Chapter 20

(G. H. C.)

LEPIDUS,the name of a Roman patrician family in the Aemilian gens.

1.Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, one of the three ambassadors sent to Egypt in 201B.C.as guardians of the infant king Ptolemy V. He was consul in 187 and 175, censor 179,pontifex maximusfrom 180 onwards, and was six times chosen by the censorsprinceps senatus. He died in 152. He distinguished himself in the war with Antiochus III. of Syria, and against the Ligurians. He made the Via Aemilia from Ariminum to Placentia, and led colonies to Mutina and Parma.

Livy xl. 42-46,epit.48; Polybius xvi. 34.

2.Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, surnamedPorcina(probably from his personal appearance), consul 137B.C.Being sent to Spain to conduct the Numantine war, he began against the will of the senate to attack the Vaccaei. This enterprise was so unsuccessful that he was deprived of his command in 136 and condemned to pay a fine. He was among the greatest of the earlier Roman orators, and Cicero praises him for havingintroduced the well-constructed sentence and even flow of language from Greek into Roman oratory.

Cicero,Brutus, 25, 27, 86, 97; Vell. Pat. ii. 10; Appian,Hisp.80-83; Livy,epit.56.

3.Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, father of the triumvir. In 81B.C.he was praetor of Sicily, where he made himself detested by oppression and extortion. In the civil wars he sided with Sulla and bought much of the confiscated property of the Marian partisans. Afterwards he became leader of the popular party, and with the help of Pompey was elected consul for 78, in spite of the opposition of Sulla. When the dictator died, Lepidus tried in vain to prevent the burial of his body in the Campus Martius, and to alter the constitution established by him. His colleague Lutatius Catulus found a tribune to place his veto on Lepidus’s proposals; and the quarrel between the two parties in the state became so acute that the senate made the consuls swear not to take up arms. Lepidus was then ordered by the senate to go to his province, Transalpine Gaul; but he stopped in Etruria on his way from the city and began to levy an army. He was declared a public enemy early in 77, and forthwith marched against Rome. A battle took place in the Campus Martius, Pompey and Catulus commanding the senatorial army, and Lepidus was defeated. He sailed to Sardinia, in order to put himself into connexion with Sertorius in Spain, but here also suffered a repulse, and died shortly afterwards.

Plutarch,Sulla, 34, 38,Pompey, 15; Appian,B.C.i. 105, 107; Livy,epit.90; Florus iii. 23; Cicero,Balbus, 15.

4.Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, the triumvir. He joined the party of Julius Caesar in the civil wars, and was by the dictator thrice nominatedmagister equitumand raised to the consulship in 46B.C.He was a man of great wealth and influence, and it was probably more on this ground than on account of his ability that Caesar raised him to such honours. In the beginning of 44B.C.he was sent to Gallia Narbonensis, but before he had left the city with his army Caesar was murdered. Lepidus, as commander of the only army near Rome, became a man of great importance in the troubles which followed. Taking part with Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony), he joined in the reconciliation which the latter effected with the senatorial party, and afterwards sided with him when open war broke out. Antony, after his defeat at Mutina, joined Lepidus in Gaul, and in August 43 Octavian (afterwards the emperor Augustus), who had forced the senate to make him consul, effected an arrangement with Antony and Lepidus, and their triumvirate was organized at Bononia. Antony and Octavian soon reduced Lepidus to an inferior position. His province of Gaul and Spain was taken from him; and, though he was included in the triumvirate when it was renewed in 37, his power was only nominal. He made an effort in the following year to regain some reality of power, conquered part of Sicily, and claimed the whole island as his province, but Octavian found means to sap the fidelity of his soldiers, and he was obliged to supplicate for his life. He was allowed to retain his fortune and the office ofpontifex maximusto which he had been appointed in 44, but had to retire into private life. According to Suetonius (Augustus, 16) he died at Circeii in the year 13.

SeeRome:Historyii., “The Republic,” Period C,ad fin.; Appian,Bell. Civ.ii.-v.; Dio Cassius xli.-xlix.; Vell. Pat. ii. 64, 80; Orelli’sOnomasticonto Cicero.

LE PLAY, PIERRE GUILLAUME FRÉDÉRIC(1806-1882), French engineer and economist, was born at La Rivière-Saint-Sauveur (Calvados) on the 11th of April 1806, the son of a custom-house official. He was educated at the École Polytechnique, and from there passed into the State Department of Mines. In 1834 he was appointed head of the permanent committee of mining statistics, and in 1840 engineer-in-chief and professor of metallurgy at the school of mines, where he became inspector in 1848. For nearly a quarter of a century Le Play spent his vacations travelling in the various countries of Europe, and collected a vast quantity of material bearing upon the social condition of the working classes. In 1855 he publishedLes Ouvriers européens, which comprised a series of thirty-six monographs on the budgets of typical families selected from the most diverse industries. The Académie des Sciences conferred on him the Montyon prize. Napoleon III., who held him in high esteem, entrusted him with the organization of the Exhibition of 1855, and appointed him counsellor of state, commissioner general of the Exhibition of 1867, senator of the empire and grand officer of the Legion of Honour. He died in Paris on the 5th of April 1882.

