school he was apprenticed to an engraver at Manchester, eventually setting up on his own account in that city as an engraver and printer—principally of maps. His name was already known as the publisher ofBradshaw’s Maps of Inland Navigation, when in 1839, soon after the introduction of railways, he published, at sixpence,Bradshaw’s Railway Time Tables, the title being changed in 1840 toBradshaw’s Railway Companion, and the price raised to one shilling. A new volume was issued at occasional intervals, a supplementary monthly time-sheet serving to keep the book up to date. In December 1841, acting on a suggestion made by his London agent, Mr W.J. Adams, Bradshaw reduced the price of his time-tables to the original sixpence, and began to issue them monthly under the titleBradshaw’s Monthly Railway Guide.In June 1847 was issued the first number ofBradshaw’s Continental Railway Guide, giving the time-tables of the Continental railways just asBradshaw’s Monthly Railway Guidegave the time-tables of the railways of the United Kingdom. Bradshaw, who was a well-known member of the Society of Friends, and gave considerable time to philanthropic work, died in 1853.

BRADSHAW, HENRY(c.1450-1513), English poet, was born at Chester. In his boyhood he was received into the Benedictine monastery of St Werburgh, and after studying with other novices of his order at Gloucester (afterwards Worcester) College, Oxford, he returned to his monastery at Chester. He wrote a Latin treatiseDe antiquitate et magnificentia Urbis Cestriae, which is lost, and a life of the patron saint of his monastery in English seven-lined stanza. This work was completed in the year of its author’s death, 1513, mentioned in “A balade to the auctour” printed at the close of the work. A second ballad describes him as “Harry Braddeshaa, of Chestre abbey monke.” Bradshaw disclaims the merit of originality and quotes the authorities from which he translates—Bede, William of Malmesbury, Giraldus Cambrensis, Alfred of Beverley, Henry of Huntingdon, Ranulph Higden, and especially the “Passionary” or life of the saint preserved in the monastery. The poem, therefore, which is defined by its editor, Dr Carl Horstmann, as a “legendary epic,” is rather a compilation than a translation. It contains a good deal of history beside the actual life of the saint. St Werburgh was the daughter of Wulfere, king of Mercia, and Bradshaw gives a description of the kingdom of Mercia, with a full account of its royal house. He relates the history of St Ermenilde and St Sexburge, mother and grandmother of Werburgh, who were successively abbesses of Ely. He does not neglect the miraculous elements of the story, but he is more attracted by historical fact than legend, and the second book narrates the Danish invasion of 875, and describes the history and antiquities of Chester, from its foundation by the legendary giant Leon Gaur, from which he derives the British name of Caerleon, down to the great fire which devastated the city in 1180, but was suddenly extinguished when the shrine of St Werburgh was carried in procession through the streets.The Holy Lyfe and History of saynt Werburge very frutefull for all Christen people to rede(printed by Richard Pynson, 1521) has been very variously estimated. Thomas Warton, who deals with Bradshaw at some length,1quotes as the most splendid passage of the poem the description of the feast preceding Werburgh’s entry into the religious life. He considered Bradshaw’s versification “infinitely inferior to Lydgate’s worst manner.” Dr Horstmann, on the other hand, finds in the poem “original genius, of a truly epic tone, with anative simplicity of feeling which sometimes reminds the reader of Homer.” Most readers will probably adopt a view between these extremes. Bradshaw expresses the humblest opinion of his own abilities, and he certainly had no delicate ear for rhythm. His sincerity is abundantly evident, and his piety is admitted even by John Bale2, hostile as he was to monkish writers. W. Herbert3thought that aLyfe of Saynt Radegunde, also printed by Pynson, was certainly by Bradshaw. The only extant copy is in the Britwell library.

Pynson’s edition of theHoly Lyfeis very rare, only five copies being known. A reprint copying the original type was edited by Mr. Edward Hawkins for the Chetham Society in 1848, and by Dr Carl Hortsmann for the Early English Text Society in 1887.

Pynson’s edition of theHoly Lyfeis very rare, only five copies being known. A reprint copying the original type was edited by Mr. Edward Hawkins for the Chetham Society in 1848, and by Dr Carl Hortsmann for the Early English Text Society in 1887.

1History of English Poetry(ed. W.C. Hazlitt, 1871; iii. pp. 140-149).2Scriptorum Illustrium, cant. ix.No. 17.3Ames,Typographical Antiquities(ed. W. Herbert, 1785; i. p. 294).

1History of English Poetry(ed. W.C. Hazlitt, 1871; iii. pp. 140-149).

2Scriptorum Illustrium, cant. ix.No. 17.

3Ames,Typographical Antiquities(ed. W. Herbert, 1785; i. p. 294).

