after a long abeyance, occupies a modern building, as does also the hospital, though founded as far back as the 15th century. There are numerous societies in the town, including the Académie Delphinale (founded in 1772), and many charitable institutions.
The staple industry of Grenoble is the manufacture of kid gloves, most of the so-called gants Jouvin being made here—they are named after the reviver of the art, X. Jouvin (1800–1844). There are about 80 glove factories, which employ 18,500 persons (of whom 15,000 are women), the annual output being about 800,000 dozen pairs of gloves. Among other articles produced at Grenoble are artificial cements, liqueurs, straw hats and carved furniture.
Grenoble occupies the site of Cularo, a village of the Allobroges, which only became of importance when fortified by Diocletian and Maximian at the end of the 3rd century. Its present name is a corruption of Gratianopolis, a title assumed probably in honour of Gratian (4th century), who raised it to the rank of a civitas. After passing under the power of the Burgundians (c. 440) and the Franks (532) it became part of the kingdom of Provence (879-1032). On the break-up of that kingdom a long struggle for supremacy ensued between the bishops of the city and the counts of Albon, the latter finally winning the day in the 12th century, and taking the title of Dauphins of the Viennois in the 13th century. In 1349 Grenoble was ceded with the rest of the Dauphiné to France, but retained various municipal privileges which had been granted by the dauphins to the town, originally by a charter of 1242. In 1562 it was sacked by the Protestants under the baron des Adrets, but in 1572 the firmness of its governor, Bertrand de Gordes, saved it from a repetition of the Massacre of St Bartholomew. In 1590 Lesdiguières (1543–1626) took the town in the name of Henry IV., then still a Protestant, and during his long governorship (which lasted to his death) did much for it by the construction of fortifications, quays, &c. In 1788 the attempt of the king to weaken the power of the parlement of Grenoble (which, though strictly a judicial authority, had preserved traditions of independence, since the suspension of the states-general of the Dauphiné in 1628) roused the people to arms, and the “day of the tiles” (7th of June 1788) is memorable for the defeat of the royal forces. In 1790, on the formation of the department of the Isère, Grenoble became its capital. Grenoble was the first important town to open its gates to Napoleon on his return from Elba (7th of March 1815), but a few months later (July) it was obliged to surrender to the Austrian army. Owing to its situation Grenoble was formerly much subject to floods, particularly in the case of the wild Drac. One of the worst took place in 1219, while that of 1778 was known as the déluge de la Saint Crépin. Among the celebrities who have been born at Grenoble are Vaucanson (1709–1782), Mably (1709–1785), Condillac (1715–1780), Beyle, best known as Stendhal, his nom de guerre (1783–1842), Barnave (1761–1793) and Casimir Perier (1777–1832).
See A. Prudhomme, Histoire de Grenoble (1888); X. Roux, La Corporation des gantiers de Grenoble (1887); H. Duhamel, Grenoble considéré comme centre d’excursions (1902); J. Marion, Cartulaires de l’église cathédrale de Grenoble (Paris, 1869). (W. A. B. C.)
GRENVILLE, SIR BEVIL (1596–1643), Royalist soldier in the English Civil War (see Great Rebellion), was educated at Exeter College, Oxford. As member of Parliament, first for Cornwall, then for Launceston, Grenville supported Sir John
Eliot and the opposition, and his intimacy with Eliot was life-long. In 1639, however, he appears as a royalist going to the Scottish War in the train of Charles I. The reasons of this change of front are unknown, but Grenville’s honour was above suspicion, and he must have entirely convinced himself that he was doing right. At any rate he was a very valuable recruit to the royalist
cause, being “the most generally loved man in Cornwall.” At the outbreak of the Civil War he and others of the gentry not only proclaimed the king’s Commission of Array at Launceston assizes, but also persuaded the grand jury of the county to declare their opponents guilty of riot and unlawful assembly, whereupon the Posse comitatus was called out to expel them. Under the command of Sir Ralph Hopton, Sir Bevil took a
distinguished part in the action of Bradock Down, and at
Stratton (16 May 1643), where the parliamentary earl of Stamford was completely routed by the Cornishmen, led one of the storming parties which captured Chudleigh’s lines (Clarendon, vii. 89). A month later, the endeavour of Hopton to unite with Maurice and Hertford from Oxford brought on the battle of Lansdown, near
Bath. Here Grenville was killed at the head of the Cornish infantry as it reached the top of the hill. His death was a blow from which the king’s cause in the West never recovered, for he alone knew how to handle the Cornishmen. Hopton they revered and respected, but Grenville they loved as peculiarly their own commander, and after his death there is little more heard of the reckless valour which had won Stratton and Lansdown.
Grenville is the type of all that was best in English royalism. He was neither rapacious, drunken nor dissolute, but his loyalty was unselfish, his life pure and his skill no less than his bravery unquestionable. A monument to him has been erected on the field of Lansdown.
See Lloyd, Memoirs of Excellent Personages (1668); S. R. Gardiner, History of the English Civil War (vol. i. passim).
GRENVILLE, GEORGE (1712–1770), English statesman,
second son of Richard Grenville and Hester Temple, afterwards Countess Temple, was born on the 14th of October 1712. He was educated at Eton and at Christ Church, Oxford, and was called to the bar in 1735. He entered parliament in 1741 as member for Buckingham, and continued to represent that borough till his death. In parliament he was a member of the “Boy Patriot” party which opposed Sir Robert Walpole. In December 1744 he became a lord of the admiralty in the Pelham administration. He allied himself with his brother
Richard and with William Pitt in forcing their feeble chief to give them promotion by rebelling against his authority and obstructing business. In June 1747 he became a lord of the treasury, and in 1754 treasurer of the navy and privy councillor. As treasurer of the navy in 1758 he introduced and carried a bill which established a less unfair system of paying the wages of the seamen than had existed before. He remained in office in 1761, when his brother Lord Temple and his brother-in-law Pitt resigned upon the question of the war with Spain, and in the administration of Lord Bute he was entrusted with the leadership of the House of Commons. In May 1762 he was appointed secretary of state, and in October first lord of the admiralty;
and in April 1763 he became first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer. The most prominent measures of his administration were the prosecution of Wilkes and the passing of the American Stamp Act, which led to the first symptoms of alienation between America and the mother country. During the latter period of his term of office he was on a very unsatisfactory footing with the young king George III., who gradually came to feel a kind of horror of the interminable persistency of his conversation, and whom he endeavoured to make use of as the mere puppet of the ministry. The king made
various attempts to induce Pitt to come to his rescue by forming a ministry, but without success, and at last had recourse to the marquis of Rockingham, on whose agreeing to accept office Grenville was dismissed July 1765. He never again held office, and died on the 13th of November 1770.
The nickname of “gentle shepherd” was given him because he bored the House by asking over and over again, during the debate on the Cider Bill of 1763, that somebody should tell him “where” to lay the new tax if it was not to be put on cider. Pitt whistled the air of the popular tune “Gentle Shepherd, tell me where,” and the House laughed. Though few excelled him in a knowledge of the forms of the House or in mastery of administrative details, his tact in dealing with men and with affairs was so defective that there is perhaps no one who has been at the head of an English administration to whom a lower place can be assigned as a statesman.
In 1749 he married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir William Wyndham, by whom he had a large family. His son, the second Earl Temple, was created marquess, and his grandson duke, of Buckingham. Another son was William, afterwards Lord
