Part 1160

The weakened and disordered state of the Vandal kingdom, concurring with the revival of a military spirit in the eastern Roman empire, which the great soldier Belisarius had brought about, encouraged the Emperor Justinian to attempt, A. D. 533, a reconquest of the lost Roman provinces in Africa. With a fleet of six hundred ships, bearing 37,000 men, Belisarius set sail from Constantinople in the month of June and landed early in September on the African coast, about five days journey from Carthage,—having halted at a port in Sicily on the voyage. A few days later, he defeated the Vandal king, Gelimer, in a battle (Ad Decimus) fought at ten miles distance from his capital, and entered Carthage in triumph (September 15, A. D. 533), received with joy by its Roman and Catholic inhabitants, long persecuted and humiliated by the Arian Vandals. A second and decisive battle was fought some weeks afterwards at Tricamaron, twenty miles away from Carthage, and there and then the Vandal kingdom came to its end. Gelimer fled into the wilds of Numidia, was pursued, and, having surrendered himself in the March following, was sent to Constantinople, and passed the remainder of his days in peace and modest luxury on a comfortable estate in Galatia. "The fall of the Vandal monarchy was an event full of meaning for the future history of Africa. There can be little doubt that in destroying it Justinian was unconsciously removing the most powerful barrier which might in the next century have arrested the progress of Mohammedanism."

_T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 4, chapter 15 (v 3)._

"The bravest of the Vandal youth were distributed into five squadrons of cavalry, which adopted the name of their benefactor. … But these rare exceptions, the reward of birth or valour, are insufficient to explain the fate of a nation whose numbers, before a short and bloodless war, amounted to more than 600,000 persons. After the exile of their king and nobles, the servile crowd might purchase their safety by abjuring their character, religion, and language; and their degenerate posterity would be insensibly mingled with the common herd of African subjects. Yet even in the present age, and in the heart of the Moorish tribes, a curious traveller has discovered the white complexion and long flaxen hair of a northern race; and it was formerly believed that the boldest of the Vandals fled beyond the power, or even the knowledge, of the Romans, to enjoy their solitary freedom on the shores of the Atlantic ocean."

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

VANDALS: End--------

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND, TASMANIA: Discovery and naming.

See AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1601-1800.

VANGIONES. TRIBOCI. NEMETES.

"The Rhine bank itself is occupied by tribes unquestionably German—the Vangiones, the Triboci, and the Nemetes."—"These tribes dwelt on the west bank of the Rhine, in what is now Rhenish Bavaria."

_Tacitus, Germany; translated by Church and Brodribb, with geographical notes._

VANNES, Origin of.

See VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL.

VAN RENSSELAER, Patroon Killian, The land purchases of.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1621-1646.

VAN RENSSELAER, General Stephen, and the Battle of Queenston Heights.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812 (SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER).

VAN RENSSELAER MANOR.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1621-1646; and LIVINGSTON MANOR.

VAN TWILLER, Wouter, The governorship of.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1638-1647.

VARANGIAN SEA.

One of the ancient names of the Baltic.

_R. G. Latham, Native-Races of Russian Empire, chapter 16._

VARANGIANS, OR WARINGS. THE WARING GUARD.

Varangians "was the name of the Byzantine equivalent to the 'soldiers of a free-company' In the 11th and 12th centuries. The soldiers were almost wholly Scandinavians—to a great extent the Swedes of Russia. The reasons against believing Varangian to be the same word as Frank, are: 1. The mention of Franci along with them, as a separate people. 2. The extent to which the Varangians were Scandinavians, rather than Germans of the Rhine. In favour of it is: The form of the present Oriental name for Europeans—Feringi. This, in my mind, preponderates. Connected by name only with the Franks, the truer ethnological affinities of the Varangians were with the Scandinavians of Russia."

