BERTH1ER BERTOLI. 



517 



disdained the protection of armour, whence he receiv- 

 ed his name, which signifies, according to Ihre, ar- 

 mourless. He raged like a madman in battle. He 

 killed king Swafurlam, and married his daughter, by 

 whom he had twelve sons, as untamable as himself. 

 They were also called Berserker, and, since their 

 time, the name has been commonly given to men of 

 headstrong violence. 



BERTHIER, Alexander ; prince of Neufchatel and 

 Wagram, marshal, vice-constable of France, &c. ; 

 born in Paris, Dec. 30, 1753 ; son of a distinguished 

 officer ; was, while yet young, employed in the gene- 

 ral staff, served in America, and fought with Lafa- 

 yette for the liberty of the United States. In the 

 first years of the French revolution, he was appointed 

 major-general in the national guard of Versailles, and 

 conducted himself in this post with uniform modera- 

 tion. Dec. 28, 1791, he was appointed chief of the 

 general staff in the army of marshal Luckner, march- 

 ed against La Vendee in 1793, and joined the army 

 of Italy in 1796, with the rank of general of division, 

 where, as chief of the general staff, he contributed 

 much to the success of the campaign. In October, 

 1797, general Bonaparte sent him to Paris to deliver 

 to the directory the treaty of Campo-Formio. In 

 January, 1798, he received the chief command of the 

 army of Italy, and was ordered by the directory to 

 march against the dominions of the pope. In the 

 beginning of February, he made his entrance into 

 Rome, abolished the papal government, and esta- 

 blished a consular one. Being much attached to 

 general Bonaparte, he followed him to Egypt as chief 

 of the general staff. After the 18th of Brumaire, 

 Bonaparte appointed him minister of war. He after- 

 wards became general-in-chief of the army of reserve, 

 accompanied Bonaparte to Italy, in 1800, and con- 

 tributed to the passage of St Bernard and the victory 

 at Marengo. He signed the armistice of Alessandria, 

 formed the provisional government of Piedmont, and 

 went on an extraordinary mission to Spain. He then 

 received again the department of war, which, in the 

 mean time, had been in the hands of Carnot. He 

 accompanied Napoleon to Milan, June, 1805, to be 

 present at his coronation, and, in October, was ap- 

 pointed chief of the general staff of the grand army 

 in Germany. Oct. 19, he signed the capitulation of 

 Ulm, with Mack, and, Dec. 6, the armistice of Aus- 

 terlitz. Having, in 1806, accompanied the emperor 

 in liis campaign against Prussia, he signed the armi- 

 stice of Tilsit, June, 1807. He afterwards resigned 

 his post as minister of war, and, having been appoint- 

 ed vice<constable of France, married, in 1808, Maria 

 Elizabeth Amelia, daughter of duke William of Ba- 

 varia-Birkenfeld, and continued to be the companion 

 of Napoleon in all his expeditions. In the campaign 

 against Austria, in 1809, he distinguished himself at 

 Wagram, and received the title of yyrince of fVagram. 

 In 1810, as proxy of Napoleon, he received the hand 

 of Maria Louisa, daughter of the emperor Francis I., 

 and accompanied her to France. Somewhat later, 

 Napoleon made him colonel-general of the Swiss 

 troops. In 1812, he was with the army in Russia, as 

 chief of the general staff, which post he also held in 

 1813. After Napoleon's abdication, he lost his prin- 

 cipality of Neufchatel, but retained his other honours, 

 and possessed the favour and confidence of Louis 

 XVIII., whom, after Napoleon's return, he accompa- 

 nied to the Netherlands, whence he repaired to his 

 family at Bamberg, where he arrived May 30. After 

 his arrival at this place, he was observed to be sunk 

 in a profound melancholy ; and when, on the after- 

 noon of June 1, the music of the Russian troops, on 

 their march to the French borders was heard at the 

 gates of the city, he put an end to his life by throwing 

 himself from a window of the third story of his palace. 



