The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 351

PICTS, a race of people now believed to be of Celtic origin, that from 296 to 844 inhabited the NE. of Caledonia from the Forth to the Pentland Firth, and were divided into northern and southern by the Grampians, while the W. of the country, or Argyll, was occupied by the Dalriads or Scots from Ireland, who eventually gained the ascendency over them, to their amalgamation into one nation.

PICTS' HOUSES, the name popularly given to EARTH-HOUSES (q. v.) in several parts of Scotland.

PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN, the hero of an old German legend, had come to a German town, offered to clear it of the rats which infested it for a sum of money, but after executing his task was unrewarded, upon which he blew a blast on his magic pipe, the sound of which drew the children of the town into a cave, which he locked when they entered, and shut them up for ever.

PIEDMONT, a district of Italy, formerly a princ.i.p.ality, ruled by the house of Savoy, surrounded by the Alps, the Apennines, and the river Ticino; occupies the W. end of the great fertile valley of the Po, a hilly region rich in vines and mulberries, and a mountainous tract with forests and grazing land intersected by lovely valleys, which send streams down into the Po; the people are industrious; textile manufactures are extensive, and agriculture is skilful; Turin, the largest town, was the capital of Italy 1859-1865; in the glens of the Cottian Alps the Vaudois or Waldenses, after much persecution, still dwell.

PIERCE, FRANKLIN, the fourteenth President of the United States, born in New Hamps.h.i.+re, was the lifelong friend of Nathaniel Hawthorne; bred to the bar; served in the Mexican War, and was elected President in 1852; his period of office was one of trouble, he supported the States'

rights doctrine, and served with the South in the Civil War (1804-1869).

PIERIA, a district in Macedonia E. of Olympus, inhabited by Thracians, and famous as the seat of the wors.h.i.+p of the Muses and their birthplace, giving rise to the phrase Pierian Spring, as the source of poetic inspiration.

PIERIDES, the name given to the Muses from their fountain PIERIA (q. v.).

PIERS PLOWMAN, VISION OF, a celebrated satirical poem of the 14th century ascribed to Robert Langland.

PIETa (i. e. piety), the name given to a picture, the subject of which is the dead Christ in the embrace of his sorrowing mother, accompanied by sorrowing women and angels; that sculptured by Michael Angelo, in St. Peter's at Rome, representing the Virgin at the foot of the cross, and the dead Christ in her lap.

PIETERMARITZBURG (16), capital of Natal, 73 m. by rail N. of Durban; well situated on the Umgeni River, with fine streets, an ample water-supply, and a fine climate; has railroad connection with Johannesburg, Pretoria, and Charlestown. A third of the population consists of Kaffirs and coolies.

PIETISTS, the name given to a religious party that arose in Germany at the end of the 17th century, but without forming a separate sect; laid more stress on religious feeling than dogmatic belief, and who at length, as all who ground religion on mere feeling are apt to do, distinguished themselves more by a weak sentimentality than by a st.u.r.dy living faith.

PIETRA DURA, a name given to the purest kind of Florentine mosaic work, consists of hard stones characterised by brilliancy of colour.

PIGEON ENGLISH, a jargon used in commercial dealings with the Chinese, being a mixture of English, Portuguese, and Chinese.

PIG-PHILOSOPHY, the name given by Carlyle in his "Latter-Day Pamphlets," in the one on Jesuitism, to the wide-spread philosophy of the time, which regarded the human being as a mere creature of appet.i.te instead of a creature of G.o.d endowed with a soul, as having no n.o.bler idea of well-being than the gratification of desire--that his only Heaven, and the reverse of it his h.e.l.l.

PIGWIGGIN, an elf in love with Queen Mab, who fights the jealous Oberon in furious combat.

PILATE, PONTIUS, Roman procurator of Judea and Samaria in the days of Christ, from A.D. 26 to 36; persuaded of the innocence of Christ when arraigned before his tribunal, would fain have saved Him, but yielded to the clamour of His enemies, who crucified Him; he protested before they led Him away by was.h.i.+ng his hands in their presence that he was guiltless of His blood.

PILATUS, MOUNT, an isolated mountain at the W. end of Lake Lucerne, opposite the Rigi; is ascended by a mountain railway, and has hotels on two peaks. A lake below the summit is said to be the last receptacle of the body of Pontius Pilate, hence the adoption of the name of "Mons Pilatus."

