whose arrival was then imminent. He died on the 3rd of October 1690.
BARCLAY, WILLIAM (1546–1608) Scottish jurist, was born in Aberdeenshire in 1546. Educated at Aberdeen University, he went to France in 1573, and studied law under Cujas, at Bourges, where he took his doctor’s degree. Charles III., duke of Lorraine, appointed him professor of civil law in the newly-founded university of Pont-à-Mousson, and also created him counsellor of state and master of requests. In 1603, however, he was obliged to quit France, having incurred the enmity of the Jesuits, through his opposition to their proposal to admit his son John (q.v.) a member of their society. Returning to England, he was offered considerable preferment by King James on condition of becoming a member of the Church of England. This offer he refused, and returned to France in 1604, when he was appointed professor of civil law in the university of Angers. He died at Angers in 1608. His principal works were De Regno et Regali Potestate, &c. (Paris, 1600), a strenuous defence of the rights of kings, in which he refutes the doctrines of George Buchanan, “Junius Brutus” (Hubert Languet) and Jean Boucher; and De Potestate Papae, &c. (London, 1609), in opposition to the usurpation of temporal powers by the pope, which called forth the celebrated reply of Cardinal Bellarmine; also commentaries on some of the titles of the Pandects.
BARCLAY DE TOLLY, MICHAEL ANDREAS, called by the Russians Michael, Prince Bogdanovich (1761–1818), Russian field marshal, was born in Livonia in 1761. He was a descendant of a Scottish family which had settled in Russia in the 17th century. He entered the Russian army at an early age. In 1788–1789 he served against the Turks, in 1790 and 1794 against the Swedes and Poles. He became colonel in 1798 and major-general in 1799. In the war of 1806 against Napoleon, Barclay took a distinguished part in the battle of Pultusk and was wounded at Eylau, where his conduct won him promotion to the rank of lieut.-general. In 1808 he commanded against the Swedes in Finland, and in 1809 by a rapid and daring march over the frozen Gulf of Bothnia he surprised and seized Umeo. In 1810 he was made minister of war, and he retained the post until 1813. In 1812 Barclay was given command of one of the armies operating against Napoleon. There was very keen opposition to the appointment of a foreigner as commander-in-chief, and after he was defeated at Smolensk the outcry was so great that he resigned his command and took a subordinate place under the veteran Kutusov. Barclay was present at Borodino, but left the army soon afterwards. In 1813 he was re-employed in the field and took part in the campaign in Germany. After the battle of Bautzen he was reinstated as commander-in-chief of the Russian forces, and in this capacity he served at Dresden, Kulm and Leipzig. After the last battle he was made a count. He took part in the invasion of France in 1814 and at Paris received the baton of a field marshal. In 1815 he was again commander-in-chief of the Russian army which invaded France, and he was made a prince at the close of the war. He died at Insterburg in Prussia on the 14th (16th) of May 1818.
BARCOCHEBAS, Bar-Cochab, or Bar Kokba (“son of a star”), the name given in Christian sources to one Simeon, the leader in the Jewish revolt against Rome in the time of Hadrian (A.D. 132–135). The name does not appear in the Roman historians. In Rabbinic sources he is called Bar (Ben) Coziba, “son of deceit,” which perhaps reflects the later verdict of condemnation recorded after his failure (root כזב “to be false”). Cochab is, therefore, the name either of his father or of his home. But it is recorded that the Rabbi ʽAqība (q.v.), who recognized him as Messiah, applied Num. xxiv. 17 to him, reading not Cochab (“a star”), but Cosiba (“goes forth from Jacob”); thus Bar-cochab is a Messianic title of the “man of Cozeba” (cf. Chron. iv. 22) whose original name was recalled by later Rabbis with sinister intention. At first the Romans paid little attention to the insurgents, who were able to strike coins in the name of Simeon, prince of Israel, and Eleazar the priest, and to persecute the Christians, who refused to join the revolt. But troops were collected and the various fortresses occupied by the Jews were successively reduced. The end came with the fall of Beth-thar (Bethar). Extraordinary stories were told of the prowess of Barcochebas and of the ordeals to which he subjected his soldiers in the way of training.
