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7 inches wide and 24 inches thick, which, when planed up and shot, are cut into two boards each 1 inch thick. Such battens are used for the best floors; but in attics, and rooms of less importance, for economy, the batten is cut into three boards. When used for walls, the 7 and 2 inch battens are cut into six pieces lengthways, being then something less than 2 inches wide and 1 inch thick, allowance being made for the sawing. Battens are usually placed at the distance of seven inches asunder, but sometimes eleven or twelve, which is, however, considered slight work; if double laths are used, it will then be sufficiently strong to carry the plaster. The battens are nailed to the bondtimbers of the wall; or, if there are no bond timbers, to wooden plugs placed at equal distances. Walls of brick and stone, when not sufficiently dry to be finished in the usual way, require battens for the lath and plaster; and it is of the utmost importance to employ battens in exposed situations, especially on the sea coast, where the driving rains will often penetrate the walls.

Battens from the British possessions in North America, when 6 and not exceeding 16 feet long, nor above 7 inches wide and not above 2 inches thick, pay a duty of 1. per 120. Battens of the same dimensions from foreign countries pay 10%. per 120. The duty increases with the length, and also with the thickness, of the battens. The net revenue from battens in 1833 was 116,215. The difference between battens and deals is this: battens are never, and deals are always, above seven inches wide. Battens are always at least six feet long, and batten-ends always under that length. The duty on battens and batten-ends is different: battens, 17. British North American, 107. foreign; batten-ends, 78. 6d. American, 31. foreign. (Government Statistical Tables, 1834.) The best battens are from Christiania; the worst, from America,

BATTERING-RAM. [See ARTILLERY.] BATTERSEA, a parish in the county of Surrey, situated four miles south-west of St. Paul's Cathedral, and forming one of the suburbs of the metropolis. In Domesday Book it is called Patricesy, and as the same survey mentions that it belonged to the abbey of St. Peter, Westminster, this probably indicates the true etymology of the name. The parish comprehends an area of 3020 acres, pretty equally divided between arable land and pasture. Much of the former is occupied by market-gardeners, Battersea being specially noted for the quantity of vegetable produce which it raises for the London market. The manor of Battersea was given by the Conqueror to Westminster Abbey in exchange for Windsor; after the dissolution of monasteries the manor passed through various hands, and in the year 1627 it was granted by the king to Oliver St. John, Viscount Grandison, from whom it descended to the celebrated St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, and in 1763 was purchased of the St. John family in trust for John Viscount Spencer, and is now the property of the present Earl Spencer. A church is mentioned in Domesday Book, but the existing parish church is a modern structure, opened in 1777. It is situated on the banks of the Thames, and is of brick, with a tower and small conical spire. It has neither aisles nor chancel. A new church has recently been erected by the commissioners for building churches. The living of Battersea is a vicarage in the diocese of Winchester, rated in the king's books at 13. 15s. 24d. The tithes which accrue from the gardens render the living one of the most valuable in the neighbourhood of London. Battersea lies too low on the Thames to be one of the most agreeable suburbs of London for residence; it nevertheless contains a large number of respectable houses and neat villas. Lord Bolingbroke was born and died in the family mansion at Battersea, of which Pope was a frequent inmate. The house was very large, having forty rooms on a floor; but it has long since been taken down and the site otherwise appropriated. The village possesses a free school, which was endowed by Sir Walter St. John, in 1700, for twenty boys; and both he and his lady afterwards left further sums for apprenticing some of the number. Battersea is connected with Chelsea by a wooden bridge across the Thames, crected in 1771. The population of this extensive parish was 5540 in 1831, of whom 3021 were females. (Lyson's Environs of London.) BATTERY, in Law. [See ASSAULT.]

BATTERY. This name is given to any number of pieces of ordnance placed behind an Epaulement, or elevation of earth, either to destroy the works or dismount the artillery of an enemy.