In 1856 Le Play founded theSociété internationale des études pratiques d’Économie sociale, which has devoted its energies principally to forwarding social studies on the lines laid down by its founder. The journal of the society,La Réforme sociale, founded in 1881, is published fortnightly. Other works of Le Play areLa Réforme sociale(2 vols., 1864; 7th ed., 3 vols., 1887);L’Organisation de la famille(1871);La Constitution de l’Angleterre(in collaboration with M. Delaire, 1875). See article inHarvard Quarterly Journal of Economics(June 1890), by H. Higgs.

LEPROSY(Lepra Arabum,Elephantiasis Graecorum,Aussatz,Spedalskhed), the greatest disease of medieval Christendom, identified, on the one hand, with a disease endemic from the earliest historical times (1500B.C.) in the delta and valley of the Nile, and, on the other hand, with a disease now common in Asia, Africa, South America, the West Indies, and certain isolated localities of Europe. An authentic representation of the leprosy of the middle ages exists in a picture at Munich by Holbein, painted at Augsburg in 1516; St Elizabeth gives bread and wine to a prostrate group of lepers, including a bearded man whose face is covered with large round reddish knobs, an old woman whose arm is covered with brown blotches, the leg swathed in bandages through which matter oozes, the bare knee also marked with discoloured spots, and on the head a white rag or plaster, and, thirdly, a young man whose neck and face (especially round the somewhat hairless eyebrows) are spotted with brown patches of various size. It is conjectured by Virchow that the painter had made studies of lepers from the leper-houses then existing at Augsburg. These external characters of medieval leprosy agree with the descriptions of it by the ancients, and with the pictures of modern leprosy given by Danielssen and Boeck for Norway, by various authors for sporadic European cases, by Anderson for Malacca, by Carter for India, by Wolff for Madeira and by Hillis for British Guiana. There has been some confusion in the technical naming of the disease; it is calledElephantiasis(Leontiasis,Satyriasis) by the Greek writers, andLepraby the Arabians.

Leprosy is now included among the parasitic diseases (seeParasitic Diseases). The cause is believed to be infection by the bacillus leprae, a specific microbe discovered by Armauer Hansen in 1871. It is worthy of note that tuberculosis is very common among lepers, and especially attacks the serous membranes. The essential character of leprosy is a great multiplication of cells, resembling the “granulation cells” of lupus and syphilis, in the tissues affected, which become infiltrated and thickened, with degeneration and destruction of their normal elements. The new cells vary in size from ordinary leucocytes to giant cells three or four times larger. The bacilli are found in these cells, sometimes in small numbers, sometimes in masses. The structures most affected are the skin, nerves, mucous membranes and lymphatic glands.

The symptoms arise from the anatomical changes indicated, and they vary according to the parts attacked. Three types of disease are usually described—(1) nodular, (2) smooth or anaesthetic, (3) mixed. In the first the skin is chiefly affected, in the second the nerves; the third combines the features of both. It should be understood that this classification is purely a matter of convenience, and is based on the relative prominence of symptoms, which may be combined in all degrees. The incubation period of leprosy—assuming it to be due to infection—is unknown, but cases are on record which can only be explained on the hypothesis that it may be many years. The invasion is usually slow and intermittent. There are occasional feverish attacks, with the usual constitutional disturbance and other slight premonitory signs, such as changes in the colour of the skin and in its sensibility. Sometimes, but rarely, the onset is acute and the characteristic symptoms develop rapidly. These begin withan eruption which differs markedly according to the type of disease. In the nodular form dark red or coppery patches appear on the face, backs of the hands, and feet or on the body; they are generally symmetrical, and vary from the size of a shilling upwards. They come with one of the feverish attacks and fade away when it has gone, but only to return. After a time infiltration and thickening of the skin become noticeable, and the nodules appear. They are lumpy excrescences, at first pink but changing to brown. Thickening of the skin of the face produces a highly characteristic appearance, recalling the aspect of a lion. The tissues of the eye undergo degenerative changes; the mucous membrane of the nose and throat is thickened, impairing the breathing and the voice; the eyebrows fall off; the ears and nose become thickened and enlarged. As the disease progresses the nodules tend to break down and ulcerate, leaving open sores. The patient, whose condition is extremely wretched, gradually becomes weaker, and eventually succumbs to exhaustion or is carried off by some intercurrent disease, usually inflammation of the kidneys or tuberculosis. A severe case may end fatally in two years, but, as a rule, when patients are well cared for the illness lasts several years. There is often temporary improvement, but complete recovery from this form of leprosy rarely or never occurs. The smooth type is less severe and more chronic. The eruption consists of patches of dry, slightly discoloured skin, not elevated above the surface. These patches are the result of morbid changes affecting the cutaneous nerves, and are accompanied by diminished sensibility over the areas of skin affected. At the same time certain nerve trunks in the arm and leg, and particularly the ulnar nerve, are found to be thickened. In the further stages the symptoms are those of increasing degeneration of the nerves. Bullae form on the skin, and the discoloured patches become enlarged; sensation is lost, muscular power diminished, with wasting, contraction of tendons, and all the signs of impaired nutrition. The nails become hard and clawed; perforating ulcers of the feet are common; portions of the extremities, including whole fingers and toes, die and drop off. Later, paralysis becomes more marked, affecting the muscles of the face and limbs. The disease runs a very chronic course, and may last twenty or thirty years. Recovery occasionally occurs. In the mixed form, which is probably the most common, the symptoms described are combined in varying degrees. Leprosy may be mistaken for syphilis, tuberculosis, ainhum (an obscure disease affecting negroes, in which the little toe drops off), and several affections of the skin. Diagnosis is established by the presence of the bacillus leprae in the nodules or bullae, and by the signs of nerve degeneration exhibited in the anaesthetic patches of skin and the thickened nerve trunks.

