repossessed of their domains, according to the fluctuations of fortune between the rival parties. Mabille, countess of Alençon and heiress of this family (d. 1082), married Roger of Montgomery, and from them descended a second house of Alençon which became extinct in the person of Robert IV.; the county of Alençon was then joined to the royal domain. It was successively granted as an appanage to Peter, son of St Louis (1268), and to Charles, count of Valois, brother of Philip the Fair (1293). The third house of Alençon sprang from Charles, second son of the count Valois, who was killed at the battle of Crécy in 1346. The countship of Alençon was raised to a peerage in 1367 and into a dukedom in 1414. John, 1st duke of Alençon, was killed at Agincourt on the 25th of October 1415, after having with his own hand slain the duke of York. His son, also named John, was dispossessed of his duchy by the king of England, but reconquered it in 1449. In 1524 the dukedom of Alençon reverted to the crown, in consequence of the death of the duke Charles IV. without issue of his marriage with Margaret, sister of Francis I. It was given as a jointure to Catherine de’ Medici in 1559, and as an appanage to her son Francis in 1566. It was pawned by Henry IV. to the duke of Württemberg, and subsequently it passed to Gaston, duke of Orleans, duchess of Guise; to Charles, duke of Berry, grandson of Louis XIV. (1710); and to Monsieur (Louis XVIII.), brother of Louis XVI.
The title of duc d’Alençon was given to Ferdinand of Orleans, son of the duc de Nemours, and grandson of Louis-Philippe. (M.P.*)
ALENÇON, a town of north-western France, capital of the department of Orne, 36 m. N. of Le Mans on a branch line of the Western railway. Pop. (1906) 14,378. Alençon, a clean, regularly built town with broad handsome streets, is situated in a wide and fertile plain, on the Sarthe at its confluence with the Briante. The only remains of the ancient castle of Alençon are two towers of the 15th century, which serve as a prison, and a third of the 14th century known as the Tour Couronnée, to which they are united. Notre-Dame, the chief church, dates from the 15th century. It is remarkable for a porch ornamented in the richest Gothic style, and for its stained windows of the 16th century. Alençon has a large circular corn-market and a cloth-market. The manufacture of the point d’Alençon lace has greatly diminished. The weaving and bleaching of cloth, which is of less importance than formerly, the manufacture of vehicles, and tanning are carried on; there is a large trade in the horses of the district, and granite is worked in the neighbourhood. Alençon is the seat of a prefect and a court of assizes. It has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a board of trade-arbitrators, a lycée, training-colleges and a chamber of arts and manufactures.
ALENIO, GIULIO (1582–1649), Italian Jesuit missionary, was born at Brescia. He entered the Society of Jesus and was sent to the East. He landed at Macao in 1610, and while waiting a favourable opportunity to penetrate into China busied himself for three years in teaching mathematics. His thirty years' residence in China was marked by unceasing zeal and considerable success. He adopted the dress and manners of the country, was the first Christian missionary in Kiang-si, and built several churches in Fo-Kien. He wrote in Chinese a Life of Christ (Pekin, 1635–1637, 8 vols.; often reprinted, e.g. in 1887 in 3 vols., and used even by Protestant missionaries) and a cosmography (Iche fang wai ki Hang-chow, 1623, 6 vols.), which was translated into Manchu under the title The True Origin of 10,000 Things, a copy of which was sent from Pekin to Paris in 1789. Alenio died at Fu-chow in 1649.
For bibliography see de Backer and Sommervogel, Bibl. de la Cie. de Jésus, i. 158-160.
ALEPPO (native Haleb). (1) A vilayet of Asiatic Turkey, comprising N. Syria and N.W. Mesopotamia, with an extension N. of Taurus to the neighbourhood of Gorun. It comprises three sanjaks, Aleppo, Marash and Urfa. About half is mountain, but there are fertile plains of great extent N. of Antakia, S. of Marash and around the city of Aleppo (see below). The only seaport of importance is Alexandretta (q.v.). The exports are, on the average, over one million sterling, and imports about double in value. The settled population is barely a million; but there is a considerable unsettled element in the S.E. which cannot well be estimated. The Christians, mainly Jacobite Syrian, but including also Armenians of several denominations (e.g. those of Marash and Zeitun), Maronites and Greeks, form about one-fifth. There are some 20,000 Jews, resident chiefly in the provincial capital; and of the Moslem majority the bulk is Arab, Turkoman and Ansarieh. In the N.W. and N. is a considerable Kurdish population.
(2) The provincial capital (anc. Khalep; Gr. Chalybon-Beroea), situated on a plateau in the valley of the Kuwaik (anc. Chalus) about 10 m. above its dissipation in the great salt-marsh of Matkh. Pop. about 130,000, three-quarters Moslem. Aleppo is about midway between the sea and the Euphrates, a little nearer the latter.
The modern city stands on both banks of the Kuwaik, and the older portions are contained within a Saracenic wall, 312 m. in circuit with seven gates. The European residents and Christians live outside in the Kitab and new Azizieh quarters, and the Jews in that of Bahsita. A modern citadel occupies the N.W., the medieval castle on its mound (partly artificial and not a strong position, according to Istakhri) being almost deserted but still forbidden to visitors. There are two mosques of special interest—the Umawi (or Zakaria) on the site of a church ascribed to the empress Helena and containing a tomb reputed to be that of the Baptist’s father, and the Kakun. Many minor ones serve the needs of a population traditionally fanatical. Gardens extend for miles along the river, and the bazaars and khans are unusually large. The climate is cold, dry and healthy, despite the prevalence of the famous “Aleppo button,” a swelling which appears either on the face or on the hands, and breaks into an ulcer which lasts a year and leaves a permanent scar. It has been ascribed to a fly, to the water and to other causes; but it is not peculiar to Aleppo, being rife also at Aintab, Bagdad, &c.
The attempt made by the British Euphrates expedition in 1841 to connect Aleppo with the sea by steamer through the nearest point on the Euphrates, Meskiné, failed owing to the obstructed state of the stream and the insecurity of the riparian districts. The latter drawback has been minimized by the continued success of the Aleppo administration in inducing the Anazeh Bedouins to become fellahin; but river traffic has not been resumed. A railway, however, connects southward with the Beirut-Damascus line at Rayak. Aleppo is an important consular station for all European powers, the residence of the Greek and Armenian Patriarchs of Antioch, and of Jacobite and Maronite bishops, and a station of Roman Catholic and Protestant missions. It is the emporium of N. Syria, and manufactures textiles in silk, cotton and wool, carpets and leather commodities, besides being the centre of a large district growing cereals, pistachios and fruit. The Turks regard it as one of the strongholds of their dominion and faith, and a future capital of their empire should they be forced into Asia. As a centre from which good natural roads lead N., N.E., W. and S., Aleppo would make a good capital.
History and Remains.—The site lies high (1400 ft.) on eight hillocks in a fertile oasis plain, beyond which stretch on the S. and S.E. grassy steppes merging ere long into desert, and on the other quarters rather sterile downs. It has superseded Antioch as the economic centre of N. Syria, and Palmyra as the great road-station for eastern caravans. But it is rather a revived than a new capital; Khalep was a very ancient Syrian and probably “Hittite” city of importance, known from Babylonian, Assyrian and Egyptian records. Seleucus Nicator gave it a Macedonian name, Beroea; but Chalcis, some distance S., was the capital of the province, Chalcidice (later, Kinnasrin), in which it lay, and the centre of that hellenized region, now a vast field of ruins, which stretches W. to the Orontes. Khalep-Beroea, we may infer, remained a native town and a focus of Aramaic influence, a fact which will explain the speedy oblivion