BRADSHAW, HENRY(1831-1886), British scholar and librarian, was born in London on the 2nd of February 1831, and educated at Eton. He became a fellow of King’s College, Cambridge, and after a short scholastic career in Ireland he accepted an appointment in the Cambridge university library as an extra assistant. When he found that his official duties absorbed all his leisure he resigned his post, but continued to give his time to the examination of the MSS. and early printed books in the library. There was then no complete catalogue of these sections, and Bradshaw soon showed a rare faculty for investigations respecting old books and curious MSS. In addition to his achievements in black-letter bibliography he threw great light on ancient Celtic language and literature by the discovery, in 1857, of theBook of Deer, a manuscript copy of the Gospel in the Vulgate version, in which were inscribed old Gaelic charters. This was published by the Spalding Club in 1869. Bradshaw also discovered some Celtic glosses on the MS. of a metrical paraphrase of the Gospels by Juvencus. He made another find in the Cambridge library of considerable philological and historical importance. Cromwell’s envoy, Sir Samuel Morland (1625-1695), had brought back from Piedmont MSS. containing the earliest known Waldensian records, consisting of translations from the Bible, religious treatises and poems. One of the poems referred the work to the beginning of the 11th century, though the MSS. did not appear to be of earlier date than the 15th century. On this Morland had based his theory of the antiquity of the Waldensian doctrine, and, in the absence of the MSS., which were supposed to be irretrievably lost, the conclusion was accepted. Bradshaw discovered the MSS. in the university library, and found in the passage indicated traces of erasure. The original date proved to be 1400. Incidentally the correct date was of great value in the study of the history of the language. He had a share in exposing the frauds of Constantine Simonides, who had asserted that theCodex Sinaiticusbrought by Tischendorf from the Greek monastery of Mount Sinai was a modern forgery of which he was himself the author. Bradshaw exposed the absurdity of these claims in a letter to theGuardian(January 26, 1863). In 1866 he made a valuable contribution to the history of Scottish literature by the discovery of 2200 lines on the siege of Troy incorporated in a MS. of Lydgate’sTroye Booke, and of theLegends of the Saints, an important work of some 40,000 lines. These poems he attributed, erroneously, as has since been proved, to Barbour (q.v.). Unfortunately Bradshaw allowed his attention to be distracted by a multiplicity of subjects, so that he has not left any literary work commensurate with his powers. The strain upon him was increased when he was elected (1867) university librarian, and as dean of his college (1857-1865) and praelector (1863-1868) he was involved in further routine duties. Besides his brilliant isolated discoveries in bibliography, he did much by his untiring zeal to improve the standard of library administration. He died very suddenly on the 10th of February 1886. His fugitive papers on antiquarian subjects were collected and edited by Mr F. Jenkinson in 1889.

An excellentMemoir of Henry Bradshaw, by Mr G.W. Prothero, appeared in 1888. See also C.F. Newcombe,Some Aspects of the Work of Henry Bradshaw(1905).

An excellentMemoir of Henry Bradshaw, by Mr G.W. Prothero, appeared in 1888. See also C.F. Newcombe,Some Aspects of the Work of Henry Bradshaw(1905).