In former times leprosy was often confounded with other skin diseases, especially psoriasis and leucoderma; the white leprosy of the Old Testament was probably a form of the latter. But there is no doubt that true leprosy has existed from time immemorial. Prescriptions for treating it have been found in Egypt, to which a date of about 4600B.C.is assigned. The disease is described by Aristotle and by later Greek writers, but not by Hippocrates, though leprosy derives its name from his “lepra” or “scaly” disease, which was no doubt psoriasis. In ancient times it was widely prevalent throughout Asia as well as in Egypt, and among the Greeks and Romans. In the middle ages it became extensively diffused in Europe, and in some countries—France, England, Germany and Spain—every considerable town had its leper-house, in which the patients were segregated. The total number of such houses has been reckoned at 19,000. The earliest one in England was established at Canterbury in 1096, and the latest at Highgate in 1472. At one time there were at least 95 religious hospitals for lepers in Great Britain and 14 in Ireland (Sir James Simpson). During the 15th century the disease underwent a remarkable diminution. It practically disappeared in the civilized parts of Europe, and the leper-houses were given up. It is a singular fact that this diminution was coincident with the great extension of syphilis (seeProstitution). The general disappearance of leprosy at this time is the more unintelligible because it did not take effect everywhere. In Scotland the disease lingered until the 19th century, and in some other parts it has never died out at all. At the present time it still exists in Norway, Iceland, along the shores of the Baltic, in South Russia, Greece, Turkey, several Mediterranean islands, the Riviera, Spain and Portugal. Isolated cases occasionally occur elsewhere, but they are usually imported. The Teutonic races seem to be especially free from the taint. Leper asylums are maintained in Norway and at two or three places in the Baltic, San Remo, Cyprus, Constantinople, Alicante and Lisbon. Except in Spain, where some increase has taken place, the disease is dying out. The number of lepers in Norway was 3000 in 1856, but has now dwindled to a few hundreds. They are no longer numerous in any part of Europe. On the other hand, leprosy prevails extensively throughout Asia, from the Mediterranean to Japan, and from Arabia to Siberia. It is also found in nearly all parts of Africa, particularly on the east and west coasts near the equator. In South Africa it has greatly increased, and attacks the Dutch as well as natives. Leper asylums have been established at Robben Island near Cape Town, and in Tembuland. In Australia, where it was introduced by Chinese, it has also spread to Europeans. In New Zealand the Maoris are affected; but the amount of leprosy is not large in either country. A much more remarkable case is that of the Hawaiian Islands, where the disease is believed to have been imported by Chinese. It was unknown before 1848, but in 1866 the number of lepers had risen to 230 and in 1882 to 4000 (Liveing). All attempts to stop it by segregating lepers in the settlement of Molokai appear to have been fruitless. In the West Indies and on the American continent, again, leprosy has a wide distribution. It is found in nearly all parts of South and Central America, and in certain parts of North America—namely, Louisiana, California (among Chinese), Minnesota, Wisconsin and North and South Dakota (Norwegians), New Brunswick (French Canadians).