It may be said that the antients made use of a species of ordnance in the operations of attack and defence; and the battering-rams, the balista, and the catapulta, which, when placed on the natural ground, or in buildings of timber, or elevated on mounds of earth, served the besiegers to demolish the walls of fortresses, or to drive the defenders from them, may be considered as corresponding to the guns, mortars, &c., which constitute the armament of a modern battery. Vitruvius states (De Architecturâ, lib. x.) that Cetras of Chalcedon was the first who covered the ram with a shed, in order to secure the men who worked it from the arrows, darts, and stones thrown by the enemy; and he adds, that the construction of the shed was subsequently improved by the engineers of Philip and Alexander. The testudines and helépoles were buildings of this nature, for the protection of the men and military engines, and in this respect they correspond to the épaulemens which cover the ordnance at present employed in the attack of a fortress. (See the description of the helépolis (¿Aéroλis) of Demetrius, Plutarch, Life of Demetrius, cap. 21.)

While the same species of artillery continued to be used in warfare, it is evident that no material change could take place in the nature of the edifices constructed to cover it; but from the epoch of the invention of gunpowder, the wooden sheds or towers were superseded by masses of earth, whose thickness was necessarily made greater than the depth to which a cannon-shot can penetrate into them. In modern times the designation of a battery varies with the purposes to be accomplished, the nature of the ordnance employed, and the manner in which the firing may be made. A breaching battery is one which may be placed at between 50 and 1000 yards from any wall or rampart, in order to demolish it; and the effect is produced by firing directly, or, as it is called, point blanc at the object: such a battery generally has its front parallel to the face of the wall to be breached.

An enfilading battery is one whose epaulement is perpendicular to the produced line of the enemy's rampart; so that the shot from the guns may graze the interior side of that rampart or its parapet, in the direction of its length. When shot discharged from pieces of ordnance make successive rebounds along the ground, the firing is said to be à ricochet and the battery a ricochetting battery; and this mode of firing is employed when it is intended to dismount artillery by enfilading a rampart. The effect is produced by giving to the axis of the gun an elevation of between six and nine degrees above a line passing from its chamber through the crest of the enemy's parapet in front; and, according to the latest experiments, the distance at which a battery should be placed from the nearest extremity of the rampart to be enfiladed by ricochet firing is between 400 and 600 yards at a greater distance than the latter much of the ammunition would be expended without effect.

A gun battery is one in which guns only are employed, for either of the purposes above mentioned, or to defend any ground, by a fire of round, or solid shot.

A howitzer battery, is one in which howitzers are employed. This species of ordnance throws shells, or hollow shot, generally at a small elevation of the axis to the horizon; and it serves to produce, by the bursting of the shells, a breach in a rampart of earth; or, when fired à ricochet, to destroy the pallisades or other obstacles which might impede the troops in assaulting an enemy's work. Howitzers are also used in conjunction with guns, to form breaches in ramparts of brick or stone.

A mortar battery is one in which shells are thrown from mortars at a great elevation of the axis of the piece; so that, by the momentum acquired in falling, they may crush the roofs, and by their explosion complete the destruction of magazines or other buildings. This is called a vertical fire. By employing large charges of powder, a very extensive range has been produced by mortars; for, at the siege of Cadiz, during the late war, the French are said to have sent shells to the distance of more than three miles from the battery.

When the battery is mounted on a natural or artificial eminence, in order to allow the guns to fire from above downward, or to make what is called a plunging fire against or into the works of the enemy, it constitutes a cavalier battery; and when the guns are elevated on a platform, or on tall carriages, so as to be enabled to fire over the superior surface of the parapet or epaulement, the battery is said to be en barbette. This kind of battery is

usually executed at the most advanced points of a fortress, for the purpose of allowing considerable variation in the direction of the artillery towards the right or left; by which means the reconnoitring parties of the besiegers may be annoyed while at a distance and in motion.

In the formation of any of the field batteries above mentioned, while they are beyond the range of the enemy's musketry, they may be executed without cover for the working parties, like any simple breast-work, after the outline has been traced on the ground by the engineers; but, when the men employed in the work would be much exposed to annoyance from the enemy's fire, it becomes necessary that they should be protected by a mask of gabions. [See GABION.] These being planted on their bases along the exterior side of the intended trench in front of the battery, form a cover, even while empty, which a musket-ball cannot pierce. Within this line of gabions the excavation is commenced, and part of the earth obtained from the trench is thrown into and beyond the gabions, till the covering mass is thick enough, if necessary, to be proof against a cannon ball: the men thus work in comparative security to raise the epaulement with earth, which they do generally to the height of about seven feet from the ground, and to the thickness of eighteen or twenty feet, not including the breiths of the slopes given to the exterior and interior sides. The exterior slope is generally left with that inclination which earth, when thrown up, naturally assumes, that is at about 45° to the horizon; but the interior slope being necessarily more steep, in order to allow the guns to be brought close up to it, is retained by a revêtement or covering, either of fascines [see FASCINES] or bags of earth.

