A

IS the first letter of the alphabet in every known language, except that of Ethiopia; Greek name is Alpha, from the Hebrew ep, which is very significant, denoting er an ox or a leader; each a mark of extrace or priority. The first place is deservgiven to this letter on account of its simcity, and the ease with which it is pronounced; the first sound uttered by human catures in their most infantile state, being that by which this letter is expressed.

In the English language this letter has four diferent sounds. The broad sound, as in all, il. The open, as in father, rather. The skender or close, which is the peculiar a of the English, exemplified in place, face, &c. And the short sound, of which we have instances in het, cat, fat.

A, among the Romans, was used in giving rotes. In their Comitia there were two tables: in the one were two letters U. R. uti rogas, signifying the people's assent; in the Er the letter A, i. e. antiquo or antiqua prole, to shew their dissent. In capital causes they had also two tables covered with wax; in one of which was this letter A, i. e. absolvo; in the other C, for condemno; whence the former is by Tully, pro Milone, called salufaris, the latter tristis.

In numerals A denoted 500, and A 5000. In the Julian calendar, A is the first of the seven dominical letters.

Among logicians, it denotes an universal affirmative proposition,

A, as a word, has the following significations: 1. A, an article set before nouns of the singular number; a man, a tree. Before a word beginning with a vowel, it is written an; as, an ox, an egg. 2. A is sometimes a

AAL

noun; as, great A. 3. A is placed before a participle, or participial noun. A hunting Chloe went (Prior). 4. A has a signification denoting proportion. The landlord hath a hundred a year (Addison). 5. A is used in burlesque poetry, to lengthen out a syllable. For cloves and nutmegs to the line-a (Dryden). A is sometimes put for he; as, will a come, for will he come. 7. A, in composition, seems sometimes the French à, and sometimes at, as aside, aslope, aware, a-weary, a-trip. 8. A is sometimes redundant; as arise, arouse, awake; nearly the same with rise, rouse, wake. 9. A, in abbreviations, stands for artium, or arts; as, A. M. artium magister; or anno; as A. D. anno domini.

A, or before a vowel an; in medical and other technical terms, a preposition or prefix, which negatives or reverses the meaning of the radical term itself.

In medical prescriptions, this letter with a dash above it, à, is used for ana, of each.

In music A is the nominal of the sixth note in the diatonic scale: it is also the name of one of the two natural moods.

The chemists use AAA. to denote amalgam or amalgama.

AA, the name of several rivers; as of three in Switzerland; one in France; one in Brabant; one in Russia; and of several of small note in Germany.

AACH, a town of Nellenburgh, in Suabia; it is situated on an eminence (near a river of the same name, which falls into the lake of Zell), fourteen miles N. E. of Schaffhausen. Lat. 47. 55 N. Long. 9 E.

AALBERG, or AALBOURG, capital of a bishopric of the same name in the north part of Jutland. It is situate on the south shore A

ef Lymfort gulf. This ancient city, next to Copenhagen, is the richest and most magnificent in Denmark. Here is an exchange for merchants; and the harbour is deep and secure, but its entrance dangerous. A considerable trade is carried on here in guns, pistols, and gloves. In 1534 it was taken by Clement, the pirate; and in 1643 and 1658 by the Swedes. Lat. 56. 50 N. Lon. 9.47 E. AAM, or HAAM, a liquid measure in common use among the Dutch, containing about 288 English pints.

AAR, the name of two rivers, one in Switzerland, and another in Westphalia in Gernany. It is also the name of a small island in the Baltic.

