Encyclopaedia Britannica 11th Edition Brequigny Louis Georges O

Chapter 83

Chapter 832,911 wordsPublic domain

BUKOVINA, a duchy and crownland of Austria, bounded E. by Russia and Rumania, S. by Rumania, W. by Transylvania and Hungary, and N. by Galicia. Area, 4035 sq. m. The country, especially in its southern parts, is occupied by the offshoots of the Carpathians, which attain in the Giumaleu an altitude of 6100 ft. The principal passes are the Radna Pass and the Borgo Pass. With the exception of the Dniester, which skirts its northern border, Bukovina belongs to the watershed of the Danube. The principal rivers are the Pruth, and the Sereth with its affluents the Suczawa, the Moldava and the Bistritza. The climate of Bukovina is healthy but severe, especially in winter; but it is generally milder than that of Galicia, the mean annual temperature at Czernowitz being 46.9° F. No less than 43.17% of the total area is occupied by woodland, and the very name of the country is derived from the abundance of beech trees. Of the remainder 27.59% is occupied by arable land, 12.68% by meadows, 10.09% by pastures and 0.78% by gardens. The soil of Bukovina is fertile, and agriculture has made great progress, the principal products being wheat, maize, rye, oats, barley, potatoes, flax and hemp. Cattle-rearing constitutes another important source of revenue. The principal mineral is salt, which is extracted at the mine of Kaczyka, belonging to the government. Brewing, distilling and milling are the chief industries. Commerce is mostly in the hands of the Jews and Armenians, and chiefly confined to raw products, such as agricultural produce, cattle, wool and wood. Bukovina had in 1900 a population of 729,921, which is equivalent to 181 inhabitants per sq. m. According to nationality, over 40% were Ruthenians, 35% Rumanians, 13% Jews, and the remainder was composed of Germans, Poles, Hungarians, Russians and Armenians. The official language of the administration, of the law-courts, and of instruction in the university is German. Nearly 70% of the population belong to the Greek Orthodox Church, and stand under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the archbishop or metropolitan of Czernowitz. To the Roman Catholic Church belong 11%, to the Greek United Church 3.25%, while 2.5% are Protestants. Elementary education is improving, but, after Dalmatia, Bukovina still shows the largest number of illiterates in Austria. The local diet, of which the archbishop of Czernowitz and the rector of the university are members _ex officio_, is composed of 31 members, and Bukovina sends 14 deputies to the Reichsrat at Vienna. For administrative purposes, the country is divided into 9 districts and an autonomous municipality, Czernowitz (pop. 69,619), the capital. Other towns are Radautz (14,343), Suczawa (10,946), Kuczurmare (9417), Kimpolung (8024) and Sereth (7610).

Bukovina was originally a part of the principality of Moldavia, whose ancient capital Suczawa was situated in this province. It was occupied by the Russians in 1769, and by the Austrians in 1774. In 1777 the Porte, under whose suzerainty Moldavia was, ceded this province to Austria. It was incorporated with Galicia in a single province in 1786, but was separated from it in 1849, and made a separate crownland.

See Bidermann, _Die Bukowina unter der osterreichischen Verwaltung, 1775-1875_ (Lemberg, 1876).

BULACÁN, a town of the province of Bulacán, Luzon, Philippine Islands, on an arm of the Pampanga delta, 22 m. N.N.W. of Manila. Pop. (1903) 11,589; after the census enumeration, the town of Guiguintó (pop. 3948) was annexed. Bulacán is served by the Manila-Dagupan railway. Sugar, rice, indigo and tropical fruits are the chief products of the fertile district in which the town lies; it is widely known for its fish-ponds and its excellent fish, and its principal manufactures are jusi, piña, ilang ilang perfume and sugar. With the exception of the churches and a few stone buildings, Bulacán was completely destroyed by fire in 1898.