BRADSHAW, JOHN(1602-1659), president of the “High Court of Justice” which tried Charles I., was the second son of Henry Bradshaw, of Marple and Wibersley in Cheshire. He was baptized on the 10th of December 1602, was educated at Banbury in Cheshire and at Middleton in Lancashire, studied subsequently with an attorney at Congleton, was admitted into Gray’s Inn in 1620, and was called to the bar in 1627, becoming a bencher in 1647. He was mayor of Congleton in 1637, and later high steward or recorder of the borough. According to Milton he was assiduous in his legal studies and acquired considerable reputation and practice at the bar. On the 21st of September 1643 he was appointed judge of the sheriff’s court in London. In October 1644 he was counsel with Prynne in the prosecution of Lord Maguire and Hugh Macmahon, implicated in the Irish rebellion, in 1645 for John Lilburne in his appeal to the Lords against the sentence of the Star Chamber, and in 1647 in the prosecution of Judge Jenkins. On the 8th of October 1646 he had been nominated by the Commons a commissioner of the great seal, but his appointment was not confirmed by the Lords. In 1647 he was made chief justice of Chester and a judge in Wales, and on the 12th of October 1648 he was presented to the degree of serjeant-at-law. On the 2nd of January 1649 the Lords threw out the ordinance for bringing the king to trial, and the small remnant of the House of Commons which survived Pride’s Purge, consisting of 53 independents, determined to carry out the ordinance on their own authority. The leading members of the bar, on the parliamentary as well as on the royalist side, having refused to participate in proceedings not only illegal and unconstitutional, but opposed to the plainest principles of equity, Bradshaw was selected to preside, and, after some protestations of humility and unfitness, accepted the office. The king refused to plead before the tribunal, but Bradshaw silenced every legal objection and denied to Charles an opportunity to speak in his defence. He continued after the king’s death to conduct, as lord president, the trials of the royalists, including the duke of Hamilton, Lord Capel, and Henry Rich, earl of Holland, all of whom he condemned to death, his behaviour being especially censured in the case of Eusebius Andrews, a royalist who had joined a conspiracy against the government. He received large rewards for his services. He was appointed in 1649 attorney-general of Cheshire and North Wales, and chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, and was given a sum of £1000, together with confiscated estates worth £2000 a year. He had been nominated a member of the council of state on the 14th of February 1649, and on the 10th of March became president. He disapproved strongly of the expulsion of the Long Parliament, and on Cromwell’s coming subsequently to dismiss the council Bradshaw is said, on the authority of Ludlow, to have confronted him boldly, and denied his power to dissolve the parliament. An ardent republican, he showed himself ever afterwards an uncompromising adversary of Cromwell. He was returned for Stafford in the parliament of 1654, and spoke strongly against vesting power in a single person. He refused to sign the “engagement” drawn up by Cromwell, and in consequence withdrew from parliament and was subsequently suspected of complicity in plots against the government. He failed to obtain a seat in the parliament of 1656, and in August of the same year Cromwell attempted to remove him from the chief-justiceship of Cheshire. After the abdication of Richard Cromwell, Bradshaw again entered parliament, became a member of the council of state, and on the 3rd of June 1659 was appointed a commissioner of the great seal. His health, however, was bad, and his last public effort was a vehement speech, in the council, when he declared his abhorrence of the arrest of Speaker Lenthall. He died on the 31st of October 1659, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. His body was disinterred at the Restoration, and exposed on a gibbet along with those of Cromwell and Ireton. Bradshaw married Mary, daughter of Thomas Marbury of Marbury, Cheshire, but left no children.

BRADWARDINE, THOMAS(c.1290-1349), English archbishop, called “the Profound Doctor,” was born either at Hartfield in Sussex or at Chichester. He was educated at MertonCollege, Oxford, where he took the degree of doctor of divinity, and acquired the reputation of a profound scholar, a skilful mathematician and an able divine. He was afterwards raised to the high offices of chancellor of the university and professor of divinity. From being chancellor of the diocese of London, he became chaplain and confessor to Edward III., whom he attended during his wars in France. On his return to England, he was successively appointed prebendary of Lincoln, archdeacon of Lincoln (1347), and in 1349 archbishop of Canterbury. He died of the plague at Lambeth on the 26th of August 1349, forty days after his consecration. Chaucer in hisNun’s Priest’s Taleranks Bradwardine with St Augustine. His great work is a treatise against the Pelagians, entitledDe causa Dei contra Pelagium et de virtute causarum, edited by Sir Henry Savile (London, 1618). He wrote alsoDe Geometria speculativa(Paris, 1530);De Arithmetica practica(Paris, 1502);De Proportionibus(Paris, 1495; Venice, 1505);De Quadratura Circuli(Paris, 1495); and anArs Memorativa, Sloane MSS. No. 3974 in the British Museum.

See Quétif-Échard,Script. Praedic.(1719), i. 744; W.F. Hook,Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, vol. iv.

See Quétif-Échard,Script. Praedic.(1719), i. 744; W.F. Hook,Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, vol. iv.

BRADY, NICHOLAS(1659-1726), Anglican divine and poet, was born at Bandon, Co. Cork, on the 28th of October 1659. He received his education at Westminster school, and at Christ Church, Oxford; but he graduated at Trinity College, Dublin. He took orders, and in 1688 was made a prebendary of Cork. He was a zealous promoter of the Revolution and suffered in consequence. When the troubles broke out in Ireland in 1690, Brady, by his influence, thrice prevented the burning of the town of Bandon, after James II. had given orders for its destruction; and the same year he was employed by the people of Bandon to lay their grievances before the English parliament. He soon afterwards settled in London, where he obtained various preferments. At the time of his death, on the 20th of May 1726, he held the livings of Clapham and Richmond. Brady’s best-known work is his metrical version of the Psalms, in which Nahum Tate collaborated with him. It was licensed in 1696, and largely ousted the old version of T. Sternhold and J. Hopkins. He also translated Virgil’sAeneid, and wrote several smaller poems and dramas, as well as sermons.

