Book: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4

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AUTHORITIES.--The best editions of Lord Byron's poetical works are: (1)
_The Works of Lord Byron with his Letters and Journals and his Life_, by
Thomas Moore (17 vols., London, John Murray, 1832, 1833); (2) _The Works of
Lord Byron_ (1 vol., 1837, reissued, 1838-1892); (3) _The Poetical Works of
Lord Byron_ (6 vols., 1855); (4) _The Works of Lord Byron_, new, revised
and enlarged edition, _Letters and Journals_, edited by G.E. Prothero, 6
vols., _Poetry_, edited by E.H. Coleridge (7 vols., 1898-1903); (5) _The
Poetical Works of Lord Byron_, with memoir by E.H. Coleridge (1 vol.,
1905).

The principal biographies, critical notices, memoirs, &c., are:--_Journey
through Albania... with Lord Byron_, by J.C. Hobhouse (1812; reprinted in 2
vols., 1813 and 1855); _Memoirs of the Life and Writings of ... Lord Byron_
[by Dr John Watkins] (1822); _Letters on the Character and Poetical Genius
of Lord Byron_, by Sir E. Brydges, Bart. (1824); _Correspondence of Lord
Byron with a Friend_ (3 vols., Paris, 1824); _Recollections of the Life of
Lord Byron_, by R.C. Dallas (1824); _Journal of the Conversations of Lord
Byron_, by Capt. T. Medwin (1824); _Last Days of Lord Byron_, by W. Parry
(1824); _Narrative of a Second Visit to Greece_, by E. Blaquiere (1825); _A
Narrative of Lord Byron's Last Journey to Greece_, by Count Gamba (1825);
_The Life, Writings, Opinions and Times of Lord Byron_ (3 vols., 1825);
_The Spirit of the Age_, by W. Hazlitt (1825); _Memoir of the Life and
Writings of Lord Byron_, by George Clinton (1826); _Correspondence of Byron
and some of his Contemporaries_, by J.H. Leigh Hunt (2 vols., 1828);
_Letters and Journals of Lord Byron, with Notices of his Life_, by Thomas
Moore (2 vols., 1830); _The Life of Lord Byron_, by J. Galt (1830);
_Conversations on Religion with Lord Byron_, by J. Kennedy (1830);
_Conversations of Lord Byron with the Countess of Blessington_ (1834);
_Critical and Historical Essays_, by T.B. Macaulay, i. 311-352 (1843);
_Lord Byron juge par les temoins de sa vie_ (1869), _My Recollections of
Lord Byron_, by the Countess _Guiccioli_ (1869); _Lady Byron Vindicated, A
History of the Byron Controversy_, by H. Beecher Stowe (1870); _Lord Byron,
a Biography_, by Karl Elze (1872); _Kunst und Alterthum_, Goethe's
_Saemmtliche Werke_ (1874), vol. xiii. p. 641; _Memoir of the Rev. F.
Hodgson_ (2 vols., 1878); _The Real Lord Byron_, by J.C. Jeaffreson (2
vols., 1883); _A Selection_, &c., by A.C. Swinburne (1885); _Records of
Shelley, Byron and the Author_, by E.J. Trelawny (1887); _Memoirs of John
Murray_, by S. Smiles (2 vols., 1891); _Poetry of Byron_, chosen and
arranged by Matthew Arnold (preface) (1892); _The Siege of Corinth_, edited
by E. Koelbing (1893) _Prisoner of Chillon and other Poems_, edited by E.
Koelbing (1869); _The Works of Lord Byron_, edited by W. Henley, vol. i.
(1897); A. Brandl's "Goethes Verhaeltniss zu Byron," _Goethe Jahrbuch,
zwanzigster Band_ (1899); _Main Currents in Nineteenth Century Literature_,
by G. Brandis (6 vols., 1901-1905), translated from _Hauptstroemungen der
Literatur des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts_, 4 Bde. (Berlin 1872-1876);
_Chambers's Cyclopaedia of English Literature_, vol. iii. (1903) art.
"Byron," by T. Watts Dunton; _Studies in Poetry and Criticism_, by J.
Churton Collins (1905); _Lord Byron, sein Leben_, &c., by Richard
Ackermann; _Byron_, 3 vols. in the _Biblioteka velikikh pisatelei pod
redaktsei_, edited by S.A. Vengesova (St Petersburg, 1906): a variorum
translation; _Byron et le romantisme francais_, by Edmond Esteve (1907).