The embrazures, or openings in the epaulement, through which the guns are to fire, are, at the neck or interior extremity, about two feet wide, and at the exterior about half the thickness of the epaulement: each of their sides or cheeks has a small declination from a vertical plane, so that the breadth of the opening at top is rather greater than at the bottom, or on what is called the sole of the embrazure, in order that the flame from the muzzle of the gun may be less liable to damage those sides: for the same reason the latter are lined with fascines, or, which is preferred, with gabions, at the neck of the embrazure. The interval between two embrazures is called a merlon; and the part between the sole and the ground within the battery is called the genouillère.

The guns rest on platforms, generally of timber, either of a rectangular or dovetailed figure, about fourteen feet long and seven feet wide; each of these is constructed by embedding five sleepers in the ground, in the direction of its length, and covering them with planks, which are closely fitted to each other, and fastened down by screws.

Besides the epaulement in front of the battery, a wing is constructed of the same materials on each side, in order to protect the interior from any enfilading fire of the enemy. A magazine is always formed either within or near the rear of the battery, to contain the ammunition for its service; this is generally a rectangular pit sunk to about three feet below, with sides and a roof of timber rising about as much above, the natural ground: the roof is covered with earth of a thickness which may be capable of resisting the momentum of a shell, and the descent to the floor of the magazine is by an inclined plane towards the rear. Traverses, or elevations of earth, secured at the sides generally by gabions, are formed at intervals in the interior of the battery, to afford protection for the men against such shot or shells of the enemy as may fall there.

Howitzer and mortar batteries are executed nearly in the same manner as the others, but the former of these seldom, and the latter never, have embrazures; the level of their interior is also generally sunk three feet below that of the natural ground, consequently no trench is required on their exterior to furnish earth, which can be obtained in sufficient quantity from within.

BATTICALO'A, an island situated near the entrance of an inlet of the sea, on the east coast of Ceylon, 7° 44' N. lat., 81° 52′ E. long. It contains a small fort and garrison, and is the head station of the assistant government agent of the district of Batticaloa. The island cannot be approached by ships of any size, as the entrance to the inlet, which extends north and south nearly thirty miles, is closed by a bar, over which the depth of water is only six feet. The country in the immediate neighbourhood of Batticaloa is flat and fertile; some scattered hills appear in the dis

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tance, among which two called Friar's Hood and Funnel Hill, serve as excellent landmarks to those who are sailing round the island of Ceylon. It was here that the Dutch admiral Spilbergen landed, in 1602, when a communication was first opened between the King of Candy and Holland. At that time this district was under the immediate rule of a petty prince, who seems to have owed a divided allegiance to the Portuguese and the Candian emperor.

