literary contemporaries as their 

 leader, he took a deep and constant 

 interest in public affairs. He 

 travelled in France, Germany, and 

 the Netherlands. Kings and popes 

 competed for his society, he was 

 induced to undertake important 

 public missions, and in letters to 

 rulers and public men he en- 

 deavoured to influence their policy 

 to the advantage of his native 

 country. He wrote a treatise on 

 government, and in 1351 his advice 

 was sought in the drafting of a con- 

 stitution for Rome, in which city, 

 on Easter Sunday, 1341, he had 

 been crowned poet-laureate. He 

 disliked Avignon, then the seat of 

 the papal court, and found a con- 

 genial retreat at Vaucluse, which 

 he left finally in 1353 for Milan, 

 Venice, and Arqua, since called 

 Arqua Petrarca, a village on the 

 S.E. of the Euganean Hills, near 

 Padua, where he died July 18, 1374. 



Petrarch has been called the first 

 of the moderns. A scholar at a 

 time when all books were in MS., 

 and texts were at the mercy of 

 the copyists against whom he de- 

 claimed, his fame soon became 

 universal in Europe, largely through 

 his sonnets and other poems, 

 which were written in Italian, and 

 exerted a lasting influence on the 

 love poetry of France and England. 



The spiritual and mystical side 

 of his character was in curious con- 

 trast to his literary paganism. As 

 a poet he possessed an acute sense 

 of melody, of the beautiful in ex- 

 pression. The first to popularise 

 the sonnet, he set chief store by 

 his Latin works, especially his un- 

 finished epic, Africa, which has 

 Scipio Africanus as hero, and his 

 De Viris Illustribus, or Lives of 

 Famous Men. His letters, of 

 which he kept copies, throw light 

 on the intellectual life of his time ; 

 his dialogues are remarkable for 

 their self -revelation. His friends 

 included Boccaccio, with whom he 

 kept up a regular correspondence 

 and whose story of Griselda he 

 translated into Latin. Petrarch, 

 to quote Villari, was the first to 

 write freely of all things in the 

 same way that a man speaks. 



6O91 



Bibliography. The Secret of Pet- 

 rarch, E. J. Mills, 1904 ; P. and His 

 Influence on English Literature, P. 

 Borghesi, 1906; P., His Life and 

 Times, H. C. Hollway-Calthrop, 

 1907 ; P. and the Ancient World, 

 and P6trarque et 1'Humanisme, P. 

 de Nolhac, 1907 ; F. P., Poet and 

 Humanist, M. F. Jerrold, 1909 ; 

 P.'s Letters to Classical Author?, M. 

 E. Cosenza, 1910 ; P., the First 

 Modern Scholar and Man of Letters, 

 J. H. Robinson and H. W. Rolfe, 

 2nd ed. 1914 ; Some Love Songs 

 of P., Translated and Annotated 

 by W. D. Foulke, 1915 ; P. Biblio- 

 graphy, D. W. Fiske, 1915. 



Petrel. Storm petrel, Procellaria pelagica 



or Mother Carey's Chicken, of the North 



Atlantic Ocean 



Petrarch. Italian poet, ani first ot 

 the humanists 



Petre. Name of an English 

 family now represented by Baron 

 Petre. Sir William Petre (d. 1572), 

 a native of Devon, was a public 

 servant under Henry VIII. He rose 

 to be a secretary of state, and was 

 sent on missions abroad. His son 

 John was made Baron Petre of 

 Writ tie in Essex in 1603, and the 

 title has since been held by his de- 

 scendants, all adherents of the R.C. 

 faith. William, the 4th baron, was 

 a victim of Titus Gates, and 

 William Joseph (1847-93), the 

 13th, a priest. The family seats are 

 Writtle Hall and Ingatestone Hall, 

 both in Essex. Another Petre of 

 note was Sir Edward (d. 1699). 

 Known as Father Petre, he was 

 confessor to James II, and became, 

 in 1693, head of the Jesuit college 

 at St. Omer. The 16th baron (1890- 

 1915), a captain in the Coldstream 

 Guards, died of wounds received in 

 action, 1915. Pron. Peter. 



Petrel (Dim. of Peter, from 

 some species appearing to walk on 

 the water). General name for about 

 100 species of oceanic birds, con- 

 stituting the order Tubinares. It 

 includes the albatross, diving 

 petrels (Pdecanoides), storm petrels 

 (Procellaria), flat- billed P. (Prion), 

 fulmar P. (Fulmarus), and the 

 shearwater P. (Puffinus). They 

 have a rudimentary hinder toe, 



PETROGRAD 



hooked bill, and tubular nostrils. 

 They nest in burrows or rock-clefts, 

 and lay a single egg. The name in- 

 dicates more particularly the storm 

 petrel, or Mother Carey's chicken 

 (Procellaria pelagica}, which breeds 

 in Britain, chiefly in Scotland and 

 Ireland, and is found in the N. 

 Atlantic, though it does not nest on 

 the American side. It is a swallow- 

 like black bird, with a patch of 

 white in front of the tail. Normally 

 subsisting upon small surface 

 animals, it often follows, and alights 

 upon, ships to pick up scraps. 



Petrie, GEORGE (1790-1866). 

 Irish antiquary. Born in Dublin, 

 Jan., 1790, he became a Royal 

 Hibernian , Academician, and 

 painter of Irish scenery and 

 remains. His Essay on Round 

 Towers (q.v.) received the Irish 

 Academy prize, 1830. His Anti- 

 quities of Tara Hill, 1839 ; Ecclesias- 

 tical Architecture of Ireland, 1845 ; 

 and Ancient Music of Ireland, 

 1855, represent researches facili- 

 tated by his superintendence of 

 the antiquarian section of the 

 Ordnance Survey of Ireland, 1833- 

 46. After his death, Jan. 17, 1866, 

 his collections were acquired for 

 the Dublin museum. Pron. Peatry. 



Petrie, SIR WILLIAM MATTHEW 

 FLINDERS (b. 1853). British Egypt- 

 ologist Born at Charlton. June 3. 

 1853, he surveyed Stonehenge and 

 ancient British earthworks, 1875- 

 80. Applying similar methods to 

 the pyramids of Gizeh, 1880, he 

 undertook thereafter, down to 

 1914, systematic excavations in 

 Egypt, especially at Naucratis, 

 Daphnae, Coptos, Nagada, Abydos, 

 Amarna, Memphis, and Tarkhan. 

 His finds include Roman portraits 

 at Hawara, and jewelry and papy- 

 rus hoards. He excavated Lachish, 

 1890, for the Palestine Exploration 

 Fund. Edwards professor of 

 Egyptology at University College, 

 London, since 1892, he founded the 

 Egyptian Research Account, 1894, 

 enlarged as the British School of 

 Archaeology in Egypt, 1905. Be- 

 sides numerous works covering the 

 whole field of Egyptian history, he 

 wrote Revolutions of Civilization, 

 1911; Eastern Exploration, 1918; 

 Some Sources of Human History, 

 1919. He was knighted, 1923. See 

 Egypt; Port. Gallery of Contrib. 



Petrograd. Government of 

 N.W. Russia. It is bounded N. by 

 Finland, E. by Olonets and Nov- 

 gorod, S. by Pskov, and W. by 

 Esthonia. The soil is marshy, and 

 climate damp. There is little 

 mineral wealth, and agriculture is 

 backward. The chief industries are 

 forestry, and shipbuilding, and 

 the manufacture of glassware, boots 

 and shoes, and textile fabrics. 

 Area, 17,226 sq. m. Pop. 3,200,000. 



