of the Cape have been assigned to this epoch. In America Rhaetic
rocks are recognized in N. Carolina, Connecticut, California, Mexico,
Bolivia and Chile; the formation is also recorded from Spitzbergen,
Franz Joseph Land and elsewhere in the Arctic regions.
For the English Rhaetic see L. Richardson, “The Rhaetic Rocks of North-west Gloucestershire,” Proc. Cotteswold Club, xiv. p. 127 (Glos. 1901–1903). (J. A. H.)
RHAMNUS PURSHIANA, or Californian buckthorn, a plant the bark of which is used in medicine under the name of cascara sagrada. An active principle anthra-gluco-sagradin has been isolated by Tschirch. The preparations of it contained in the British pharmacopoeia are: (1) Extractum cascarae sagradae (extractum rhamni purshianae, United States pharmacopoeia), dose 2 to 8 grs.; (2) Extractum cascarae sagradae liquidum, dose 12 to 1 fl. dr. From the latter is prepared syrupus cascarae aromaticus, dose 12 to 2 fl. dr. In this preparation the bitter taste of the cascara sagrada is disguised by the addition of tincture of orange, cinnamon water and syrup. In the United States pharmacopoeia preparation Fluid extractum rhamni purshianae aromaticum, does 10 to 30 minims, the taste is similarly obscured. Cascara sagrada is one of the most useful of all laxatives, since not only does it empty the bowel of faecal matter, but it acts as a tonic to the intestine and tends to prevent future constipation. It is largely used in the treatment of chronic constipation. A single full dose of the liquid extract may be taken at bedtime, or divided doses, 10 to 15 minims, three times a day before meals. When a strong purgative is required some drug other than cascara sagrada should be employed, but its use in gradually decreasing doses is indicated after evacuation has been effected by podophyllin or rhubarb. Cascara sagrada is the principal constituent of most of the proprietary laxatives on the market.
RHAMPSINĪTUS, a Greek corruption of Ra-messu-pa-neter, the popular name of Rameses III., king of Egypt of the XXth Dynasty. He is well known in connexion with the story of his treasure house told by Herodotus (ii. 121), which greatly resembles that of Agamedes and Trophonius. (See Egypt, History.)
RHANKAVĒS (commonly also Rhangabe), ALEXANDROS RHIZOS (1810–1892), Greek savant, poet and statesman, was born at Constantinople of a Phanariot family on the 25th of December 1810. He was educated at Odessa and the military school at Munich. Having served as an officer of artillery in the Bavarian army, he returned to Greece, where he held several high educational and administrative appointments. He subsequently became ambassador at Washington (1867), Paris (1868), and Berlin (1874–1886), and was one of the Greek plenipotentiaries at the congress of 1878. After his recall he lived at Athens, where he died on the 29th of June 1892. He was the chief representative of a school of literary men whose object was to restore as far as possible the ancient classical language. Of his various works, Hellenic Antiquities (1842–1855, of great value for epigraphical purposes), Archaeologia (1865–1866), an illustrated Archaeological Lexicon (1888–1891), and a History of Modern Greek Literature (1877) are of the most interest to scholars. He Wrote also the following dramatic pieces: The Marriage of Kutrules (comedy), Dukas (tragedy), the Thirty Tyrants, The Eve (of the Greek revolution); the romances, The Prince of Morea, Leila, and The Notary of Argostoli; and translated portions of Dante, Schiller, Lessing, oethe and Shakespeare.
A complete edition of his philological works in nineteen volumes was published at Athens (1874–1890), and his Ἀπομνημονεύματα (Memoirs) appeared posthumously in 1894–1895.
RHAPSODIST (Gk. Rhapsōdos), originally an epic poet who recited his own poetry; then, one who recited the poems of others (see Homer).