Batticaloa is also the name of a district of Ceylon, now under the charge of an assistant government agent, comprising an area of 13,060 square miles, the population of which, according to the census of 1832, amounted to 29,424. BATTICE, a commune and market-town in the province of Liége, situated three leagues N.N.W. of Verviers, and bounded on the north hy the communes of Mortier, St. André, and Charneux; on the east by that of Thimister; on the south by those of Dison, Petit Rechain, Grand Rechain, and Xhendelesse; and on the west by Soumagne, Melin, and Bolland. The town has a weekly grain-market which is much frequented, and two fairs are held there on the 15th May and 15th November every year. The country is well watered by numerous small streams. The soil is generally a sandy clay, and in some parts is stony; it produces rye, barley, spelt-wheat, oats, beans, and trefoil. A considerable quantity of butter and cheese are made and sent away, partly to other districts and partly to foreign countries. Some coal-mines, which are opened in this district, and cloth-weaving, furnish employment for a considerable part of the inhabitants. A description of sand is found in one part of the commune, very useful in making cement for plasterer's work. There are three very old castles, those of Crèvecœur, Bosmel, and Xhéneumont; the two latter are now occupied as farm-houses: population 4280. (Meisser's Dictionnaire Géographique de la Province de Liége.) BATTLE, or BATTEL, a parish and market-town in the hundred of the same name in the rape of Hastings, county of Sussex. It is fifty-two miles S.E. from London, in a pleasant country, where the land rises in wooded swells The name of the place was antiently Epiton, and acquired the present denomination in consequence of the great battle between the English and Normans, in which the former were defeated, and their king (Harold) killed, on the 14th October, 1066. The Conqueror commenced, in the following year, an abbey upon the site where the battle had raged most fiercely, the high altar of its church being upon the precise spot where, according to some authorities, Harold was killed, or where, as others say, his standard was taken. But as the whole neighbourhood does not afford any other spot equally eligible for such a structure, Mr. Gilpin is of opinion that accident did not determine the precise spot, though it might the general situation of the erection. When the abbey church was finished, the Conqueror made an offering of his sword and coronation robe at the high altar, in which was also deposited the famous roll or table of all the Normans of consequence who attended William to England. Copies of this catalogue have been preserved; but modern antiquarians in general concur in the opinion of Dugdale, that the list was often falsified and altered by the monks to gratify persons who wished to be considered of Norman extraction. The abbey was dedicated by the founder to St. Martin, and filled, in the first instance, with Benedictine monks from that of Marmontier in Normandy. All the land for a league around the house was given to it, besides various churches and manors in different counties, which were enlarged by royal and private donations in subsequent reigns. Its prerogatives and immunities were placed on the same footing with those of Christ Church, Canterbury; the monks and their tenants were exempt from episcopal and other ecclesiastical jurisdiction; they had the exclusive right of inquest in all murders committed within their lands, the property of all treasure discovered on their estates, the right of free warren, and the church was made a sanctuary in cases of homicide, besides other privileges. The abbot, who was mitred, and a peer in parliament, had also the royal power of pardoning any condemned thief whom he should pass or meet on going to execution. In the reign of Edward III. the abbot obtained the king's leave to fortify the abbey. The Conqueror's intention seems to have been that the foundation should maintain 140 monks, but provision does not appear to have been actually made for more than sixty. At the dissolution of the monastery, in the 26th of Henry VIII., its income was valued at 8807. 14s. 74d., according to Dugdale, or 9877. 08. 101d., according to Speed.

A pension of 667. 138. 4d. was settled upon the abbot, with smaller sums on sixteen other officers and monks. The site and demesnes of the abbey were given to a person named Gilmer, who pulled down a considerable portion of the buildings in order to dispose of the materials. He afterwards sold the estate to Sir Anthony Browne, who began to convert part of the abbey into a mansion, which was finished by his son, the first Lord Montague. This afterwards fell to decay; and when the property was sold to Sir Thomas Webster, the ancestor of Sir Godfrey Webster, the existing proprietor, the present dwelling was erected on one side of the quadrangle of which the old abbey appears to have consisted.

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Battle Abbey stands on a gentle rise, with a fine sweep before it of meadows and woods, confined by wooded hills, which form a valley winding towards Hastings, and there meeting the sea. The ruins show the antient magnificence of the structure; their circuit is computed at about a mile, and Gilpin considers that the style proves that the greater part must have been rebuilt in the time of the later Henries, when our architecture began to assume a lighter and more embellished form. The remains occupy three sides of a large quadrangle, the fourth having probably been taken down to admit a view of the country when what is now the middle side was converted into a dwelling. The two wings are in ruins. The side of the quadrangle that faces the town contains the grand entrance, which is a large square building, embattled at the top with a handsome octagon tower at each corner. The front is adorned with a series of arches and neat pilasters; and this entrance is altogether a very rich and elegant specimen of Gothic architecture. This pile is locally called the Castle, and until 1794, when the roof fell in and rendered it unfit for the purpose, it was used as a town-ball by the people of Battle. The side of the quadrangle opposite this entrance consists only of two long, low, parallel walls, which formerly supported a row of chambers, and terminated in two elegant turrets. The remaining side, which forms the existing mansion, has undergone the greatest dilapidations. Here stood the abbey church, though the ground-plan cannot now be traced; the only vestiges of it are nine elegant arches, which seem to have belonged to the inside of a cloister; they are now filled up, and appear on the outside of the house. Contiguous to the great church are the ruins of a hall, which appears to have been the refectory in ordinary use by the monks. There is another building of the same kind a little detached from the abbey, and which is of great beauty, although its dimensions, 166 feet by 35, are not in good proportion. It has twelve windows on one side and six on the other, and is strongly buttressed on the outside. This appears of older date than the remaining portions of the abbey it is now used as a barn; its original purpose was probably to accommodate the numerous tenants to whom the monks gave entertainments at stated times. The floor of the hall is raised, and there is an ascent to it by a flight of steps. Underneath are crypts of freestone divided by elegant pillars and springing arches, which form a curious vaulted building, now converted into a stable.