It is difficult to find any explanation of the geographical distribution and behaviour of leprosy. It seems to affect islands and the sea-coast more than the interior, and to some extent this gives colour to the old belief that it is caused or fostered by a fish diet, which has been revived by Mr Jonathan Hutchinson, but is not generally accepted. Leprosy is found in interiors where fish is not an article of diet. Climate, again, has obviously little, if any, influence. The theory of heredity is equally at fault, whether it be applied to account for the spread of the disease by transmission or for its disappearance by the elimination of susceptible persons. The latter is the manner in which heredity might be expected to act, if at all, for lepers are remarkably sterile. But we see the disease persisting among the Eastern races, who have been continuously exposed to its selective influence from the earliest times, while it has disappeared among the Europeans, who were affected very much later. The opposite theory of hereditary transmission from parents to offspring is also at variance with many observed facts. Leprosy is very rarely congenital, and no cases have occurred among the descendants to the third generation of 160 Norwegian lepers settled in the United States. Again, if hereditary transmission were an effective influence, the disease could hardly have died down so rapidly as it did in Europe in the 15th century. Then we have the theory of contagion. There is no doubt that human beings are inoculable with leprosy, and that the disease may be communicated by close contact. Cases have been recorded which prove it conclusively; for instance, that of a man who had never been out of the British islands, but developed leprosy after sharing for a time the bed and clothes of his brother, who had contracted the disease in the West Indies. Some of the facts noted, such as the extensive dissemination of the disease in Europe during the middle ages, and its subsequent rapid decline, suggest the existence of some unknown epidemic factor. Poverty and insanitation are said to go with the prevalence of leprosy, but they go with every malady, and there is nothing to show that they have any special influence. Vaccination has been blamed for spreading it, and a few cases of communication by arm-to-arm inoculation are recorded. The influence of thisfactor, however, can only be trifling. Vaccination is a new thing, leprosy a very old one; where there is most vaccination there is no leprosy, and where there is most leprosy there is little or no vaccination. In India 78% of the lepers are unvaccinated, and in Canton since vaccination was introduced leprosy has declined (Cantlie). On the whole we must conclude that there is still much to be learnt about the conditions which govern the prevalence of leprosy.

With regard to prevention, the isolation of patients is obviously desirable, especially in the later stages, when open sores may disseminate the bacilli; but complete segregation, which has been urged, is regarded as impracticable by those who have had most experience in leprous districts. Scrupulous cleanliness should be exercised by persons attending on lepers or brought into close contact with them. In treatment the most essential thing is general care of the health, with good food and clothing. The tendency of modern therapeutics to attach increasing importance to nutrition in various morbid states, and notably in diseases of degeneration, such as tuberculosis and affections of the nervous system, is borne out by experience in leprosy, which has affinities to both; and this suggests the application to it of modern methods for improving local as well as general nutrition by physical means. A large number of internal remedies have been tried with varying results; those most recommended are chaulmoogra oil, arsenic, salicylate of soda, salol and chlorate of potash. Vergueira uses Collargol intravenously and subcutaneously, and states that in all the cases treated there was marked improvement, and hair that had been lost grew again. Calmette’s Anterenene injected subcutaneously has been followed by good results. Deycke together with R. Bey isolated from a non-ulcerated leprous nodule a streptothrix which they call S. leproides. Its relation to the bacillus is uncertain. They found that injections of this organism had marked curative effects, due to a neutral fat which they named “Nastin.” Injections of Nastin together with Benzoyl Chloride directly act on the lepra bacilli. Some cases were unaffected by this treatment, but with others the effect was marvellous. Dr W. A. Pusey of Chicago uses applications of carbon dioxide snow with good effect. In the later stages of the disease there is a wide field for surgery, which is able to give much relief to sufferers.

Literature.—For history and geographical distribution, see Hirsch,Handbuch der historisch-geographischen Pathologie(1st ed., Erlangen, 1860, with exhaustive literature). For pathology, Virchow,Die krankhaften Geschwülste(Berlin, 1863-1867), vol. ii. For clinical histories, R. Liveing,Elephantiasis Graecorum or True Leprosy(London, 1873), ch. iv. For medieval leprosy—in Germany, Virchow, inVirchow’s Archiv, five articles, vols. xviii.-xx. (1860-1861); in the Netherlands, Israëls, inNederl. Tijdschr. voor Geneeskunde, vol. i. (1857); in Britain, J. Y. Simpson,Edin. Med. and Surg. Journ., three articles, vols. lxvi. and lxvii. (1846-1847). Treatises on modern leprosy in particular localities: Danielssen and Boeck (Norway),Traité de la Spédalskhed, with atlas of twenty-four coloured plates (Paris, 1848); A. F. Anderson,Leprosy as met with in the Straits Settlements, coloured photographs with explanatory notes (London, 1872); H. Vandyke Carter (Bombay),On Leprosy and Elephantiasis, with coloured plates (London, 1874); Hillis,Leprosy in British Guiana, an account of West Indian leprosy, with twenty-two coloured plates (London, 1882). See also the dermatological works of Hebra, Erasmus Wilson, Bazin and Jonathan Hutchinson (also the latter’s letters toThe Timesof the 11th of April and the 25th of May 1903);British Medical Journal(April 1, 1908);American Journal of Dermatology(Dec. 1907);The Practitioner(February 1910). An important early work is that of P. G. Hensler,Vom abendländischen Aussatze im Mittelalter(Hamburg, 1790).

