434 



STYLE-SUABIA. 



style, the style of business, the epistolary, the his- 

 torical style, and the various oratorical styles. 

 Style began early to be cultivated. Among the 

 Greeks, \vho, however, confined themselves almost 

 entirely to oratorical expression, Aristotle, Deme- 

 trius Phalereus, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Her- 

 mogenes, and Longinus; among the Romans, Cicero 

 and Quinctilian, are the principal writers on style. 



STYLE, in the arts. Style, or mode of repre- 

 sentation, in the arts, depends on the character of 

 the artist, the subjects, the art itself, the materials 

 used, the object aimed at, &c. The style varies in 

 different periods: thus we have the ante-Greek, or 

 old Oriental style, in which the powerful and colossal 

 prevails ; the classical or antique style of the Greeks 

 and Romans (see Antique), and the style of Chris- 

 tian art (the romantic or modern style). It is 

 influenced by differences of national character. 

 Thus we have a German, Italian, French, and Eng- 

 lish style or school. The effect of the national 

 character is particularly apparent in certain arts, 

 e. g. painting or music. The national style also 

 has its periods ; at one time aims particularly at the 

 sublime or great, at other times strives after the 

 beautiful, the pleasing, and graceful; as Winckel- 

 mann has observed in respect to the Greek plastic 

 art. The style varies, too, with the character of 

 the individual. Here we must distinguish between 

 the style which proceeds from the nature of the 

 subjects to which the genius of the artist inclines 

 him, and his mode of representing those subjects. 

 The latter is called more particularly manner. The 

 manner of an artist may be noble or petty, strong 

 or weak ; but it is always uniform, and in a certain 

 degree arbitrary, while the style, in its proper 

 sense, is not. The style of great artists continues 

 in their schools, and there usually degenerates into 

 manner. The word style is also applied to the dif- 

 ferent modes of representation, occasioned by the 

 different nature of the various arts: thus there is 

 an architectural, a plastic, a picturesque style. 

 The various branches of an art, too, have each its 

 peculiar style ; e. g. in poetry, there are the epic, 

 lyric, dramatic styles ; in music, the sacred, opera, 

 concert styles, the vocal and instrumental styles, 

 the quartetto, sonata, symphony styles, &c. ; in 

 painting, there are the historical, landscape, &c. 

 styles. 



STYLE, OLD and NEW. See Calendar, and 

 Epoch. 



STYLES OF ARCHITECTURE. See Archi- 

 tecture. 



STYLITES (from <r'x, column; in Latin, 

 sancti columnares). The most singular saints of 

 the Christian church were anchorites who, by way 

 of penance, passed the greater part of their lives on 

 the top of high columns. Simeon, a Syrian monk, 

 of the fifth century, invented this insane method of 

 self-torture, about 423. He lived, for nine years, 

 on a column, the top of which was only two ells 

 in circumference, in the open air, near Antioch, 

 afterwards changed it for a higher one, and at 

 length for one forty cubits, and only three feet in 

 diameter at the top; when he slept, he leaned 

 against a sort of balustrade. On this pillar he re- 

 mained twenty-eight years, till his death, in 459 or 

 460. The whole time which he passed on the top 

 of pillars, was about thirty-seven years. It appears, 

 however, that he must have descended at times, 

 since he cured the sick by his touch, and performed 

 sundry other miracles; wrote epistles, and took 

 part in political quarrels. The example of this 



strange being, who was canonized utter his death, 

 was imitated by many persons in Syria and Pales- 

 tine; and the mania continued until the 12th cen- 

 tury. The Dictionnaire de Thfologie, a modern 

 Catholic work, chiefly in defence of the Roman 

 church, has a long article Stylite, vindicating St 

 Simeon, as an instrument in the hands of the 

 Creator, for the conversion of the heathen. " Shall 

 we refuse to God," says the writer, " the liberty 

 of attaching the grace of conversion to such means 

 as he may choose?" The article also relates the 

 miracles of St Simeon. 



STYMPHALIDES, in mythology; certain birds 

 of prey, which derived their name from the town 

 or the lake of Stymphalus, in Arcadia, near which 

 they lived; or from an ancient hero Stymphalus, 

 whose daughters they were eonsidered to be. They 

 were large birds, with iron wings, beaks and claws, 

 of the size of cranes, in form similar to the ibis, but 

 having straight beaks. They could shoot their 

 feathers like arrows, and thus kill men and beasts. 

 (See Argonauts.} Eurystheus imposed on Hercu- 

 les the task of driving them from the place of their 

 abode, in which he succeeded. 



STYMPHALUS. See Stymphalides. 



STYPTIC; a remedy that has the virtue of 

 stopping blood, or of closing the aperture of a 

 wounded vessel. Many waters and powders are of 

 this nature ; but in most of them vitriol is the chief 

 ingredient. 



STYRIA. See Stiria. 



STYX ; a nymph, according to Hesiod, the 

 daughter of Oceanus and Thetis, according to others, 

 of Erebus and Night. By Pallas, she became the 

 mother of Zelos and Cratos, Nike and Bia (Zeal, 

 Power, Victory and Strength) ; according to Pau- 

 sanias, she bore the Hydra to a certain Piras ; and, 

 according to Apollodorus, Proserpine to Jupiter. 

 Her children, by Pallas (according to Hesiod), en- 

 joyed the honour of living with Jupiter, and of 

 being inseparably connected with him, because they 

 and their mother assisted him in the war with the 

 Titans. In honour of Styx herself, it was pro- 

 vided, that the gods should swear by her. According 

 to another passage of Hesiod, Styx lived with her 

 children in the region of Tartarus, in a palace of 

 rocks, separated from the dwellings of the other 

 deities residing there, or in a grotto- resting on 

 columns. From this rock issued a cold stream, 

 which flowed far under the earth unseen. It was 

 the tenth arm of Ocean. Nine of them flowed 

 around the earth, and the sea, and then emptied 

 into the tenth, which (the Styx) descended to the 

 lower regions, where it formed the celebrated Sty- 

 gian pool. By this the gods swore ; and if any 

 god violated his oath, he was banished from Olym- 

 pus, stretched out lifeless, and became overgrown 

 with mould. In this state he remained a year ; 

 after which, he suffered other torments for nine 

 years, and, during this period, was excluded from 

 the society of the gods. Styx was originally a 

 rivulet in Arcadia, springing from a high rock, 

 near the town of Nonacris. Its water was con- 

 sidered poisonous to men and beasts, metals were 

 corroded, and vessels burst to pieces by it. 



SUABIA, OR SWABIA (in German Schwaben); 

 one of the ten circles into which the German em- 

 pire was divided, previous to its dissolution in 1806. 

 It lay in the south-western part of Germany, com- 

 prising some of the most fertile and beautiful parts 

 of the country, traversed from south-west to north- 

 east by the Danube. The Black Forest (q. v.), or 



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