The town of Battle owes its origin to the abbey. Under the encouragement of the monks, houses to the number of 150 were gradually erected in the vicinity; and to the town thus formed, a market, to be held on Sundays, was granted by Henry I. At the commencement of the seventeenth century Anthony Viscount Montague obtained an act of parliament for changing the market-day to Thursday, on which it is still held. The present town consists of one street, running along a valley from north-west to south-east. The church is dedicated to St. Mary, and is a very handsome edifice, consisting of a nave, chancel, two aisles, and a substantial tower. The windows of the north aisle are decorated with numerous figures, portraits, and devices in painted glass. The incumbent is styled Dean of Battle,' though the living is, in fact, a vicarage in the archdeaconry of Lewes and diocese of Chichester, charged in the king's book at 247. 138. 4d. The lord of the manor is patron. The number of houses in the parish was 515 in 1831, when the population amounted to 2999 persons, of whom 1538 were females. The only manufacture for which the place is remarkable is the excellent gunpowder, well known to sportsmen by the name of Battle powder. It is considered to be surpassed only by that of Dartford: there are several extensive mills in the neighbourhood for the manufacture of it. Besides the weekly market, there is one on

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the second Tuesday of every month for cattle, at which, as well as at the fairs, on Whit-Monday and 22nd November, considerable business is transacted. The town possesses a charity-school for forty boys. The Burrell MSS. in the British Museum state that the hundred of Battle is a franchise, the inhabitants whereof are exempt from attending assizes and sessions, or serving on juries, and the lord appoints a coroner thereof. The petty sessions are holden at Battle.

(Camden's Britannia; Dugdale's Monasticon; Gilpin's Observations on the Coasts of Hampshire, Sussex, and Kent; Pennant's Journey from London to the Isle of Wight.) BATTLE-AXE, a military weapon of offence used in different countries from the remotest times. Sir Samuel Meyrick says, as it was suggested by, so it immediately followed, the invention of the hatchet. The two Greek names for the battle-axe àžívŋ (axine), and wiλɛKvç (pélekus), occur in Homer in the same verse, Il. O. l. 711. What was the precise difference between the two weapons we are not told by antient writers, but it seems probable that the axine was similar to our hatchet, while the pelekus, which is usually translated in Latin by bipennis, had evidently two heads or edges; for Homer mentions another instrument of the same kind in the 23rd book of the Iliad, called 'Huriλekov (hemipelekon), or the half-axe. Suidas interprets Ημιπέλεκα (hemipeleka), by ai povóoroμoi àžívaι, one-edged axes. (See Kuster's note on 'Héλera.) The pelekus, or bipennis, was also called securis Amazonica, the Amazonian axe, from its having been supposed to have been used by those female warriors. The best representation of the antient form of this bipennis is probably to be found in Petit's Dissertatio de Amazonibus, 8vo. Amst. 1687, where it appears on the reverse of a coin of Thyatira, as well as upon the reverses of two coins of Marcus Aurelius. Numerous other coins of great antiquity bearing the bipennis are referred to in Rasche's Lexicon Rei Nummariæ, tom. i. col. 502, et seq.; Supplem. tom. i. p. 596.

Among the nations and tribes who joined the great expedition of Xerxes, we find battle-axes among the Sacæ (Herodot. vii. c. lxiv.), and the Egyptians (ibid. c. lxxxix.). Brennus, at the siege of the Roman capitol by the Gauls, was armed with a battle-axe. The Vindelici fought against Drusus with the battle-axe. (Horat. Carm. iv. 4.) Tacitus, speaking of a later period (Hist. ii. 42), describes Otho's forces as cutting through helmets and breastplates with their swords and axes (gladiis et securibus). În the Roman armies, however, we do not find the battle-axe in ordinary use. It seems to have been considered as the weapon more peculiarly used by uncivilized nations. Ammianus Marcellinus (fol. Par. 1681, lib. xix. c. vi.), under the year 359, describes a body of Gauls as furnished with battle-axes and swords.