(E. H. C.)

[1] An anonymous work entitled _The Life, Writings, &c. of ... Lord Byron_
(3 vols., 1825) purports to give "Recollections of the Lately Destroyed
Manuscript." To judge by internal evidence (see "The Wedding Day," &c. ii.
278-284) there is some measure of truth in this assertion, but the work as
a whole is untrustworthy.

BYRON, HENRY JAMES (1834-1884), English playwright, son of Henry Byron, at
one time British consul at Port-au-Prince, was born in Manchester in
January 1834. He entered the Middle Temple as a student in 1858, with the
intention of devoting his time to play-writing. He soon ceased to make any
pretence of legal study, and joined a provincial company as an actor. In
this line he never made any real success; and, though he continued to act
for years, chiefly in his own plays, he had neither originality nor charm.
Meanwhile he wrote assiduously, and few men have produced so many pieces of
so diverse a nature. He was the first editor of the weekly comic paper,
_Fun_, and started the short-lived _Comic Trials_. His first successes were
in burlesque; but in 1865 he joined Miss Marie Wilton (afterwards Lady
Bancroft) in the management of the Prince of Wales's theatre, near
Tottenham Court Road. Here several of his pieces, comedies and
extravaganzas were produced with success; but, upon his severing the
partnership two years later, and starting management on his own account in
the provinces, he was financially unfortunate. The commercial success of
his life was secured with _Our Boys_, which was played at the Vaudeville
from January 1875 till April 1879--a then unprecedented "run." _The Upper
Crust_, another of his successes, gave a congenial opportunity to Mr J.L.
Toole for one of his [v.04 p.0906] inimitably broad character-sketches.
During the last few years of his life Byron was in frail health; he died in
Clapham on the 11th of April 1884. H.J. Byron was the author of some of the
most popular stage pieces of his day. Yet his extravaganzas have no wit but
that of violence; his rhyming couplets are without polish, and decorated
only by forced and often pointless puns. His sentiment had T.W. Robertson's
insipidity without its freshness, and restored an element of vulgarity
which his predecessor had laboured to eradicate from theatrical tradition.
He could draw a "Cockney" character with some fidelity, but his _dramatis
personae_ were usually mere puppets for the utterance of his jests. Byron
was also the author of a novel, _Paid in Full_ (1865), which appeared
originally in _Temple Bar_. In his social relations he had many friends,
among whom he was justly popular for geniality and imperturbable good
temper.

BYRON, JOHN BYRON, 1ST BARON (c. 1600-1652), English cavalier, was the
eldest son of Sir John Byron (d. 1625), a member of an old Lancashire
family which had settled at Newstead, near Nottingham. During the third
decade of the 17th century Byron was member of parliament for the town and
afterwards for the county of Nottingham; and having been knighted and
gained some military experience he was an enthusiastic partisan of Charles
I. during his struggle with the parliament. In December 1641 the king made
him lieutenant of the Tower of London, but in consequence of the persistent
demand of the House of Commons he was removed from this position at his own
request early in 1642. At the opening of the Civil War Byron joined Charles
at York. He was present at the skirmish at Powick Bridge; he commanded his
own regiment of horse at Edgehill and at Roundway Down, where he was
largely responsible for the royalist victory; and at the first battle of
Newbury Falkland placed himself under his orders. In October 1643 he was
created Baron Byron of Rochdale, and was soon serving the king in Cheshire,
where the soldiers sent over from Ireland augmented his forces. His defeat
at Nantwich, however, in January 1644, compelled him to retire into
Chester, and he was made governor of this city by Prince Rupert. At Marston
Moor, as previously at Edgehill, Byron's rashness gave a great advantage to
the enemy; then after fighting in Lancashire and North Wales he returned to
Chester, which he held for about twenty weeks in spite of the king's defeat
at Naseby and the general hopelessness of the royal cause. Having obtained
favourable terms he surrendered the city in February 1646. Byron took some
slight part in the second Civil War, and was one of the seven persons
excepted by parliament from all pardon in 1648. But he had already left
England, and he lived abroad in attendance on the royal family until his
death in Paris in August 1652. Although twice married Byron left no
children, and his title descended to his brother Richard (1605-1679), who
had been governor of Newark. Byron's five other brothers served Charles I.
during the Civil War, and one authority says that the seven Byrons were all
present at Edgehill.

