Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 2.djvu/412

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

BATEU


35S


BAYEUX


lisliment in Indiana of the Sisters of providence from Brittany, tlie Little Sisters of the Poor in Brooklj-n, and other good works. Adele was married. 8 Sept., 1841. to Edward Bayer, a German CathoHc merchant (d. 3 Feb., 1894). at the first nuptial Mass celebrated in BrookljTi. During the Civil AVar Madame Bayer began caring for the spiritual and temporal wants of the sailors at the Brooklyn Na\'y Yard, a work to which she devoted the remainder of her life. For thirty years she toiled unostentatiously at this voluntary task and was known and revered as a guardian and friend by seamen all over the world. Stiles. History of the City of Brooklyn (Brooklyn. 1870): U. S. Cath. Hist. Soc. Records and amdies (New York, 1900), II, pt. I; Ibid. (New York, 1904), III. pt. II.

Thom.\s F. MeEH-VN.

Bayeu y Subias, Fr.^ncisco, b. at Saragossa, 9 March. 1734; d. Madrid, 4 August, 1795, a distinguished religious and historical painter. He first studied at Tarragona with Jose Luzdn Martinez, and gain- ing the first prize at the Academy there, he received a pension to go to Madrid, where he entered the San Fernando Academy and had for his master Antonio Gonzales A'elasquez. While there he at- tracted the attention of Raphael Mengs, then court painter to Carlos III. After returning to Sara- gossa, he was recalled, on the suggestion of Jlengs, by that monarch, who put him to work on the coun- try palaces of El Pardo and Aranjuez and on the new Royal Palace at Madrid. He also painted pictures for several churches in Madrid. Painting \\'ith. and presumably partly under the direction of, Mengs he became devoted to his style and is classed with his school. Don Pedro de Madrazo in the Prado catalogue speaks of him as a mannered painter only to be appreciated as a frescoist. In 1765 Bayeu y Subias was chosen a member of the San Fernando Academy, and became, twenty-three years later, its director and painter to the court. In the palace at Madrid are his frescoes, "The Fall of the Giants", "The Apotheosis of Hercules", and "The Conquest of Granada". He decorated the royal chapel at Aranjuez. and pictured scenes from the life of St. Bruno at the convent of the Carthusians in Madrid. He painted many frescoes in the churches of Toledo and Saragossa. being assisted on the latter by liis brother and pupil, Ramon, b. Saragossa. 1746; d. Aranjuez, 1793. His subjects at the Toledo cathedral are scenes from the life of St. Eugenio. There are fifteen works by the painter in the Museum of the Prado at Madrid. Among them are "The Coronation of the Virgin", "The Ascension", "The Evangelist St. Matthew", "The Evangehst St. Mark", "The Evangelist St. Luke", "The Evangehst St. John", "OljTnpus" — all .studies for more important works — "St. Francis de .Sales Founding the Order of the Visitation", the last being attributed by some to Ramon Bayeu y Subias, "View of the Canal of Manzanares", "View of the Paseo de las Delieias in Madrid", "Luncheon in the Coimtrj'", a scene in a Manzanares orchard, and four sketches of sacred allegories for arch panels at the college of San Ildefonso. Don Francisco was an etcher as well as a painter, and executed a small number of plates.

Ch.\mplin' .\nd Perkins, Cyclopedia of Painters and Paint- ing (New York. 1S86-S8); Bryan. Dictionary of Painters and Enornrers (London and New York, 1903-05).

Augustus van Cleef.

Bayeux (B.\joc,e), Diocese of, coextensive with the Department of Calvados, is suffragan to the Archbishopric of Rouen. At the time of the Con- cordat (1802) the ancient Diocese of Lisieux was united to that of Bayeux. A pontifical Brief, in 18.54, authorized the Bishop of Bayeux to call himself Bishop of Bayeux and Lisieux.

The See of B.weux. — A local legend, found in


the breviaries of the fifteenth centurj", makes St. Exuperius, first Bishop of Bayeux, an immediate disciple of St. Clement, and his see a foundation of the first century. St. Regnobertus, the same legend tells us, was the successor of St. Exuperius. But the BoUandists and M. Jules Lair have shown how little ground there is for this legend; it was only towards the middle of the fourth century that St. Exuperius founded the See of Bayeux; after him the priest St. Reverendus did much for the propagation of the Faith in these parts. A certain number of the successors of St. Exuperius were saints: Rufinianus; Lupus (about 465); Vigor (beginning of the sixth century), who destroyed a pagan temple, then stUl frequented; Regnobertus (about 629), who founded many churches, and whom the legend, owing to an anachronism, made first successor to Exuperius; and Hugues (d. 730), simultaneously bishop of two other sees, Paris and Rouen. We may also mention Odon of Conte\ille (10.50-97), brother of WiUiam the Conqueror, who built the cathedral, was present at the Battle of Hastings, intrigued for the tiara on the death of Gregory A'll (1085) , and died a crusader in Sicily; Cardinal Trivulce (1531-48), papal legate in the Roman Campagna during the siege and pillage of Rome by the Constable de Bourbon; Cardinal d'Ossat (1602-04), an illustrious diplomatist promi- nently identified with the conversion of Henry IV. Claude Fauchet, who after being court preacher to Louis XVI, became one of the "conquerors" of the Bastille, was chosen Constitutional Bishop of Bayeux in 1791, and was beheaded 31 October, 1793. Mgr. Amette, coadjutor, with right of succession to the Cardinal Archbishop of Paris was, until 1905, Bishop of Bayeux. In the municipal Musee Arch^ologique is preserved the famous "Bayeux Tapestry", one of the most remarkable relics of medieval textile art. Its contemporary embroideries reproduce scenes from the Xorman Conquest of England (1066) and are valuable as illustrations of eleventh-century costume and life.

The See of Lisieux. — The first known Bishop of Lisieux is Theudibaudes, mentioned in connexion with a councU held in 538. The most celebrated among his successors were Freculfus (d. 850), a pupil of the palace school founded by Charlemagne, and author of a universal history; Arnoul (1141-81), statesman and WTiter; Nicole Oresme (1378-82), philosopher, mathematician, and tutor to Charles V; Pierre Cauchon (1432-42), concerned in the con- demnation of Joan of Arc; Thomas Basin (1447-74), the historian of Charles VII, and one of the pro- moters of the rehabilitation of Joan of Arc; Guil- laume du Vair (1618-21). the well-known philosopher who left the bench for the Church.

In the Middle Ages both sees were verj' important. The Bishop of Bayeux was senior among the Norman bishops, and the chapter was one of the richest in France. The See of Lisieux maintained the College de Lisieux at Paris for poor students of the diocese. Important councils were held within this diocese, at Caen, in 1042 and 1061; in the latter was pro- claimed "the Truce of God". The statutes of a synod heM at Bayeux about 1300, furnish a very fair idea of the discipline of the time.

Among the abbeys of the Diocese of Bayeux should be mentioned those of St. Stephen (Abbaye-aux- Hommes) and of the Trinity (Abbaye-aux-Dames). both founded at Caen by 'William the Conqueror (1029-87) and his wife Matilda, in expiation of their unlawful marriage. The former of these abbeys was governed by the celebrated Lanfranc, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. Other abbeys were those of Troarn of which Durand, the successful opponent of Berengarius, was abbot in the eleventh centurj-, and the Abbaye du Val. of which Ranc6 was abbot in 1661. prior to his reform of La Trappe. The Abbey