Greek manuscript. His editions of the Greek, Latin, Italian and French classics are all highly prized for their typographical elegance, and some of them are not less remarkable for their accuracy. Bodoni died at Padua in 1813. In 1818 a magnificent work appeared in two volumes quarto, entitled Manuale Tipografico, containing specimens of the vast collection of types which had belonged to him.
See De Lama, Vita del Cavaliere Giambattista Bodoni (1816).
BODY-SNATCHING, the secret disinterring of dead bodies
in churchyards in order to sell them for the purpose of dissection.
Those who practised body-snatching were frequently called
resurrectionists or resurrection-men. Previous to the passing
of the Anatomy Act 1832 (see Anatomy: History), no licence
was required in Great Britain for opening an anatomical school,
and there was no provision for supplying subjects to students
for anatomical purposes. Therefore, though body-snatching
was a misdemeanour at common law, punishable with fine and
imprisonment, it was a sufficiently lucrative business to run the
risk of detection. Body-snatching became so prevalent that
it was not unusual for the relatives and friends of a deceased
person to watch the grave for some time after burial, lest it
should be violated. Iron coffins, too, were frequently used for
burial, or the graves were protected by a framework of iron
bars called mortsafes, well-preserved examples of which may
still be seen in Greyfriars’ churchyard, Edinburgh.
For a detailed history of body-snatching, see The Diary of a Resurrectionist, edited by J. B. Bailey (London, 1896), which also contains a full bibliography and the regulations in force in foreign countries for the supply of bodies for anatomical purposes.
BOECE (or Boyce), HECTOR (c. 1465 – c. 1536), Scottish
historian, was born at Dundee about the year 1465, being
descended of a family which for several generations had possessed
the barony of Panbride in Forfarshire. He received his
early education at Dundee, and completed his course of study
in the university of Paris, where he took the degree of B.D.
He was appointed regent, or professor, of philosophy in the
college of Montaigu; and there he was a contemporary of
Erasmus, who in two epistles has spoken of him in the highest
terms. When William Elphinstone, bishop of Aberdeen, was
laying his plans for the foundation of the university of Aberdeen
(King’s College) he made Boece his chief adviser; and the latter
was persuaded, after receipt of the papal bull erecting the
university (1494), to be the first principal. He was in Aberdeen
about 1500 when lectures began in the new buildings, and he
appears to have been well received by the canons of the
cathedral, several of whom he has commemorated as men of
learning. It was a part of his duty as principal to read lectures
on divinity.
The emoluments of his office were poor, but he also enjoyed the income of a canonry at Aberdeen and of the vicarage of Tullynessle. Under the date of 14th July 1527, we find a “grant to Maister Hector” of an annual pension of £50, to be paid by the sheriff of Aberdeen out of the king’s casualties; and on the 26th of July 1529 was issued a “precept for a lettre to Mr Hector Boys, professor of theology, of a pension of £50 Scots yearly, until the king promote him to a benefice of 100 marks Scots of yearly value; the said pension to be paid him by the custumars of Aberdeen.” In 1533 and 1534, one-half of his pension was, however, paid by the king’s treasurer, and the other half by the comptroller; and as no payment subsequent to that of Whitsuntide 1534 has been traced in the treasurer’s accounts, he is supposed to have obtained the benefice soon after that period. This benefice was the rectorship of Tyrie.
In 1528, soon after the publication of his history, Boece received the degree of D.D. at Aberdeen; and on this occasion the magistrates voted him a present of a tun of wine when the new wines should arrive, or, according to his option, the sum of £20 to purchase bonnets. He appears to have survived till the year 1536; for on the 22nd of November in that year, the king presented John Garden to the rectory of Tyrie, vacant by the death of “Mr Hector Boiss.” He died at Aberdeen, and was buried before the high altar at King’s College, beside the tomb of his patron Bishop Elphinstone.
His earliest publication, Episcoporum Murthlacensium et Aberdonensium per Hectorem Boetium Vitae, was printed at the press of Jodocus Badius (Paris, 1522). The notices of the early prelates are of little value, but the portion of the book in which he speaks of Bishop Elphinstone is of enduring merit. Here we likewise find an account of the foundation and constitution of the college, together with some notices of its earliest members. His fame rests chiefly on his History of Scotland, published in 1527 under the title Scotorum Historiae a prima gentis origine cum aliarum et rerum et gentium illustratione non vulgari. This edition contains seventeen books. Another edition, containing the eighteenth book and a fragment of the nineteenth, was published by Ferrerius, who has added an appendix of thirty-five pages (Paris, 1574).
The composition of the history displays much ability; but Boece’s imagination was, however, stronger than his judgment: of the extent of the historian’s credulity, his narrative exhibits many unequivocal proofs; and of deliberate invention or distortion of facts not a few, though the latter are less flagrant and intentional than early 19th-century criticism has assumed. He professed to have obtained from the monastery of Icolmkill, through the good offices of the earl of Argyll, and his brother, John Campbell of Lundy, the treasurer, certain original historians of Scotland, and among the rest Veremundus, of whose writings not a single vestige is now to be found. In his dedication to the king he is pleased to state that Veremundus, a Spaniard by birth, was archdeacon of St Andrews, and that he wrote in Latin a history of Scotland from the origin of the nation to the reign of Malcolm III., to whom he inscribed his work. His propensity to the marvellous was at an early period exposed in the following verses by Leland:—
| “Hectoris historici tot quot mendacia scripsit |
Boece’s History of Scotland was translated into Scottish prose by John Bellenden, and into verse by William Stewart. The Lives of the Bishops was reprinted for the Bannatyne Club, Edin., 1825, in a limited edition of sixty copies. A commonplace verse-rendering of the Life of Bishop Elphinstone, which was written by Alexander Gardyne in 1619, remains in MS. There is no modern edition of the history, though the versions of Bellenden and Stewart have been edited.
BOEHM, SIR JOSEPH EDGAR, Bart. (1834–1890), British
sculptor, was born of Hungarian parentage on the 4th of July
1834 at Vienna, where his father was director of the imperial
mint. After studying the plastic art in Italy and at Paris, he
worked for a few years as a medallist in his native city. After
a further period of study in England, he was so successful as an
exhibitor at the Exhibition of 1862 that he determined to abandon
the execution of coins and medals, and to give his mind
to portrait busts and statuettes, chiefly equestrian. The colossal
statue of Queen Victoria, executed in marble (1869) for Windsor
Castle, and the monument of the duke of Kent in St George’s
chapel, were his earliest great works, and so entirely to the taste
of his royal patrons that he rose rapidly in favour with the court.
He was made A.R.A. in 1878, and produced soon afterwards
the statue of Carlyle on the Thames embankment at Chelsea.
In 1881 he was appointed sculptor in ordinary to the queen,
and in the ensuing year became full Academician. On the death
of Dean Stanley, Boehm was commissioned to execute his
sarcophagus in Westminster Abbey, and his achievement, a
recumbent statue, has been pronounced to be one of the best
portraits in modern sculpture. Less successful was his monument
to General Gordon in St Paul’s cathedral. He executed
the equestrian statue of the duke of Wellington at Hyde Park
Corner, and designed the coinage for the Jubilee of Queen Victoria
in 1887. Among his ideal subjects should be noted the “Herdsman
and Bull.” He died suddenly in his studio at South
Kensington on the 12th of December 1890.
BOEHM VON BAWERK, EUGEN (1851– ), Austrian economist and statesman, was born at Brünn on the 12th of February 1851. Entering the Austrian department of finance in 1872, he held various posts until 1880, when he became