_R. G. Latham, The Germania of Tacitus, Epilegomena, section. 17._

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"Many of the Warings and probably of the English also had taken military service at an early period under the Byzantine emperors. They formed a body-guard for the Emperor, and soon gained for themselves a renown greater than that possessed by the earlier imperial guard of the Immortals. The Byzantine writers usually speak of them as the barbarian guard or as the axe-bearers. Their weapon was the Danish battle-axe, or rather bill, and seems not to have had two blades turning different ways like those of a halberd, but to have had one with a sharp steel spike projecting, so that the weapon could be used either to strike or to thrust. Anna, the daughter of Alexis the First, calls them Warings or Varangians. Nicetas speaks of them as Germans. The Western writers call them usually Danes, or 'English and Danes.' The conquest of England by William the Norman caused many of the English to emigrate to Russia and so to Constantinople, where they joined the Waring guard. … Warings and English, while occupants of the Greek palace, still spoke their own language, had their own laws, and chose, with certain exceptions, their own officers. The one in command was called the acolyth, or follower, because his place was immediately behind the Emperor."

_E. Pears, The Fall of Constantinople, chapter 6. section 3._

ALSO IN: _V. Thomsen, The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia, lecture 3._

See, also, RUSSIA: A. D. 862.

VARAVILLE, Battle of.

A decisive victory over the French, invading Normandy, by Duke William—afterwards the Conqueror of England—A. D. 1058.

_E. A. Freeman, Norman Conquest, chapter 12, section 2 (volume 3)._

VARCHONITES, The.

See AVARS.

VARIAN LAW.

See MAJESTAS.

VARIAN MASSACRE, The.

See GERMANY: B. C. 8-A. D. 11.

VARINI, The.

See AVIONES.

VARKANA.

See HYRCANIA.

VARNA, The battle of (1444).

See TURKS: A. D. 1402-1451.

VARNA, Siege and capture (1828).

See TURKS: A. D. 1826-1829.

VARUS, and his Legions, The destruction of.

See GERMANY: B. C. 8-A. D. 11.

VASCONES, The.

See BASQUES.

VASSAL.

See FEUDALISM.

VASSAR COLLEGE.

See EDUCATION, MODERN: REFORMS, &c.: A. D. 1804-1891.

VASSILI.

See BASIL.

VASSY, The Massacre of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1560-1563.

VATICAN, THE. THE LEONINE CITY.

"The name Vatican was applied by the writers of the Augustan age to the whole range of hills extending along the western bank of the Tiber, including the Janiculum and the Monte Mario. … But the name Vaticanus has now been restricted to the small hill standing behind the Basilica of St. Peter's, upon which the Vatican Museum and the Papal Gardens are situated. This hill is a small projecting portion of the range which includes the Janiculum and Monte Mario, and it is separated from the Janiculum by a depression, along which the street of the Borgo S. Spirito runs. The derivation of the name Vatican is lost. Gellius has preserved a quotation from Varro, in which the word is said to be derived from a deity Vaticanus, the presiding god of the first rudiments of speech ('vagire,' 'vagitanus'). Paulus Diaconus gives a different explanation, founded on the supposed expulsion of the Etruscans in fulfilment of an oracle ('vatum responso expulsis Etruscis'); and from this Niebuhr and Bunsen, following him, have supposed that an Etruscan city existed here in ancient times. There appears to be no sufficient evidence of such a settlement."

_R. Burn, Rome and the Campagna, chapter 11._

In the ninth century, at the time of the pontificate of Leo IV., "the nations of the West and North who visited the threshold of the apostles had gradually formed the large and populous suburb of the Vatican, and their various habitations were distinguished, in the language of the times, as the 'schools' of the Greeks and Goths, of the Lombards and Saxons. But this venerable spot was still open to sacrilegious insult: the design of enclosing it with walls and towers exhausted all that authority could command or charity would supply: and the pious labour of four years was animated in every season and at every hour by the presence of the indefatigable pontiff. The love of fame, a generous but worldly passion, may be detected in the name of the Leonine City, which he bestowed on the Vatican; yet the pride of the dedication was tempered with Christian penance and humility."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 52._

VATICAN COUNCIL, The.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1869-1870.

VATICAN LIBRARY, The.

See LIBRARIES, MODERN: EUROPE, and ITALY.