See Eusebius H.E. iv. 6; Dio Cassius xix. 12-14; Schürer, Gesch. d. jüd. Volkes, 3rd ed. i. 682 ff; Derenbourg, Hist. de la Palest. 423 ff. (distinguishes Barcochebas from Simeon); Schlattler, Gesch. Israels, 2nd ed. 303 ff; articles Jews and Palestine, History; also art. s.v. “Bar Kokba” in Jewish Encyc. (S. Krauss).
BARD, a word of Celtic derivation (Gaelic baird, Cymric bardh, Irish bard) applied to the ancient Celtic poets, though the name is sometimes loosely used as synonymous with poet in general. So far as can be ascertained, the title bards, and some of the privileges peculiar to that class of poets, are to be found only among Celtic peoples. The name itself is not used by Caesar in his account of the manners and customs of Gaul and Britain, but he appears to ascribe the functions of the bards to a section of the Druids, with which class they seem to have been closely connected. Later Latin authors, such as Lucan (Phar. p. 447), Festus (De Verb. Sign. s.v.), and Ammianus Marcellinus (bk. xv.), used the term Bardi as the recognized title of the national poets or minstrels among the peoples of Gaul and Britain. In Gaul, however, the institution soon disappeared; the purely Celtic peoples were swept back by the waves of Latin and Teutonic conquest, and finally settled in Wales, Ireland, Brittany and the north of Scotland. There is clear evidence of the existence of bards in all these places, though the known relics belong almost entirely to Wales and Ireland, where the institution was more distinctively national. In Wales they formed an organized society, with hereditary rights and privileges. They were treated with the utmost respect and were exempt from taxes or military service. Their special duties were to celebrate the victories of their people and to sing hymns of praise to God. They thus gave poetic expression to the religious and national sentiments of the people, and therefore exercised a very powerful influence. The whole society of bards was regulated by laws, said to have been first distinctly formulated by Hywell Dha, and to have been afterwards revised by Gruffydd ap Conan. At stated intervals great festivals were held, at which the most famous bards from the various districts met and contended in song, the umpires being generally the princes and nobles. Even after the conquest of Wales, these congresses, or Eisteddfodau, as they were called (from the Welsh eistedd, to sit), continued to be summoned by royal commission, but from the reign of Elizabeth the custom has been allowed to fall into abeyance. They have not been since summoned by royal authority, but were revived about 1822, and are held regularly at the present time. In modern Welsh, a bard is a poet whose vocation has been recognized at an Eisteddfod. In Ireland also the bards were a distinct class with peculiar and hereditary privileges. They appear to have been divided into three great sections: the first celebrated victories and sang hymns of praise; the second chanted the laws of the nation; the third gave poetic genealogies and family histories. The Irish bards were held in high repute, and frequently were brought over to Wales to give instruction to the singers of that country.
In consequence, perhaps, of Lucan’s having spoken of carmina bardi, the word bard began to be used, early in the 17th century, to designate any kind of a serious poet, whether lyric or epic, and is so employed by Shakespeare, Milton and Pope. On the other hand, in Lowland Scots it grew to be a term of contempt and reproach, as describing a class of frenzied vagabonds.
See Ed. Jones, Relics of the Welsh Bards (1784); Walker, Memoirs of the Irish Bards (1786); Owen Jones, Myvyrian Archaeology of Wales (3 vols., 1801–1807); W. F. Skene, Four Ancient Books of Wales (2 vols., 1868).
BARDAIṢĀN, an early teacher of Christianity in Mesopotamia, the writer of numerous Syriac works which have entirely perished[1] (with one possible exception, the Hymn of the Soul in the Acts of Thomas), and the founder of a school which was soon branded as heretical. According to the trustworthy Chronicle of Edessa, he was born in that city on the 11th Tammuz (July), A.D. 154.
- ↑ The Book of the Laws of the Countries, referred to below, is the work of a disciple of Bardaiṣān.