BYRON, HON. JOHN (1723-1786), British vice-admiral, second son of the 4th
Lord Byron, and grandfather of the poet, was born on the 8th of November
1723. While still very young, he accompanied Anson in his voyage of
discovery round the world. During many successive years he saw a great deal
of hard service, and so constantly had he to contend, on his various
expeditions, with adverse gales and dangerous storms, that he was nicknamed
by the sailors, "Foul-weather Jack." It is to this that Lord Byron alludes
in his _Epistle to Augusta_:--

"A strange doom is thy father's son's, and past
Recalling as it lies beyond redress,
Reversed for him our grandsire's fate of yore,
He had no rest at sea, nor I on shore."

Among his other expeditions was that to Louisburg in 1760, where he was
sent in command of a squadron to destroy the fortifications. And in 1764 in
the "Dolphin" he went for a prolonged cruise in the South Seas. In 1768 he
published a _Narrative_ of some of his early adventures with Anson, which
was to some extent utilized by his grandson in _Don Juan_. In 1769 he was
appointed governor of Newfoundland. In 1775 he attained his flag rank, and
in 1778 became a vice-admiral. In the same year he was despatched with a
fleet to watch the movements of the Count d'Estaing, and in July 1779
fought an indecisive engagement with him off Grenada. He soon after
returned to England, retiring into private life, and died on the 10th of
April 1786.

BYSTROeM, JOHAN NIKLAS (1783-1848), Swedish sculptor, was born on the 18th
of December 1783 at Philipstad. At the age of twenty he went to Stockholm
and studied for three years under Sergel. In 1809 he gained the academy
prize, and in the following year visited Rome. He sent home a beautiful
work, "The Reclining Bacchante," in half life size, which raised him at
once to the first rank among Swedish sculptors. On his return to Stockholm
in 1816 he presented the crown prince with a colossal statue of himself,
and was entrusted with several important works. Although he was appointed
professor of sculpture at the academy, he soon returned to Italy, and with
the exception of the years from 1838 to 1844 continued to reside there. He
died at Rome in 1848. Among Bystroem's numerous productions the best are his
representations of the female form, such as "Hebe," "Pandora," "Juno
suckling Hercules," and the "Girl entering the Bath." His colossal statues
of the Swedish kings are also much admired.

BYTOWNITE, a rock-forming mineral belonging to the plagioclase (_q.v._)
series of the felspars. The name was originally given (1835) by T. Thomson,
to a greenish-white felspathic mineral found in a boulder near Bytown (now
the city of Ottawa) in Ontario, but this material was later shown on
microscopical examination to be a mixture. The name was afterwards applied
by G. Tschermak to those plagioclase felspars which lie between labradorite
and anorthite; and this has been generally adopted by petrologists. In
chemical composition and in optical and other physical characters it is
thus much nearer to the anorthite end of the series than to albite. Like
labradorite and anorthite, it is a common constituent of basic igneous
rocks, such as gabbro and basalt. Isolated crystals of bytownite bounded by
well-defined faces are unknown.

(L. J. S.)

