188 



ANT AH ANTENOK. 



iner, or jus a different part of speech, which attracts 

 j'tU'iition, and gives c\pic--i\cncss tn tin- phrase; 

 , . -.. I. it the dead bury their dead;" or, " Live 

 while you live." The returning to a subject after a 

 long iirenlh'sis is also allied antunaclaau. 



AM u;, or ANPAK ; a I'amous Arabian prince in the 

 middle of the 6th century, and one of the seven 

 poets, whose Mirre^t'ul vcr-cs. embroidered with gold 

 upon silk, were hung up at the door of the I'aaha. 

 (See Arabian Literature, and Motillakut.) He de- 

 scribes in his Moallaka his warlike deeds and his 

 love for Abla. The most complete edition is that of 

 Menil (Leyden, 1816, 4to.) Harlinanu's (ierinan 

 tnuislation, from the English tninslation by Sir W. 

 . l ones, was published in the Hellstruthlrntlrn I'lr/ad- 

 en, am Arab. poet. Himmel. (Minister, 180^.) In 

 the Anibian n)iiiance Antar, the author, Asmai, a 

 renowned grammarian and theologian at the court 

 of Ilaroun Al Raschid, in the beginning of the 9th 

 century, who first collected the old Arabian tradi- 

 tions, lias added to the name, and the heroic adven- 

 tures of Antar, the other most famous chivalrous 

 deeds of the Arabians. Sir W. Jones first made us 

 well acquainted with this remarkable and attractive 

 romance; after him, v. Hammer, in his Fundgrulen 

 det Orientes (1812,) described the complete copy of 

 it in the imperial library at Vienna ; besides which, 

 there are six others in Europe. This romance gives 

 the most complete idea of the manners and life, of 

 the way of thinking, of the opinions and the super- 

 stitions, of the early Arabians before the time of the 

 prophet, and the fidelity of the picture is even now 

 to be recognized in many features of the modern Be- 

 douins. It is written in the purest Arabic, and 

 ranked among the classics of Arabian literature. It 

 is so attracting, tliat critics prefer it to the Arabian 

 Nights. Hamilton, secretary of the British embassy 

 in Constantinople, has translated it into English 

 (Antar, a Bedoueen Romance, translated from the 

 Arabic, by Terrik Hamilton ; London, 1819, 4 vols.) 

 A French translation has since appeared at Paris. 



ANTARCTIC CIRCLE (of T<, opposite, and azures, a 

 bear) is one of the smaller circles of the sphere, 

 parallel to the equator, and distant from the south 

 pole 23 30'. Antarctic pole, being opposite to the 

 arctic pole, denotes the opposite end of the earth's 

 axis, or the south pole. Till lately, no land was 

 known to exist beyond the 60th degree of south lat. 

 Cook (q. v.) reached this degree, but masses of ice 

 and storms drove him back. In 1820, a whaleman 

 discovered an island south of cape Horn, in lat. 61, 

 about 200 miles in length, which he called Neio 

 Shetland. Since this time, British and Russian ships 

 have penetrated still farther towards the south pole. 

 (See Southern Polar Island*.) Probably not the cold, 

 but the great number of islands, with shallow cur- 

 rents between them, and the late melting of the ice 

 on the sand-banks, in narrow gulfs, would form the 

 chief obstruction to ever reaching the south pole. 

 As, in this region of cold, the whales have been 

 pursued but a few years, they are very numerous, and 

 chance will no doubt, lead some seaman, while en- 

 gaged in the wliale fishery in the antarctic region, to 

 new discoveries. 



' ANTEDILUVIAN ; any thing or being which existed 

 before the deluge. See Deluge, and Fossil Remains. 