BULANDSHAHR, a town and district of British India in the Meerut division of the United Provinces. The town is situated on a height on the right bank of the Kali-Nadi, whence the substitution of the names Unchanagar and Bulandshahr (high town) for its earlier name of Baran, by which it is still sometimes called. The population in 1901 was 18,959. Its present handsome appearance is due to several successive collectors, notably F.S. Growse, who was active in erecting public buildings, and in encouraging the local gentry to beautify their own houses. In particular, it boasts a fine bathing-ghat, a town-hall, a market-place, a tank to supply water, and a public garden.

The DISTRICT OF BULANDSHAHR has an area of 1899 sq. m. The district stretches out in a level plain, with a gentle slope from N.W. to S.E., and a gradual but very slight elevation about midway between the Ganges and Jumna. Principal rivers are the Ganges and Jumna--the former navigable all the year round, the latter only during the rains. The Ganges canal intersects the district, and serves both for irrigation and navigation. The Lower Ganges canal has its headworks at Narora. The climate of the district is liable to extremes, being very cold in the winter and excessively hot in the summer. In 1901 the population was 1,138,101, showing an increase of 20% in the decade. The district is very highly cultivated and thickly populated. There are several indigo factories, and mills for pressing and cleaning cotton, but the former have greatly suffered by the decline in indigo of recent years. The main line of the East Indian railway and the Oudh and Rohilkhand railway cross the district. The chief centre of trade is Khurja.

Nothing certain is known of the history of the district before A.D. 1018, when Mahmud of Ghazni appeared before Baran and received the submission of the Hindu raja and his followers to Islam. In 1193 the city was captured by Kutb-ud-din. In the 14th century the district was subject to invasions of Rajput and Mongol clans who left permanent settlements in the country. With the firm establishment of the Mogul empire peace was restored, the most permanent effect of this period being the large proportion of Mussulmans among the population, due to the zeal of Aurangzeb. The decline of the Mogul empire gave free play to the turbulent spirit of the Jats and Gujars, many of whose chieftains succeeded in carving out petty principalities for themselves at the expense of their neighbours. During this period, however, Baran had properly no separate history, being a dependency of Koil, whence it continued to be administered under the Mahratta domination. After Koil and the fort of Aligarh had been captured by the British in 1803, Bulandshahr and the surrounding country were at first incorporated in the newly created district of Aligarh (1805). Bulandshahr enjoyed an evil reputation in the Mutiny of 1857, when the Gujar peasantry plundered the towns. The Jats took the side of the government, while the Gujars and Mussulman Rajputs were most actively hostile.

See _Imperial Gazetteer of India_ (Oxford, ed. 1908); F.S. Growse, _Bulandshahr_ (Benares, 1884).

BULAWAYO, the capital of Matabeleland, the western province of southern Rhodesia, South Africa. White population (1904) 3840. It occupies a central position on the tableland between the Limpopo and Zambezi rivers, is 4469 ft. above the sea and 1362 m. north-east of Cape Town by rail. Beira, the nearest port, is 398 m. east in a direct line, but distant 675 m. by railway. Another railway, part of the Cape to Cairo connexion, runs north-west from Bulawayo, crossing the Zambezi just below the Victoria Falls. In the centre of the town is a large market square to which roads lead in regular lines north, south, east and [v.04 p.0717] west. Those going east and west are called avenues and are numbered, those running north and south are called streets and are named. Through the centre of Market Square runs Rhodes Street. There are many handsome public and private buildings. In front of the stock exchange is a monument in memory of the 257 settlers killed in the Matabele rebellion of 1896, and at the junction of two of the principal streets is a colossal bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes. East of the town is a large park and botanical gardens, beyond which is a residential suburb. The railway station and water and electric supply works are in the south-west quarter. An avenue 130 ft. broad and nearly 1½ m. long, planted throughout its length with trees, leads from the town to Government House, which is built on the site of Lobengula's royal kraal. The tree under which that chieftain sat when giving judgment has been preserved. A number of gold reefs intersect the surrounding district and in some of the reefs gold is mined. South-south-east of the town are the Matoppo Hills. In a grave in one of these hills, 33 m. from Bulawayo, Rhodes is buried.