VAUCHAMP. Battle of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1814 (JANUARY-MARCH).

VAUDOIS.

See WALDENSES.

VAUGHT'S HILL, Battle of.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1863 (FEBRUARY-APRIL: TENNESSEE).

VAVASSOR, VAVASOUR.

See FEUDAL TENURES; also CATTANI.

VECTIGAL, THE. VECTIGALIA.

"Pascua—Vectigalia-Publicum-are the terms employed to denote generally the Revenues of Rome, from whatever source derived. Pascua, i. e. Pasture lands, signified Revenue; because, in the earliest ages, the public income was derived solely from the rent of pastures belonging to the state. … Vectigal is the word used more frequently than any other to denote the Revenue of the state generally. … Publicum, in its widest acceptation, comprehended every thing which belonged to the community at large."

_W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquity, chapter 8._

"Cicero states that there was a difference between Sicily and all the other Roman provinces in the management of the Vectigal, which is the name for the contribution which the provinces made to the Roman State. All the provinces except Sicily paid either a fixed land-tax (vectigal stipendiarium) or tenths [decumæ] or other quotæ of their produce, and these tenths were let at Rome by the censors to the Publicani, who paid the State a certain sum for the privilege of collecting the tenths and made out of them what profit they could. … The tenths of wheat and barley were let in Sicily to the Publicani, but sometimes a community would bid for its tenths and pay them itself."

_G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 3, chapter 4._

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VECTIS. The ancient name of the Isle of Wight.

_E. H. Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography, chapter 24, section 2 (volume 2)._

VEDAS. VEDIC HYMNS. VEDISM.

See INDIA: THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS, and IMMIGRATION AND CONQUESTS OF THE ARYAS.

VEHMGERICHTS. VEHMIC COURTS.

"In times when political, social, and legal life are in process of fermentation, and struggling towards a new order of things, the ordinary tribunals lose their authority, and from the body of the people men spring up to protect the right in a primitive fashion, and to punish the criminal who has escaped the ordinary penalties of the law. Thus, at the close of the Middle Ages, or, more precisely, the first half of the 15th century, the Vehmgerichts (or Vehmic Courts, also called Free Courts, Franchise Courts, Secret Courts) rose to an authority which extended all over Germany, which knew no respect of persons, and before which many evil-doers in high places, who had bade defiance to the ordinary tribunals, were made to tremble. The name 'Vehme' is derived from the old German 'vervehmen,' which means to ban, or to curse. The Vehmic courts were peculiar to Westphalia, and even there could only be held on the 'Red Land'—that is, the district between the Rhine and the Weser. They were dependent on the German Emperor alone, and their presidents, the Free-counts, received from the Emperor in person, or from his representative, the Elector of Cologne, the power of life and death. They traced their origin to Charlemagne, who, respecting the legal customs of the old heathen Saxons, introduced county courts among them after they had been converted to Christianity. For, even in the most ancient times, the Saxon freemen used to assemble at an appointed season, after they had held their great sacrifice, and hold a 'Thing' under the presidency of one of their oldest members, called the Grave, or Count, where they inflicted punishment and administered justice. The Vehmic court consisted of a Free-count and a number of assessors, who were called 'The Initiated,' because they knew the secrets of the holy Vehme. There must be at least fourteen of these assessors, but there were generally twice that number. As it was no secret when a man was all assessor, and as it contributed greatly to the safety of his person, since people took good care not to molest a member of the holy Vehme, it gradually came about that men from every German province obtained admission into the number of assessors. When the Emperor Sigismund was elected into the number of 'The Initiated' at the Franchise Court of Dortmund, the number of assessors is said to have amounted to 100,000, among whom were many princes and nobles. And about a thousand assessors are said to have been present when the ban was issued against Duke Henry of Bavaria in 1429. … There was a 'secret court' to which only the initiated had access, and a 'public court' which was held in the morning in the light of day at a known court-house. The presidents' chairs were always set in the open air under a lime, oak, pear, or hawthorn tree, an often near a town, castle, or village. At Dortmund the president's chair was placed close to the town wall under a lime-tree, which, though sadly shattered, is still standing between the rails inside the railway station. Round the stone table were ranged three stone benches for the assessors; on the table there was carved in relief the German imperial eagle, and on it was placed the sword of justice, … The Vehmic court which was originally, and was bound to be, a public one, gradually altered its character, enveloped itself in mysterious darkness, and under the cloak of secrecy lent itself to all sorts of unrighteous objects. In 1461, accordingly, princes and cities leagued together to suppress the irregularities of these courts, and as soon as the orderly administration of justice came into existence with the rise of the new princely authority, they perished from their own impotence."