LEPSIUS, KARL RICHARD(1810-1884), German Egyptologist, was born at Naumburg-am-Saale on the 23rd of December 1810, and in 1823 was sent to the “Schulpforta” school near Naumburg, where he came under the influence of Professor Lange. In 1829 he entered the university of Leipzig, and one year later that of Göttingen, where, under the influence of Otfried Müller, he finally decided to devote himself to the archaeological side of philology. From Göttingen he proceeded to Berlin, where he graduated in 1833 as doctor with the thesisDe tabulis Eugubinis. In the same year he proceeded to study in Paris, and was commissioned by the duc de Luynes to collect material from the Greek and Latin writers for his work on the weapons of the ancients. In 1834 he took the Volney prize with hisPaläographie als Mittel der Sprachforschung. Befriended by Bunsen and Humboldt, Lepsius threw himself with great ardour into Egyptological studies, which, since the death of Champollion in 1832, had attracted no scholar of eminence and weight. Here Lepsius found an ample field for his powers. After four years spent in visiting the Egyptian collections of Italy, Holland and England, he returned to Germany, where Humboldt and Bunsen united their influence to make his projected visit to Egypt a scientific expedition with royal support. For three years Lepsius and his party explored the whole of the region in which monuments of ancient Egyptian and Ethiopian occupation are found, from the Sudan above Khartum to the Syrian coast. At the end of 1845 they returned home, and the results of the expedition, consisting of casts, drawings and squeezes of inscriptions and scenes, maps and plans collected with the utmost thoroughness, as well as antiquities and papyri, far surpassed expectations. In 1846 he married Elisabeth Klein, and his appointment to a professorship in Berlin University in the following August afforded him the leisure necessary for the completion of his work. In 1859 the twelve volumes of his vastDenkmäler aus Ägypten und Äthiopienwere finished, supplemented later by a text prepared from the note-books of the expedition; they comprise its entire archaeological, palaeographical and historical results. In 1866 Lepsius again went to Egypt, and discovered the famous Decree of Tanis or Table of Canopus, an inscription of the same character as the Rosetta Stone, in hieroglyphic, demotic and Greek. In 1873 he was appointed keeper of the Royal Library, Berlin, which, like the Berlin Museum, owes much to his care. About ten years later he was appointed Geheimer Oberregierungsrath. He died at Berlin on the 10th of July 1884. Besides the colossalDenkmälerand other publications of texts such as theTodtenbuch der Ägypter(Book of the Dead, 1842) his other works, amongst which may be specially named hisKönigsbuch der Ägypter(1858) andChronologie der Ägypter(1849), are characterized by a quality of permanence that is very remarkable in a subject of such rapid development as Egyptology. In spite of his scientific training in philology Lepsius left behind few translations of inscriptions or discussions of the meanings of words: by preference he attacked historical and archaeological problems connected with the ancient texts, the alphabet, the metrology, the names of metals and minerals, the chronology, the royal names. On the other hand one of his latest works, theNubische Grammatik(1880), is an elaborate grammar of the then little-known Nubian language, preceded by a linguistic sketch of the African continent. Throughout his life he profited by the gift of attaching to himself the right men, whether as patrons or, like Weidenbach and Stern, as assistants. Lepsius was a fine specimen of the best type of German scholar.

SeeRichard Lepsius, by Georg Ebers (New York, 1887), and art.Egypt, sectionExploration and Research.

LEPTINES,an Athenian orator, known as the proposer of a law that no Athenian, whether citizen or resident alien (with the sole exception of the descendants of Harmodius and Aristogeiton), should be exempt from the public charges (λειτουργίαι) for the state festivals. The object was to provide funds for the festivals and public spectacles at a time when both the treasury and the citizens generally were short of money. It was further asserted that many of the recipients of immunity were really unworthy of it. Against this law Demosthenes delivered (354B.C.) his well-known speechAgainst Leptinesin support of the proposal of Ctesippus that all the cases of immunity should be carefully investigated. Great stress is laid on the reputation for ingratitude and breach of faith which the abolition of immunities would bring upon the state. Besides, the law itself had been passed unconstitutionally, for an existing law confirmed these privileges, and by the constitution of Solon no law could be enacted until any existing law which it contravened had been repealed. The law was probably condemned. Nothing further is known of Leptines.

See the edition of the speech by J. E. Sandys (1890).

LEPTIS,the name of two towns in ancient Africa. The first, Leptis Magna (Λεπτίμαγνα), the modern Lebda, was in Tripolitana between Tripolis and Mesrata at the mouth of the Cinyps; the second, Leptis Parva (Λέπτις ἡ μικρά), known also as Leptiminus or Leptis minor, the modern Lamta, was a small harbour of Byzacena between Ruspina (Monastir) and Thapsus (Dimas).

