Encyclopaedia Britannica Volume 2, Slice 2 Part 6

It appears that it had long been the practice in Holland for life annuities to be granted to nominees of any age, in the constant proportion of double the rate of interest allowed on stock; that is to say, if the towns were borrowing money at 6%, they would be willing to grant a life annuity at 12%, and so on. De Witt states that "annuities have been sold, even in the present century, first at six years'

purchase, then at seven and eight; and that the majority of all life annuities now current at the country's expense were obtained at nine years' purchase"; but that the price had been increased in the course of a few years from eleven years' purchase to twelve, and from twelve to fourteen. He also states that the rate of interest had been successively reduced from 6 to 5%, and then to 4%. The princ.i.p.al object of his report is to prove that, taking interest at 4%, a life annuity was worth at least sixteen years' purchase; and, in fact, that an annuitant purchasing an annuity for the life of a young and healthy nominee at sixteen years' purchase, made an excellent bargain. It may be mentioned that he argues that it is more to the advantage, both of the country and of the private investor, that the public loans should be raised by way of grant of life annuities rather than perpetual annuities. It appears conclusively from De Witt's correspondence with Hudde, that the rate of mortality a.s.sumed as the basis of his calculations was deduced from careful examination of the mortality that had actually prevailed among the nominees on whose lives annuities had been granted in former years. De Witt appears to have come to the conclusion that the probability of death is the same in any half-year from the age of 3 to 53 inclusive; that in the next ten years, from 53 to 63, the probability is greater in the ratio of 3 to 2; that in the next ten years, from 63 to 73, it is greater in the ratio of 2 to 1; and in the next seven years, from 73 to 80, it is greater in the ratio of 3 to 1; and he places the limit of human life at 80. If a mortality table of the usual form is deduced from these suppositions, out of 212 persons alive at the age of 3, 2 will die every year up to 53, 3 in each of the ten years from 53 to 63, 4 in each of the next ten years from 63 to 73, and 6 in each of the next seven years from 73 to 80, when all will be dead.

De Witt calculates the value of an annuity in the following way. a.s.sume that annuities on 10,000 lives each ten years of age, which satisfy the Hm mortality table, have been purchased. Of these nominees 79 will die before attaining the age of 11, and no annuity payment will be made in respect of them; none will die between the ages of 11 and 12, so that annuities will be paid for one year on 9921 lives; 40 attain the age of 12 and die before 13, so that two payments will be made with respect to these lives. Reasoning in this way we see that the annuities on 35 of the nominees will be payable for three years; on 40 for four years, and so on. Proceeding thus to the end of the table, 15 nominees attain the age of 95, 5 of whom die before the age of 96, so that 85 payments will be paid in respect of these 5 lives. Of the survivors all die before attaining the age of 97, so that the annuities on these lives will be payable for 86 years. Having previously calculated a table of the values of annuities certain for every number of years up to 86, the value of all the annuities on the 10,000 nominees will be found by taking 40 times the value of an annuity for 2 years, 35 times the value of an annuity for 3 years, and so on--the last term being the value of 10 annuities for 86 years--and adding them together; and the value of an annuity on one of the nominees will then be found by dividing by 10,000.

Before leaving the subject of De Witt, we may mention that we find in the correspondence a distinct suggestion of the law of mortality that bears the name of Demoivre. In De Witt's letter, dated the 27th of October 1671 (_a.s.s. Mag_. vol. iii. p. 107), he speaks of a "provisional hypothesis" suggested by Hudde, that out of 80 young lives (who, from the context, may be taken as of the age 6) about 1 dies annually. In strictness, therefore, the law in question might be more correctly termed Hudde's than Demoivre's.

De Witt's report being thus of the nature of an unpublished state paper, although it contributed to its author's reputation, did not contribute to advance the exact knowledge of the subject; and the author to whom the credit must be given of first showing how to calculate the value of an annuity on correct principles is Edmund Halley. He gave the first approximately correct mortality table (deduced from the records of the numbers of deaths and baptisms in the city of Breslau), and showed how it might be employed to calculate the value of an annuity on the life of a nominee of any age (see _Phil. Trans_. 1693; _a.s.s. Mag_. vol. xviii.).