AARON, (278, an ark, or chest: the name of the ark of the testimony, in which, among the Hebrews, the cherubim stood in the holy of holies.) In Scripture history, the son of Amranand Jochebed, and grandson of Levi; was born A. M. 2430. He was three years older than his brother Moses; and was appointed to aid him as his advocate and interpreter, in the rescue of the Israelites from their Egyptian bondage. The two brothers went together into Egypt; and accomplished their object A. M. 2513. During the peregrination of the Israelites in the Wilderness Aaron and his sons exercised the office of priests by a divine appointment; and, as soon as the tabernacle was built, Aaron was consecrated by Moses. During the continuance of Moses in the mount, whither he went to receive the law, the people became impatient and tumultuous, and Aaron, yielding to their solicitations, melted down their pendents, ear-rings, &c. and formed the golden calf to which they paid homage. He afterwards numbled himself for this offence, obtained forgiveness, and was continued in the priesthood. He was conFrmed in this office by the miracle of the almond-rod, which blossomed, and which was deposited in the most holy place, in order to perpetuate his title, and the remembrance of this prodigy. He married Eliseba, the daughter of Ainminadab, by whom he had four sons: two of these were destroyed by fire; but from the other two the race of the high priests of the Jews was continued from Aaron in regular succession. In consequence of his distrusting God at Meribah, he was debarred from entering Canaan. About a year before the Israelites entered that country, he ascended mount Hor, disrobed himself of the pontifical ornaments, in the view of the people, and put them upon Eleazer his eldest son, and his successor in the high priesthood. He then died in the arms of Moses and his son, at the age of one hundred and twenty-three years; and was buried in a cave of this mountain but the place of his interment was e cealed, probably under an apprehension that in future ages he might boccide an object of superstitious worship.

AARON, a physical writer of the sevent century. He wrote in Syriac several treatises on medicine, entitled the Pandects, of which there are no remains. He was the first author who described the small-pox and measles. He directed the vein under the tongue to be opened in the cure of the jaundice.

AARON, the Caraite, a Jewish physician at Constantinople, in 1294. He wrote a commentary on the Pentateuch, printed at Jena, in folío, 1710, and a Hebrew grammar,

printed at Constantinople, 1581.

AARSENS, or AERSENS (Peter), a celebrated painter, born at Amsterdam, in 1519He painted a noble altar-piece, representing the crucifixion, at Antwerp, which was destroyed by the populace in the insurrection that happened there in 1566. He died in 1585, and left three sons, all eminent painters.

AAVORA, in natural history, the fruit of a sort of large palm tree, in the West Indies, and in Africa, furnishing an astringent beneficial in diarrhoea.

AB, in the Hebrew chronology, the cleventh month of the civil year, and the fifth of the ecclesiastical year, which begins with Nisan. The month Ab answers to the moon of July, and contained thirty days. In the Syriac calendar, Ab is the name of the last summer month.

AB, at the beginning of the names of places, generally shows that they have some relation to an abbey, as Abingdon (Gilson).

ABACĂ, a kind of flax or hemp, obtained from the Manillas, or Philippine islands.

ABACINARE, a species of punishment used in the middle ages; in which criminals were blinded, by having hot metal held before

their eves.

ABACK. ad. (from back.) Backward (Spenser).

ABACOT, the name of an ancient cap of state worn by the kings of England, the upper part whereof was in the form of a double

crown.

ABACTORS, or ABACTORES, a name given to those who drive away, or rather steal, cattle by herds. They are distinguished from fures, or thieves.

ABACUS, in midwifery, forcibly expelled: (from the Latin, abigo, a miscarriage, produced by violence.)

ABACUS, (as, from pas, dust, Hebrew.) A table containing medical preparations: such tables, whether for medicine or other sciences, having formerly been projected on surfaces of sand or dust.

ABACUS & palmula, in the ancient music, denote the machinery, whereby the strings of the instruments were struck, with a plectrum made of quills. Sometimes also abacus signified a kind of key-board, an instrument for dividing the intervals of the octave.

ABACUS, in architecture, the superior

member of the capital, to which it serves as a kind of crown. It was originally intended to represent a square tile laid over a basket; and it sull retains its original form in the Tuscan, Doric, and Ionic orders; but in the Corinthian and composite, its four sides or faces are arched inwards, having some ornament, as a rose or other flower in the middle. This term is also used for a concave moulding on the capital of the Tuscan pedestal. And Palladio calls the plinth above the echinus in the Tuscan and Dorie orders by the same name.

ABACUS, PYTHAGOREAN, so denominated from its inventor, Pythagoras; a table of numbers, contrived for readily learning the principles of arithmetic; and was probably what we now call the multiplication table.

ABACUS LOGISTICUS is a right angled trianzie, whose sides, about the right angle, conuin all the numbers from 1 to 60; and its arca the products of each two of the opposite numbers. This is called a canon of sexagesimals, and is no other than a multiplicationtable carried to 60 both ways.