1.Leptis Magnawas one of the oldest and most flourishing of the Phoenician emporia established on the coasts of the greater Syrtis, the chief commercial entrepot for the interior of the African continent. It was founded by the Sidonians (Sallust,Jug.78) who were joined later by people of Tyre (Pliny,Hist. Nat.v. 17). Herodotus enlarges on the fertility of its territory (iv. 175, v. 42). It was tributary to Carthage to which it paid a contribution of a talent a day (Livy xxxiv. 62). After the Second Punic War Massinissa made himself master of it (Sallust,Jug.78; Livy xxxiv. 62; Appian viii. 106). During the Jugurthine War it appealed for protection to Rome (Sallust,Jug.78). Though captured and plundered by Juba, it maintained its allegiance to Rome, supported the senatorial cause, received Cato the younger with the remains of the Pompeian forces after Pharsalus 48B.C.After his victory Julius Caesar imposed upon it an annual contribution of 300,000 measures of oil. Nevertheless, it preserved its position as a free city governed by its own magistrates (C.I.L.viii. 7). It received the title ofmunicipium(C.I.L.viii. 8), and was subsequently made acoloniaby Trajan (C.I.L.viii. 10). Septimius Severus, who was born there, beautified the place and conferred upon it theIus Italicum. Leptis Magna was the limit of the Roman state, the last station of thelimes Tripolitanus; hence, especially during the last centuries of the Empire, it suffered much from the Nomads of the desert, the Garamantes, the Austuriani and the Levathae (Ammian. Marc. xxviii. 6; Procop.De Aedif.vi. 4). Its commerce declined and its harbour silted up. Justinian made a vain attempt to rebuild it (Procop.ibid.; Ch. Diehl,L’Afrique byzantine, p. 388). It was the seat of a bishopric, but no mention is made of its bishops after 462.

Leptis Magna had a citadel which protected the commercial city which was generally called Neapolis, the situation of which may be compared with that of Carthage at the foot of Byrsa. Its ruins are still imposing; remains of ramparts and docks, a theatre, a circus and various buildings of the Roman period still exist. Inscriptions show that the current pronunciation of the name was Lepcis, Lepcitana, instead of Leptis, Leptitana (Tissot,Géogr. comp. de la prov. d’Afrique, ii. 219; Clermont-Ganneau,Recueil d’archéologie orientale, vi. 41;Comptes rendus de l’Acad. des Inscr. et B.-Lettres, 1903, p. 333; Cagnat,C.R. Acad., 1905, p. 531). The coins of Leptis Magna, like the majority of the emporia in the neighbourhood, present a series from the Punic period. They are of bronze with the legendלפקי(Lepqi). They have on one side the head of Bacchus, Hercules or Cybele, and on the other various emblems of these deities. From the Roman period we have also coins bearing the heads of Augustus, Livia and Tiberius, which still have the name of the town in Neo-Punic script (Lud. Müller,Numism. de l’anc. Afrique, ii. 3).

The ruins of Leptis Magna have been visited by numerous travellers since the time of Frederick William and Henry William Beechey (Travels, pp. 51 and 74) and Heinrich Barth (Wanderungen, pp. 306, 360); they are described by Ch. Tissot (Géogr. comp.ii. 219 et seq.); Cl. Perroud,De Syrticis emporiis, p. 33 (Paris, 1881, in 8°); see also a description in the New York journal,The Nation(1877), vol. xxvii. No. 683. M. Méhier de Mathuisieulx explored the site afresh in 1901; his account is inserted in theNouvelles Archives des missions, x. 245-277; cf. vol. xii. See also J. Toutain, “Le Limes Tripolitanus en Tripolitaine,” in theBulletin archéologique áu comité des travaux historiques(1905).

2.Leptis Parva(Lamta), 7½ m. from Monastir, which is often confused by modern writers with Leptis Magna in their interpretations of ancient texts (Tissot,Géogr. comp.ii. 169), was, according to theTabula Peutingeriana, 18 m. south of Hadrumetum. Evidently Phoenician in origin like Leptis Magna, it was in the Punic period of comparatively slight importance. Nevertheless, it had fortifications, and the French engineer, A. Daux, has discovered a probable line of ramparts. Like its neighbour Hadrumetum, Leptis Parva declared for Rome after the last Punic War. Also after the fall of Carthage in 146 it preserved its autonomy and was declared acivitas libera et immunis(Appian,Punica, 94;C.I.L.i. 200;De bell. Afric.c. xii.). Julius Caesar made it the base of his operations before the battle of Thapsus in 46 (Ch. Tissot,Géogr. comp.ii. 728). Under the Empire Leptis Parva became extremely prosperous; its bishops appeared in the African councils from 258 onwards. In Justinian’s reorganization of Africa we find that Leptis Parva was with Capsa one of the two residences of theDux Byzacenae(Tissot,op. cit.p. 171). The town had coins under Augustus and Tiberius. On the obverse is the imperial effigy with a Latin legend, and on the reverse the Greek legendΛΕΠΤΙCwith the bust of Mercury (Lud. Müller,Numism. de l’anc. Afrique, ii. 49). The ruins extend along the sea-coast to the north-west of Lemta; the remains of docks, the amphitheatre and the acropolis can be distinguished; a Christian cemetery has furnished tombs adorned with curious mosaics.

SeeComptes rendus de l’Acad. des Inscrip. et B.-Lettres(1883), p. 189; Cagnat and Saladin, “Notes d’archéol. tunisiennes,” in theBulletin monumentalof 1884;Archives des missions, xii. 111; Cagnat,Explorations archéol. en Tunisie, 3mefasc. pp. 9-16, andTour du monde(1881), i. 292; Saladin,Rapport sur une mission en Tunisie(1886), pp. 9-20;Bulletin archéol. du comité de travaux historiques(1895), pp. 69-71 (inscriptions of Lamta);Bulletin de la Soc. archéol. de Sousse(1905; plan of the ruins of Lamta).