BRAEKELEER, HENRI JEAN AUGUSTIN DE(1840-1888), Belgian painter, was born at Antwerp. He was trained by his father, agenrepainter, and his uncle, Baron Henri Leys, and devoted himself to scenes of everyday Antwerp life. The first pictures he exhibited, “The Laundry” (Van Cutsem collection, Brussels), and “The Coppersmith’s Workshop” (Vleeshovwer collection, Antwerp), were shown at the Antwerp exhibition in 1861. He received the gold medal at Brussels in 1872 for “The Geographer” and “The Lesson” (both in the Brussels gallery); the gold medal at Vienna in 1873 for “The Painter’s Studio” and “Grandmother’s Birthday”; and the medal of honour at the Exposition Universelle at Amsterdam for “The Pilot House.” Among his more notable works are “A Shoemaker” (1862), “A Tailor’s Workroom” (1863), “A Gardener” (1864, Antwerp gallery), “Interior of a Church” (1866), “Interior, Flanders” (1867), “Woman spinning” (1869), “Man reading” (1871), “The rue du Serment, Antwerp” (1875), “A Copperplate Printer,” “The Sailor’s Return,” “The Man at the Window” (Couteaux collection, Brussels), “The Horn-blower” (Couteaux collection), “Man retouching a Picture” (Couteaux collection), “The Potters” (Marlier collection, Brussels), “Staircase in the Hydraulic House at Antwerp” (Marlier collection), and “The Brewer’s House at Antwerp” (Marlier collection). The last, better known as “A Man sitting,” is generally regarded as his masterpiece. As a lithographer and etcher, his work resembles that of Henri Leys. Towards the end of his life de Braekeleer did some dot painting (pointillisme), in which he achieved admirable effects of light.

BRAEMAR,a district in S.W. Aberdeenshire, Scotland, extending from Ballater in the E. to Glen Dee in the W., a distance of 24 m. with a breadth varying from 3 to 6 m. It is drained throughout by the river Dee, both banks of which are bounded by hills varying from 1000 to nearly 3000 ft. in height. The whole area is distinguished by typical Highland scenery, and is a resort alike for sportsmen and tourists. The villages and clachans (Gaelic for hamlet) being situated at an altitude of from 600 to more than 1000 ft. above the sea, the air is everywhere pure and bracing. The deer forests comprise the royal forests of Balmoral and Ballochbuie, Glen Ey Forest, Mar Forest and Invercauld Forest. At various points on either side of the Dee, granite castles, mansions and lodges have been built, mostly in the Scottish baronial style, and all effectively situated with reference to the wooded hills or the river. The chief of these are Balmoral and Abergeldie Castles belonging to the crown, Invercauld House, Braemar Castle, Mar Lodge and Old Mar Lodge. Castleton of Braemar is the foremost of the villages, being sometimes styled the capital of the Deeside Highlands. Its public buildings include halls erected by the duke of Fife and Colonel Farquharson of Invercauld to commemorate the Victorian jubilee of 1887. Not far from the spot where the brawling Clunie joins the Dee the earl of Mar raised the standard of revolt in 1715. His seat, Braemar Castle, reputed to be a hunting-lodge of Malcolm Canmore, was forfeit along with the estates. The new castle built by the purchasers in 1720 was acquired at a later date by Farquharson of Invercauld, who gave government the use of it during the pacification of the Highlands after the battle of Culloden in 1746. Population of Crathie and Braemar (1901) 1452.

BRAG,a very old game of cards, probably evolved from the ancient Spanishprimero, played by five or six, or more players. It is the ancestor of poker. A full pack is used, the cards ranking as at whist, with certain exceptions. There are no trumps. Each player receives three cards and puts up three stakes. The last round is dealt face upwards: the holder of the highest card irrespective of suits wins the first stake from all the players. In the case of equality the elder hand wins, but the ace of diamonds is always a winning card. For the second stake the playersbragor bet against each other, if they hold either a pair, or a pair-royal (three cards of the same rank). Pairs and pairs-royal take precedence according to the value of the cards composing them, but any pair-royal beats any pair. The knave of clubs may be counted as any card,e.g.two twos and the knave of clubs rank as a pair-royal in twos; two aces and the knave as a pair-royal in aces. Sometimes the knave of diamonds is allowed the same privilege, but is inferior to the club knave;e.g.two threes and the club would beat the other two threes and the diamond. Players who accept another’s brag must cover his. bet and offer another. The third stake is won by the player whose cards make 31 or are nearest to 31 by their pips, aces and court counting ten; but the ace may by arrangement count as 1 or 11. Players may draw from the stock, losing if they over-draw. If one player wins all three stakes, he may receive the value of another stake, or of two or three stakes, all round, as arranged. The deal passes as at whist. Each player should have the same number of deals before the game is abandoned.

