jr 8 A iVI B 
direft manner of expreffion.—They gave thofe complex 
ideas names, that they might the more ealily record and 
difcourfe of things they were daily converfant in, without 
long ambages and circumlocutions ; and that the things they 
were continually to give and receive information about, 
might be the eafier and quicker tmderrtood. Locke. 
AMB A'GIOUS, ad], [from ambages, Lat.] Circumlo¬ 
cutory; perplexed; tedious. 
AMBAMAR'jAM, or Amba'ra, the capital of Abyf- 
finia, near the head of the Nile. Lat.13.12.N. Ion.35.14.E. 
AMBAPA'YA,/. in botany. See Carica. 
AMB ARVA'LIA,y. [of ambio, to furround, and arva, 
Lat. the grounds.] A lead: inhonourof Ceres, celebrated 
by the ancient Remans to obtain a good harvefi of the 
gods. They facrificed a heifer according to Virgil, but 
Tibullus fays a lamb, which was. carried three times in 
proceffion about their fields. This fefiival was generally 
kept at the time of the harvefi, and fometimes w hen the 
product of the earth was in danger. It was fometimes ce¬ 
lebrated at Rome, and the prietls who performed the ce¬ 
remonies were called arvales. 
AMB ASSA'DE,/". \_ambajfade, Fr.] Embaffy; charac¬ 
ter or bufinefs of an ambaffador. A word not now in ufe: 
When you difgrac’d me in my ambaffade. 
Then I degraded you from being king. Shakefpeare. 
AMB AS'SADORyi \_awibaJJ'adeur, Fr. rmbaxador , Span. 
It is written differently, as it is fuppofed to come from 
the French or Spanifli language ; and the original deriva¬ 
tion being uncertain, it is not eafy to fettle' its orthogra¬ 
phy. Some derive it from tjie Hebrew nra, to tell, and 
•wic a melfenger; others from ambaElus, which in the 
old Gaulilh fignified a fervant; whence ambafeia, in low 
Latin, is found to fignify fervice, and ambafeiator, a fer¬ 
vant; others deduce it from ambacht, in old Teutonic, 
fignifying a government, and Junius mentions a polfibility 
of its defeent from a.tnx.Qcavcj ; and others from am for ad, 
and bajjus, low, as fuppofing the aft of fending an ambaf¬ 
fador, to be in forne fort an aft of fubmifiion. All thefe 
derivations lead to writ c ambajjador, not mbaJfador.~\ A 
perfon fent in a public manner from one fovereign power 
to another, and fuppofed to reprefent the power from 
which he is fent. The perfon of an ambaffador is invio¬ 
lable. Ambafiadors are either ordinary or extraordinary. 
Ambafiador in ordinary, is he who conftantly refides in 
the court of another prince, to maintain a good under- 
ftanding, and look to the interefi of his mafter. Till a- 
bout 200 years ago, ambafiadors in ordinary were not 
heard of : all, till then, were ambafiadors extraordinary; 
that is, fuch as are fent on fome particular occafion, and 
who retire as foon as tlie affair is difpatched. By the law 
of nations, none under the quality of a fovereign prince 
can fend or receive an ambaffador. At Athens, ambafia¬ 
dors mounted the pulpit of the public orators, and there 
opened their commiffion, acquainting the people with their 
errand. At Rome, they were introduced to the fenate, 
and delivered their eommiffions to the fathers. 
Ambafiadors fliould never attend any public folemnities, 
as marriages, funerals, &c. unlefs their inafters have fome 
interefi therein : nor muft they go into mourning on any 
occafion of their own, becaufe they reprefent the perfon of 
their prince. By* the civil law, all writs and precedes, 
whereby the perfon of any ambafiador or other public mi- 
tiifter of any foreign prince or ftate, or of any of his. do- 
meftics or domeftic fervants, may be arrefted, or his goods 
diftrained, fliall be void. Provided, that no merchant or 
other trader, within the defeription of any of the ftatutes 
againft bankrupts, (hall have any benefit of this aft ; nor 
any fervant of an ambafiador, unlefs the name of fuch 
fervant be regiffered in the office of one of the fecretaries 
of ftate, and by him tranfmitted to the ffieriffs of London 
and Middlefex. 7 An.c. 12. 