RHATANY or KRAMERIA ROOT, in medicine, the dried root either of Para rhatany or of Peruvian rhatany. The action of rhatany is due to the rhatania-tannic acid, and resembles that of tannic acid, being a powerful astringent. An infusion is used as a gargle for relaxed throats; and lozenges, particularly those containing rhatany and cocaine, are useful in similar cases. Like tannic acid, the powdered extract may be applied as a local haemostatic. All preparations of rhatany taken internally are powerful astringents in diarrhoea and intestinal hemorrhage.
RHAYADER (Rhaiadr-Gwy), a market town of Radnorshire, Wales, situated amid wild and beautiful scenery on the left bank of the Wye, about 112 m. above its confluence with the Elan. Pop. (1901) 1215. Rhayader is a station on the Cambrian railway. A stone bridge over the Wye connects the town with the village and parish church of Cwmdauddwr. Rhayader has for some centuries been an important centre for Welsh mutton and Wool, and its sheep fairs are largely attended by drovers and buyers from all parts. Near Rhayader are the large reservoirs constructed (1895) by the corporation of Birmingham in the Elan and Claerwen valleys.
Rhayader, built close to the Falls of the Wye (whence its name), owes its early importance to the castle erected here by Prince Rhys ap Griffith of South Wales, c. 1178, in order to check the English advance up the Wye Valley. Seized by the invaders, castle and town were later retaken in 1231 by Prince Llewelyn ap Iorwerth, who burned the fortress and slew its garrison. Scarcely a trace of the castle exists, although its site near St Clement's church is locally known as Tower Hill. With the erection of Maesyfed into the shire of Radnor in 1536 Rhayader was named as assize-town for the newly formed county in conjunction with New Radnor; but in 1542, on account of a local riot, the town was deprived of this privilege in favour of Presteign. Rhayader constituted one of the group of boroughs comprising the Radnor parliamentary district until the Redistribution Act of 1885.
RHEA, a goddess of the Greeks known in mythology as the daughter of Uranus and Gaia, the sister and consort of Kronos, and the mother of Zeus. In Homer she is the mother of the gods, though not a universal mother like Cybele, the Phrygian Great Mother, with whom she was later identified. The original seat of her worship was in Crete. There, according to legend, she saved the new-born Zeus, her sixth child, from being devoured by Kronos by substituting a stone for him and entrusting the infant god to the care of her attendants the Curetes (q.v.). These attendants afterwards became the bodyguard of Zeus and the priests of Rhea, and performed ceremonies in her honour. In historic times the resemblances between Rhea and the Asiatic Great Mother, Phrygian Cybele, were so noticeable that the Greeks accounted for them by regarding the latter as only their own Rhea, who had deserted her original home in Crete and fled to the mountain wilds of Asia Minor to escape the persecution of Kronos (Strabo 469, 12). The reverse view was also held (Virgil, Aen. iii. 111), and it is probably true that a stock of Asiatic origin formed part of the primitive population of Crete and brought with them the worship of the Asiatic Great Mother, who became the Cretan Rhea. (See Great Mother of the Gods.) (G. Sn.)
RHEA, the name given in 1752 by P. H. G. Möhring[1] to a South American bird which, though long before known and described by the earlier writers—Nieremberg, Marcgrav and Piso (the last of whom has a recognizable but rude figure of it)—had been without any distinctive scientific appellation. Adopted a few years later by M. J. Brisson, the name has since passed into general use, especially among English authors, for what their predecessors had called the American ostrich; but on the European continent the bird is commonly called Nandu,[2] a word corrupted from a name it is said to have borne among the aboriginal inhabitants of Brazil, where the Portuguese settlers called it ema (see Emeu). The resemblance of the rhea to the ostrich (q.v.) was at once perceived, but the differences between them are also very evident. The former, for instance, has three instead of two toes on each foot, it has no apparent tail, its wings are far better developed, and when folded cover the body, and its head and neck are clothed with feathers, while internal distinctions of still deeper significance have since been
- ↑ What prompted his bestowal of this name, so well known in classical mythology, is not apparent.
- ↑ The name Touyou, also of South American origin, was applied to it by Brisson and others, but erroneously, as Cuvier shows, since by that name, or something like it, the jabiru (q.v.) is properly meant.
