697 



ECKHEL, JOSEPH HILARY. 



EDGAR. 



archdeacon of Stowe and prebendary of Lincoln. His historical works 

 have long ceased to be read ; but his translation of Terence is still 

 frequently purchased by indolent schoolboys, who could not well buy 

 a more unprofitable or worthless book. The characters of the elegant 

 and refined Terence are made to utter all the vulgarisms and scurri- 

 lities of the 18th century, yet Ecbard has written a self-complacent 

 preface, wherein he says that he could not have followed his author 

 more closely without destroying his design " of giving an easy comic 

 style." 



ECKHEL, JOSEPH HILARY, an eminent antiquary and numis- 

 matist, was born at Entzersfeld, in Austria, January 13, 1737. His 

 father, who was in the service of Count Zinzendorf, sent him at a very 

 early age to the Jesuits' College at Vienna, where, ia 1751, he was 

 enrolled in their society. He studied philosophy, mathematics, 

 divinity, and the learned language?, but devoted himself chiefly to 

 antiquities and medals. His skill in the latter induced the superiors 

 of the college, a few years afterwards, to give him the place of keeper 

 of their cabinet of medals and coins. In 1772 he went to Italy, where 

 the grand-duke of Tuscany, Leopold II., engaged him to arrange his 

 collection; and on his return to Vienna, in 1774, he was appointed 

 director of the Imperial Cabinet of Medals, and professor of antiquities. 

 In 1775 he published his first work upon his favourite study, entitled 

 ' Numi veteres Anecdoti ex Museis Ciesareo Vindobonensi, Florentino 

 Magni lJucis Etmrise, Granelliano nunc Csesareo, Vitzaino, Festetic- 

 siano, Savorgnano Veneto, aliisque,' 4to, Vienna, This was followed 

 in 1776 by 'Catalogua Muiei Ccesarei Vindobonensis Numorum Vete- 

 rum, distributes in partes ii. quarum prior Monetam Urbium, Popu- 

 lorum, Regum, altera Romanorurn complectitur,' 2 torn, folio, accom- 

 panied by eight plates of inedited coins. In 17S6 he published his 

 ' Sylloge I. numoruiu anecdotorum Thesauri Csesarei,' 4to; his'Des- 

 criptio Numorum Antiochire Syriac, sive Specimen Artis critica) 

 Numarife,' 4to, was likewise printed at Vienna the same year ; and in 

 1787 be produced a small elementary work on coins for the use of 

 schools, in his native language, entitled ' Kurzgefasste Anfangsgrunde 

 zur alien Numismatik,' 8vo, Vien. This work has since been improved 

 and published in France, under the title of ' Trait*" Elementaire de 

 Numismatique Grecquc et Romaiue, compose d'aprea celui d'Eckhel,' 

 par Gerard Jacob, 2 torn. 8vo, Par., 1825. In 1788 Eckhel published 

 a folio volume upon the gems of the Imperial Collection, ' Chuix dc 

 Pierres grave'es du Cabinet Imperial des Antiques, represented en xL 

 Planches; ' and in 1792 the first volume of his 'Doctrina Numorum 

 Veterum,' Vienna, 4 to ; the eighth and last volume of which was pub- 

 lished in 1798. A supplement to it, with his portrait prefixed, after- 

 wards appeared, ' Addenda ad Eckhelii Doctrinam Numorum Veterum 

 ex ejusdem Autographo postumo,' 4 to, Vindob., 1826. This work, 

 which embraces the science of numismatics in general, has placed 

 Kckhel at the head of writers upon ancient coins. He died May ICth, 

 1 798, at the house of his friend the Baron de Locella. 



