the captives by whose hands the labour had been accomplished were put to death that none might learn their secret. He was succeeded in the command of the Gothic army by his brother-in-law, Ataulphus.
Our chief authorities for the career of Alaric are the historian Orosius and the poet Claudian, both strictly contemporary; Zosimus, a somewhat prejudiced heathen historian, who lived probably about half a century after the death of Alaric; and Jordanes, a Goth who wrote the history of his nation in the year 551, basing his work on the earlier history of Cassiodorus (now lost), which was written about 520. (T. H.)
ALARIC II. (d. 507), eighth king of the Goths in Spain, succeeded his father Euric or Evaric in 485. His dominions not only included the whole of Spain except its north-western corner, but also Aquitaine and the greater part of Provence. In religion Alaric was an Arian, but he greatly mitigated the persecuting policy of his father Euric towards the Catholics and authorized them to hold in 506 the council of Agde. He displayed similar wisdom and liberality in political affairs by appointing a commission to prepare an abstract of the Roman laws and imperial decrees, which should form the authoritative code for his Roman subjects. This is generally known as the Breviarium Alaricianum, or Breviary of Alaric (q.v.) Alaric . was of a peaceful disposition, and endeavoured strictly to maintain the treaty which his father had concluded with the Franks, whose king Clovis, however, desiring to obtain the Gothic province in Gaul, found a pretext for war in the Arianism of Alaric. The intervention of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths and father-in-law of Alaric, proved unavailing. The two armies met in 507 at the Campus Vogladensis, near Poitiers, where the Goths were defeated, and their king, who took to flight, was overtaken and slain, it is said, by Clovis himself.
ALA-SHEHR (anc. Philadelphia), a town of Asia Minor, in the Aidin vilayet, situated in the valley of the Kuzu Chai (Cogamus), at the foot of the Boz Dagh (Mt. Tmolus) 83 m. E. of Smyrna (105 by railway). Pop. 22,000 (Moslems, 17,000; Christians, 5000). Philadelphia was founded by Attalus II. of Pergamum about 150 B.C., became one of the “Seven Churches” of Asia, and was called “Little Athens” on account of its festivals and temples. It was subject to frequent earthquakes. Philadelphia was an independent neutral city, under the influence of the Latin Knights of Rhodes, when taken in 1390 by Sultan Bayezid I. and an auxiliary Christian force under the emperor Manuel II. after a prolonged resistance, when all the other cities of Asia Minor had surrendered. Twelve years later it was captured by Timur, who built a wall with the corpses of his prisoners. A fragment of the ghastly structure is in the library of Lincoln cathedral. The town is connected by railway with Afium-Kara-Hissar and Smyrna. It is dirty and ill-built; but, standing on elevated ground and commanding the extensive and fertile plain of the Hermus, presents at a distance an imposing appearance. It is the seat of an archbishop and has several mosques and Christian churches. There are small industries and a fair trade. From one of the mineral springs comes a heavily charged water known in commerce as “Eau de Vals,” and in great request in Smyrna.
See W. M. Ramsay, Letters to the Seven Churches (1904).
ALASKA, formerly called Russian America, a district of the United States of America, occupying the extreme north-western part of North America and the adjacent islands. The name is a corruption of a native word possibly meaning “mainland” or “peninsula.” The district of Alaska comprises, first, all that part of the continent W. of the 141st meridian of W. longitude from Greenwich; secondly, the eastern Diomede island in Bering Strait, and all islands in Bering Sea and the Aleutian chain lying E. of a line drawn from the Diomedes to pass midway between Copper Island, off Kamchatka, and Attu Island of the Aleutians; thirdly, a narrow strip of coast and adjacent islands N. of a line drawn from Cape Muzon, in lat. 54° 40′ N., E. and N. up Portland Canal to its head, and thence, as defined in the treaty of cession to the United States, quoting a boundary treaty of 1825 between Great Britain and Russia, following “the summit of the mountains situated parallel to the coast” to the
141st meridian, provided that when such line runs more than ten marine leagues from the ocean the limit “shall be formed by a line parallel to the windings of the coast and which shall never exceed the distance of ten marine leagues therefrom.” The international disputes connected with this description are referred to below.