BRAGA,a city of northern Portugal, formerly included in the province of Entre Minho e Douro, situated on the right-bank of the small river Deste near its source, and at the head of a railway from Oporto. Pop. (1900) 24,202. Braga, which ranks after Lisbon and Oporto as the third city of the kingdom, is the capital of an administrative district, and an archiepiscopal see. Its cathedral, founded in the 12th century, was rebuilt during the 16th century in the blend of Moorish and florid Gothic styles known as Manoellian. It contains several tombs of considerable historical interest, some fine woodwork carved in the 15th century, and a collection of ancient vestments, plate and other objects of art. Among the other churches Santa Cruz is noteworthy for its handsome façade, which dates from 1642. There are several convents, an archiepiscopal palace, a library, containing many rare books and manuscripts, an orphan asylum, and a large hospital; also the ruins of a theatre, a temple and an aqueduct of Roman workmanship, and a great variety of minor antiquities of different ages. The principal manufactures are firearms, jewelry, cutlery, cloth and felt hats. Large cattle fairs are held in June and September, for cattle-breeding anddairy-farming are among the foremost local industries. On a hill about 3 m. E. by S. stands the celebrated sanctuary of Bom Jesus, or Bom Jesus do Monte, visited at Whitsuntide by many thousands of pilgrims, who do public penance as they ascend to the shrine; and about 1 m. beyond it is Mount Sameiro (2535 ft.), crowned by a colossal statue of the Virgin Mary, and commanding a magnificent view of the mountainous country which culminates in the Serra do Gerez, on the north-east.

Braga is the RomanBracara Augusta, capital of theCallaici Bracarii, orBracarenses, a tribe who occupied what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. Early in the 5th century it was taken by the Suevi; but about 485 it passed into the hands of the Visigothic conquerors of Spain, whose renunciation of the Arian and Priscillianist heresies, at two synods held here in the 6th century, marks the origin of its ecclesiastical greatness. The archbishops of Braga retain the title of primate of Portugal, and long claimed supremacy over the Spanish church also; but their authority was never accepted throughout Spain. From the Moors, who captured Braga early in the 8th century, the city was retaken in 1040 by Ferdinand I., king of Castile and Leon; and from 1093 to 1147 it was the residence of the Portuguese court.

The administrative district of Braga coincides with the central part of the province of Entre Minho e Douro (q.v.). Pop. (1900) 357,159. Area, 1040 sq. m.

BRAGANZA(Bragança), the capital of an administrative district formerly included in the province of Traz-os-Montes, Portugal; situated in the north-eastern extremity of the kingdom, on a branch of the river Sabor, 8 m. S. of the Spanish frontier. Pop. (1900) 5535. Braganza is an episcopal city. It consists of a walled upper town, containing the cathedral college and hospital, and of a lower or modern town. Large tracts of the surrounding country are uncultivated, partly because railway communication is lacking and the roads are bad. Except farming, the chief local industry is silkworm-rearing and the manufacture of silk. The administrative district of Braganza coincides with the eastern part of Traz-os-Montes (q.v.). Pop. (1900) 185,162; area, 2513 sq. m.

The city gave its name to the family of Braganza, members of which were rulers of Portugal from 1640 to 1853, and emperors of Brazil from 1822 to 1889. This family is descended from Alphonso (d. 1461), a natural son of John I., king of Portugal (d. 1433), who was a natural son of King Peter I., and consequently belonged to the Portuguese branch of the Capetian family. Alphonso was made duke of Braganza in 1442, and in 1483 his grandson, Duke Ferdinand II., lost his life through heading an insurrection against King John II. In spite of this Ferdinand’s descendants acquired great wealth, and several of them held high office under the kings of Portugal. Duke John I. (d. 1583) married into the royal family, and when King Henry II. died without direct heirs in 1580, he claimed the crown of Portugal in opposition to Philip II. of Spain. John, however, was unsuccessful, but, when the Portuguese threw off the Spanish dominion in 1640, his grandson, John II., duke of Braganza, became king as John IV. In 1807, when Napoleon declared the throne of Portugal vacant, King John VI. fled to Brazil; but he regained his inheritance after the fall of Napoleon in 1814, although he did not return to Europe until 1821, when he left his elder son Peter to govern Brazil. In 1822 a revolution established the independence of Brazil with Peter as emperor. In 1826 Peter became king of Portugal on the death of his father; but he at once resigned the crown to his young daughter Maria, and appointed his brother Miguel to act as regent. Miguel soon declared himself king, but after a stubborn struggle was driven from the country in 1833, after which Maria became queen. Maria married for her second husband Ferdinand (d. 1851), son of Francis, duke of Saxe-Coburg; and when she died in 1853 the main Portuguese branch of the family became extinct. Maria was succeeded by her son Louis I., father of Charles I., who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1889. The empire of Brazil descended on the death of Peter I. to his son Peter II., who was expelled from the country in 1889. When Peter died in 1891 this branch of the family also became extinct in the male line. His only child, Isabella, married Louis Gaston of Orleans, count of Eu. The exiled king, Miguel, founded a branch of the family of Braganza which settled in Bavaria, and various noble families in Portugal are descended from cadets of this house. The title of duke of Braganza is now borne by the eldest son of the king of Portugal.