PILCOMAYO, a tributary of the Rio Paraguay, in South America, which it joins after a course of 1700 miles from its source in the Bolivian Andes.

PILGRIMAGE OF GRACE, a rising in the northern counties of England in 1536 against the policy of Cromwell, Henry VIII.'s Chancellor, in regard to the temporalities of the Church, which, though concessions were made to it that led to its dispersion, broke out afresh with renewed violence, and had to be ruthlessly suppressed.

PILGRIM FATHERS, the name given to the Puritans, some 100 in all, who sailed from Plymouth in the _Mayflower_ in 1620 and settled in Ma.s.sachusetts, carrying with them "the life-spark of the largest nation on our earth."

PILLAR-SAINTS, a cla.s.s of recluses, called Stylites, who, in early Christian times, retired from the world to the Syrian Desert, and, perched on pillars, used to spend days and nights in fasting and praying, in the frantic belief that by mortification of their bodies they would ensure the salvation of their souls; their founder was Simon, surnamed Stylites; the practice, which was never allowed in the West, continued down to the 12th century.

PILLARS OF HERCULES. See HERCULES, PILLARS OF.

PILLORY, an obsolete instrument of punishment for centuries in use all over Europe, consisted of a platform, an upright pole, and at a convenient height cross-boards with holes, in which the culprit's neck and wrists were placed and fastened; so fixed he was exposed in some public place to the insults and noxious missiles of the mob. Formerly in England the penalty of forgery, perjury, &c., it became after the Commonwealth a favourite punishment for seditious libellers. It was last inflicted in London in 1830, and was abolished by law in 1837.

PILOTY, KARL VON, a modern German painter of the new Munich school, and professor of Painting at the Munich Academy; did portraits, but his masterpieces are on historical subjects, such as "Nero on the ruins of Rome," "Galileo in Prison," "The Death of Caesar," &c.; he was no less eminent as a teacher of art than as an artist (1826-1886).

PILSEN (50), a town in Bohemia, 67 m. SW. of Prague; has numerous industries, and rich coal and iron mines, and produces an excellent beer, which it exports in large quant.i.ties. It was an important place during the Thirty Years' War.

PINDAR, the greatest lyric poet of Greece, and for virgin purity of imagination ranked by Ruskin along with Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Scott; born near Thebes, in Boeotia, of a musical family, and began his musical education by practice on the flute, while he was a.s.sisted in his art by the example of his countrywoman Corinna, who competed with and defeated him more than once at the public festivals; he was a welcome visitor at the courts of all the Greek princes of the period, and not the less honoured that he condescended to no flattery and attuned his lyre to no sentiment but what would find an echo in every n.o.ble heart; he excelled in every department of lyric poetry, hymns to the G.o.ds, the praises of heroes, paeans of victory, choral songs, festal songs and dirges, but of these only a few remain, his Epinikia, a collection of triumphal odes in celebration of the successes achieved at the great national games of Greece; he was not only esteemed the greatest of lyric poets by his countrymen, but is without a rival still; when Alexander destroyed Thebes he spared the house of Pindar (522-442 B.C.).

PINDAR, PETER. See WOLCOTT, JOHN.

PINDAREES or PINDARIS, a set of freebooters who at the beginning of the present century ravaged Central India and were the terror of the districts, but who under the governor-generals.h.i.+p of Hastings were driven to bay and crushed in 1817.

PINDUS, MOUNT, is the range of mountains rising between Thessaly and Epirus, which forms the watershed of the country.

PINEAL GLAND, a small cone-shaped body of yellowish matter in the brain, the size of a pea, and situated in the front of the cerebellum, notable as considered by Descartes to be the seat of the soul, but is now surmised to be a rudimentary remnant of some organ, of vision it would seem, now extinct.

PINEL, PHILIPPE, a French physician, distinguished for the reformation he effected, against no small opposition, in the treatment of the insane, leading to the abandonment everywhere of the cruel, inhuman methods till then in vogue (1745-1826).

PINERO, ARTHUR WING, dramatic author, born in London; bred to law, took to the stage and the writing of plays, of which he has produced a goodly number; collaborated with Sir Arthur Sullivan and Mr. Comyns Carr in a romantic musical drama ent.i.tled "The Beauty Stone"; _b_. 1855.

PINEROLO (12), a town 23 m. SW. of Turin, now a fortress in an important military position, and in which the "Man with the Iron Mask"