BERAT BERBERS 549 He published an Essai sur les anomalies de la variole et de la varicelle (1818) ; a treatise on the Doctrine medicale de I'ecole de Montpellier (1819); with Rouzet, a commentary on the Maladies chroniques of Dumas (2 vols., 1823); and Doctrine des rapports du physique et dw moral (1823), in which he fully exposes his philosophical system and combats the doctrines of Oabanis. II. Pierre Honore, a French surgeon, born at Lichtenberg in 1797, died in 1858. He was elected professor of physiology to the fac- ulty of medicine of Paris in 1831, became dean of that faculty in 1848, and in 1852 was appointed by the president of the republic in- spector general of the medical schools, and entered into the new upper council of public instruction. He published a Cours de physio- logie (4 vols., Paris, 1848-'54), edited the Nou- veaux elements de physiologie of Richerand (1832), and wrote an account of the sickness and death of Cuvier. III. August* 1 , brother of the preceding, a French surgeon, born at Var- rains, near Saumur, Aug. 2, 1802, died in Paris, Oct. 15, 1846. He studied at Paris under his brother, became professor of clinical surgery to the faculty of Paris, and was one of the founders of the society of surgery. He wrote Sur le diagnostic cJiirurgical (1836), Struc- ture dw poumon (1836), and various other treatises, and began with Denonvilliers the elaborate Compendium de ekirurgie pratique, continued after his death by Denonvilliers and Gosselin. BERAT, or Arnant Beligrad, a town of Albania, European Turkey, in the eyalet and 88 m. N. W. of the city of Janina, on the river Usumi ; pop. about 10,000, of whom two thirds are Greeks and the rest Turks. It is the resi- dence of an archbishop and of a pasha, who is lieutenant governor of central Albania. Mt. Tomor towers above it. The upper town contains the vizier's palace, several Greek churches, and about 250 houses. The lower town is mostly inhabited by Turks, and has numerous mosques and a good bazaar. BERBER (BERBER EL-MUSHERRIF or EL-ME- KHEIB), a town of Nubia, capital of a district of the same name belonging to Egypt, on the E. bank of the Nile, in lat. 17 59' N., Ion. 33 59' E., 25 m. N. of the mouth of the Atbara, and 190 m. N. of Khartoom ; pop. about 8,000. The streets are unpaved and dirty, and the flat- roofed houses are built of sun-dried bricks. The town is subject to sudden and destructive whirlwinds. It usually contains a garrison of about 1,500 men. It carries on considerable traffic with Egypt and the interior of Africa in spices, ivory, leather, tobacco, liquors, and European manufactures. BEKBERA (anc. Males), a trading place of Africa, on the S. shore of the gulf of Aden, in the territory of the Somauli, and directly S. of Aden. In summer it is a spot of barren sand. In winter a market is held there, and it be- comes a commercial city of more than 20,000 inhabitants, dwelling in tents. The market commences about Nov. 1, increases in activity till March, and closes in May. The export is mostly of cattle, sheep, gold dust, hides, coffee, myrrh, benzoin, ostrich feathers, elephants' tusks, and gum arable, which are sent to Ber- bera from the interior. Vessels bring to it cotton and silk goods, beads, wire, sugar, rice, copper, iron, and zinc, from Arabia and other parts of Asia. The climate is wholesome, the water good, and the harbor excellent. BERBERINA, an alkaloid which receives its name from having been found in the berberis vulgaris or common barberry, but which has been obtained from many other plants, among which are the columbo root, false columbo (coscinium), gold thread (coptis), yellow root (xanthorrhiza), yellow puccoon (hydrastis), and probably the prickly ash (xanthoxylum). Some of these vegetables, all of which have yellow root wood, were used by the Indians for dye- ing. The alkaloid, having the formula CoHi T NOs, occurs in the form of minute yellow crystals, has a bitter taste, and forms difficultly soluble salts with hydrochloric and sulphuric acids, and a readily soluble acetate. The im- pure muriate is used by the eclectic practitioners under the name of hydrastin, and must not be confounded with the colorless alkaloid hydras- tia, also found in the hydrastis Canadensis. The effects of berberina are probably those of a pure bitter, though it is less employed in medi- cine, except in the form of the impure muriate just mentioned, than the drugs, especially co- lumbo, which contain it. BERBERS, the race which originally peopled the whole northern part of Africa, embra- cing the nations known to the Greeks and Romans as Mauri, Gaatuli, Numidians, Nasa- mones, Phazanians, and Libyans. The Bar- bary states derive their name from them. Some writers have derived the name from the Arabian word bar, desert; others from berberat, mur- muring, as descriptive of the sound of the North African language ; others from Ber, the son of one of the shepherd kings of Egypt. The Berbers call themselves Amazirghs, either from their progenitor or as a generic name signifying noble or freemen. They have been conquered in succession by the Phoenicians, Romans, Van- dals, and Arabs. The Arabs in the 7th century, like the former conquerors, took chiefly posses- sion of the northern portions of their territory, and dispersed them over the interior, between Egypt and the Atlantic. The principal rem- nants of the race consist of three groups : the Shelloohs, found in Morocco, the Kabyles in Algeria, and the Tuariks in the desert. Their language is classed by modern philologists among the Hamitic tongues. By some it is specifically designated as Libyan. Their num- ber is estimated at between 3,000,000 and 4,000,000. They are light brown in com- plexion, of middle stature, and sparely but strongly built. They have dark hair, little beard, dark and piercing eyes, and are proud, suspicious, implacable, and generally at war.