The introduction of the battle-axe into this country has been frequently attributed to the Danes; but proofs of an earlier use of it in our islands are deducible. Mr. Hayman Rooke, in a memoir printed in the Archæologia of the Society of Antiquaries, has engraved a fragment of a battleaxe found among some Druidical remains at Aspatria in Cumberland, in June, 1789 (Archæol. vol. x. p. 113); and in the same volume, pl. xl., are two representations of the old Galwegian bill or battle-axe, each two feet six inches long, found in a moss near Terreagles. Remains of others are stated to have been found among the barrows on the downs of Wiltshire, and in the north of Scotland. The Danes and Norwegians, however, probably made more use of this instrument than any other nations of their time.

At the battle of Stamford Bridge, between Harold of England and Harold Harfager of Norway, when the Norwegians gave way and the English pursued them, a total stop is stated to have been put to the pursuit for some hours by the desperate boldness of a single Norwegian, who defended the pass of the bridge with his battle-axe. He killed more than forty of the English, and was himself at last slain only by stratagem. (Hen. Huntingt. 1. vii. 211.)

That the battle-axe was used in England in the Saxon times we have the authority of different MSS. of the ninth century, and the English are represented as using it, in the Bayeux tapestry. The pole-axe, with an edge on one side and a sharp point on the other, is believed to have come in with the Normans.

When King Stephen was taken prisoner by the Earl of Gloucester, we are told by Gervas of Canterbury that he

had broken his battle-axe in pieces before he took to his | he has taken great pains to describe the characteristic feasword, and was even then brought down by a stone. (Script. tures of the Norman, early English, decorated English, and x. Twysd. col. 1354.) perpendicular English styles of battlements.

During the middle period of English history we read but little of this weapon, though it appears to have been constantly used. The Welsh infantry at the battle of Agincourt, in 1415, found it particularly serviceable in despatching those whom the archers had wounded with their arrows. In Strutt's Manners and Customs of the English, vol. ii. pl. xliv., Henry V. is represented as setting Richard, Earl of Warwick, to keep Port Quartervyle, at the siege of Rouen, by the delivery of a battle-axe.

Toward the close of the sixteenth century, the battle-axe, as a weapon of war, seems to have fallen into gradual disuse: although the occasional placing of a pistol in its handle, in some specimens which remain, seems to bespeak a wish on the part of the warriors of that period that it should be retained with an improved use.

Grose, in his Military Antiquities, vol. ii. pl. xxviii. fig. 4, and pl. xxxiv. fig. 3, has engraved a Lochaber axe, and an antient battle-axe. Sir Samuel Meyrick, in his engraved illustrations of antient armour now at Goodrich Court in Herefordshire, pl. lxxxiii., has engraved numerous specimens of battle-axes and pole-axes from the time of Henry VI. Fig. 1 represents a German pole-axe of the time of Henry VI., furnished with a ring to which a thong might be fastened, in order to twist round the arm of the person wielding it. Fig. 2, a battle-axe of the time of Henry VIII., to which was once attached a match-lock pistol. The whole is of iron, and came from Ireland. Fig. 3, a Venetian poleaxe of the same period, the blade beautifully engraved, and having on it the lion of St. Mark. Fig. 4, another specimen. Fig. 5, a battle-axe of the close of the reign of Henry VIII. Fig. 6, a Jedburg axe, or Jeddart staff of the same period, found in a river in Scotland. Such weapons were implied by the single word 'staves,' which included all kinds of arms whose handles were long poles. Fig. 7, a Lochaber axe as old as the last described, if not of greater age. Fig. 8, a battle-axe of the commencement of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Fig. 9, another of the middle of that period. Figs. 10, 11, two of the close of her reign. Fig. 12, one of the commencement of the reign of James I. Fig. 13, another of this period, furnished with a wheel-lock pistol. Fig. 14, a Polish pole-axe, having on the blade a crown, and the letter S. twisted round the number III., for Sigismund III.; its staff ornamented with a brass bead, and its form exactly like those of the Anglo-Saxons in the Bayeux tapestry. Fig. 15, a Dutch battle-axe, having on it the date 1685, the handle being ornamented with ivory.

