and after holding Warsaw for a short time he fled to Saxony. The alliance with Russia was renewed and in reply Charles invaded Saxony in 1706, and compelled the elector to sign the treaty of Altranstädt in September of that year, to recognize Stanislaus Leszczynski as his successor in Poland, and to abandon the Russian alliance. During the War of the Spanish Succession, Augustus fought with the imperialists in the Netherlands, but after the defeat of Charles XII. at Poltawa in July 1709, he turned his attention to the recovery of Poland. Declaring the treaty of Altranstädt void and renewing his alliance with Russia and Denmark, he quickly recovered the Polish crown. He then attacked Swedish Pomerania. He was handicapped by the mutual jealousy of the Saxons and the Poles, and a struggle broke out in Poland which was only ended when the king promised to limit the number of his army in that country to 18,000 men. Peace was made with Sweden in December 1719 at Stockholm after the death of Charles XII., and Augustus was recognized as king of Poland. His remaining years were spent in futile plans to make Poland a hereditary monarchy, to weaken the power of the Saxon nobles, and to gain territory for his sons in various parts of Europe. He was a man of extravagant and luxurious tastes, and, although he greatly improved the city of Dresden, he cannot be called a good ruler. He sought to govern Saxony in an absolute fashion, and, in spite of his declaration that his conversion to Roman Catholicism was personal only, assisted the spread of the teachings of Rome. His wife was Christine Eberhardine, a member of the Hohenzollern family, who left him when he became a Roman Catholic, and died in 1727. Augustus died at Warsaw on the 1st of February 1733, leaving a son Frederick Augustus, who succeeded him in Poland and Saxony, and many illegitimate children, among whom was the famous general, Maurice of Saxony, known as Marshal Saxe (q.v.).
See Otwikowski, History of Poland under Augustus II. (Cracow, 1849); F. Förster, Die Höfe und Kabinette Europas im achtzehnten Jahrhundert (Potsdam, 1839); Jarochowski, History of Augustus II. (Posen, 1856–1874); C. W. Böttiger and T. Flathe, Geschichte des Kurstaates und Königreichs Sachsen (Gotha, 1867–1873).
AUGUSTUS III., king of Poland, and, as Frederick Augustus II., elector of Saxony (1696–1763), the only legitimate son of Augustus II. (“the Strong”), was born at Dresden on the 17th of October 1696. Educated as a Protestant, he followed his father’s example by joining the Roman Catholic Church in 1712, although his conversion was not made public until 1717. In August 1719 he married Maria Josepha, daughter of the emperor Joseph I., and seems to have taken very little part in public affairs until he became elector of Saxony on his father’s death in February 1733. He was then a candidate for the Polish crown; and having purchased the support of the emperor Charles VI. by assenting to the Pragmatic Sanction, and that of the czarina Anne by recognizing the claim of Russia to Courland, he was elected king of Poland in October 1733. Aided by the Russians, his troops drove Stanislaus Leszczynski from Poland; Augustus was crowned at Cracow in January 1734, and was generally recognized as king at Warsaw in June 1736. On the death of Charles VI. in October 1740, Augustus was among the enemies of his daughter Maria Theresa, and, as a son-in-law of the emperor Joseph I., claimed a portion of the Habsburg territories. In 1742, however, he was induced to transfer his support to Maria Theresa, and his troops took part in the struggle against Frederick the Great during the Silesian wars, and again when the Seven Years’ War began in 1756. Saxony was in that year attacked by the Prussians, and with so much success that not only was the Saxon army forced to capitulate at Pirna in October, but the elector, who fled to Warsaw, made no attempt to recover Saxony, which remained under the dominion of Frederick. When the treaty of Hubertsburg was concluded in February 1763, he returned to Saxony, where he died on the 5th of October 1763. He left five sons, the eldest of whom was his successor in Saxony, Frederick Christian; and five daughters, one of whom was the wife of Louis, the dauphin of France, and mother of Louis XVI. Another daughter was the wife of Charles III., king of Spain, but she predeceased her father. Augustus, who showed neither talent nor inclination for government, was content to leave Poland under the influence of Russia, and Saxony to the rule of his ministers. He took great interest in music and painting, and added to the collection of art treasures at Dresden.