BRAGG, BRAXTON(1817-1876), American soldier, was born in Warren county, North Carolina, on the 22nd of March 1817. He graduated at the United States military academy in 1837, and as an artillery officer served in the Seminole wars of 1837 and 1841, and under General Taylor in Mexico. For gallant conduct at Fort Brown, Monterey and Buena Vista, he received the brevets of captain, major and lieutenant-colonel. He resigned from the regular army on the 3rd of January 1856, and retired to his plantation in Louisiana. From 1859 to 1861 he was commissioner of the board of public works of the state. When in 1861 the Civil War began, Bragg was made a brigadier-general in the Confederate service, and assigned to command at Pensacola. In February 1862, having meanwhile become major-general, he took up a command in the Army of the Mississippi, and he was present at the battle of Shiloh (April). The vacancy created by the death of Sidney Johnston at that battle was filled by the promotion of Bragg to full general’s rank, and he succeeded General Beauregard when that officer retired from the Western command. In the autumn of 1862 he led a bold advance from Eastern Tennessee across Kentucky to Louisville, but after temporary successes he was forced to retire before Buell, and after the battle of Perryville (8th October) retired into Tennessee. Though the material results of his campaign were considerable, he was bitterly censured, and his removal from his command was urged. But the personal favour of Jefferson Davis kept him, as it had placed him, at the head of the central army, and on the 31st of December 1862 and 2nd of January 1863 he fought the indecisive battle of Murfreesboro (or Stone river) against Rosecrans, Buell’s successor. In the campaign of 1863 Rosecrans constantly outmanoeuvred the Confederates, and forced them back to the border of Georgia. Bragg, however, inflicted a crushing defeat on his opponent at Chickamauga (September 19-20) and for a time besieged the Union forces in Chattanooga. But enormous forces under Grant were concentrated upon the threatened spot, and the great battle of Chattanooga (November 23-25) ended in the rout of the Confederates. Bragg was now deprived of his command, but President Davis made him his military adviser, and in that capacity he served during 1864. In the autumn of that year he led an inferior force from North Carolina to Georgia to oppose Sherman’s march. In February 1865 he joined Johnston, and he was thus included in the surrender of that officer to Sherman. After the war he became chief engineer to the state of Alabama, and supervised improvements in Mobile harbour. He died suddenly at Galveston, Texas, on the 27th of September 1876. General Bragg, in spite of his want of success, was unquestionably a brave and skilful officer. But he was a severe martinet, and rarely in full accord with the senior officers under his orders, the consequent friction often acting unfavourably on the conduct of the operations.

His brother,Thomas Bragg(1810-1872), was governor of North Carolina 1855-1859, U.S. senator 1859-1861, and attorney-general in the Confederate cabinet from Nov. 1861 to March 1862.

BRAGI,in Scandinavian mythology, the son of Odin, and god of wisdom, poetry and eloquence. At the Scandinavian sacrificial feasts a horn consecrated to Bragi was used as a drinking-cup by the guests, who then vowed to do some great deed which would be worthy of being immortalized in verse.

BRAHAM, JOHN(c.1774-1856), English vocalist, was born in London about 1774, of Jewish parentage, his real name being Abraham. His father and mother died when he was quite young. Having received lessons in singing from an Italian artist named Leoni, he made his first appearance in public at Covent Garden theatre on the 21st of April 1787, when he sang “The soldier tired of war’s alarms” and “Ma chère arrive.” On the breaking of his voice, he had to support himself by teaching thepianoforte. In a few years, however, he recovered his voice, which proved to be a tenor of exceptionally pure and rich quality. His second début was made in 1794 at the Bath concerts, to the conductor of which, Rauzzini, he was indebted for careful training extending over a period of more than two years. In 1796 he reappeared in London at Drury Lane in Storace’s opera ofMahmoud. Such was his success that he obtained an engagement the next year to appear in the Italian opera house in Grétry’sAzor et Zémire. He also sang in oratorios and was engaged for the Three Choir festival at Gloucester. With the view of perfecting himself in his art he set out for Italy in the autumn of 1797. On the way he gave some concerts at Paris, which proved so successful that he was induced to remain there for eight months. His career in Italy was one of continuous triumph; he appeared in all the principal opera-houses, singing in Milan, Genoa, Leghorn and Venice. His compass embraced about nineteen notes, his management of the falsetto being perfect. In 1801 he returned to his native country, and appeared once more at Covent Garden in the operaChains of the Heart, by Mazzinghi and Reeve. So great was his popularity that an engagement he had made when abroad to return after a year to Vienna was renounced, and he remained henceforward in England. In 1824 he sang the part of Max in the English version of Weber’sDer Freischütz, and he was the original Sir Huon in that composer’sOberonin 1826. Braham made two unfortunate speculations on a large scale, one being the purchase of the Colosseum in the Regent’s Park in 1831 for £40,000, and the other the erection of the St James’s theatre at a cost of £26,000 in 1836. In 1838 he sang the part of William Tell at Drury Lane, and in 1839 the part of Don Giovanni. His last public appearance was at a concert in March 1852. He died on the 17th of February 1856. There is, perhaps, no other case upon record in which a singer of the first rank enjoyed the use of his voice so long; between Braham’s first and last public appearances considerably more than sixty years intervened, during forty of which he held the undisputed supremacy alike in opera, oratorio and the concert-room. Braham was the composer of a number of vocal pieces, which being sung by himself had great temporary popularity, though they had little intrinsic merit, and are now deservedly forgotten. A partial exception must be made in favour of “The Death of Nelson,” originally written in 1811 as a portion of the operaThe American; this still keeps its place as a standard popular English song.