Previously to Halley's time, and apparently for many years subsequently, all dealings with life annuities were based upon mere conjectural estimates. The earliest known reference to any estimate of the value of life annuities rose out of the requirements of the Falcidian law, which (40 B.C.) was adopted in the Roman empire, and which declared that a testator should not give more than three-fourths of his property in legacies, so that at least one-fourth must go to his legal representatives. It is easy to see how it would occasionally become necessary, while this law was in force, to value life annuities charged upon a testator's estate. Aemilius Macer (A.D. 230) states that the method which had been in common use at that time was as follows:--From the earliest age until 30 take 30 years' purchase, and for each age after 30 deduct 1 year. It is obvious that no consideration of compound interest can have entered into this estimate; and it is easy to see that it is equivalent to a.s.suming that all persons who attain the age of 30 will certainly live to the age of 60, and then certainly die. Compared with this estimate, that which was propounded by the praetorian prefect Ulpian was a great improvement. His table is as follows:--

+-------------+-----------+------------+-----------+ Age. Years' Age. Years' Purchase. Purchase +-------------+-----------+------------+-----------+ Birth to 20 30 45 to 46 14 20 " 25 28 46 " 47 13 25 " 30 25 47 " 48 12 30 " 35 22 48 " 49 11 35 " 40 20 49 " 50 10 40 " 41 19 50 " 55 9 41 " 42 18 55 " 60 7 42 " 43 17 60 and 43 " 44 16 upwards 5 44 " 45 15 +-------------+-----------+------------+-----------+

Here also we have no reason to suppose that the element of interest was taken into consideration; and the a.s.sumption, that between the ages of 40 and 50 each addition of a year to the nominee's age diminishes the value of the annuity by one year's purchase, is equivalent to a.s.suming that there is no probability of the nominee dying between the ages of 40 and 50. Considered, however, simply as a table of the average duration of life, the values are fairly accurate. At all events, no more correct estimate appears to have been arrived at until the close of the 17th century.

The mathematics of annuities has been very fully treated in Demoivre's _Treatise on Annuities_ (1725); Simpson's _Doctrine of Annuities and Reversions_ (1742); P. Gray, _Tables and Formulae_; Baily's _Doctrine of Life Annuities_; there are also innumerable compilations of _Valuation Tables_ and _Interest Tables_, by means of which the value of an annuity at any age and any rate of interest may be found. See also the article INTEREST, and especially that on INSURANCE.

_Commutation tables_, aptly so named in 1840 by Augustus De Morgan (see his paper "On the Calculation of Single Life Contingencies," _a.s.surance Magazine_, xii. 328), show the proportion in which a benefit due at one age ought to be changed, so as to retain the same value and be due at another age. The earliest known specimen of a commutation table is contained in William Dale's _Introduction to the Study of the Doctrine of Annuities_, published in 1772. A full account of this work is given by F. Hendriks in the second number of the _a.s.surance Magazine_, pp.

15-17. William Morgan's _Treatise on a.s.surances_, 1779, also contains a commutation table. Morgan gives the table as furnis.h.i.+ng a convenient means of checking the correctness of the values of annuities found by the ordinary process. It may be a.s.sumed that he was aware that the table might be used for the direct calculation of annuities; but he appears to have been ignorant of its other uses.

The first author who fully developed the powers of the table was John Nicholas Tetens, a native of Schleswig, who in 1785, while professor of philosophy and mathematics at Kiel, published in the German language an _Introduction to the Calculation of Life Annuities and a.s.surances_. This work appears to have been quite unknown in England until F. Hendriks gave, in the first number of the _a.s.surance Magazine_, pp. 1-20 (Sept.

1850), an account of it, with a translation of the pa.s.sages describing the construction and use of the commutation table, and a sketch of the author's life and writings, to which we refer the reader who desires fuller information. It may be mentioned here that Tetens also gave only a specimen table, apparently not imagining that persons using his work would find it extremely useful to have a series of commutation tables, calculated and printed ready for use.

The use of the commutation table was independently developed in England-apparently between the years 1788 and 1811--by George Barrett, of Petworth, Suss.e.x, who was the son of a yeoman farmer, and was himself a village schoolmaster, and afterwards farm steward or bailiff. It has been usual to consider Barrett as the originator in England of the method of calculating the values of annuities by means of a commutation table, and this method is accordingly sometimes called Barrett's method.

(It is also called the commutation method and the columnar method.) Barrett's method of calculating annuities was explained by him to Francis Baily in the year 1811, and was first made known to the world in a paper written by the latter and read before the Royal Society in 1812.

