THE 



POPULAR ENCYCLOPEDIA; 



OB, 



A ABACUS. 



A, in all known languages, but the Ethiopic, is the 

 first letter of the alphabet, from the reason, perhaps, 

 that if pronounced open, as in father, it is the 

 simplest and easiest of all sounds. This is the only 

 mode of pronouncing it in almost every country ex- 

 cept England. To produce this sound, the mouth 

 is merely opened, without the contraction or exten- 

 sion necessarily accompanying the utterance of either 

 of the other vowels. A is the letter with which 

 children generally begin to speak, and it serves 

 to express many and even opposite emotions, e. g. 

 admiration, pain, astonishment, laughter, ( with the 

 preceding H, ) disgust, pleasure, according to the 

 mode in which it is uttered. For the same reason, a 

 is found, in all original languages, in many words 

 which infants utter to designate the objects with 

 which they are most nearly connected, e. g. in the 

 names by which they call their parents. Hence, in 

 Hebrew, am is mother, ab father ; in old Greek and 

 Gothic, atta is father ; in Latin, mamma signifies the 

 breast. Many philologists are of opinion, that a, 

 (as In father) was the original vowel in most of those 

 words which designate objects expressive of great 

 strength, quickness, &c., as these first attracted the 

 attention of men ; and it is true, that, in original 

 languages, a appears in very many words belonging 

 to the class just mentioned. A (as in father) is 

 very rarely the predominating sound in the cries of 

 animals. In these, the sounds ee, ow, , and a, (as 

 in fate]) generally prevail. We do not include th< 

 sounds ofsinging birds, which are inarticulate music, 

 like that of wind instruments. The regularly arched 

 roof of the human mouth, and the other fine organs 

 of speech, with which the Creator has blessed man- 

 kind above all lower orders of animals, are necessary 

 to pronounce the melodious sound a (open.) A is, 

 generally speaking, the favourite sound of singers, 

 because it is the most musical and most capable of 

 expansion. Several diphthongal sounds, as i (in pine), 

 are, in singing, to be resolved into a (open) and 

 another simple sound. The frequent occurrence of 

 a (open) in the Italian language, is one of the many 

 causes which render the Tuscan dialect so favourable 

 for music. The Scottish dialect possesses the same 

 advantage. The English language is the only one 

 among the cultivated modern tongues, which has 

 four (according to others still more) sounds for the 

 single character a. Most of the modern languages 

 as French, Italian, German, &c. have only the open 

 or Italian a, pronounced short or long. Other 

 languages have also the sound of the English a, as 

 in all, e. g. the dialect of Finland. In Greek, this 

 letter, when prefixed to a word, has the power o 



h 



negation, like the syllable un in English, and hence 

 it was called alpha privativt/m. In many English 

 words derived from the Greek, the a has the same 

 power. , Among the Greeks and Romans, a was 

 used as an arithmetical sign : by the former, for 1 ; 

 by the latter, for 500. A\ hen a dash was placed on 

 the top, thus, A, it stood for 5000. ( See Abbrevia- 

 tions.) A, in music, the sixth diatonic interval of 

 the first or lowest octave of the modern scale : a in- 

 dicates the same interval in the second octave. As 

 the capital A is used in the first instance, and the small 

 a in the next, the former is called the great octave, 

 the other the small, a, with a line above, denotes the 

 same interval in the third, and E, with two lines, the 

 same interval in the fourth octave. The first of 

 these, from each denomination of the note in the 

 octave being designated by a line, is termed the one- 

 lined octave, the other the two-lined, and so on. A, 

 major, is that key, in modern music, in which the 

 sixth diatonic interval is assumed as the fundamental 

 tone of the major key. To maintain the natural 

 characteristic of the major, F, G, and c, must be made 

 sharp, Ff G cj. According to Schubert's Charac- 

 teristics of Music, this key conveys the expression 

 of innocent love, content, and cheerfulness. ( See 

 Key.) If any numeral figure is added to the letter 

 A, when prefixed to a vocal composition, it denotes 

 the number of voices for which the piece is intend- 

 ed : thus, A 3 signifies for 3 voices. 



AA, the name of a great number of rivers in Swit- 

 zerland, Germany, France, and Holland ; so, also, 

 Aach, which is, in German, originally the same 

 with Aa, only pronounced with an aspirated ter- 

 mination. 



AA, Peter Van der, a bookseller of Leyden, who 

 carried on an extensive business from 1682, until his 

 death in 1730, during which time he compiled and 

 published many collections of Voyages, Travels, &c. 

 in the Dutch and French languages ; the most ex- 

 tensive of which was his " Galerie du Monde," in 

 66 vols. folio. 



AARGAU, ARGOVIA, AHGAU, formerly a part of the 

 cantons of Berne and Zurich, but since 1798 a sepa- 

 rate canton. In 1803 it received a large accession 

 of territory. Capital Arau; population, 132,763. 

 Several liberals have fled, in modern times, from 

 Germany, and lived for a while hi A., protected by 

 Government. 



AARON, (Heb. a mountaineer,) the brother of Mo- 

 ses, and first high-priest of the Israelites. See Moses. 



ABACUS signified, among the ancients, a kind of 

 cup-board, or buftet. They were, in times of great 

 luxury, plated with gold. It also signified a table 

 A B 