BRAHE, PER,Count(1602-1680), Swedish soldier and statesman, was born on the island of Rydboholm, near Stockholm, on the 18th of February 1602. He was the grandson of Per Brahe (1520-1590), one of Gustavus I.’s senators, created count of Visingsborg by Eric XIV., known also as the continuator of Peder Svart’s chronicle of Gustavus I., and author ofOeconomia(1585), a manual for young noblemen. Per Brahe the younger, after completing his education by several years’ travel abroad, became in 1626 chamberlain to Gustavus Adolphus, whose lasting friendship he gained. He fought with distinction in Prussia during the last three years of the Polish War (1626-1629) and also, as colonel of a regiment of horse, in 1630 in Germany. After the death of Gustavus Adolphus in 1632 his military yielded to his political activity. He had been elected president (Landsmarskalk) of the diet of 1629, and in the following year was created a senator (Riksråd). In 1635 he conducted the negotiations for an armistice with Poland. In 1637-1640 and again in 1648-1654 he was governor-general in Finland, to which country he rendered inestimable services by his wise and provident rule. He reformed the whole administration, introduced a postal system, built ten new towns, improved and developed commerce and agriculture, and very greatly promoted education. In 1640 he opened the university of Åbo, of which he was the founder, and first chancellor. After the death of Charles X. in 1660, Brahe, asrikskansleror chancellor of Sweden, became one of the regents of Sweden for the second time (he had held a similar office during the minority of Christina, 1632-1644), and during the difficult year 1660 he had entire control of both foreign and domestic affairs. He died on the 2nd of September 1680, at his castle at Visingsborg, where during his lifetime he had held more than regal pomp.

His brother,Nils Brahe(1604-1632), also served with distinction under Gustavus Adolphus. He took part in the siege and capture of Riga in 1621, served with distinction in Poland (1626-1627) and assisted in the defence of Stralsund in 1628. In 1630 he accompanied Gustavus into Germany, and in 1631 was appointed colonel of “the yellow regiment,” the king’s world-renowned life-guards, at the head of which he captured the castle of Würzburg on the 8th of October 1631. He took part in the long duel between Gustavus and Wallenstein round Nuremberg as general of infantry, and commanded the left wing at Lützen (November 6, 1632), where he was the only Swedish general officer present. At the very beginning of the fight he was mortally wounded. The king regarded Brahe as the best general in the Swedish army after Lennart Torstensen.

A direct descendant of Nils,Magnus Brahe(1790-1844), fought in the campaign of 1813-14, under the crown prince Bernadotte, with whom, after his accession to the throne as Charles XIV., he was in high favour. He became marshal of the kingdom, and, especially from 1828 onwards, exercised a preponderant influence in public affairs.

See Martin Veibull,Sveriges Storhetstid, vol. iv. (Stockholm, 1881);Letters to Axel Oxenstjerna(Swed.) 1832-1851 (Stockholm, 1890); Petrus Nordmann,Per Brahe(Helsingfors, 1904).

See Martin Veibull,Sveriges Storhetstid, vol. iv. (Stockholm, 1881);Letters to Axel Oxenstjerna(Swed.) 1832-1851 (Stockholm, 1890); Petrus Nordmann,Per Brahe(Helsingfors, 1904).

(R. N. B.)