_A. W. Grube, Heroes of History and Legend, chapter 13._

ALSO IN: _Sir W. Scott, Introduction to "Anne of Geierstein."_

_A. P. Marras, Secret Fraternities of the Middle Ages, chapter 5._

VEII. VEIENTINE WARS.

See ROME: B. C. 406-396.

VELABRUM, The.

See FORUM BOARIUM.

VELETRI, Battle of.

See ITALY: A. D. 1744.

VELETRI, Battle of (1849).

See ITALY: A. D. 1848-1849.

VELIBORI, The.

See IRELAND. TRIBES OF EARLY CELTIC INHABITANTS.

VELITES.

The light infantry of the Roman army, as distinguished from the heavy-armed legionaries. "The velites did not wear any corslet or cuirass, but their tunic appears to have been formed of leather. … It is possible also that the velites sometimes wore, instead of leather, a tunic of quilted linen."

_C. Boutell, Arms and Armour, chapter 4._

VELLICA, Battle of.

See CANTABRIANS.

VELLINGHAUSEN, or KIRCH-DEN-KERN, Battle of (1761).

See GERMANY: A. D. 1761-1762.

VELLORE, Sepoy mutiny and massacre at (1806).

See INDIA: A. D. 1805-1816.

VELOCASSES, The.

See BELGÆ.

VENATIONES.

Contests of wild beasts with each other or with men, in the Roman amphitheatres, were called Venationes.

_W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquities, chapter 10._

VENDEE, The War in La.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (MARCH-APRIL), (JUNE), (JULY-DECEMBER); 1793-1794 (OCTOBER-APRIL); and 1794-1796.

VENDEMIARE, The month.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (OCTOBER) THE NEW REPUBLICAN CALENDAR.

VENDEMIARE: The 13th.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1795 (OCTOBER-DECEMBER).

VENEDI, The.

"The Venedi extended beyond the Peucini and Bastarnæ [around the mouths of the Danube] as far as the Baltic Sea; where is the Sinus Venedicus, now the Gulf of Dantzig. Their name is also preserved in Wenden, a part of Livonia. When the German nations made their irruption into Italy, France, and Spain, the Venedi, also called Winedi, occupied their vacant settlements between the Vistula and Elbe. Afterward they crossed the Danube, and seized Dalmatia, Illyricum, Istria, Carniola, and the Noric Alps. A part of Carniola still retains the name of Windismarck derived from them. This people were also called Slavi."

_Tacitus, The Germans, note to Oxford Translation, chapter 46._

"The Venedi [of Tacitus] … are obviously the Wends—the name by which the Germans always designate the neighbouring Slavonian populations; but which is no more a national name than that of Wälsch, which they apply in like manner to the Latin races on their southern frontiers."

_E. H. Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography, chapter 26, section. 2, foot-note (volume 2)._

See, also, SLAVONIC PEOPLES, and VANDALS.

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VENEDI OF BOHEMIA, The.

See AVARS: 7TH CENTURY.

VENEDOTIA.

See BRITAIN: 6TH CENTURY.

VENETA.

See (in Supplement) COMMERCE, MEDIÆVAL.

VENETI OF CISALPINE GAUL, The.