By what has been universally considered an unfortunate error of judgment, this paper was not recommended by the council of the Royal Society to be printed, but it was given by Baily as an appendix to the second issue (in 1813) of his work on life annuities and a.s.surances.

Barrett had calculated extensive tables, and with Baily's aid attempted to get them published by subscription, but without success; and the only printed tables calculated according to his manner, besides the specimen tables given by Baily, are the tables contained in Babbage's _Comparative View of the various Inst.i.tutions for the a.s.surance of Lives_, 1826.

In the year 1825 Griffith Davies published his _Tables of Life Contingencies_, a work which contains, among others, two tables, which are confessedly derived from Baily's explanation of Barrett's tables.

Those who desire to pursue the subject further can refer to the appendix to Baily's _Life Annuities and a.s.surances_, De Morgan's paper "On the Calculation of Single Life Contingencies," _a.s.surance Magazine_, xii. 348-349; Gray's _Tables and Formulae_ chap. viii.; the preface to Davies's _Treatise on Annuities_; also Hendriks's papers in the _a.s.surance Magazine_, No. 1, p. 1, and No. 2, p. 12; and in particular De Morgan's "Account of a Correspondence between Mr George Barrett and Mr Francis Baily," in the _a.s.surance Magazine_, vol. iv.

p. 185.

The princ.i.p.al commutation tables published in England are contained in the following works:--David Jones, _Value of Annuities and Reversionary Payments_, issued in parts by the Useful Knowledge Society, completed in 1843; Jenkin Jones, _New Rate of Mortality_, 1843; G. Davies, _Treatise on Annuities_, 1825 (issued 1855); David Chisholm, _Commutation Tables_, 1858; Nelson's _Contributions to Vital Statistics_, 1857; Jardine Henry, _Government Life Annuity Commutation Tables_, 1866 and 1873; _Inst.i.tute of Actuaries Life Tables_, 1872; R.P. Hardy, _Valuation Tables_, 1873; and Dr William Farr's contributions to the sixth (1844), twelfth (1849), and twentieth (1857) _Reports_ of the Registrar General in England (English Tables, I. 2), and to the _English Life Table_, 1864.

The theory of annuities may be further studied in the discussions in the English _Journal of the Inst.i.tute of Actuaries_. The inst.i.tute was founded in the year 1848, the first sessional meeting being held in January 1849. Its establishment has contributed in various ways to promote the study of the theory of life contingencies. Among these may be specified the following:--Before it was formed, students of the subject worked for the most part alone, and without any concert; and when any person had made an improvement in the theory, it had little chance of becoming publicly known unless he wrote a formal treatise on the whole subject. But the formation of the inst.i.tute led to much greater interchange of opinion among actuaries, and afforded them a ready means of making known to their professional a.s.sociates any improvements, real or supposed, that they thought they had made.

Again, the discussions which follow the reading of papers before the inst.i.tute have often served, first, to bring out into bold relief differences of opinion that were previously unsuspected, and afterwards to soften down those differences,--to correct extreme opinions in every direction, and to bring about a greater agreement of opinion on many important subjects. In no way, probably, have the objects of the inst.i.tute been so effectually advanced as by the publication of its _Journal_. The first number of this work, which was originally called the _a.s.surance Magazine_, appeared in September 1850, and it has been continued quarterly down to the present time. It was originated by the public spirit of two well-known actuaries (Mr Charles Jellicoe and Mr Samuel Brown), and was adopted as the organ of the Inst.i.tute of Actuaries in the year 1852, and called the _a.s.surance Magazine and Journal of the Inst.i.tute of Actuaries_, Mr Jellicoe continuing to be the editor,--a post he held until the year 1867, when he was succeeded by Mr T.B. Sprague (who contributed to the 9th edition of this Encyclopaedia an elaborate article on "Annuities," on which the above account is based). The name was again changed in 1866, the words "a.s.surance Magazine" being dropped; but in the following year it was considered desirable to resume these, for the purpose of showing the continuity of the publication, and it is now called the _Journal of the Inst.i.tute of Actuaries and a.s.surance Magazine_. This work contains not only the papers read before the inst.i.tute (to which have been appended of late years short abstracts of the discussions on them), and many original papers which were unsuitable for reading, together with correspondence, but also reprints of many papers published elsewhere, which from various causes had become difficult of access to the ordinary reader, among which may be specified various papers which originally appeared in the _Philosophical Transactions_, the _Philosophical Magazine_, the _Mechanics' Magazine_, and the _Companion to the Almanac_; also translations of various papers from the French, German, and Danish. Among the useful objects which the continuous publication of the _Journal_ of the inst.i.tute has served, we may specify in particular two:--that any supposed improvement in the theory was effectually submitted to the criticisms of the whole actuarial profession, and its real value speedily discovered; and that any real improvement, whether great or small, being placed on record, successive writers have been able, one after the other, to take it up and develop it, each commencing where the previous one had left off.

