See Gurley’s Life of Jehudi Ashmun, 1835; Stockwell, The Republic of Liberia, 1868; Wilson, West Africa, 1856; Hutchinson, Impressions of West Africa, 1858; Ritter, in Zeitschrift für allgemeine Erdkunde, vol. i., 1853; Brown, Countries of the World, vol. vi. pp. 123–127, 1881; Bowen, Central Africa, 1857; Thomas, West Coast of Africa, 1860; “Die Negerrepublik Liberia,” in Unsere Zeit, vol. iii., 1858; U.S. Consular Reports, 1881.
LIBERIUS, pope from 352 to 366, the successor of Julius I., was consecrated according to the Catalogus Liberianus on May 22. His first recorded act was, after a synod had been held at Rome, to write to Constantius, then in quarters at Arles (353–54), asking that a council might be called at Aquileia with reference to the affairs of Athanasius; but his messenger Vincentius of Capua, so far from being successful in his mission, was himself compelled by the emperor at a conciliabulum held in Arles to subscribe against his will a condemnation of the orthodox patriarch of Alexandria. In 355 Liberius was one of the few who, along with Eusebius of Vercelli, Dionysius of Milan, and Lucifer of Cagliari, refused to sign the condemnation of Athanasius, which had anew been imposed at Milan by imperial command upon all the Western bishops; the consequence was his relegation to Berœa in Thrace, Felix II. (antipope) at the same time being consecrated his successor by three “catascopi haud episcopi,” as Athanasius called them. At the end of an exile of more than two years he yielded so far as to subscribe the third Sirmian formula giving up the “homoousion,”—an act which procured his immediate and triumphant return to Rome, but has ever since caused considerable embarrassment to maintainers of the indefectibility of Roman orthodoxy. The remainder of his pontificate was uneventful. He died on September 24, 366, and was succeeded by Damasus I. With the rest of the first sixty popes he shares the title of “Saint.” His biographers used to be perplexed by a letter purporting to be from Liberius, in the works of Hilary, in which he seems to write, in 352, that he had excommunicated Athanasius at the instance of the Oriental bishops; but the document is now held to be spurious. See Hefele, Conciliengesch., i. p. 648 sq.
LIBOURNE, the chief town of an arrondissement, and in point of population the second town of the department of Gironde, France, is situated at the confluence of the Isle with the Dordogne, 337 miles by rail south-west from Paris, and 22 miles east from Bordeaux. The sea is 56 miles off, but the tide affects the river so as to admit of vessels of 300 tons burden reaching the town. The Dordogne is here crossed by a stone bridge 492 feet long, and a suspension bridge across the Isle connects Libourne with the adjoining Fronsac, the citadel of which, 235 feet above the sea, was at one time occupied by a palace of Charlemagne, and subsequently became an important fortress. Libourne is regularly built, but has no monuments of much architectural or historical interest; the (restored) Gothic church has a stone spire 232 feet high. On the quay there is a machicolated clock-tower which is a remnant of the ramparts of the 14th century; and the town-house, containing a small museum, is a quaint relic of the 16th century. There is a statue of the Duc Decazes, who was born in the neighbourhood. The principal articles of commerce are the wines and brandies of the district, the growths of chief repute being those of St Emilion, a short distance above Libourne, on the right bank of the Dordogne, and of Canon, a little below Fronsac. There is also some trade in yarn, grain, and wood for cooperage. Woollen stuffs and some articles of army outfit are manufactured; and nail-making, tanning, shoemaking, and shipbuilding are also carried on. The harbour is used exclusively by small vessels for the export of wines; the shipping owned in the place does not exceed 2500 tons. The population of Libourne in 1876 was 15,231.
Like other sites at the confluence of important rivers, that of Libourne was appropriated at an early period. Under the Romans Condate stood rather more than a mile to the south of the present Libourne, where the old Gothic chapelle de Condat now is; it was destroyed during the troubles of the 5th century. Resuscitated by Charlemagne, it was rebuilt, under its present name, and on the site and plan it still retains, by Edward, prince of Wales, in 1270. It suffered considerably in the struggles of the French and English for the possession of Guienne in the 14th century, and again during the religious wars, and finally in the war of the Fronde in the minority of Louis XIV. Nevertheless it ultimately outgrew both its powerful neighbours Fronsac and Saint Emilion, the latter of which is archæologically one of the most curious spots in France.
LIBRARIES
HISTORY AND DESCRIPTION.
Ancient Period.
LIBRARIES, in our modern sense of collections of printed or written literature, imply an advanced and elaborate civilization. If the term be extended to any considerable collection of written documents, they must be nearly as old as civilization itself. The earliest use to which the invention of inscribed or written signs was put was probably to record important religious and political transactions. These records would naturally be preserved in sacred places, and accordingly the earliest libraries of the world were probably temples, and the earliest librarians priests. And indeed before the extension of the arts of writing and reading the priests were the only persons who could perform such work as, e.g., the compilation of the Annales Maximi, which was the duty of the pontifices in ancient Rome. The beginnings of literature proper in the shape of ballads and songs may have continued to be conveyed orally only from one generation to another, long after the record of important religious or civil events was regularly committed to writing. The earliest collections of which we know anything therefore were collections of archives. Of this character appear to have been such famous collections as that of the Medians at Ecbatana or the Persians at Susa. It is not until the development of arts and sciences, and the growth of a considerable written literature, and even of a distinct literary class, that we find collections of books which can be called libraries in our modern sense. It is of libraries in the modern sense, and not, except incidentally, of archives that we are to speak.
The researches which have followed the discoveries of Botta and Layard have thrown unexpected light not only upon the history but upon the arts, the sciences, and the literatures of the ancient civilizations of Babylonia and Assyria. In all these wondrous revelations no facts are more interesting than those which show the existence of extensive libraries so many ages ago, and none are more eloquent of the elaborateness of these forgotten civilizations.
Assyria.