Physical Features.—Alaska is bounded on the N. by the Arctic Ocean, on the W. by the Arctic Ocean and Bering Strait, on the S. and S.W. by the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean, and on the E. by Yukon Territory and British Columbia. It consists of a compact central mass and two straggling appendages running from its S.W. and S.E. corners, and sweeping in a vast arc over 16 degrees of latitude and 58 degrees of longitude. These three parts will be referred to hereafter respectively, as Continental Alaska, Aleutian Alaska and the “Panhandle.” The range of latitude from Point Barrow in the Arctic Ocean to Cape Muzon is almost 17 degrees—as great as from New Orleans to Duluth; the range of longitude from Attu Island to the head of Portland Canal is 58 degrees—considerably greater than from New York to San Francisco. The total area is about 586,400 sq. m. The general ocean-coast line is about 4750 m., and, including the islands, bays, inlets and rivers to the head of tide water, is about 26,000 m. in length (U.S. Coast Survey 1889). The entire southern coast is very irregular in outline; it is precipitous, with only very slight stretches of beach or plain. Its elevation gradually decreases as one travels W. toward the Aleutians. A great submarine platform extends throughout a large part of Bering Sea. The western and northern coasts are regular in outline with long straight beaches; and shallows are common in the seas that wash them. On the Arctic there is a broad coastal plain. Of the islands of Alaska the more important are: at the S.E. extremity and lying close inland, the Alexander Archipelago, whose principal islands from N.W. to S.E. are Chicagof, Baranof, Admiralty, Kupreanof, Kuiu, Prince of Wales (the largest of the archipelago and of all the islands about Alaska, measuring about 140 m. in length and 40 m. in width), Etolin and Revillagigedo; S.W. of the mainland, two groups—(1) Kodiak, whose largest island, of the same name, is 40 m. by 100 m., and may be considered a continuation of the Kenai Peninsula, and whose W. continuation, S. of Alaska Peninsula, consists of the Semidi, Shumagin and Sannak clusters; (2) the Aleutian Islands (q.v.) sweeping 1200 m. W.S.W. from the end of Alaska Peninsula, W. of the mainland, in Bering Sea, the Pribilof Islands, about 500 m. S. of Cape Prince of Wales, the small Hall and St Matthew Islands, about 170 m. S.W. of the same cape, St Lawrence Island (100 m. and 10 to 30 m. wide), which is about half way between the last mentioned pair of islets and Cape Prince of Wales and Nunivak Island, near the mainland and due E. of St Matthew; and in the middle of Bering Strait the Diomede Islands, which belong in part to Russia.
Very little was known about Alaska previous to 1896, when the gold discoveries in the Klondike stimulated public interest regarding it. Since 1895, however, the explorations of the United States Geological Survey and the Department of War, and other departments of the government, have fully established the main features of its physiography. It has mountains, plateaus and lowlands on a grand scale. “In a broad way, the larger features of topography correspond with those of the western states. There is a Pacific Mountain system, a Central Plateau region, a Rocky Mountain system, and a Great Plains region. These four divisions are well marked, and show the close geographic relation of this area to the southern part of the Continent.” The orographic features of the Pacific Mountain system trend parallel to the coast-line of the Gulf of Alaska, changing with this at the great bend beyond the N., and of the Panhandle from S.E. and N.W. to N.E. and S.W. and running through the Alaska Peninsula. The Pacific Mountain system includes four ranges. The Coast Range of the Panhandle attains a width of 100 m., but has no well-defined crest line. The range is characterized by the uniformity of summit levels between 5000 and 6000 ft. Continuing the Coast Range, with