BRAHE, TYCHO(1546-1601), Danish astronomer, was born on the 14th of December 1546 at the family seat of Knudstrup in Scania, then a Danish province. Of noble family, he was early adopted by his uncle, Jörgen Brahe, who sent him, in April 1559, to study philosophy and rhetoric at Copenhagen. The punctual occurrence at the predicted time, August 21st, 1560, of a total solar eclipse led him to regard astronomy as “something divine”; he purchased theEphemeridesof Johann Stadius (3rd ed., 1570), and the works of Ptolemy in Latin, and gained some insight into the theory of the planets. Entered as a law-student at the university of Leipzig in 1562, he nevertheless secretly prosecuted celestial studies, and began continuous observations with a globe, a pair of compasses and a “cross-staff.” He quitted Leipzig on the 17th of May 1565, but his uncle dying a month later, he repaired to Wittenberg, and thence to Rostock, where, in 1566, he lost his nose in a duel, and substituted an artificial one made of a copper alloy. In 1569 he matriculated at Augsburg, and devoted himself to chemistry for two years (1570-1572). On his return to Denmark, in 1571, he was permitted by his maternal uncle, Steno Belle, to instal a laboratory at his castle of Herritzvad, near Knudstrup; and there, on the 11th of November 1572, he caught sight of the famous “new star” in Cassiopeia. He diligently measured its position, and printed an account of his observations in a tract entitledDe Novâ Stellâ(Copenhagen, 1573), a facsimile of which was produced in 1901, as a tercentenary tribute to the author’s memory.

Tycho’s marriage with a peasant-girl in 1573 somewhat strained his family relations. He delivered lectures in Copenhagen by royal command in 1574; and in 1575 travelled through Germany to Venice. The execution of his design to settle at Basel was, however, anticipated by the munificence of Frederick II., king of Denmark, who bestowed upon him for life the island of Hveen in the Sound, together with a pension of 500 thalers, a canonry in the cathedral of Roskilde, and the income of an estate in Norway. The first stone of the magnificent observatory of Uraniborg was laid on the 8th of August 1576; it received the finest procurable instrumental outfit; and was the scene, during twenty-one years, of Tycho’s labours in systematically collecting materials—the first made available since the Alexandrian epoch—for the correction of astronomical theories. James VI. of Scotland, afterwards James I. of England, visited him at Uraniborg on the 20th of March 1590. But by that time his fortunes were on the wane; for Frederick II. died in 1588, and his successor, Christian IV., was less tolerant of Tycho’s arrogant and insubordinate behaviour. His pension and fief having been withdrawn, he sailed for Rostock in June 1597, and re-commenced observing before the close of the year, in the castleof Wandsbeck near Hamburg. He spent the following winter at Wittenberg, and reached Prague in June 1599, well assured of favour and protection from the emperor Rudolph II. That monarch, accordingly, assigned him the castle of Benatky for his residence, with a pension of 3000 florins; his great instruments were moved thither from Hveen, and Johannes Kepler joined him there in January 1600. But this phase of renewed prosperity was brief. After eleven days’ illness, Tycho Brahe died on the 24th of October 1601, at Benatky, and was buried in the Teynkirche, Prague.

Tycho’s principal work, entitledAstronomiae Instauratae Progymnasmata(2 vols., Prague, 1602-1603) was edited by Kepler. The first volume treated of the motions of the sun and moon, and gave the places of 777 fixed stars (this number was increased to 1005 by Kepler in 1627 in the “Rudolphine Tables”). The second, which had been privately printed at Uraniborg in 1588 with the headingDe Mundi Aetherei recentioribus Phaenomenis, was mainly concerned with the comet of 1577, demonstrated by Tycho from its insensible parallax to be no terrestrial exhalation, as commonly supposed, but a body traversing planetary space. It included, besides, an account of the Tychonic plan of the cosmos, in which avia mediawas sought between the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems. The earth retained its immobility; but the five planets were made to revolve round the sun, which, with its entire cortège, annually circuited the earth, the sphere of the fixed stars performing meanwhile, as of old, its all-inclusive diurnal rotation (see ASTRONOMY:History). Under the headingAstronomiae Instauratae Mechanica, Tycho published at Wandsbeck, in 1598, a description of his instruments, together with an autobiographical account of his career and discoveries, including the memorable one of the moon’s “variation” (seeMoon). The book was reprinted at Nuremberg in 1602 (cf. Hasselberg,Vierteljahrsschrift Astr. Ges.xxxix. iii. 180). HisEpistolae Astronomicae, printed at Uraniborg in 1596 with a portrait engraved by Geyn of Amsterdam in 1586, were embodied in a complete edition of his works issued at Frankfort in 1648. Tycho vastly improved the art of astronomical observation. He constructed a table of refractions, allowed for instrumental inaccuracies, and eliminated by averaging accidental errors. He, moreover, corrected the received value of nearly every astronomical quantity; but the theoretical purpose towards which his practical reform was directed, was foiled by his premature death.


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