ANNULAR, ANNULATE, &c. (Lat. _annulus_, a ring), ringed. "Annulate" is used in botany and zoology in connexion with certain plants, worms, &c.

(see ANNELIDA), either marked with rings or composed of ring-like segments. The word "annulated" is also used in, heraldry and architecture. An annulated cross is one with the points ending in an "annulet" (an heraldic ring, supposed to be taken from a coat of mail), while the annulet in architecture is a small fillet round a column, which encircles the lower part of the Doric capital immediately above the neck or trachelium. The word "annulus" (for "ring") is itself used technically in geometry, astronomy, &c., and the adjective "annular"

corresponds. An _annular s.p.a.ce_ is that between an inner and outer ring.

The _annular finger_ is the ring finger. An _annular eclipse_ is an eclipse of the sun in which the visible part of the latter completely encircles the dark body of the moon; for this to happen, the centres of the sun and moon, and the point on the earth where the observer is situated, must be collinear. Certain nebulae having the form of a ring are also called "annular."

ANNUNCIATION, the announcement made by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary of the incarnation of Christ (Luke i, 26-38). The Feast of the Annunciation in the Christian Church is celebrated on the 25th of March.

The first authentic allusions to it are in a canon, of the council of Toledo (656), and another of the council of Constantinople "in Trullo"

(692), forbidding the celebration of all festivals in Lent, excepting the Lord's day and the Feast of the Annunciation. An earlier origin has been claimed for it on the ground that it is mentioned in sermons of Athanasius and of Gregory Thaumaturgus, but both of these doc.u.ments are now admitted to be spurious. A synod held at Worcester, England (1240), forbade all servile work on this feast day. See further LADY DAY.

ANNUNZIO, GABRIELE D' (1863- ), Italian novelist and poet, of Dalmatian extraction, was born at Pescara (Abruzzi) in 1863. The first years of his youth were spent in the freedom of the open fields; at sixteen he was sent to school in Tuscany. While still at school he published a small volume of verses called _Primo Vere_ (1879), in which, side by side with some almost brutal imitations of Lorenzo Stecchetti, the then fas.h.i.+onable poet of _Postuma_, were some translations from the Latin, distinguished by such agile grace that Giuseppe Chiarini on reading them brought the unknown youth before the public in an enthusiastic article. The young poet then went to Rome, where he was received as one of their own by the _Cronaca Bizantina_ group (see CARDUCCI). Here he published _Canto Nuovo_ (1882), _Terra Vergine_ (1882), _L' Intermezzo di Rime_ (1883), _Il Libro delle Vergini_ (1884), and the greater part of the short stories that were afterwards collected under the general t.i.tle of _San Pantaleone_ (1886). In _Canto Nuovo_ we have admirable poems full of pulsating youth and the promise of power, some descriptive of the sea and some of the Abruzzi landscape, commented on and completed in prose by _Terra Vergine_, the latter a collection of short stories dealing in radiant language with the peasant life of the author's native province. With the _Intermezzo di Rime_ we have the beginning of d'Annunzio's second and characteristic manner. His conception of style was new, and he chose to express all the most subtle vibrations of voluptuous life. Both style and contents began to startle his critics; some who had greeted him as an _enfant prodige_--Chiarini amongst others--rejected him as a perverter of public morals, whilst others hailed him as one bringing a current of fresh air and the impulse of a new vitality into the somewhat prim, lifeless work hitherto produced.