ABADIR, in the Roman mythology, is the name of a stone which Saturn swallowed, by the contrivance of his wife Ops, believing it in be his new-born infant son Jupiter: hence it ridiculously became the object of regions worship.

ABAFT. a. (of abartan, Sax.) From the fore part of the ship, toward the stern.

ABAFT THE BEAM, denotes the relative situation of any object with the ship, when it is placed in that part of the horizon which is contained between a line at right angles with the keel, and that point of the compass which is directly opposite to the ship's course.

ABAGI, a silver coin in Persia, is equivalent to four sains, to thirty-six sols, old French money, or about seventeen pence Eng

lish.

To ABA'LIENATE. v. a. (abalieno, Lat.) To make that another's which was our own before.

ABALIENATION. s. (al alieratio, Lat.) The act of giving up one's right to another.

To ABANDON. v. a. (abandonner, Fr.) 1. To give up, resign, or quit (Dryden). 2. To desert; to forsake (Shakspeare). 3. To forsake; to leave (Spenser).

ABANDONED. part. a. Corrupted in the highest degree.

ABANDONMENT. s. (abandonnement, Fr.) The act of abandoning.

ABANET, (acam, from x, Hebrew, the girdle worn by the Jewish priests.) In old medicine, a bandage for the waist.

ABANGA. Sce ADY.

ABAPTISTON, or ABAPTISTA, in surgery, the saw terebella, or perforating part of the instrument called the trepan. It is derived from the negative a and Buttw, I immerge. See TREPAN.

ABARTICULATION. s. (from ab, from,

and articulus, a joint, Lat.) That species of articulation that has manifest motion.

A'BAS. 1. The tania, or tape-worm. 2. The epilepsy, as an effect often hence produced."

ABAS, a weight used in Persia, for weighing pearls.

To ABASE. v. a. (abaisser, Fr.) To cast down, to depress, to bring low (Sidney). ABASEMENT. s. The state of being brought low; depression (Ecclesiasticus). To ABASH. v. a. (See BASHFUL.) To make ashamed (Milton).

ABA'SSA, a silver coin current in Persia, worth about thirty-eight sols, or eighteen pence English.

ABA'SSIA, the modern name of a kingdom in Ethiopia Proper: is it large, mountainous, and comprehends the provinces of Bagemeder, Golam, Waleka, Shewa, &c.

To ABATE. v. a. (from the French abbatre.) 1. To lessen; to diminish (Davies). 2. To deject, or depress the mind (Dryden). 3. To let down the price in selling. 4. (la common law) To abate a writ, is, by some exception, to defeat or overthrow it (Cowell). TO ABATE. v. n. To grow less (Dryden). ABATE, in the mange signifies, that a horse when working upon curvets, puts both his hind legs to the ground at once, and observes the same exactness at all the times.

ABATELEMENT, a term used for a prohibition of trade to French merchants in the ports of the Levant, who will not stand to their bargains, or who refused to pay their debts.

1.

ABATEMENT. s. (abatément, Fr.) The act of abating (Locke). 2. The state of being abated (Arbuth.). 3. The sum or quantity taken away by the act of abating (Locke). 4. The cause of abating; extenuation (Atterbury).

ABATEMENT, in heraldry, an accidental figure supposed to have been added to coats of arms, in order to denote some dishonourable demeanour or stain, whereby the dignity of coat-armour was rendered of less esteem.

ABATEMENT, in law, the rejecting a suit through some fault either in the matter or proceeding. Among traders, the same with rebate or discount.

ABATER. 3. The agent or cause by which an abatement is procured (Arbuthnot). ABATIS, an ancient term for an officer of the stables.

ABATIS, in fortification, a range of large trees laid side by side with their boughs outwards, to hinder the approaches of an enemy.

ABATOR, in law, a term applied to a per son who enters to a house or lands void by the death of the last possessor, before the true heir.

ABATOS, an island in the Lake Maris, in Egypt, famous for being the sepulchre of Osiris, and for producing the reed papyrus, of which the ancients made their paper.

A BATTUTA, in music. An expression