TASSO. si<yni della Gerusalemme libcralu (Bologna, 1808) ; Solerti, "Bibliografia dcUe publicazioni tassiane in occasione ilfl terzo centenario," in the Rivistadelle biblioteche e archii-i (1895). Of the English translations of the Gerusalemme liberata the most noted is that by Fairfax (Lon- don, lliOO). TASSONI, ta-sO'n?, Alessandro (1565- 1G35). An Italian diplomat, critic, and poet. He was born in Jlodcna of an old patrician fam- ily. About 1595 he ]iublished at Rome a dialogie in defense of Alessandro Magno and Obizzo d'Este. an efl'ort which was dedicated to Cardi- nal Alessandro d'Este. and which attracted such favorable notice from that prelate that young Tassoni was taken into the service of Cardinal Ascanio Colonna (1597). His Considerazioni sopra le rime del Pelrarca (1G09) became the occasion of bitter controversy. In 1G13 Tassoni entered the service of Duke Charles Emmanuel of Savoy. But his FilippieJie eo>itra gli SpagniioH (1615; reprinted lS55i incurred the displeasure of Cardinal Prince Filiberto of Savoy, and Tas- soni withdrew into ]nivate life (1622). After- wards he became secretary to Cardinal Ludovisi, and then councilor and chamberlain at the Court of Duke Francis I. of Modena (1632). The work by which the poet achieved his greatest fame was La secchia rapita ("The Stolen Bucket." written 1614; printed in Paris 1622; edited by Carducci 1861. etc.). This is a mock heroic poem in twelve cantos, founded upon an actual incident of the ]Iodenese wars. Precursor of Boileau's hulrin (1673) and Pope's Rape of the Lock (1712). it is perhaps the first example of modern humor. Not its entertaining mixture of wit and seriousness alone, but the Tuscan purity of its language and the perfec- tion of its versified form, have made it an Italian classic. A selection of Tassoni's letters was pub- lished by Gamba (Venice. 1827), and Casini edited liis Rime (Bologna. 1880). Consult: D'Ancona and Bacci. Mniiiiale delia letteratiira iialiana (Florence. 1893); Muratori, Vita di Alessandro Tassoni (Modenese edition of the l^ecchia, 1744) ; and Bacci, Le eonsidernzioni sal Petrarra di Alessandro Tassoni (Florence, 1887). TASTE (OF. taster. Ff. tater, to taste, from Lat. *taxitare, frequentative of taxare, to touch, intensive of tangerc, to touch; connected with Goth, telcan, Icel. taka, AS. tacan, Eng. take). The tongue is supplied with nerve endings which not only (like those of the skin) mediate sensa- tions of pressure, temperature, and pain, but also furnish sensations of taste. The nerve endings concerned in gustatory sensation are the taste bulbs or beakers, many of which are clustered together in the sides of each circumvallate and fungiform papilla (the filiform papilht are in- sensitive to taste). Taste sensations enter con- sciousness highly fused with pressure, tempera- ture, and notably with smell sensations ; e.g. the flavor of wine is largely smell. Hence it is not strange that the number of elementary taste qualities lias but recently been determined. Linnoeus gave a list of 20 qualities; another early writer 10; modern methods have lowered the number to 4: sweet, bitter, sour, and salt, to which Wundt adds, doulitfully. alkaline and metallic. See Tongue and accompanying illus- trations. If the tongue be experimentally explored by 55 TATARS. stimulating individual papilhc with four solu- tions (usually sugar, <iuinine, tartaric acid, and salt), it will be discovered that most papilliB are selective; e.g. one may react only to sweet, another only to salt and sour, a third to sweet, salt, and sour, etc. That such differences should appear is but natural, for each papilla is. in reality, a cluster of taste cells. Now it is possi- ble so to treat a papilla which has yielded more than one taste as to destroy temporarily its re- action to one of these tastes without destroying its sensitivity to the others; thus a 20 per cent. solution of cocaine hyjroehlorate will eliminate bitter alone. From these facts, it is warrantable to assume that the doctrine of specific sense en- ergies applies to the tongue. The recent work of Kiesow and Nadoleczny (stimulating the chorda tympani at a point near the internal ear) seems to establish the possibility of inducing specific taste sensations by inadequate electrical stimulation; pressure yields more doubtful re- sults. Kiesow has shown that the tongue is not equally sensitive over all its surface; the tip is best for sweet, the base for bitter (pressure here seems at times to arouse bitter), the sides for sour. Sensitivity to salt is al)Out equal over all the surface. Recent experimentation has estab- lished beyond much doubt the existence of taste contrasts, both simultaneous and successive. The contrasting pairs are sweet-salt, sweet-sour, salt- sour ; bitter does not contrast with any taste. The stimulation of the tongue by one member of these pairs increases its sensitivity to the other mem- ber, or causes distilled water to give the con- trasting taste. As in the cases of vision and smell (qq.v.), taste contrasts imply taste com- pensations. A mixture of sugar and salt in proper proportions is insipid. From these facts, Kiesow has constructed a two-dimensional taste continuum — a square whose opposite corners are sweet and salt, bitter and sour. Mixtures of adjacent terms will, then, give an intermediate, mixtures of opposite ternis, an insipid taste. BiBLiOGR.pirY. Kuelpe, Outlines of Psyehology (London, 1895) ; Hofman and Bunzel, Pfliiger's Archir. Ixvi. (1897); Kiesow and Nadoleczny, Zeitsehrift fiir Psychologic und Physiologie, xxiii. (1900); Kiesow. Philosophischc fitiidien. x. (1894), xii. (1896); Titchener, Experimental Psychology (New York. 1901); Vintschgau, in Hermann's Handbiich der Physiologie. iii. (1880); Zevneck, Centralblatt fiir Physiologie, xii. (1S98). TATAR BAZARJIK, ta-tiir' bil'zar-jek', or P.z.E.TiK. A district town in Eastern Rume- lia. Bulgaria, situated on the Maritza, 74 miles southeast of Sofia (Map: Balkan Peninsula, E 3). It lies in a low region and suffers from in- undations. Population,' in 1892, 16,343, mainly Bulgarians. The place was founded by Tatars in the fifteenth century. TATARS (less correctly Tartars. Fr. Tartare, from ML. Tartarus, from Pers. Tatar. Chin. Tah- tar. Tah-dzii. Tatar, possibly from a Tungnsic or Manchu word meaning archer, nomad ; probably confused by popular etymology with Lat. Tar- tarus, hell, on account of their atrocities). A term loosely applied tn certain Tungusic tribes originally inhabiting Manchuria and Mongolia, and now represented by the Fishshin Tatars of Northern Manchuria, the Solons and Daurians