In his younger years Eckhel published three or four small pieces 

 unconnected with numismatics : namely, two Latin odes on the nuptials 

 of Joseph II., in 1765 ; another in German, in 1768, on the departure 

 of Maria Carolina, archduchess of Austria, from Vienna; and two 

 years afterwards an oration in German on the occasion of the emperor's 

 visit to Italy, ' Rede auf die Reise Josephs II. in Italian,' 8vo, Wien., 

 1770. An ' Explication Grammaticale des Prophe'lies d Haggle,' by 

 him, appeared in Millin's Magasin Encyclopedique, II C aiim'e, torn ii., 

 p. 461. 



(Saxii, Onomatlicon ; Visconti's account of Eckhel, in the Biographic 

 Univtnelle ; and the Notitia, Literaria de Vitd et Scriptta J. H. Eckhel, 

 translated from the French of Millin, prefixed to the Addenda ad 

 Doctrinam Numorum Veterum.) 



EDELINCK, GERARD, a distinguished engraver, and likewise 

 painter, was born in 1649, at Antwerp, where lie acquired the rudi- 

 ments of his art ; but it was in France that his talents were fully 

 developed ; and the favours bestowed on him by Louis XIV. induced 

 him to fix his abode in that country. Among his engravings the 

 following are especially worthy of notice : ' the Holy Family,' after 

 Raffaelle; 'Alexander in the Tent of Darius,' after Lebrun ; 'the Combat 

 of Cavalry,' after Leonardo da Vinci ; and, above all, 'the Crucifixion,' 

 after Lebrun. In his larger plates of historical subjects, we too often 

 have reason to lament the work selected ; many pictures owe all their 

 celebrity to his master-hand. Edelinck was no less happy in his por- 

 traits than in his historical engravings ; he has left a great number of 

 portraits of the most distinguished characters of his age. Several of 

 them are in the collection of eminent men by Perrault. A remarkably 

 pure and brilliant burin, a bold manner, correct drawing, fidelity to 

 nature, and inimitable harmony of execution, place the works of 

 Edelinck in the highest rank among those of his nation. He was 

 engraver to the king, and member of the Royal Academy of Painting, 

 and died at Paris in 1707. Neither his brother John, born 1630, nor 

 his son Nicholas, born at Paris, 1680, equalled him in his art. 



EDGAR, Rurnarned the Peaceable, was the second and youngest son 

 r>[ King Edmund I. by his wife Elgiva, or Algiva. He appears to have 

 been born in 943, and consequently was only about three years old 

 at his father's death, in 946. His brother Edwy, or Eadwy, may have 

 been a year or perhaps two years older. In these circumstances, 

 Edmund's brother Edred was unanimously chosen to succeed him by 

 the Witenagemote. On the death of Edred however in 956, Edwy 



EIOO. DIV. VOL. II. 



was placed on the throne ; and at the same time his brother Edgar 

 was appointed governor or sub-regulus of Mercia, which was still con- 

 sidered as a distinct though subject kingdom. When, about two 

 years after his accession, the enmity between Edwy and the church 

 interest broke out into an open quarrel, the people of Mercia and 

 Northumbria, instigated to revolt by Archbishop Odo, or at least 

 timing their movement very opportunely for the purposes of the 

 clerical party, placed Edgar at their head and proclaimed him king. 

 It was finally arranged that Edwy should retain the sovereignty of 

 the territory to the south of the Thames, and that all the rest of the 

 kingdom should be made over to Edgar. The death of Edwy, 

 however, about a year after, made Edgar king of all England in 959. 



Dunstan, who had been banished by Edwy, had been recalled by 

 Edgar, and made his chief counsellor, as soon aa he found himself 

 established as king of the country to the north of the Thames. Being 

 as yet only in his sixteenth year (or perhaps not quite so old) when 

 he became full king, he was of course entirely in the hands of the 

 monks and clergy, whose instrument he had hitherto been. Dunstan, 

 already Bishop both of Worcester and London, was now promoted to 

 the primacy, as well as restored to his abbey of Glastonbury, and 

 became the chief director of affairs both in church and state. The 

 government of the kingdom by Edgar, under the guidance of this 

 ecclesiastic (or rather under the direction of this ecclesiastic, for Edgar 

 was evidently a mere instrument in the hands of Dunstan) was 

 unquestionably conducted with a certain amount of ability and success. 