BYWATER, INGRAM (1840- ), English classical scholar, was born in London on
the 27th of June 1840. He was educated at University and King's College
schools, and at Queen's College, Oxford. He obtained a first class in
Moderations (1860) and in the final classical schools (1862), and became
fellow of Exeter (1863), reader in Greek (1883), regius professor of Greek
(1893-1908), and student of Christ Church. He received honorary degrees
from various universities, and was elected corresponding member of the
Prussian Academy of Sciences. He is chiefly known for his editions of Greek
philosophical works: _Heracliti Ephesii Reliquiae_ (1877); _Prisciani Lydi
quae extant_ (edited for the Berlin Academy in the _Supplementum
Aristolelicum_, 1886); Aristotle, _Ethica Nicomachea_ (1890), _De Arte
Poetica_ (1898); _Contributions to the Textual Criticism of the Nicomachean
Ethics_ (1892).

BYZANTINE ART

PLATE I.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE HOLY WISDOM (S. SOPHIA), CONSTANTINOPLE.
Sixth century, the dome was rebuilt in the tenth century. The metal
balustrades, pulpits, and the large discs are Turkish.]

CAPITALS OF COLUMNS.

[Illustration: S. VITALI, RAVENNA.
Sixth century.]

[Illustration: S. MARK, VENICE.
Eleventh century.]

[Illustration: S. APOLLINARI, RAVENNA.
Sixth century.]

PLATE II.

[Illustration: SMALL MEDIEVAL CATHEDRAL, ATHENS. _Photo: Emery Walker._]

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF ST. LUKE'S, NEAR DELPHI.

Showing a typical scheme of internal decoration. The lower parts of the
walls are covered with marble, and the upper surfaces and vaults with
mosaics and paintings. Eleventh century. _From a Drawing by Sidney
Barnsley._]

BYZANTINE ART.[1] By "Byzantine art" is meant the art of Constantinople
(sometimes called _Byzantium_ in the middle ages as in antiquity), and of
the Byzantine empire; it represents the form of art which followed the
classical, after the transitional interval of the early Christian period.
It reached maturity under Justinian (527-565), declined and revived with
the fortunes of the empire, and attained a second culmination from the 10th
to the 12th centuries. Continuing in existence throughout the later middle
ages, it is hardly yet extinct in the lands of the Greek Church. It had
enormous influence over the art of Europe and the East during the early
middle ages, not only through the distribution of minor works from
Constantinople but by the reputation of its architecture and painting.
Several buildings in Italy are truly Byzantine. It is difficult to set a
time for the origin of the style. When Constantine founded new Rome the art
was still classical, although it had even then gathered up many of the
elements which were to transform its aspect. Just two hundred years later
some of the most characteristic works of this style of art were being
produced, such [v.04 p.0907] as the churches of St Sergius, the Holy Wisdom
(St Sophia), and the Holy Apostles at Constantinople, and San Vitale at
Ravenna. We may best set an arbitrary point for the demarcation of the new
style midway between these two dates, with the practical separation of the
eastern and western empires.

The style may be said to have arisen from the orientalization of Roman art,
and itself largely contributed to the formation of the Saracenic or
Mahommedan styles. As Choisy well says, "The history of art in the Roman
epoch presents two currents, one with its source in Rome, the other in
Hellenic Asia. When Rome fell the Orient returned to itself and to the
freedom of exploring new ways. There was now a new form of society, the
Christian civilization, and, in art, an original type of architecture, the
Byzantine." It has hardly been sufficiently emphasized how closely the art
was identified with the outward expression of the Christian church; in
fact, the Christian element in late classical art is the chief root of the
new style, and it was the moral and intellectual criticism that was brought
to bear on the old material, which really marked off Byzantine art from
being merely a late form of classic.