The "Place of Slaughter," as the Zulu word Bulawayo is interpreted, was founded about 1838 by Lobengula's father, Mosilikatze, some distance south of the present town, and continued to be the royal residence till its occupation by the British South Africa Company's forces in November 1893, when a new town was founded. Four years later the railway connecting it with Cape Town was completed (see RHODESIA).

BULDANA, a town and district of India, in Berar. The town had a population in 1901 of 4137. The district has an area of 3662 sq. m. The southern part forms a portion of Berar Balaghat or Berar--above the Ghats. Here the general contour of the country may be described as a succession of small plateaus decreasing in elevation to the extreme south. Towards the eastern side of the district the country assumes more the character of undulating high lands, favoured with soil of a good quality. A succession of plateaus descends from the highest ridges on the north to the south, where a series of small ghats march with the nizam's territory. The small fertile valleys between the plateaus are watered by streams during the greater portion of the year, while wells of particularly good and pure water are numerous. These valleys are favourite village sites. The north portion of the district occupies the rich valley of the Purna. The district is rich in agricultural produce; in a seasonable year a many-coloured sheet of cultivation, almost without a break, covers the valley of the Purna. In the Balaghat also the crops are very fine. Situated as the district is in the neighbourhood of the great cotton market of Khamgaon, and nearer to Bombay than the other Berar districts, markets for its agricultural produce on favourable terms are easily found. In 1901 the population was 423,616, showing a decrease of 12% in the decade due to the effects of famine. The district was reconstituted, and given an additional area of 853 sq. m. in 1905; the population on the enlarged area in 1901 was 613,756. The only manufacture is cotton cloth. Cotton, wheat and oil-seeds are largely exported. The Nagpur line of the Great Indian Peninsula railway runs through the north of the district. The most important place of trade is Malkapur--pop. (1901) 13,112--with several factories for ginning and pressing cotton.

BULDUR, or BURDUR, chief town of a sanjak of the Konia vilayet in Asia Minor. It is called by the Christians _Polydorion_. Its altitude is 3150 ft. and it is situated in the midst of gardens, about 2 m. from the brackish lake, Buldur Geul (anc. _Ascania Limne_). Linen-weaving and leather-tanning are the principal industries. There is a good carriage road to Dineir, by which much grain is sent from the Buldur plain, and a railway connects it with Dineir and Egirdir. Pop. 12,000.

BULFINCH, CHARLES (1763-1844), American architect, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on the 8th of August 1763, the son of Thomas Bulfinch, a prominent and wealthy physician. He was educated at the Boston Latin school and at Harvard, where he graduated in 1781, and after several years of travel and study in Europe, settled in 1787 in Boston, where he was the first to practise as a professional architect. Among his early works were the old Federal Street theatre (1793), the first play-house in New England, and the "new" State House (1798). For more than twenty-five years he was the most active architect in Boston, and at the same time took a leading part in the public life of the city. As chairman of the board of selectmen for twenty-one years (1797-1818), an important position which made him practically chief magistrate, he exerted a strong influence in modernizing Boston, in providing for new systems of drainage and street-lighting, in reorganizing the police and fire departments, and in straightening and widening the streets. He was one of the promoters in 1787 of the voyage of the ship "Columbia," which under command of Captain Robert Gray (1755-1806) was the first to carry the American flag round the world. In 1818 Bulfinch succeeded B.H. Latrobe (1764-1820) as architect of the National Capitol at Washington. He completed the unfinished wings and central portion, constructing the rotunda from plans of his own after suggestions of his predecessor, and designed the new western approach and portico. In 1830 he returned to Boston, where he died on the 15th of April 1844. Bulfinch's work was marked by sincerity, simplicity, refinement of taste and an entire freedom from affectation, and it greatly influenced American architecture in the early formative period. His son, Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch (1809-1870), was a well-known Unitarian clergyman and author.