In Sir Samuel Meyrick's engraved Illustrations, vol. ii. pl. 93, fig. 7, he has given the blade of a battle-axe of its full size of the time of Queen Elizabeth, made in Ger

many.

The battle-axe was used at a very early period in naval fights, chiefly to cut the ropes and rigging of vessels. (See Scheffer, Mil. Nav. ii. 7.)

BATTLE, WAGER OF. [See APPEAL.]

BATTLEMENT, a parapet wall, commonly employed in castellated and in ecclesiastical edifices of that kind which are distinguished by the general name of Gothic. [See GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.] The battlement is of very remote antiquity, as remains of them still exist in Greece and Italy. (See Mazois' Pompeii and Stuart's Athens.) The modern battlement, however, is better known as belonging to buildings from the eleventh to the end of the sixteenth century; but it was not in general use in ecclesiastical edifices until the middle of the twelfth century.

The battlement is generally indented, with a coping sloping both ways from about the centre; the lower part between the coping and the cornice of the building is often pierced and decorated. Although by the word battlement is generally understood the whole indented parapet wall, the term may perhaps with more propriety be applied to express rather the higher part of the wall, in contradistinction to the indent, interval, or embrasure. It is possible that the term battlement may have derived its name from the facility afforded to soldiers of doing battle under the protection afforded by the higher part of the indented wall. Battlements offer in their proportions, and in the details of their mouldings and ornaments, a great variety of examples. Mr. Rickman has endeavoured to distinguish the different periods in which the pointed-arch style of Gothic architecture changed the form of its detail; and in this endeavour

As to Norman battlements, he says it is very difficult to ascertain what was their precise form. He considers them to have been only plain parapets; but remarks that there are instances in some castellated Norman buildings of a parapet with here and there a narrow interval cut in it, which appears original.

It is more probable, then, that the Norman battlement was a plain parapet, but without intervals; and, if decorated, the decoration probably consisted of the semicircular arch, the peculiar feature of the Norman style. In support of this opinion we may mention the upper part or rim of a Norman font, decorated with semicircular-headed pannels, in South Hayling Church, Hampshire. The Norman church of l'Abbaye aux Dames, at Caen in Normandy, has a parapet decorated with pointed-arched-headed pannels, which at the introduction of the pointed-arch style most probably supplanted the old semicircular-arched pannel, similar to that at Hayling Church,

Early English Battlements.-During nearly the whole period in which this style was in use, the parapet was seldom indented; and in many buildings it was plain, in others decorated. At Salisbury it is executed with a series of arches and pannels, and in Lincoln Cathedral with quatrefoils in sunk pannels. A battlement of equal intervals

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occurs in small ornamented works erected about the close of this period, when the early English style gave way to another more decorated, denominated by Mr. Rickman the decorated English style.

Decorated English Battlement.-During this period the parapet wall without indentations continued frequently to be used; but it is often pierced through in various forms, generally consisting of quatrefoils, and quatrefoils in circles. Another form, however, which is not so common, may be considered more beautiful. This is a waved line, the spaces of which are trefoiled. In St. Mary Magdalen Church, at Oxford, there is a good example of this kind of

[Mary Magdalen Church, Oxford.]

battlement. Of the plain battlements, that which was most in use in this period has the embrasures or intervals narr w, and is surmounted with a capping moulding placed in a horizontal position as at Waltham Cross; but there are

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[Waltham Cross, as restored from the antient fragments, by W. B. Clarke.

some battlements of the same date with the capping run ning both vertically and horizontally, of which there is a fine specimen in the tower of Merton Chapel, Oxford. In some small works of this style a flower is occasionally used as a finish above the capping, moulding, or cornice, but it is by no means common. The nave of York Cathedral presents a fine example of the pierced battlement so prevalent during this period: it consists of arches or arched pannels

trefoiled or cinquefoiled, and the interval is a quatrefoil in a circle; the whole is covered with a moulding running both horizontally and vertically.

