Part 197

MICHIGAN: A. D. 1818-1836. Extension of Territorial limits to the Mississippi, and then beyond.

See WISCONSIN: A. D. 1805-1848.

MICHIGAN: A. D. 1837. Admission into the Union as a State. Settlement of Boundaries.

A conflict between the terms of the constitution under which the state of Ohio was admitted into the Union in 1803 and the Act of Congress which, in 1805, erected the Territory of Michigan, gave rise to a serious boundary dispute between the two. The Michigan claim rested not only upon the Act of 1805, but primarily upon the great Ordinance of 1787. {2180} It involved the possession of a wedge-shaped strip of territory, which "averaged six miles in width, across Ohio, embraced some 468 square miles, and included the lake-port of Toledo and the mouth of the Maumee river." In 1834, Michigan began to urge her claims to statehood. "Without waiting for an enabling act, a convention held at Detroit in May and June, 1835, adopted a state constitution for submission to congress, demanding entry into the Union, 'in conformity to the fifth article of the ordinance' of 1787—of course the boundaries sought being those established by the article in question. That summer, there were popular disturbances in the disputed territory, and some gunpowder harmlessly wasted. In December, President Jackson laid the matter before congress in a special message. Congress quietly determined to 'arbitrate' the quarrel by giving to Ohio the disputed tract, and offering Michigan, by way of partial recompense, the whole of what is to-day her upper peninsula. Michigan did not want the supposedly barren and worthless country to her northwest, protested long and loud against what she deemed to be an outrage, declared that she had no community of interest with the north peninsula, and was separated from it by insurmountable natural barriers for one-half of the year, while it rightfully belonged to the fifth state, to be formed out of the Northwest Territory. But congress persisted in making this settlement of the quarrel one of the conditions precedent to the admission of Michigan into the Union. In September, 1836, a state convention, called for the sole purpose of deciding the question, rejected the proposition on the ground that congress had no right to annex such a condition, according to the terms of the ordinance; a second convention, however, approved of it on the 15th of December following, and congress at once accepted this decision as final. Thus Michigan came into the sisterhood of states, January 26, 1837, with the territorial limits which she possesses to-day."

_R. G. Thwaites, The Boundaries of Wisconsin (Wisconsin Historical Society Collections, volume 11, pages 456-460)._

ALSO IN: _B. A. Hinsdale, The Old Northwest, chapter 17._

MICHIGAN: A. D. 1854. Early organization and victory of the Republican Party.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1854-1855.

MICHIGAN: End----------

MICHIGAN, Lake: Start----------

MICHIGAN, Lake: The Discovery.

See CANADA: A. D. 1634-1673.

MICHIGAN, Lake: Navigated by La Salle.

See CANADA: A. D. 1669-1687.

MICHIGAN, Lake: End----------

MICHIGANIA, The proposed State of.

See NORTHWEST TERRITORY: A. D. 1784.

MICHILLIMACKINAC.

See MACKINAW.

MICHMASH, War of.

One of Saul's campaigns against the Philistines received this name from Jonathan's exploit in scaling the height of Michmash and driving the garrison in panic from their stronghold.

_I. Samuel XIV._

_Dean Stanley, Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, lecture 21 (volume 2)._

MICKLEGARTH.

"Constantine had transplanted the Roman name, the centre of Roman power, and much of what was Roman in ideas and habits, to Byzantium, the New Rome.

See CONSTANTINOPLE: A. D. 330.

The result was that remarkable empire [see BYZANTINE EMPIRE] which, though since its fall it has become a by-word, was, when it was standing, the wonder and the envy of the barbarian world, the mysterious 'Micklegarth,' 'the Great City, the Town of towns,' of the northern legends."

_R. W. Church, The Beginning of the Middle Ages, chapter 6._

MICMACS, The.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

MICROSCOPE IN MEDICINE, The.

See MEDICAL SCIENCE: 17-18TH CENTURIES, and after.

MIDDLE AGES.

"The term Middle Ages is applied to the time which elapsed between the fall of the Roman Empire and the formation of the great modern monarchies, between the first permanent invasion of the Germans, at the beginning of the 5th century of our era [see GAUL: A. D. 406-409], and the last invasion, made by the Turks, ten centuries later, in 1453."

_V. Duruy, History of the Middle Ages, author's preface._

"It is not possible to fix accurate limits to the Middle Ages; … though the ten centuries from the 5th to the 15th seem, in a general point of view, to constitute that period."