Hardly any distinction can be set up in the material contents of the art;
it was at least for a period only simplified and sweetened, and it is this
freshening which prepared the way for future development. It must be
confessed, however, that certain influences darkened the style even before
it had reached maturity; chief among these was a gloomy hierarchical
splendour, and a ritual rigidity, which to-day we yet refer to, quite
properly, as Byzantinism. Choisy sees a distinction in the constructive
types of Roman and Byzantine architecture, in that the former covered
spaces by concreted vaults built on centres, which approximated to a sort
of "monolithic" formation, whereas in the Byzantine style the vaults were
built of brick and drawn forward in space without the help of preparatory
support. Building in this way, it became of the greatest importance that
the vaults should be so arranged as to bring about an equilibrium of
thrusts. The distinction holds as between Rome in the 4th century and
Constantinople in the 6th, but we are not sufficiently sure that the
concreted construction did not depend on merely local circumstances, and it
is possible, in other centres of the empire where strong cement was not so
readily obtainable, and wood was scarce, that the Byzantine _constructive_
method was already known in classical times. Choisy, following Dieulafoy,
would derive the Byzantine system of construction from Persia, but this
proposition seems to depend on a mistaken chronology of the monuments as
shown by Perrot and Chipiez in their _History of Art in Persia_. It seems
probable that the erection of brick vaulting was indigenous in Egypt as a
building method. Strzygowski, in his recent elaborate examination of the
art-types found at the palace of Mashita (Mschatta), a remarkable ruin
discovered by Canon Tristram in Moab, of which the most important parts
have now been brought to the new Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin, shows
that there are Persian ideas intermixed with Byzantine in its decoration,
and there are also brick arches of high elliptical form in the structure.
He seems disposed to date this work rather in the 5th than in the 6th
century, and to see in it an intermediate step between the Byzantine work
of the west and a Mesopotamian style, which he postulates as probably
having its centre at Seleucia-Ctesiphon. From the examples brought forward
by the learned author himself, it is safer as yet to look on the work as in
the main Byzantine, with many Egyptian and Syrian elements, and an
admixture, as has been said, of Persian ideas in the ornamentation. Egypt
was certainly an important centre in the development of the Byzantine
style.

The course of the transition to Byzantine, the first mature Christian
style, cannot be satisfactorily traced while, guided by Roman
archaeologists, we continue to regard Rome as a source of Christian art
apart from the rest of the world. Christianity itself was not of Rome, it
was an eastern leaven in Roman society. Christian art even in that capital
was, we may say, an eastern leaven in Roman art. If we set the year 450 for
the beginning of Byzantine art, counting all that went before as early
Christian, we get one thousand years to the Moslem conquest of
Constantinople (1453). This millennium is broken into three well-marked
periods by the great iconoclastic schism (726-842) and the taking of
Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204. The first we may call the
classical epoch of Byzantine art; it includes the mature period under
Justinian (the central year of which we may put as 550), from which it
declined until the settlement of the quarrel about images, 400 years in
all, to, say, 850. The second period, to which we may assign the limits
850-1200, is, in the main, one of orientalizing influences, especially in
architecture, although in MSS. and paintings there was, at one time, a
distinct and successful classical revival. The interregnum had caused
almost complete isolation from the West, and inspiration was only to be
found either by casting back on its own course, or by borrowing from the
East. This period is best represented by the splendid works undertaken by
Basil the Macedonian (867-886) and his immediate successors, in the
imperial palace, Constantinople. The third period is marked by the return
of western influence, of which the chief agency was probably the
establishment of Cistercian monasteries. This western influence, although
it may be traced here and there, was not sufficient, however, to change the
essentially oriental character of the art, which from first to last may be
described as Oriental-Christian.