(E. B.*)

LE PUY, orLe Puy en Velay, a town of south-eastern France, capital of the department of Haute-Loire, 90 m. S.W. of Lyons on the Paris-Lyon railway. Pop. (1906) town, 17,291; commune, 21,420. Le Puy rises in the form of an amphitheatre from a height of 2050 ft. above sea-level upon Mont Anis, a hill that divides the left bank of the Dolézon from the right bank of the Borne (a rapid stream joining the Loire 3 m. below). From the new town, which lies east and west in the valley of the Dolézon, the traveller ascends the old feudal and ecclesiastical town through narrow steep streets, paved with pebbles of lava, to the cathedral commanded by the fantastic pinnacle of Mont Corneille. Mont Corneille, which is 433 ft. above the Place de Breuil (in the lower town), is a steep rock of volcanic breccia, surmounted by an iron statue of the Virgin (53 ft. high) cast, after a model by Bonassieux, out of guns taken at Sebastopol. Another statue, that of Msgr de Morlhon, bishop of Le Puy, also sculptured by Bonassieux, faces that of the Virgin. From the platform of Mont Corneille a magnificent panoramic view is obtained of the town and of the volcanic mountains, which make this region one of the most interesting parts of France.

The Romanesque cathedral (Notre-Dame), dating chiefly from the first half of the 12th century, has a particoloured façade of white sandstone and black volcanic breccia, which is reached by a flight of sixty steps, and consists of three tiers, the lowest composed of three high arcades opening into the porch, which extends beneath the first bays of the nave; above are three windows lighting the nave; and these in turn are surmounted by three gables, two of which, those to the right and the left, are of open work. The staircase continues within the porch, where it divides, leading on the left to the cloister, on the right into the church. The doorway of the south transept is sheltered by a fine Romanesque porch. The isolated bell-tower (184 ft.), which rises behind the choir in seven storeys, is one of the most beautiful examples of the Romanesque transition period. The bays of the nave are covered in by octagonal cupolas, the central cupola forming a lantern. The choir and transepts are barrel-vaulted. Much veneration is paid to a small image of the Virgin on the high altar, a modern copy of the medieval image destroyed at the Revolution. The cloister, to the north of the choir, is striking, owing to its variously-coloured materials and elegant shafts. Viollet-le-Duc considered one of its galleries to belong to the oldest known type of cathedral cloister (8th or 9th century). Connected with the cloister are remains of fortifications of the 13th century, by which it was separated from the rest of the city. Near the cathedral thebaptistery of St John (11th century), built on the foundations of a Roman building, is surrounded by walls and numerous remains of the period, partly uncovered by excavations. The church of St Lawrence (14th century) contains the tomb and statue of Bertrand du Guesclin, whose ashes were afterwards carried to St Denis.

Le Puy possesses fragmentary remains of its old line of fortifications, among them a machicolated tower, which has been restored, and a few curious old houses dating from the 12th to the 17th century. In front of the hospital there is a fine medieval porch under which a street passes. Of the modern monuments the statue of Marie Joseph Paul, marquis of La Fayette, and a fountain in the Place de Breuil, executed in marble, bronze and syenite, may be specially mentioned. The museum, named after Charles Crozatier, a native sculptor and metal-worker to whose munificence it principally owes its existence, contains antiquities, engravings, a collection of lace, and ethnographical and natural history collections. Among the curiosities of Le Puy should be noted the church of St Michel d’Aiguilhe, beside the gate of the town, perched on an isolated rock like Mont Corneille, the top of which is reached by a staircase of 271 steps. The church dates from the end of the 10th century and its chancel is still older. The steeple is of the same type as that of the cathedral. Three miles from Le Puy are the ruins of the Château de Polignac, one of the most important feudal strongholds of France.

Le Puy is the seat of a bishopric, a prefect and a court of assizes, and has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a board of trade arbitration, a chamber of commerce, and a branch of the Bank of France. Its educational institutions include ecclesiastical seminaries, lycées and training colleges for both sexes and municipal industrial schools of drawing, architecture and mathematics applied to arts and industries. The principal manufacture is that of lace and guipure (in woollen, linen, cotton, silk and gold and silver threads), and distilling, leather-dressing, malting and the manufacture of chocolate and cloth are carried on. Cattle, woollens, grain and vegetables are the chief articles of trade.