 Throughout the whole reign England remained undisturbed by war ; 

 the northern pirates, who had harassed the country so incessantly for 

 150 years before, and who, twenty years after the death of Edgar, 

 renewed their attacks, and did not desist until they had effected its 

 conquest, during his life did not once attack the English coasts. 

 According to the monkish writers, they were deterred from doing so 

 by the powerful naval force that was kept up by the king. These 

 writers make the fleet of Edgar to have consisted of 3600 ships. " The 

 number," says a modern historian, in a somewhat decisive style of 

 narration, " appears to me enormous ; I have therefore retrenched a 

 cipher." (Liugard, ' Hist. Engl.') In this fleet, which was divided 

 into three squadrons, Edgar is said by Malmsbury to have every 

 Easter circumnavigated the island in person ; but this looks very like 

 merely one of the improbable inventions by which Edgar's monkish 

 admirera have laboured to magnify his name, and, in fact, the entire 

 story wears a somewhat apocryphal aspect. It may be doubted 

 whether we ought not to regard in the same light what some of the 

 chroniclers tell us about his making annually a progress through the 

 different provinces of his kingdom for the administration of justice. 

 Another work of great public benefit which is attributed to him ia the 

 reformation of the coinage. He is also said to have freed Wales 

 from wolves by commuting the money tribute imposed upon the 

 Welsh by his predecessors for a tribute of 300 heads of these animals 

 annually ; by which means the wolves were extirpated in four years. 

 But there were wolves in England long after this. Edgar has been 

 chiefly lauded by the monkish annalists for his restoration of the 

 church both to its ancient possessions and to a more perfect state of 

 discipline than it had probably ever before known. And thia is no 

 doubt the true explanation of the extravagant eulogiea which the 

 monkish writers lavish upon Edgar, who was plainly a weak, selfish, 

 and luxurious prince that he raised, or permitted to be raised, the 

 ecclesiastical power to a higher point than it had yet attained in 

 England, and placed the supreme secular authority in the hands of a 

 priest who ruled the country with a despotic sway, to which the 

 people were compelled to yield a sullen obedience. The reign of 

 Edgar was a peaceful and apparently a powerful one; but under 

 priestly domination and Danish favouritism, the Anglo-Saxon spirit 

 was broken, and the country was left, when the strong hand of 

 Dunstrn was removed, to fall a helpless prey to intestine turbulence 

 and the assault of the foreigner. Under the vigorous administration 

 of Dunstan and his subservient associates Ethelwold and Oswald, the 

 bishops of Winchester<and Worcester, the married clergy were removed 

 almost to a man from the cathedrals and abbeys ; and no fewer than 

 fifty-four monasteries were founded or restored in different parts of 

 the kingdom, and filled with monks as well as richly endowed. They 

 were all subjected to the Benedictine rule. 



The laws of Edgar that have been preserved consist partly of some 

 enactments touching the payment of the tithes and other church-dues, 

 and partly of a few civil regulations chiefly relating to the improve- 

 ment of the police of the kingdom and the better administration of 

 justice. One is directed against the crime of malicious defamation, 

 and enacts that if the falsehood of the evil report can be proved, the 

 defamer should either have his tongue cut out (that was no doubt 

 thought a peculiarly appropriate punishment), or should redeem it 

 with the value of his head, that is to say, should pay the sum at which 

 his life was valued according to the class of society in which he was 

 ranked. Another directs that the Winchester measure should be the 

 standard for the kingdom. These laws however were only enforced 

 in the Saxon provinces of Edgar's dominions. To his Danish subjects, 

 who occupied nearly or fully half the kingdom, he appears to have only 

 recommended the adoption of some of the English laws. The majority 

 of these Danes resident in England were still pagans, and were governed 

 by earls of their own nation, though they acknowledged the supremacy 



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