NIEBUHR NIELLO. 



233 



A. V. Bernstorff, which, as he himself says, in the 

 biography of his father above-mentioned, affected es- 

 sentially the direction of his whole life. After a cer- 

 tain time, he was appointed a director of the bank. 

 In 1801, he witnessed the bombardment of Copenha- 

 gen. The invasion of Germany (which he always 

 loved as his true country) by the French affected him 

 much ; and his translation of the first Philippic of De- 

 mosthenes, dedicated to the emperor A lexander, with 

 a remarkable call upon him, prove his sentiments. 

 In 1806, he was taken into the Prussian service ; but, 

 soon after his arrival in Berlin, the battle of Jena 

 changed the whole condition of the kingdom. In 

 Konigsberg, whither he had followed the court, he 

 was appointed one of the counsellors who directed 

 public affairs, under Hardenberg, until the peace of 

 Tilsit. He then took an active part in the organiza- 

 tion of the Prussian states under the minister Stein. 

 In 1808, he was sent to Holland on a special mission, 

 where he remained fourteen months, during which he 

 always contrived to save some time from his public 

 occupations for study. On his return to Berlin, he 

 was made privy-counsellor of state, and a temporary 

 officer in the department of finances. In 1810, when 

 the university of Berlin was established, his friends 

 persuaded him to deliver his first lectures on Roman 

 history ; which were received with such interest by 

 the hearers, and so much commended by men like 

 Buttmann, Heindorf, Spalding, and Savigny, that he 

 published, in 1811 and 1812, the two volumes of his 

 Roman history. When the Prussians rose against 

 the French, lie established a journal at Berlin, under 

 the title of the Prussian Correspondent, and, in 1814, 

 was sent again to Holland, to negotiate a loan with 

 Britain. On his return, in the same year, to Berlin, 

 he lost his wife, and, soon after, his father ; and, to 

 divert his mind under his losses, he planned the bio- 

 graphy of his father, and edited, together with Butt- 

 man and Heindorf, the fragments of Pronto, found in 

 Verona by Angelo Maio. In 1816, he married a se- 

 cond time, and was appointed Prussian minister at the 

 papal see ; and on his passage through Verona to 

 Rome, he discovered, in the cathedral library of the 

 former city, the Institutions of Gaius. (See Caius.) 

 The chief object of his mission was to arrange with the 

 pope the reorganization of the Catholic church in the 

 Prussian dominions, which was finally settled by the 

 Prussian concordate, when prince Hardenberg went 

 to Rome in 1822. The result is the bull De Salute 

 .dnimarum. Pius VII., himself a lover of science, 

 had a great regard for Niebuhr. Even before he 

 went to Italy, his attention had jeen directed to the 

 importance of the Codices rescripts (see Codeaf) t and 

 the discovery of Gaius added to his interest in the 

 subject, so that he spent much time in Rome, in an 

 accurate examination of the manuscripts of the Vati- 

 can library; but, when Angelo Maio was appointed 

 keeper of the library, a very ill-placed jealousy on his 

 part towards Niebuhr prevented the latter from con- 

 tinuing freely his learned labours, the result of which 

 he made known to the world in his collection of un- 

 edited fragments of Cicero and Livy (Rome, 1820) ; 

 and, at a later period, when a good understanding 

 existed again between Maio and Niebuhr, produced 

 by the disinterested frankness of the latter, he took 

 an active part in Maio's edition of the precious frag- 

 ments of Cicero's De Republica. His residence in 

 Rome gave him an intimate knowledge of the locali- 

 ties of the city, and a clearer conception of its an- 

 cient character and history. His knowledge in this 

 branch appears in his essay On the Increase and 

 Decline of Ancient, and the Restoration of Modern, 

 Rome, which is printed in the first volume of the 

 Description of Rome, by Bunsen and Plattncr. It is 

 also published hi his Minor Works. I" '-hi;; period 



he also wrote some Latin treatises in the Atti delP 

 Accademia di Archeologia, on the Greek inscriptions 

 brought by Gau from Nubia, and a German treatise 

 on the age of Curtius and Petronius, in the Transac- 

 tions of the Academy of Berlin. In 1823 he left 

 Rome, and, before his return to Germany, went to 

 Naples, where he devoted some hours every day to 

 the collation of the best manuscript of the gramma- 

 rian Charisius in the library of that city. In Switzer- 

 land, he remained six weeks in St Gall, examining 

 laboriously the manuscripts of the library ; and, if he 

 expected more than he actually found, lie at least dis- 

 covered some remains of the latest Roman poetry, 

 that is, poems of Merobaudes. He settled in Bonn, 

 where the Prussian government had established a 

 university. He wrote here, in the winter of 1823 

 1824, that portion which is finished of the third vo- 

 lume of his history of Rome. He was appointed a 

 member of the council of state, whose sessions he 

 attended at Berlin. After his return to Bonn, he 

 determined to remodel the two first volumes of his 

 Roman history before publishing the third, as further 

 researches had changed his views in many respects. 

 He now also began to lecture again, and the fees paid 

 for attendance he devoted to prizes for scientific ques- 

 tions, or to the support of poor students. Volume i. 

 (2d ed.) appeared in 1827, and was so well received 

 that the third edition appeared in 1828. The second 

 volume was, in its new state, finished only a few 

 months before his death ; and, in the preface, he says 

 that the melancholy influence of recent political 

 events upon his mind appears in the mode of the 

 execution of the concluding part of the work. That 

 part of the third volume which he had finished, and 

 which carries the history of Rome from the Licinian 

 law to the last quarter of the fifth century, will pro- 

 bably soon appear. Niebuhr's activity was great. 

 Every scholar will easily perceive in his history the 

 extensive and unremitted labour which it required ; 

 and, towards the close of his life, he added to his 

 other occupations the task of preparing a new edition 

 of the Byzantine Historians. He himself made the 

 beginning with a critical edition of Agathias, and 

 obtained active collaborators, while he superintended 

 the execution of his plan. At the same time, he 

 made a collection of his treatises in the Transactions 

 of the Academy of Berlin, and in the Rhenish Mu- 

 seum, which he had edited, together with professor 

 Brandes, since 1827. His reputation is spread over 

 Europe, and in America he is equally honoured. He 

 died, January 2, 1831, at a period of his life which 

 afforded reason for expecting much from him. His 

 wife died on the llth of the same month. The task 

 of confining articles within the limits required by a 

 work like the present, often difficult, is, on the pre- 

 sent occasion,- painful, from the necessity of repres- 

 sing the utterance of gratitude for numerous bene- 

 fits, and of admiration for a man whose integrity, 

 benevolence, and frankness of spirit, are deeply im- 

 pressed on the mind of the writer, from a long resi- 

 dence under his roof. 



NIEDER (German for lower) forms part of maiiy 

 geographical names. 



NIEDERRHEIN. See Rhine, Lower. 



NIELLO (Kalian}; a species of work used among 

 the Romans and modern Italians, somewhat resem- 

 bling Damascus work, and performed by enchasing 

 a mixture of silver and lead into cavities and holes 

 cut in all sorts of hard wood and metals. This art 

 was denominated by the ancients nigellum, and was 

 used by them to decorate a great variety of things, 

 and more especially candelabra. It was practised by 

 the jewellers and goldsmiths, and flourished chiefly in 

 the fifteenth century. See Duchene's Essai sitr ics 

 Nil-lies, Paris, 1826, with plates. 