_H. Hallam, The Middle Ages, preface to first edition._

"We commonly say that ancient history closed with the year 476 A. D. The great fact which marks the close of that age and the beginning of a new one is the conquest of the Western Roman Empire by the German tribes, a process which occupied the whole of the fifth century and more. But if we are to select any special date to mark the change, the year 476 is the best for the purpose. … When we turn to the close of medieval history we find no such general agreement as to the specific date which shall be selected to stand for that fact. For one author it is 1453, the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire through the capture of Constantinople by the Turks; for another, 1492, the discovery of America; for another, 1520, the full opening of the Reformation. This variety of date is in itself very significant. It unconsciously marks the extremely important fact that the middle ages come to an end at different dates in the different lines of advance—manifestly earlier in politics and economics than upon the intellectual side. … It is a transition age. Lying, as it does, between two ages, in each of which there is an especially rapid advance of civilization, it is not itself primarily an age of progress. As compared with either ancient or modern history, the additions which were made during the middle ages to the common stock of civilization are few and unimportant. Absolutely, perhaps, they are not so. … But the most important of them fall within the last part of the period, and they are really indications that the age is drawing to a close, and a new and different one coming on. Progress, however much there may have been, is not its distinctive characteristic. There is a popular recognition of this fact in the general opinion that the medieval is a very barren and uninteresting period of history—the 'dark ages'—so confused and without evident plan that its facts are a mere disorganized jumble, impossible to reduce to system or to hold in mind. This must be emphatically true for every one, unless there can be found running through all its confusion some single line of evolution which will give it meaning and organization. … Most certainly there must be some such general meaning of the age. {2181} The orderly and regular progress of history makes it impossible that it should be otherwise. Whether that meaning can be correctly stated or not is much more uncertain. It is the difficulty of doing this which makes medieval history seem so comparatively barren a period. The most evident general meaning of the age is … assimilation. The greatest work which had to be done was to bring the German barbarian, who had taken possession of the ancient world and become everywhere the ruling race, up to such a level of attainment and understanding that he would be able to take up the work of civilization where antiquity had been forced to suspend it and go on with it from that point. … Here, then, is the work of the middle ages. To the results of ancient history were to be added the ideas and institutions of the Germans; to the enfeebled Roman race was to be added the youthful energy and vigor of the German. Under the conditions which existed this union could not be made—a harmonious and homogeneous Christendom could not be formed, except through centuries of time, through anarchy, and ignorance, and superstition."

_G. B. Adams, Civilization During the Middle Ages, introduction._

"We speak, sometimes, of the 'Dark Ages,' and in matters of the exact sciences perhaps they were dark enough. Yet we must deduct something from our youthful ideas of their obscurity when we find that our truest lovers of beauty fix the building age of the world between the years 500 and 1500 of our era. Architecture, more than any other art, is an index to the happiness and freedom of the people; and during this period of 1,000 years, 'an architecture, pure in its principles, reasonable in its practice, and beautiful to the eyes of all men, even the simplest,' covered Europe with beautiful buildings from Constantinople to the north of Britain. In presence of this manifestation of free and productive intelligence, unmatched even in ancient Greece and Rome, and utterly unmatchable to-day, we may usefully reflect upon the expressive and constructive force of the spirit of Christendom, even in its darkest hours. The more closely we examine the question, the less ground we shall find for the conception of the Middle Ages as a long sleep followed by a sudden awakening. Rather we should consider that ancient Greece was the root, and ancient Rome the stem and branches of our life; that the Dark Ages, as we call them, represent its flower, and the modern world of science and political freedom the slowly-matured fruit. If we consider carefully that the Christian humanistic spirit held itself as charged from the first with the destinies of the illiterate and half-heathen masses of the European peoples, whereas, neither in Greece nor in the Roman Empire was civilisation intended for more than a third or a fourth part of the inhabitants of their territories, we shall not be surprised at an apparent fall of intellectual level, which really meant the beginning of a universal rise hitherto unknown in the history of the world. Ideas of this kind may help us to understand what must remain after all a paradox, that we have been taught to apply the term 'Dark Ages' to the period of what were in some respects the greatest achievements of the human mind, for example, the Cathedral of Florence and the writings of Dante. … It is perfectly obvious now to all who look carefully at these questions, that the instinct of our physical science and naturalistic art, of our evolutionist philosophy and democratic politics, is not antagonistic to, but is essentially one with the instinct which, in the Middle Ages, regarded all beauty and truth and power as the working of the Divine reason in the mind of man and in nature. What a genuine though grotesque anticipation of Charles Darwin is there in Francis of Assisi preaching to the birds!"