See C. W. Böttiger and T. Flathe, Geschichte des Kurstaates und Königreichs Sachsen (Gotha, 1867–1873); R. Röpell, Polen um die Mitte des 18. Jahrhunderts (Gotha, 1876).
AUGUSTUSBAD, a watering-place of Germany, in the kingdom of Saxony, 10 m. E. from Dresden, close to Radeberg, in a pleasant valley. Pop. 900. It has five saline chalybeate springs, used both for drinking and bathing, and specific in feminine disorders, rheumatism, paralysis and neuralgia. The spa is largely frequented in summer and has agreeable public rooms and gardens.
AUK, a name commonly given to several species of sea-fowl. A special interest attaches to the great auk (Alca impennis), owing to its recent extinction and the value of its eggs to collectors. (See Garefowl; also Guillemot, Puffin, Razorbill.)
AULARD, FRANÇOIS VICTOR ALPHONSE (1849– ), French historian, was born at Montbron in Charente in 1849. Having obtained the degree of doctor of letters in 1877 with a Latin thesis upon C. Asinius Pollion and a French one upon Giacomo Leopardi (whose works he subsequently translated into French), he made a study of parliamentary oratory during the French Revolution, and published two volumes upon Les Orateurs de la constituante (1882) and upon Les Orateurs de la législative et de la convention (1885). With these works, which were reprinted in 1905, he entered a fresh field, where he soon became an acknowledged master. Applying to the study of the French Revolution the rules of historical criticism which had produced such rich results in the study of ancient and medieval history, he devoted himself to profound research in the archives, and to the publication of numerous most important contributions to the political, administrative and moral history of that marvellous period. Appointed professor of the history of the French Revolution at the Sorbonne, he formed the minds of students who in their turn have done valuable work. To him we owe the Recueil des actes du comité de salut public (vol. i., 1889; vol. xvi., 1904); La Société des Jacobins; recueil de documents pour l’histoire du club des Jacobins de Paris (6 vols., 1889–1897); and Paris pendant la réaction thermidorienne et sous le directoire, recueil de documents pour l’histoire de l’esprit public à Paris (5 vols., 1898–1902), which was followed by an analogous collection for Paris sous le consulat (2 vols., 1903–1904). For the Société de l’Histoire de la Révolution Française, which brought out under his supervision an important periodical publication called La Révolution française, he produced the Registre des délibérations du consulat provisoire (1894), and L’État de la France en l’an VIII et en l’an IX, with the reports of the prefects (1897), besides editing various works or memoirs written by men of the Revolution, such as J. C. Bailleul, Chaumette, Fournier (called the American), Hérault de Séchelles, and Louvet de Couvrai. But these large collections of documents are not his entire output. Besides a little pamphlet upon Danton, he has written a Histoire politique de la Révolution française (1901), and a number of articles which have been collected in volumes under the title Études et leçons sur la Révolution française (5 vols., 1893–1908). In a volume entitled Taine, historien de la Révolution française (1908), Aulard has submitted the method of the eminent philosopher to a criticism, severe, perhaps even unjust, but certainly well-informed. This is, as it were, the “manifesto” of the new school of criticism applied to the political and social history of the Revolution (see Les Annales Révolutionnaires, June 1908).
See A. Mathiez, “M. Aulard, historien et professeur,” in the Revue de la Révolution française (July 1908). (C. B.*)
AULIC COUNCIL (Reichshofrat), an organ of the Holy Roman Empire, originally intended for executive work, but acting chiefly as a judicature, which worked from 1497 to 1806. In the