It is not known whether Le Puy existed previously to the Roman invasion. Towards the end of the 4th or beginning of the 5th century it became the capital of the country of the Vellavi, at which period the bishopric, originally at Revession, now St Paulien, was transferred hither. Gregory of Tours speaks of it by the name of Anicium, because a chapel “ad Deum” had been built on the mountain, whence the name of Mont Adidon or Anis, which it still retains. In the 10th century it was called Podium Sanctae Mariae, whence Le Puy. In the middle ages there was a double enclosure, one for the cloister, the other for the town. The sanctuary of Nôtre Dame was much frequented by pilgrims, and the city grew famous and populous. Rivalries between the bishops who held directly of the see of Rome and had the right of coining money, and the lords of Polignac, revolts of the town against the royal authority, and the encroachments of the feudal superiors on municipal prerogatives often disturbed the quiet of the town. The Saracens in the 8th century, the Routiers in the 12th, the English in the 14th, the Burgundians in the 15th, successively ravaged the neighbourhood. Le Puy sent the flower of its chivalry to the Crusades in 1096, and Raymond d’Aiguille, called d’Agiles, one of its sons, was their historian. Many councils and various assemblies of the states of Languedoc met within its walls; popes and sovereigns, among the latter Charlemagne and Francis I., visited its sanctuary. Pestilence and the religious wars put an end to its prosperity. Long occupied by the Leaguers, it did not submit to Henry IV. until many years after his accession.

LERDO DE TEJADA, SEBASTIAN(1825-1889), president of Mexico, was born at Jalapa on the 25th of April 1825. He was educated as a lawyer and became a member of the supreme court. He became known as a liberal leader and a supporter of President Juarez. He was minister of foreign affairs for three months in 1857, and became president of the Chamber of Deputies in 1861. During the French intervention and the reign of the emperor Maximilian he continued loyal to the patriotic party, and had an active share in conducting the national resistance. He was minister of foreign affairs to President Juarez, and he showed an implacable resolution in carrying out the execution of Maximilian at Querétaro. When Juarez died in 1872 Lerdo succeeded him in office in the midst of a confused civil war. He achieved some success in pacifying the country and began the construction of railways. He was re-elected on the 24th of July 1876, but was expelled in January of the following year by Porfirio Diaz. He had made himself unpopular by the means he took to secure his re-election and by his disposition to limit state rights in favour of a strongly centralized government. He fled to the United States and died in obscurity at New York in 1889.

See H. H. Bancroft,Pacific States, vol. 9 (San Francisco, 1882-1890).

LERICI,a village of Liguria, Italy, situated on the N.E. side of the Gulf of Spezia, about 12 m. E.S.E. of Spezia, and 4 m. W.S.W. of Sarzana by road, 17 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) 9326. Its small harbour is guarded by an old castle, said to have been built by Tancred; in the middle ages it was the chief place on the gulf. S. Terenzo, a hamlet belonging to Lerici, was the residence of Shelley during his last days. Farther north-west is the Bay of Pertusola, with its large lead-smelting works.

LÉRIDA,a province of northern Spain, formed in 1833 of districts previously included in the ancient province of Catalonia, and bounded on the N. by France and Andorra, E. by Gerona and Barcelona, S. by Tarragona and W. by Saragossa and Huesca. Pop. (1900) 274,590; area 4690 sq. m. The northern half of Lérida belongs entirely to the Mediterranean or eastern section of the Pyrenees, and comprises some of the finest scenery in the whole chain, including the valleys of Aran and La Cerdaña, and large tracts of forest. It is watered by many rivers, the largest of which is the Segre, a left-hand tributary of the Ebro. South of the point at which the Segre is joined on the right by the Noguera Pallaresa, the character of the country completely alters. The Llaños de Urgel, which comprise the greater part of southern Lérida, are extensive plains forming part of the Ebro valley, but redeemed by an elaborate system of canals from the sterility which characterizes so much of that region in Aragon. Lérida is traversed by the main railway from Barcelona to Saragossa, and by a line from Tarragona to the city of Lérida. In 1904 the Spanish government agreed with France to carry another line to the mouth of an international tunnel through the Pyrenees. Industries are in a more backward condition than in any other province of Catalonia, despite the abundance of water-power. There are, however, many saw-mills, flour-mills, and distilleries of alcohol and liqueurs, besides a smaller number of cotton and linen factories, paper-mills, soap-works, and oil and leather factories. Zinc, lignite and common salt are mined, but the output is small and of slight value. There is a thriving trade in wine, oil, wool, timber, cattle, mules, horses and sheep, but agriculture is far less prosperous than in the maritime provinces of Catalonia. Lérida (q.v.) is the capital (pop. 21,432), and the only town with more than 5000 inhabitants. Séo de Urgel, near the headwaters of the Segre, is a fortified city which has been an episcopal see since 840, and has had a close historical connexion with Andorra (q.v.). Solsona, on a small tributary of the Cardoner, which flows through Barcelona to the Mediterranean, is theSetelixof the Romans, and contains in its parish church an image of the Virgin said to possess miraculous powers, and visited every year by many hundreds of pilgrims. Cervera, on a small river of the same name, contains the buildings of a university which Philip V. established here in 1717. This university had originally been founded at Barcelona in the 15th century, and was reopened there in 1842. In character, and especially in their industry, intelligence and keen local patriotism, the inhabitants of Lérida are typical Catalans. (SeeCatalonia.)

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