(See Memoires d? Alexandre Bert/tier, Pr. de Neufcha- 

 tel et de ffagram, Paris, 1826.) He left a son, 

 Alexander (born in 1810), and two daughters. 



BERTHOLLET, Claude Louis, count ; member of the 

 scientific academies at Paris, London, Turin, Haer- 

 lem, &c. ; one of the most eminent theoretical che- 

 mists of our times ; born at Talloire, in Savoy, Dec 

 9, 1748 ; studied medicine at Turin ; went, in 1772, 

 to Paris, where he became connected with Lavoisier ; 

 was admitted, in 1780, a member of the academy ot 

 sciences in that city ; was made, in 1794, professor 

 in the normal school there, and was sent to Italy, in 

 1796, in order to select the monuments that were to 

 be carried to Paris. He followed Bonaparte to 

 Egypt, and returned with him in 1799. After the 

 18th of Brumaire, he was made a member of the 

 senat-conservateur ; afterwards, count and grand 

 officer of the legion of honour. In 1804, Napoleon 

 appointed him senator for the district of Montpellier. 

 In 1813, he received the grand cross of the order of 

 the Reunion. April 1, 1814, however, he voted for 

 the establishment of a provisional government and 

 the dethronement of Napoleon. Louis XVIII. made 

 him a peer; but Napoleon passed him by in 1815. 

 After the restoration of Louis, he took his seat again 

 in the chamber of peers. Among the inventions and 

 new processes with which the sciences and the arts 

 were enriched by him, the most important are those 

 for the charring of vessels to preserve water in ships, 

 for the stiffening and glazing of linen, c., but prin- 

 cipally that for the bleaching of vegetable substances 

 by means of oxymuriatic acid, which, since 1786, 

 has been in general use in France. Besides different 

 essays in the collections of the academy and the in- 

 stitute, he has written several larger works, among 

 \rhich his Kssai de Statique Chimique (1803, 2 vols. ; 

 translated into English, German, and Italian) must 

 be considered as the most important, and as one of 

 the finest productions of our times. The complicated 

 phenomena of chemistry are reduced, in this work, to 

 the strict and simple laws of mechanics. He had also a 

 large share in the reformation of the chemical nomen- 

 clature, as well as in the publication of the work that 

 appeared on this subject in Paris, 1787 Methode de 

 Nomenclature Chhnique. He died in Paris, Nov. 7, 1 822. 



BERTHOPD, Ferdinand, celebrated for his marine 

 chronometers, born at Plancemont, in the county of 

 Neufchatel, in 1727, was destined for the church, 

 but, at the age of sixteen, conceived an irresistible 

 inclination for mechanics. His father caused him to 

 be instructed in the art of watchmaking, and, to af- 

 ford him an opportunity of perfecting his knowledge, 

 sent him to Paris. He resided in this city from 1745, 

 and there made his first marine chronometers, which 

 have been used by French navigators, on so many 

 occasions, for extending and correcting geographical 

 knowledge. He left several works relating to his 

 art. He died in 1807. His nephew, Louis B., his 

 pupil, and the heir of his talents, has extended his 

 improvements still further. His chronometers are in 

 the hands of almost all navigators, and are even 

 more convenient than those ot his uncle. They are 

 famous for accuracy. 



BERTOLI, Giovanni Domenico, count of; was born, 

 in 1676, at Moreto, in Friuli, and is called the 

 patriarch of Aquileia, from having first directed at- 

 tention to the antiquities of that place. The inhabi- 

 tants of Aquileia had been in the habit, for a long 

 time, of building their houses with ruins and remains 

 of art. To prevent further destruction, B., in con- 

 junction with other men of learning and taste, bought 

 all the ancient marbles which were excavated. Mu- 

 ratori and Apostolo Zeno encouraged him in his 

 antiquarian researches and publications. B. died in 

 1758. His most important work is Le Antichita. di 