_B. Bosanquet, The Civilization of Christendom, chapter 3._

"'I know nothing of those ages which knew nothing.' I really forget to which of two eminent wits this saying belongs; but I have often thought that I should have liked to ask him how he came to know so curious and important a fact respecting ages of which he knew nothing. Was it merely by hearsay? Everybody allows, however, that they were dark ages. Certainly; but what do we mean by darkness? Is not the term, as it is generally used, comparative? Suppose I were to say that I am writing 'in a little dark room,' would you understand me to mean that I could not see the paper before me? Or if I should say that I was writing 'on a dark day,' would you think I meant that the sun had not risen by noon? Well, then, let me beg you to remember this, when you and I use the term, dark ages. … Many causes … have concurred to render those ages very dark to us; but, for the present, I feel it sufficient to remind the reader, that darkness is quite a different thing from shutting the eyes: and that we have no right to complain that we can see but little until we have used due diligence to see what we can. As to the other point—that is, as to the degree of darkness in which those ages were really involved, and as to the mode and degree in which it affected those who lived in them, I must express my belief, that it has been a good deal exaggerated. There is no doubt that those who lived in what are generally called the 'middle' or the 'dark' ages, knew nothing of many things which are familiar to us, and which we deem essential to our comfort, and almost to our existence; but still I doubt whether, even in this point of view, they were so entirely dark as some would have us suppose."

_S. R. Maitland, The Dark Ages, introduction._

"In the Middle Ages both sides of human consciousness—that which was turned within as that which was turned without—lay dreaming or half-awake beneath a common veil. The veil was woven of faith, illusion, and childish prepossession, through which the world and history were seen clad in strange hues. Man was conscious of himself only as a member of a race, people, party, family, or corporation—only through some general category. In Italy this veil first melted into air; an objective treatment and consideration of the state and of all the things of this world became possible. The subjective side at the same time asserted itself with corresponding emphasis; man became a spiritual individual, and recognised himself as such."

_J. Burckhardt, The Renaissance in Italy, part 2, chapter 1 (volume 1)._

See, also, EUROPE (page 1010-1048): EDUCATION, MEDIÆVAL; LIBRARIES, MEDIÆVAL; MEDICAL SCIENCE, MEDIÆVAL; MONEY AND BANKING, MEDIÆVAL.

MIDDLEBURG: Taken by the Gueux of Holland (1574).

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1573-1574.

MIDDLESEX, Origin of.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 477-527.

{2182}

MIDDLESEX ELECTIONS, John Wilkes and the.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1768-1774.

MIDIANITES, The.

"The name of Midian, though sometimes given peculiarly to the tribe on the south-east shores of the Gulf of Akaba, was extended to all Arabian tribes on the east of the Jordan,—'the Amalekites, and all the children of the East.'"

_Dean Stanley, Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, lecture 15 (volume 1)._

MIGDOL.

See JEWS: THE ROUTE OF THE EXODUS.

MIGHTY HOST, Knights of the.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1864 (OCTOBER).

MIGNONS OF HENRY III., The.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1573-1576.

MIKADO.

"Though this is the name by which the whole outer world knows the sovereign of Japan, it is not that now used in Japan itself, except in poetry and on great occasions. The Japanese have got into the habit of calling their sovereign by such alien Chinese titles as Tenshi, 'the Son of Heaven'; Ten-o, or Tenno, 'the Heavenly Emperor'; Shujo, 'the Supreme Master.' His designation in the official translations of modern public documents into English is 'Emperor.' … The etymology of the word Mikado is not quite clear. Some—and theirs is the current opinion—trace it to 'mi,' 'august,' and 'kado,' a 'gate,' reminding one of the 'Sublime Porte' of Turkey. … The word Mikado is often employed to denote the monarch's Court as well as the monarch himself."

_B. H. Chamberlain, Things Japanese, page 229._

MIKASUKIS, The.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: MUSKHOGEAN FAMILY.

MILAN, King, Abdication of.

See BALKAN AND DANUBIAN STATES: A. D. 1879-1889.

MILAN: Start--------

MILAN: B. C. 223-222. The capital of the Insubrian Gauls (Mediolanum). Taken by the Romans.

See ROME: B. C. 295-191.

MILAN: A. D. 268. Aureolus besieged.

During the miserable and calamitous reign of the Roman emperor Gallienus, the army on the Upper Danube invested their leader, Aureolus, with the imperial purple, and crossed the Alps to place him on the throne. Defeated by Gallienus in a battle fought near Milan, Aureolus and his army took refuge in that city and were there besieged. During the progress of the siege a conspiracy against Gallienus was formed in his own camp, and he was assassinated. The crown was then offered to the soldier Claudius—afterwards called Claudius Gothicus—and he accepted it. The siege of Milan was continued by Claudius, the city was forced to surrender and Aureolus was put to death.

