at Exeter college, Oxford, and in 1523 was elected a fellow of All Soul's college. He became principal of Peckwater inn—a seminary for lawyers, afterwards incorporated with Christ Church college. While engaged as tutor to the son of Thomas Boleyn, earl of Wiltshire, he attracted the notice of Thomas Cromwell, by whose influence he was sent to travel at the expense of the crown. On his return he was appointed Latin secretary to Cromwell, and in 1535 was employed on the commission of inquiry into the state of the monasteries. His good service on this occasion brought him wealth in the shape of abbey lands, and promotion in office. He was sworn of the privy council in 1543, and made a secretary of state. In the following year he was left as adviser to the regent, Catherine Parr, and in 1546 was nominated by will a counsellor to the king's successor, Edward VI., in whose brief reign he was further employed in several important commissions. He even enjoyed the favour of Queen Mary, whose marriage with Philip he negotiated; and he succeeded in obtaining a dispensation from the pope for the retention of the abbey lands granted to him in the previous reigns. The office of secretary of state which he held through Mary's reign he continued to hold for two years under Elizabeth, to whom, moreover, he was a privy councillor until his death. He spent his old age in deeds of charity; was a great benefactor to Exeter college, Oxford, and to the poor of Ingatestone. He died in 1572. The secret of his uniform success under four different sovereigns of conflicting opinions, was his faculty of silence. After a negotiation he conducted at Boulogne, Chatillon said of him—"We had gained the last two hundred thousand crowns without hostages, had it not been for the man who said nothing." In King Henry's time he observed his humour; in King Edward's he kept to the law; in Queen Mary's he minded wholly state affairs; and in Elizabeth's he was religious.—R. H.
PETROF, Vassili Petrovitch, a Russian poet, was born at Moscow, the son of a priest, in 1736. He was educated in the ecclesiastical seminary, and attracted notice by his sermons while yet a student. In 1763 he composed an ode on Catherine's coronation, which being shown to the empress procured him a substantial reward and the favour of several courtiers. In 1769 he was appointed translator to the cabinet and reader to the empress, who subsequently sent him to travel for his improvement. On his return in 1784 he became the imperial librarian; but his health failing, he retired in 1790 to a country residence in the government of Orel, where he died on the 4th December, 1799. His collected works were published in 1811, in three parts. They consist chiefly of various odes on public events and epistles to his friends. In 1781 he had published a metrical version in Russian of the Æneid.—R. H.
PETRONIUS, Caius or Titus, was one of the voluptuous courtiers of Nero. From that emperor he received the title of "arbiter elegantiarum," or director-in-chief of the imperial pleasures and amusements, from which circumstance he is commonly known by the name of Petronius Arbiter. Being a person of much talent and ingenuity, he aroused the jealousy of Tigellinus, the infamous minister of Nero, who accused him of participating in the conspiracy of Scevinus and Piso. Petronius avoided the cruelty of the emperor by a voluntary death at Cumæ, a.d. 66. A work is still extant, bearing the title of "Petronii Arbitri Satyricon," which is by many scholars referred to this Petronius. It consists of a prose narrative, interspersed with numerous pieces of poetry, thus resembling in form the ancient Roman satire. It is a sort of comic romance, written with abundance of wit and cleverness, and throwing much light on the manners and usages of the Romans under the empire. Many of the short poems introduced are replete with grace and beauty, and a fine imagination is everywhere visible. Unhappily the book is polluted with gross indecency, and proves the corrupt and degraded condition of the writer and his age. The "Satyricon," as we have it, is made up of various fragments, forming but a small part of the original work. The longest and most important section is that known as the "Supper of Trimalchio," presenting us with a detailed and very amusing account of a fantastic banquet, such as the luxurious and extravagant gourmands of the empire were wont to exhibit on their tables. Great uncertainty exists as to the date of the author, respecting which the most conflicting opinions have been entertained. Niebuhr places him in the third century after Christ, under Alexander Severus or Gordian. Petronius is ranked by Niebuhr as the greatest poetical genius that Roman literature can boast of after the time of Augustus. The best edition is by Burmann, Utrecht, 1709; republished with additions, in 2 vols., at Amsterdam, 1743.—G.