_Architecture._--The architecture of our period is treated in some detail
in the article ARCHITECTURE; here we can only glance at some broad aspects
of its development. As early as the building of Constantine's churches in
Palestine there were two chief types of plan in use--the basilican, or
axial, type, represented by the basilica at the Holy Sepulchre, and the
circular, or central, type, represented by the great octagonal church once
at Antioch. Those of the latter type we must suppose were nearly always
vaulted, for a central dome would seem to furnish their very _raison
d'etre_. The central space was sometimes surrounded by a very thick wall,
in which deep recesses, to the interior, were formed, as at the noble
church of St George, Salonica (5th century?), or by a vaulted aisle, as at
Sta Costanza, Rome (4th century); or annexes were thrown out from the
central space in such a way as to form a cross, in which these additions
helped to counterpoise the central vault, as at the mausoleum of Galla
Placidia, Ravenna (5th century). The most famous church of this type was
that of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople. Vaults appear to have been early
applied to the basilican type of plan; for instance, at St Irene,
Constantinople (6th century), the long body of the church is covered by two
domes.

At St Sergius, Constantinople, and San Vitale, Ravenna, churches of the
central type, the space under the dome was enlarged by having apsidal
additions made to the octagon. Finally, at St Sophia (6th century) a
combination was made which is perhaps the most remarkable piece of planning
ever contrived. A central space of 100 ft. square is increased to 200 ft.
in length by adding two hemicycles to it to the east and the west; these
are again extended by pushing out three minor apses eastward, and two
others, one on either side of a straight extension, to the west. This
unbroken area, about 260 ft. long, the larger part of which is over 100 ft.
wide, is entirely covered by a system of domical surfaces. Above the conchs
of the small apses rise the two great semi-domes which cover the
hemicycles, and between these bursts out the vast dome over the central
square. On the two sides, to the north and south of the dome, it is
supported by vaulted aisles in two storeys which bring the exterior form to
a general square. At the Holy Apostles (6th century) five domes were
applied to a cruciform plan, that in the midst being the highest. After the
6th century there were no churches built which in any way competed in scale
with these great works of Justinian, and the plans more or less tended to
approximate to one type. The central area covered by the dome was included
in a considerably larger square, of which the four divisions, to the east,
west, north and south, were carried up higher in the vaulting and roof
system than the four corners, forming in this way a sort of nave [v.04
p.0908] and transepts. Sometimes the central space was square, sometimes
octagonal, or at least there were eight piers supporting the dome instead
of four, and the "nave" and "transepts" were narrower in proportion. If we
draw a square and divide each side into three so that the middle parts are
greater than the others, and then divide the area into nine from these
points, we approximate to the typical setting out of a plan of this time.
Now add three apses on the east side opening from the three divisions, and
opposite to the west put a narrow entrance porch running right across the
front. Still in front put a square court. The court is the _atrium_ and
usually has a fountain in the middle under a canopy resting on pillars. The
entrance porch is the _narthex_. The central area covered by the dome is
the _solea_, the place for the choir of singers. Here also stood the
_ambo_. Across the eastern side of the central square was a screen which
divided off the _bema_, where the altar was situated, from the body of the
church; this screen, bearing images, is the _iconastasis_. The altar was
protected by a canopy or _ciborium_ resting on pillars. Rows of rising
seats around the curve of the apse with the patriarch's throne at the
middle eastern point formed the _synthronon_. The two smaller compartments
and apses at the sides of the bema were sacristies, the _diaconicon_ and
_prothesis_. The continuous influence from the East is strangely shown in
the fashion of decorating external brick walls of churches built about the
12th century, in which bricks roughly carved into form are set up so as to
make bands of ornamentation which it is quite clear are imitated from Cufic
writing. This fashion was associated with the disposition of the exterior
brick and stone work generally into many varieties of pattern, zig-zags,
key-patterns, &c.; and, as similar decoration is found in many Persian
buildings, it is probable that this custom also was derived from the East.
The domes and vaults to the exterior were covered with lead or with tiling
of the Roman variety. The window and door frames were of marble. The
interior surfaces were adorned all over by mosaics or paintings in the
higher parts of the edifice, and below with incrustations of marble slabs,
which were frequently of very beautiful varieties, and disposed so that,
although in one surface, the colouring formed a series of large panels. The
choicer marbles were opened out so that the two surfaces produced by the
division formed a symmetrical pattern resembling somewhat the marking of
skins of beasts.

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