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 11._

MILAN: A. D. 286. The Roman imperial court.

"Diocletian and Maximian were the first Roman princes who fixed, in time of peace, their ordinary residence in the provinces. … The court of the emperor of the west [Maximian] was, for the most part, established at Milan, whose situation, at the foot of the Alps, appeared far more convenient than that of Rome, for the important purpose of watching the motions of the barbarians of Germany. Milan soon assumed the splendour of an imperial city. The houses are described as numerous and well-built; the manners of the people as polished and liberal."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 13._

MILAN: A. D. 313. Constantine's Edict of Toleration.

See ROME: A. D. 313.

MILAN: A. D. 374-397. The Ambrosian Church.

The greatness of the Milanese, in later times, "was chiefly originated and promoted by the prerogatives of their Archbishop, amongst which that of crowning, and so in a manner constituting, the King of Italy, raised him in wealth and splendour above every other prelate of the Roman Church, and his city above every other city of Lombardy in power and pride. … It is said that the Church of Milan was founded by St. Barnabas; it is certain that it owed its chief aggrandisement, and the splendour which distinguished it from all other churches, to St. Ambrose [Archbishop from 374 to 397], who, having come to Milan in the time of Valentinian as a magistrate, was by the people made Bishop also, and as such was able to exalt it by the ordination of many inferior dignitaries, and by obtaining supremacy for it over all the Bishops of Lombardy. … This church received from St. Ambrose a peculiar liturgy, which was always much loved and venerated by the Milanese, and continued longer in use than any of those which anciently prevailed in other churches of the West. To the singing in divine service, which was then artless and rude, St. Ambrose, taking for models the ancient melodies still current in his time, the last echoes of the civilisation of distant ages, imparted a more regular rhythm [known as 'the Ambrosian Chant']; which, when reduced by St. Gregory to the grave simplicity of tone that best accords with the majesty of worship, obtained the name of 'Canto fermo'; and afterwards becoming richer, more elaborate, and easier to learn through the many ingenious inventions of Guido d' Arezzo, … was brought by degrees to the perfection of modern counterpoint. … St. Ambrose also composed prayers for his church, and hymns; amongst others, according to popular belief, that most sublime and majestic one, the Te Deum, which is now familiar and dear to the whole of Western Christendom. It is said that his clergy were not forbidden to marry. Hence an opinion prevailed that this church, according to the ancient statutes, ought not to be entirely subject to that of Rome."

_G. B. Testa, History of the War of Frederick I. against the Communes of Lombardy, pages 23-24._

MILAN: A. D. 404. Removal of the Imperial Court.

See ROME: A. D.404-408.

MILAN: A. D. 452. Capture by the Huns.

See HUNS: A. D. 452.

MILAN: A. D. 539. Destroyed by the Goths.

When Belisarius, in his first campaign for the recovery of Italy from the Goths, had secured possession of Rome, A. D. 538, he sent a small force northward to Milan, and that city, hating its Gothic rulers, was gladly surrendered to him. It was occupied by a small Roman garrison and unwisely left to the attacks upon it that were inevitable. Very soon the Goths appeared before its walls, and with them 10,000 Burgundians who had crossed the Alps to their assistance. Belisarius despatched an army to the relief of the city, but the generals in command of it were cowardly and did nothing. After stoutly resisting for six months, suffering the last extremes of starvation and misery, Milan fell, and a terrible vengeance was wreaked upon it. "All the men were slain, and these, if the information given to Procopius was correct, amounted to 300,000. The women were made slaves, and handed over by the Goths to their Burgundian allies in payment of their services. The city itself was rased to the ground: not the only time that signal destruction has overtaken the fair capital of Lombardy."

_T. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, book 5, chapter 11._

See, also, ROME: A. D. 535-553.

{2183}

"The Goths, in their last moments, were revenged by the destruction of a city second only to Rome in size and opulence."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 41._

MILAN: 11th Century. Acquisition of Republican independence.

See ITALY: A. D. 1056-1152.

MILAN: A. D. 1162. Total destruction by Frederick Barbarossa.

See ITALY: A. D. 1154-1162.

MILAN: A. D. 1167. The rebuilding of the city.

See ITALY: A. D. 1166-1167.

MILAN: A. D. 1277-1447. The rise and the reign of the Visconti. Extension of their Tyranny over Lombardy. The downfall of their House.