Meanwhile the Review of Angelo Sommaruga perished in the midst of scandal, and his group of young authors found itself dispersed. Some entered the teaching career and were lost to literature, others threw themselves into journalism. Gabriele d'Annunzio took this latter course, and joined the staff of the _Tribuna_. For this paper, under the pseudonym of "Duca Minimo," he did some of his most brilliant work, and the articles he wrote during that period of originality and exuberance would well repay being collected. To this period of greater maturity and deeper culture belongs _Il Libro d' Isotta_ (1886), a love poem, in which for the first time he drew inspiration adapted to modern sentiments and pa.s.sions from the rich colours of the Renaissance. _Il Libro d' Isotta_ is interesting also, because in it we find most of the germs of his future work, just as in _Intermezzo melico_ and in certain ballads and sonnets we find descriptions and emotions which later went to form the aesthetic contents of _Il Piacere_, _Il Trionfo della Morte_, and _Elegie Romane_ (1892).

D' Annunzio's first novel _Il Piacere_ (1889)--translated into English as _The Child of Pleasure_--was followed in 1891 by _L' Innocente_ (_The Intruder_), and in 1892 by _Giovanni Episcopo_. These three novels created a profound impression. _L' Innocente_, admirably translated into French by Georges Herelle, brought its author the notice and applause of foreign critics. His next work, _Il Trionfo della Morte_ (_The Triumph of Death_) (1894), was followed at a short distance by _La Vergini della Roccio_ (1896) and _Il Fuoco_ (1900), which in its descriptions of Venice is perhaps the most ardent glorification of a city existing in any language.

D' Annunzio's poetic work of this period, in most respects his finest, is represented by _Il Poema Paradisiaco_ (1893), the _Odi Navali_ (1893), a superb attempt at civic poetry, and _Laudi_ (1900).

A later phase of d' Annunzio's work is his dramatic production, represented by _Il Sogno di un mattino di primavera_ (1897), a lyrical fantasia in one act; his _Cilia Morta_ (1898), written for Sarah Bernhardt, which is certainly among the most daring and original of modern tragedies, and the only one which by its unity, persistent purpose, and sense of fate seems to continue in a measure the traditions of the Greek theatre. In 1898 he wrote his _Sogno di un Pomeriggio d'

Autunno_ and _La Gioconda_; in the succeeding year _La Gloria_, an attempt at contemporary political tragedy which met with no success, probably through the audacity of the personal and political allusions in some of its scenes; and then _Francesca da Rimini_ (1901), a perfect reconstruction of medieval atmosphere and emotion, magnificent in style, and declared by one of the most authoritative Italian critics--Edoardo Boutet--to be the first real although not perfect tragedy which has ever been given to the Italian theatre.

The work of d' Annunzio, although by many of the younger generation injudiciously and extravagantly admired, is almost the most important literary work given to Italy since the days when the great cla.s.sics welded her varying dialects into a fixed language. The psychological inspiration of his novels has come to him from many sources--French, Russian, Scandinavian, German--and in much of his earlier work there is little fundamental originality. His creative power is intense and searching, but narrow and personal; his heroes and heroines are little more than one same type monotonously facing a different problem at a different phase of life. But the faultlessness of his style and the wealth of his language have been approached by none of his contemporaries, whom his genius has somewhat paralysed. In his later work, when he begins drawing his inspiration from the traditions of bygone Italy in her glorious centuries, a current of real life seems to run through the veins of his personages. And the lasting merit of d'Annunzio, his real value to the literature of his country, consists precisely in that he opened up the closed mine of its former life as a source of inspiration for the present and of hope for the future, and created a language, neither pompous nor vulgar, drawn from every source and district suited to the requirements of modern thought, yet absolutely cla.s.sical, borrowed from none, and, independently of the thought it may be used to express, a thing of intrinsic beauty. As his sight became clearer and his purpose strengthened, as exaggerations, affectations, and moods dropped away from his conceptions, his work became more and more typical Latin work, upheld by the ideal of an Italian Renaissance.

ANOA, the native name of the small wild buffalo of Celebes, _Bos_ (_Bubalus_) _depressicornis_, which stands but little over a yard at the shoulder, and is the most diminutive of all wild cattle. It is nearly allied to the larger Asiatic buffaloes, showing the same reversal of the direction of the hair on the back. The horns are peculiar for their upright direction and comparative straightness, although they have the same triangular section as in other buffaloes. White spots are sometimes present below the eyes, and there may be white markings on the legs and back; and the absence or presence of these white markings may be indicative of distinct races. The horns of the cows are very small. The nearest allies of the anoa appear to be certain extinct buffaloes, of which the remains are found in the Siwalik Hills of northern India. In habits the animal appears to resemble the Indian buffalo.