One of the tribes or nations of Cisalpine Gaul bore the name of the Veneti. The Veneti occupied the country between the rivers Adige and Plavis and seem to have been considerably civilized when they first appear in history. They became allies of the Romans at an early day and were favorably dealt with when Gallia Cisalpina was added to the dominions of Rome. "No ancient writer distinctly states to what race the Veneti belonged. They are said to have resembled the Illyrians in dress and manners; but the very way in which this statement is made shows that its author did not regard them as Illyrians. … I have no doubt that the Veneti belonged to the race of the Liburnians, and that accordingly they were a branch of the wide-spread Tyrrheno-Pelasgians, in consequence of which they also became so easily Latinized." The capital city of the Veneti was Patavium (modern Padua). "Patavium was a very ancient and large town, and it is strange that it appears as such in Roman history all at once. It is mentioned as early as the fifth century [B. C.], during the expedition of the Spartan Cleonymus; it is also spoken of at the time of Caesar and of the triumvirs. But Strabo is the first who describes Patavium as a large town, and in such a manner as to make it evident that it was an ancient place. He says that, next to Rome, it was the wealthiest city of Italy. … In the time of Augustus it was a large commercial and manufacturing place."

_B. G. Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient Ethnography and Geography, volume 2, page 246._

VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL, The.

"The Veneti were one of the Armoric states of the Celtae. Their neighbours on the south were the Namnetes or Nannetes (Nantes), on the east the Redones, and on the north the Curiosolitae, and the Osismi in the north-west part of Bretagne, in the department of Finistère. The chief town of the Veneti was Dariorigum, now Vannes, on the bay of Morbihan in the French department of Morbihan, which may correspond nearly to the country of the Veneti. The Veneti were the most powerful of all the maritime peoples who occupied the peninsula of Bretagne. They had many vessels in which they sailed to the island Britannia, to Cornwall and the parts along the south coast of England, as we may assume. They surpassed all their neighbours in skill and experience in naval affairs."

_G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6._

The Veneti, "together with the Aulerci, Rhedones [or Redones], Carnutes, Andi and Turones, occupied the whole space between the lower Seine and the lower Loire, and were apparently closely united among themselves."

_C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 7._

"The Andes [Andi] are the people whom Tacitus names the Andecavi, and the copyists of Ptolemy have named Ondicavae. They were west of the Turones, and their position is defined by the town Juliomagus or Civitas Andecavorum, now Angers on the Mayenne."

_G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6._

"In my opinion these Veneti were the founders of the Veneti in the Adriatic, for almost all the other Keltic nations in Italy have passed over from the country beyond the Alps, as for instance the Boii and Senones. … However, I do not maintain my opinion positively; for in these matters probability is quite sufficient."

_Strabo, Geography; translated by Hamilton and Falconer, book 4, chapter 4, section 1._

VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL, The. Cæsar's campaign.

Cæsar's third campaign in Gaul, B. C. 56, was directed against the Veneti and their Armorican neighbors. These tribes had submitted themselves in the previous year to Cæsar's lieutenant, the younger Crassus; but the heavy exactions of the Romans provoked a general rising, and Cæsar was called to the scene in person. The Veneti were so amphibious a race, and their towns were generally placed so much out of the reach of a land army, that he found it necessary to build a fleet at the mouth of the Loire and bring it up against them. But the Veneti were better sailors than the Romans and their ships were more strongly built, so that the advantage would have still remained to them if Roman inventiveness had not turned the scale. Cæsar armed his men with hooked knives at the end of long poles, with which they cut the rigging of the Venetian ships and brought down their clumsy sails, which were of leather. By this means he overcame and destroyed them, in a great naval fight. When the survivors submitted, he ruthlessly slew the senatorial elders and sold the remnant of the people into slavery.

_Cæsar, Gallic Wars, book 3, chapters 7-16._

ALSO IN: _G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6._

_C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 7._

_Napoleon III., History of Cæsar, book 3, chapter 6._

VENETIA.

See VENICE.

VENEZUELA: Start--------

VENEZUELA: Aboriginal inhabitants.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: CARIBS AND THEIR KINDRED, and COAJIRO.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1499-1550. Discovery and naming of the province. Its first occupation by German adventurers.

"The province contiguous to Santa Martha on the east was first visited by Alonso de Ojeda, in the year 1499.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1499-1500.