See _The Life and Letters of Charles Bulfinch_ (Boston, 1896), edited by his grand-daughter, and "The Architects of the American Capitol," by James Q. Howard, in _The International Review_, vol. i. (New York, 1874).

BULGARIA, a kingdom of south-eastern Europe, situated in the north-east of the Balkan Peninsula, and on the Black Sea. From 1878 until the 5th of October 1908, Bulgaria was an autonomous and tributary principality, under the suzerainty of the sultan of Turkey. The area of the kingdom amounts to 37,240 sq. m., and comprises the territories between the Balkan chain and the river Danube; the province of Eastern Rumelia, lying south of the Balkans; and the western highlands of Kiustendil, Samakov, Sofia and Trn. Bulgaria is bounded on the N. by the Danube, from its confluence with the Timok to the eastern suburbs of Silistria whence a line, forming the Rumanian frontier, is drawn to a point on the Black Sea coast 10 m. S. of Mangalia. On the E. it is washed by the Black Sea; on the S. the Turkish frontier, starting from a point on the coast about 12 m. S. of Sozopolis, runs in a south-westerly direction, crossing the river Maritza at Mustafa Pasha, and reaching the Arda at Adakali. The line laid down by the Berlin Treaty (1878) ascended the Arda to Ishiklar, thence following the crest of Rhodope to the westwards, but the cantons of Krjali and Rupchus included in this boundary were restored to Turkey in 1886. The present frontier, passing to the north of these districts, reaches the watershed of Rhodope a little north of the Dospat valley, and then follows the crest of the Rilska Planina to the summit of Tchrni Vrkh, where the Servian, Turkish and Bulgarian territories meet. From this point the western or Servian frontier passes northwards, leaving Trn to the east and Pirot to the west, reaching the Timok near Kula, and following the course of that river to its junction with the Danube. The Berlin Treaty boundary was far from corresponding with the ethnological limits of the Bulgarian race, which were more accurately defined by the abrogated treaty of San Stefano (see below, under _History_). A considerable portion of Macedonia, the districts of Pirot and Vranya belonging to Servia, the northern half of the vilayet of Adrianople, and large tracts of the Dobrudja, are, according to the best and most impartial authorities, mainly inhabited by a Bulgarian population.

_Physical Features._--The most striking physical features are two mountain-chains; the Balkans, which run east and west through the heart of the country; and Rhodope, which, for a considerable distance, forms its southern boundary. The Balkans constitute the southern half of the great semicircular range known as the anti-Dacian system, of which the Carpathians form the northern portion. This great chain is sundered at the Iron Gates by the passage of the Danube; its two component parts present many points of resemblance in their aspect and outline, geological formation and flora. The Balkans (ancient _Haemus_) run almost parallel to the Danube, ...

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Corrections made to printed original.

p. 499, History: "It was, however, recovered": 'recoverd' in original

p. 506, 1st para: "the yarrow (Achillea millefolium).": 'Achilloea' in original

p. 506, 2nd para: "owing partly to licensing legislation": 'lincensing' in original

p. 507, 2nd para: "The worts of each brewing must be collected": 'much be collected' in original

p. 541, Lansdowne Bridge: "main members at end of cantilevers": 'centilevers' in original

p. 602, Climate, Flora and Fauna: "constant breeze from the Indian Ocean": 'beeeze' in original

P. 625, Brockville: "situated 119 m. S.W. of Montreal": 'situtated' in original

p. 635, 5th para: "the embarrassment of breathing": 'embarassment' in original

p. 671, 1st para: "he conceived an enthusiastic admiration": 'enthusiatic' in original

P. 703, Marchantiales: "Marchantia polymorpha and Lunularia": 'Marchantia, polymorpha' in original

p. 707, Fig. 14: "Andreaea petrophila": 'pelrophila' in original

P. 742, Buddhaghosa: "a nearly contemporaneous Chinese translation": 'comtemporaneous' in original