Perpendicular English Battlements. In the battlements belonging to this period, parapets without indentures still continued to be used occasionally; the serpentine line with the trefoil was also still in use, but the line dividing the trefoil was more frequently made straight, and the divisions were consequently formed into triangular pannels. But in the early and best works the trefoils are not divided by straight lines. One of the finest examples of pannelled parapets is at the Beauchamp Chapel, at Warwick, consisting of quatrefoils in squares, with shields and flowers. There are many varieties of pierced battlements belonging to this period. Those erected in the early part of it have commonly quatrefoils, either in the lower compartments or above the pannels of the lower compartments, forming part of the higher pannels. Two heights of pannels are also frequently employed in battlements of this period. At Loughborough there is an example of a fine battlement, consisting of rich pierced quatrefoils in two heights. Such battlements have generally a moulded cornice running round the battlement and the embrasure. A few edifices of a later period have pierced battlements ornamented with pointed compartments, as in the tower of Lincoln Cathedral,

[merged small][graphic][merged small]

of this period has a broad cornice consisting of several mouldings running both vertically and horizontally, the embrasures being very often much narrowed and the battlement enlarged.

As the battlements of the perpendicular style were liable to frequent alterations, they cannot alone be depended on to determine the age of a building. (Rickman's Attempt to Discriminate the Styles of English Architecture.) Between the periods which are distinguished by the appellations of early, decorated, and perpendicular English, there are some minute shades of difference in the detail and proportion of battlements. This will be apparent on an examination of the antient edifices of Great Britain.

The battlement, which was originally designed for the protection of the besieged, became afterwards merely an ornament to an edifice. A most remarkable example of

[graphic]

[From the tower of Lincoln Cathedral, from a sketch by G. Moore, Arch.] the Tomb-house at Windsor, the Lady Chapel at Peterborough, and the great battlement at King's College Chapel, Cambridge. Sometimes on the exterior of a building, and often within, the Tudor or three-leaved flower, forming a point at the top, is used on the battlement, as at the screens in the choir of Exeter Cathedral; and there are a few instances of the upper part of a battlement analogous in form to it in small works erected long before this date,- as at Northampton Cross. But Waltham Cross, erected at the

[Northampton Cross, from an original sketch by G. Moore, Arch.] same time, is without this finish. Some battlements of this period, especially in very rich designs, have, in lieu of the Tudor flower, a finial on the top of pierced quatrefoils, as at Woolpit and Blithborough Churches in Suffolk.

Of plain battlements in the perpendicular style there are many varieties. Some are formed with nearly equal intervals, and with a plain coping placed both horizontally and vertically. Castellated battlements have the embrasures between the battlements nearly equal to the width of the battlements themselves: sometimes they have wide battle

[Turret of King's College Cha; el, Cambridge.]

[Buttress, with battlements, at Loddon Church, Norfolk.]

the excessive use of it as a decoration is shown in the annexed cut, representing the top of a buttress at Loddon Church, Norfolk.

(For representations of battlements, see Britton's Cathedrals; and Views of Collegiate and Parochial Churches in Great Britain, by J. P. Neale.)

BATURIN, a town founded by Stephen Bathory when king of Poland, at present situated in the Russian province of Tschernigoff, or Czerniechoff, and in the circle of Konotoss. It occupies a picturesque position on a hill, and is skirted on one side by the Seyma, in the midst of a beautiful expanse of country which is remarkable for its fertility. The town is surrounded by a wall of earth, and contains a handsome convent, eight churches, and about 5000 inhabitants. The environs are well cultivated. The soil and climate are favourable to the partial growth of the filbert, vine, and mulberry; and the trade of the district, which is promoted by fairs held in the place, depends chiefly on agricultural produce. Baturin was for some time a favourite residence of the Atamans of the Cossacks, among whom none has acquired greater notoriety than the traitor Mazeppa, who sold himself to the Swedes in 1708. The Russians, to whom the town has belonged since the year 1604, afterwards burnt it in revenge for the treachery of Mazeppa. It has since been rebuilt, and was with its dependencies, including at that time nearly 9300 male inhabitants, granted by the Empress Elizabeth to Prince Razumoffsky, whose descendants are its present proprietors. The palace of the A tamans and its once handsome grounds are now going to decay. Baturin lies, according to Hassel, in 51° 45' N. lat., and 50° 40' E. long.

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