ANTELOPE; a genus of mammiferous, ruminant 

 quadrupeds, intermediate to the deer and goat, first 

 established by the Russian naturalist Pallas, and 

 subsequently divided into numerous sections by 

 Blainville, founded on characters furnished by the 

 shape and curvature of the horns, &c. The charac- 

 teristics of the genus are the following : horns per- 

 sistent, hollow, resting on a solid, bony nucleus of 

 the os frontis ; straight, spiral, lyre shaped, annulated 



at Imse; marked with transverse bands, a salient 

 spiral line, or bifurcated in different species: yiill 

 bladder uniformly present, which is not possessed by 

 d,-cr. in other clianictt r>, the antelopes beara very 

 marked resemblance to the deer, except that some 

 >-pccies of antelope have tut'ls of hair pendent from 

 the carpus. Numerous as are the species ofantelope, 

 but two are found in Europe, and only one in Ameri- 

 ca the Hiamni> and saiga, in the former, the prong- 

 horn (q. v.) in the latter. All the rest are native- of 

 the holiest paris of Asia and Africa. They are gene- 

 rally remarkable for the symmetry and delicacy of 

 their forms, and surpassing celerity of movement. 

 Then- eyes are proverbial for largeness and lustre. 

 Possessing less of muscular vigour and compactness 

 of frame than the deer, they do not advance by suc- 

 cessive bounds, but by a regular r,;ce, the swiftness 

 of which in some species, almost exceeds imagina- 

 tion. They are generally yellow on the back, and 

 white beneath, having a brown band separating these 

 colours at the flank. The ears are long, straight, 

 pointed, and somewliat dilated in the middle, (ireat 

 varieties of appearance and habits are exhibited in the 

 different species : some are monogamous and solitary ; 

 some prefer arid deserts, where Lut a scanty subs 1st - 

 ence is to be obtained, of aromatic, acrid, or silt- 

 tasted plants; others delight exclusively in the fresh 

 herbage growing in the vicinity of rivers and mar-h- 

 es. One species, the chamois, delights to browse on 

 the almost inaccessible summits of the icy Alps : al- 

 most all the others prefer the sultry plains of the 

 torrid zone. In form, some of the species resemble 

 a slender deer or goat ; while a few others approxi- 

 mate considerably to the appearance of the ox. With 

 a solitary exception, that of the gnu, they are gentle, 

 timid, harmless, and easily tamed. The gnu is fierce 

 and warlike, exhibiting through life a vicious and 

 indomitable disposition. Many of the species are 

 gregarious, living in herds or families, consisting of 

 twenty or thirty individuals. They feed exclusively 

 on vegetable food, and their flesh is regarded as a 

 luxury when obtained in the proper season. Against 

 their numerous enemies, they have no resort but in 

 flight,' and swift as this is, it cannot save them from 

 the unremitted pursuit of the jackal, or the insidious 

 prowling of the tiger. Lions, leopards, ounces, and 

 other carnivorous tyrants lie in ambush for them at 

 their drinking-places ; and man, aided by dogs and 

 falcons, contributes his share to their destruction. In 

 the great system of balances established by nature, 

 they seem peculiarly adapted for their situation, which 

 is generally in countries where a luxuriant vegeta- 

 tion requires constant efforts to repress its superabun- 

 dance ; while they, at the, same time, furnish large 

 supplies of food to numerous carnivorous animals, as 

 well as to the human race. The following are the 

 names of the subgenera proposed by Blainville, &c~, 

 and now generally adopted by naturalists: 1. An- 

 tilope. 2. Gazella. 3. Cervicapra. 4. Alcelaphns. 

 5. Tragelaphus. 6. Oreas, Desm. 7. Boselaph- 

 us. 8. Oryx. 9. Egocerus, Desm. 10. Bupicapra. 

 11. Antilocapra. 



ANTENATI (a Latin word, signifying born before) : 

 the subjects of Scotland bom before the accession of 

 James I., to the English crown are thus called; 

 those who were born after the accession being de- 

 nominated postnati. The A. were considered aliens 

 in England ; so, too, persons born in Britain before 

 the separation of the present United States from 

 the mother country have been held to be aliens in the 

 United States. 



ANTENNA, in entomology ; slender bodies, with 

 which nature' has furnished the heads of insects, be- 

 ing the same with what are called horns or feelers. 



ANTENOR : a noble Trojan. In Homer, he is repre- 