PETRUS HISPANUS, supposed to have been originally called Johannes Petrus, or Petrus Juliani, is by some identified with Pope John XXI. or XXII. (see John XXI. or XXII.), but by others is regarded as a distinct person. He is reported to have been born at Lisbon, and to have studied medicine and astronomy, or rather astrology. He wrote "Summulæ Logicæ," whence he obtained the name of Summulator. Another of his works was the "Thesaurus Pauperum," a kind of popular medical treatise. Those who distinguish the two authors say that Petrus Hispanus was a dominican, who lived about the same period as John, i.e., in the latter half of the fourteenth century.—B. H. C.
PETTIGREW, Thomas Joseph, F.R.S., a well-known antiquary and surgeon, was born in London. His father was an apothecary practising in Fleet Street. Mr. Pettigrew received his medical education at Bartholomew's hospital under Mr. Abernethy. In 1812 he passed the examination of the College of Surgeons, and soon after was introduced to the notice of the dukes of Kent and Sussex. The duke of Sussex appointed him his librarian, and in that capacity he compiled and published "Bibliotheca Sussexiana"—two volumes, 1827-39—or a catalogue of the books and MSS in the ducal library, illustrated with historical and biographical notices. Mr. Pettigrew's antiquarian bias induced him to cultivate various fields of historical research. He is perhaps best known as an acute and able investigator of the antiquities, manners, and sepulchral remains of the ancient Egyptians. He examined a large number of mummies, and in 1834 published a history of Egyptian mummies. He collected much curious information on the worship and embalming of sacred animals, and on other rites and customs of the Egyptians. Another department of antiquarian research which he illustrated is that of the history of medicine and surgery, especially of the popular practice of medicine. His work on medical superstitions is full of curious information, not merely for the professional, but also for the general reader. Amongst his other antiquarian writings are—"On a Roman Urn found in Charnwood Forest, Leicester;" "Discovery of the Ancient City of Tharros;" "On the Study of Archæology," London, 1850; "On the History of the Barber Surgeons," London, 1852. He has the honour of having been one of the founders of the Archæological Association, and contributed frequently to the Archæological Journal. He was also a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and some papers by him are in the Archæologia. Biography was also one of Mr. Pettigrew's favourite pursuits. He was the author of a collection of biographies of medical men under the title of the "Medical Portrait Gallery;" of a memoir of Dr. Lettsom; and of a life of Lord Nelson. His surgical writings are not so well known, perhaps, as his contributions to other departments of literature. He, however, published an anatomical work on the base of the skull and brain; and papers on hydrophobia, cholera, &c. He at one time filled the office of surgeon to the Charing Cross hospital, and to the Asylum for female orphans. He was a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons; a doctor of philosophy of the university of Göttingen; and a member of several continental medical societies. He died 23rd November, 1865.—F. C. W.
PETTY, Sir William, an eminent political economist, was born in 1623 at Romsey in Hampshire, where his father carried on the business of a clothier. He was educated at the grammar-school of his native town, and from his early years displayed a remarkable genius for mechanics. At the age of fifteen he went to prosecute his studies at Caen in Normandy. He is said, on his return to England, to have obtained some place in the navy office, which, however, he must have held only for a short time, as he returned to the continent in 1643, and spent three years in studying medicine and anatomy at Leyden, Utrecht, Amsterdam, and Paris. In 1647 he obtained a patent for an instrument which he had invented for double writing, and in the following year he published a small treatise recommending the extension of education to a variety of subjects of utility in common life. Soon afterwards he took up his residence in Oxford, where he employed himself in teaching anatomy and chemistry. The philosophical meetings which preceded and led to the establishment of the Royal Society were frequently held in his rooms, and when that celebrated society was instituted he was a member of the council. In 1649 he received the honorary degree of M.D., and was elected a fellow of Brazennose college. In the follow-
