Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Armour Plates" to "Arundel, Earls of"
3000. It lies in a pleasant undulating country at an elevation of 900
1344 words | Chapter 119
ft. above the sea. The Evangelical parish church contains some fine
statues by Christian Rauch, and the palace (built 1710-1720), in
addition to a valuable library of 30,000 vols., a collection of coins
and pictures, among the latter several by Angelica Kauffmann. Arolsen is
the birthplace of the sculptor C. Rauch and of the painters Wilhelm and
Friedrich Kaulbach.
ARONA, a town of Piedmont, Italy, in the province of Novara, on the W.
bank of Lake Maggiore, 3 m. from its S. extremity, 23 m. N. of Novara,
and 42 m. N.W. of Milan by rail. Pop. (1901) 4700. It is a railway
centre of some importance on the Simplon line, and is also the southern
terminus of the steamers which ply on Lake Maggiore. The church of S.
Maria contains a fine altar-piece by Gaudenzio Ferrari. On a hill to the
north of the town stands a colossal bronze statue of S. Carlo Borromeo
(born here in 1538), erected in 1697. The pedestal, of red granite, is
42 ft. high, and the statue 70 ft. high; the latter is hollow, and can
be ascended from within.
ARPEGGIO (from Ital. _arpeggiare_, to play upon the harp), in music, the
notes of a chord, played in rapid succession as on a harp, and not
together.
ARPI (Gr. [Greek: Hargorippa]), an ancient city of Apulia, 20 m. W. of
the sea coast, and 5 m. N. of the modern Foggia. The legend attributes
its foundation to Diomedes, and the figure of a horse, which appears on
its coins, shows the importance of horse-breeding in early times in the
district. Its territory extended to the sea, and Strabo says that from
the extent of the city walls one could gather that it had once been one
of the greatest cities of Italy. As a protection against the Samnites
Arpi became an ally of Rome, and remained faithful until after the
battle of Cannae, but Fabius captured it in 213 B.C., and it never
recovered its former importance. It lay on a by-road from Luceria to
Sipontum. No Roman inscriptions have, indeed, been found here, and
remains of antiquity are scanty. Foggia is its medieval representative.
(T. As.)
ARPINO (anc. _Arpinum_), a town of Campania, Italy, in the province of
Caserta, 1475 ft. above sea-level; 12 m. by rail N.W. of Roccasecca, a
station on the railway from Naples to Rome. Pop. (1901) 10,607. Arpino
occupies the lower part of the site of the ancient Volscian town of
Arpinum, which was finally taken from the Samnites by the Romans in 305
B.C. It became a _civitas sine suffragio_, but received full privileges
(_civitas cum suffragio_) in 188 B.C. with Formiae and Fundi; it was
governed as a _praefectura_ until the Social War, and then became a
_municipium_. The ancient polygonal walls, which are still finely
preserved, are among the best in Italy. They are built of blocks of
pudding-stone, originally well jointed, but now much weathered. They
stand free in places to a height of 11 ft., and are about 7 ft. wide at
the top. A single line of wall, with medieval round towers at intervals,
runs on the north side from the present town to Civitavecchia (2055
ft.), on the site of the ancient citadel. Here is the Porta dell' Arco,
a gate of the old wall, with an aperture 15 ft. high, formed by the
gradual inclination of the two sides towards one another. Below Arpino,
in the valley of the Liris, between the two arms of its tributary the
Fibrenus, and 3/4 m. north of Isola del Liri, lies the church of S.
Domenico, which marks the site of the villa in which Cicero was born and
frequently resided. Near it is an ancient bridge, of a road which
crossed the Liris to Cereatae (modern Casamari). The painter Giuseppe
Cesari (1560-1640), more often known as the Cavaliere d' Arpino, was
also born here.
See O.E. Schmidt, _Arpinum, eine topographisch-historische Skizze_
(Meissen, 1900). (T. As.)
ARQUA PETRARCA, a village of Venetia, Italy, in the province of Padua, 3
m. to the S.W. of Battaglia. Pop. (1901) 1573. It is chiefly famous as
the place where Petrarch lived his last few years and died in 1374. His
house still exists, and his tomb, a sarcophagus supported by four short
columns of red marble, stands in front of the church. Near Arqua, on the
banks of the small Lago della Costa, is the site of a prehistoric lake
village, excavations in which have produced interesting results.
See A. Moschetti and F. Cordenone in _Bollettino del Museo Civico di
Padova_, iv. (1901), 102 seq.
ARQUEBUS (also called harquebus, hackbut, &c.), a firearm of the 16th
century, the immediate predecessor of the musket. The word itself is
certainly to be derived from the German Hakenbuhse (mod. Hakenbuchse,
cf. Eng. _hackbut_ and _hackbush_), "hook gun." The "hook" is often
supposed to refer to the bent shape of the butt, which differentiated it
from the straight-stocked hand gun, but it has also been suggested that
the original arquebus had a metal hook near the muzzle, which was used
to grip the wall (or other fixed object) so as to steady the aim and
take up the force of recoil, that from this the name _Hakenbuhse_
spread till it became the generic name for small arms, and that the
original form of the weapon then took the name of _arquebus a croc_. The
French form _arquebuse_ and Italian _arcobugio_, _archibugio_, often and
wrongly supposed to indicate the hackbut's affinity with the crossbow
("hollow bow" or "mouthed bow"), are popular corruptions, the Italian
being apparently the earlier of the two and supplanting the first and
purest French form _haquebut_. Previous to the French wars in Italy,
hand-gun men and even arbalisters seem to have been called arquebusiers,
but in the course of these wars the arquebus or hackbut came into
prominence as a distinct type of weapon. The Spanish arquebusiers, who
used it with the greatest effect in the Italian wars, notably at Bicocca
(1522) and Pavia (1525), are the originators of modern infantry fire
action. Filippo Strozzi made many improvements in the arquebus about
1530, and his weapons were effective up to four and five hundred paces.
He also standardized the calibres of the arquebuses of the French army,
and from this characteristic feature of the improved weapon arose the
English term "caliver." In the latter part of the 16th century (c. 1570)
the arquebus began to be displaced by the musket.
ARQUES-LA-BATAILLE, a village of France, in the department of
Seine-Inferieure, 4 m. S.E. of Dieppe by the Western railway. Pop.
(1906) 1250. Arques is situated near the confluence of the rivers
Varenne and Bethune; the forest of Arques stretches to the north-east.
The interest of the place centres in the castle dominating the town,
which was built in the 11th century by William of Arques; his nephew,
William the Conqueror, regarding it as a menace to his own power,
besieged and occupied it. After frequently changing hands, it came into
the possession of the English, who were expelled in 1449 after an
occupation of thirty years. In 1589 its cannon decided the battle of
Arques in favour of Henry IV. Since 1869 the castle has been state
property. The first line of fortification was the work of Francis I.;
the second line and the donjon date back to the 11th century. The church
of Arques, a building of the 16th century, preserves a fine stone rood
screen, statuary, stained glass and other relics of the Renaissance
period.
ARRACK, RACK or RAK, a generic name applied to a variety of spirituous
liquors distilled in the Far East. According to some authorities the
word is derived from the Arabic _arak_ (perspiration), but according to
others (see Morewood's _History of Inebriating Liquors_, 1834, p. 140)
it is derived from the _areca-nut_, a material from which a variety of
arrack was long manufactured, and is of Indian origin. The liquor to
which this or a similar name is applied is (or was, since the
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