Generally, the rights, powers, duties, and privileges, 
of ambafiadors, are determined by the law of nature and 
{.aliens, and not by any municipal conftitutions: for, as 
A M B 
they reprefent the perfons of their refpeftive mafters, who 
owe no fubjeftion to any laws but thofe of their own coun¬ 
try, their aftions are not fubjeft to the controul of the 
private law’ of that ftate wherein they are appointed to re'- 
fide. 1 Black. 253. 
If an ambaffador grofsly offends, or makes an ill ufe of 
his charafter, he may be fent home, and accufed before 
his mafter, who is bound either to do juftice upon him, or 
avow hin>felf the accomplice of his crimes; but the ge¬ 
neral praftice throughout Europe feems now to be, not to 
punifit him in the country where he executes the funftion 
of ambaffador. Id. 
AMBAS'SADRESS ,_/1 \_ambajfadrice, Fr.] The lady 
of an ambaffador. In ludicrous language, a woman lent 
on a metfage: 
Well, my ambajfadrefs - 
Come you to menace war, and loud defiance >. 
Or does the peaceful olive grace your brow. Rowe. 
AM'BASSAGE,/. [from ambaffador.^ An embaffay ; 
the bufinefs ot ambafiador.—Maximilian entertained them 
with dilatory anfvvers ; fo as the formal part of their am- 
baffage might well warrant their further (lay. Bacon. 
AMBAY'BA,yi in botany. See Cecropia. 
AM'BE, [aqw£u, Gr.] The ridge or edge of a hill. In 
furgery, a luperficial jutting out of the bones. 
A mb e, or Am b 1, aninftrument ufed in diftocations of the 
humerus. Hippocrates has taken notice of it in his treatife- 
de Articul. feft. vi. and it is called Hippocrates’s ambe. 
Galen explains the word ambe, by eTraiwrcurii;, 
“an eminence like a border and fays, that the whole 
ol the machine takes that name, becaufe its extremity 
runs out with an edge like the lip or brim of a pot towards 
the interior cavity, which, as w’ell as the edge or border 
of any thing on the top or extremity, are fignified by the 
word ambe. When the head of the humerus refts in the 
axilla, this inftrument is fometimes of fervice, but in no 
other cafe ; and even here it is rarely ufed, for, when gen¬ 
tle methods fail, violence feldom lucceeds. 
AM'BEL, f. in botany. See NymphyEA. 
AMBELA'NIA, in botany. See Wi llughbeia. 
Svccinum AM'BER,_/! \_ambre, Fr. ambar, Lat. of 
Gr.] A folid, hard, femipellucid, bituminous, fubftance, 
of a particular nature, of ufe in medicine and in feveral of 
the arts. Amber has been of great repute in the w'orld 
from the earlieft times. Plato, Ariftotle, Herodotus, fEf- 
chylus, and others, have commended its virtues. In the 
times of the Romans, it became in high efteem as a gem ; 
and in the luxurious reign of Nero, immenfe quantities of 
it were brought to Rome, and ufed for ornamenting works 
of various kinds. The molt remarkable property of this 
fubftance is, that when rubbed it draws or attrafts other 
bodies to it: and this, it is obferved, it does even to thofe 
fubftances w'hich the ancients thought it had an antipathy 
to ; as oily bodies, drops of water, human fweat, See. 
By friction it is brought to yield light pretty copioufty in 
the dark ; whence it is reckoned among the native phof- 
phori. The property which amber poffeftes, of attrafting 
light bodies, was very anciently obferved. Thales of Mile¬ 
tus, 600 years before Chrift, concluded from hence, that it 
was animated. But the firft perfon who exprefsly mentions 
this fubftance, is Theophraftus, about the year 300 before 
Chrift. The attraftive property of amber is likewife occa- 
fionally taken notice of by Pliny, and other later natural- 
ifts, particularly by Gaffendus, Kenelm Digby, and Sir 
Thomas Brown ; but it is generally apprehended that this 
quality was peculiar to amber and jet, and perhaps agate, 
till Gilbert publiffied his treatife De Magnete, in the year 
1600. From rMy.rpev, the Greek name for amber, is de¬ 
rived the term eleElricily, which is now* very extenfively 
applied, not only to the power of attrafting light bodies 
inherent in amber, but to other fimilar powers, and their 
various eftefts, in whatever bodies they relide, or to what¬ 
ever bodies they may be communicated. 
Amber affumes all figures in the ground; that of a 
pear, 