ANODYNE (from Gr. [Greek: an-], privative, and [Greek: odune], pain), a cause which relieves pain. The term is commonly applied to medicines which lessen the sensibility of the brain or nervous system, such as morphia, &c.

ANOINTING, or greasing with oil, fat, or melted b.u.t.ter, a process employed ritually in all religions and among all races, civilized or savage, partly as a mode of ridding persons and things of dangerous influences and diseases, especially of the demons (Persian _drug_, Greek [Greek: keres], Armenian _dev_) which are or cause those diseases; and partly as a means of introducing into things and persons a sacramental or divine influence, a holy emanation, spirit or power. The riddance of an evil influence is often synonymous with the introduction of the good principle, and therefore it is best to consider first the use of anointing in consecrations.

The Australian natives believed that the virtues of one killed could be transferred to survivors if the latter rubbed themselves with his caul-fat. So the Arabs of East Africa anoint themselves with lion's fat in order to gain courage and inspire the animals with awe of themselves.

Such rites are often a.s.sociated with the actual eating of the victim whose virtues are coveted. Human fat is a powerful charm all over the world; for, as R. Smith points out, after the blood the fat was peculiarly the vehicle and seat of life. This is why fat of a victim was smeared on a sacred stone, not only in acts of homage paid to it, but in the actual consecration thereof. In such cases the influence of the G.o.d, communicated to the victim, pa.s.sed with the unguent into the stone. But the divinity could by anointing be transferred into men no less than into stones; and from immemorial antiquity, among the Jews as among other races, kings were anointed or greased, doubtless with the fat of the victims which, like the blood, was too holy to be eaten by the common votaries.

b.u.t.ter made from the milk of the cow, the most sacred of animals, is used for anointing in the Hindu religion. A newly-built house is smeared with it, so are demoniacs, care being taken to smear the latter downwards from head to foot.

In the Christian religion, especially where animal sacrifices, together with the cult of totem or holy animals, have been given up, it is usual to hallow the oil used in ritual anointings with special prayers and exorcisms; oil from the lamps lit before the altar has a peculiar virtue of its own, perhaps because it can be burned to give light, and disappears to heaven in doing so. In any case oil has ever been regarded as the aptest symbol and vehicle of the holy and illuminating spirit.

For this reason the catechumens are anointed with holy oil both before and after baptism; the one act (of eastern origin) a.s.sists the expulsion of the evil spirits, the other (of western origin), taken in conjunction with imposition of hands, conveys the spirit and retains it in the person of the baptized. In the postbaptismal anointing the oil was applied to the organs of sense, to the head, heart, and midriff. Such ritual use of oil as a [Greek: sfragis] or seal may have been suggested in old religions by the practice of keeping wine fresh in jars and amphorae by pouring on a top layer of oil; for the spoiling of wine was attributed to the action of demons of corruption, against whom many ancient formulae of aversion or exorcism still exist.

The holy oil, chrism, or [Greek: muron], as the Easterns call it, was prepared and consecrated on Maundy Thursday, and in the Gelasian sacramentary the formula used runs thus: "Send forth, O Lord, we beseech thee, thy Holy Spirit the Paraclete from heaven into this fatness of oil, which thou hast deigned to bring forth out of the green wood for the refres.h.i.+ng of mind and body; and through thy holy benediction may it be for all who anoint with it, taste it, touch it, a safeguard of mind and body, of soul and spirit, for the expulsion of all pains, of every infirmity, of every sickness of mind and body. For with the same thou hast anointed priests, kings, and prophets and martyrs with this thy chrism, perfected by thee, O Lord, blessed, abiding within our bowels in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ."

In various churches the dead are anointed with holy oil, to guard them against the vampires or ghouls which ever threaten to take possession of dead bodies and live in them. In the Armenian church, as formerly in many Greek churches, a cross is not holy until the Spirit has been formally led into it by means of prayer and anointing with holy oil. A new church is anointed at its four corners, and also the altar round which it is built; similarly tombs, church gongs, and all other instruments and utensils dedicated to cultual uses. In churches of the Greek rite a little of the old year's chrism is left in the jar to communicate its sanct.i.ty to that of the new. (F. C. C.)