BARBARY, the general designation of that part of Northern Africa which is bounded on the E. by Egypt, W. by the Atlantic, S. by the Sahara, and N. by the Mediterranean, and comprises the states of Marocco, Algeria, Tunis, and Tripoli. The name is derived from the Berbers, one of the most remarkable races in the region. (See Africa, vol. i. p. 251, Algeria, Marocco, Tripoli, Tunis.)
BARBASTRO, a fortified city of Spain, in the province of Huesca, on the River Vero, near its junction with the Cinca. It has an interesting cathedral and seven other churches, with several hospitals. It was recovered from the Moors in 1065. The brothers Argensola were born here. The inhabitants are chiefly employed in tanning and currying leather. Long. 0° 20′ W., lat. 41° 54′ N.
BARBAULD, Mrs. Anna Letitia, was born at Kibworth-Harcourt, in Leicestershire, on the 20th June 1743. Her father, the Rev. John Aikin, was a Presbyterian clergyman, who conducted a private school at that place. He instructed his daughter very carefully, and besides the usual female accomplishments she acquired a good knowledge of Latin and a fair knowledge of Greek. In 1758 Mr Aikin removed his family to Warrington, to act as theological tutor in a dissenting academy there. In 1773 Miss Aikin, at the earnest request of her brother, Dr John Aikin, known as the author of the Evenings at Home, consented to publish some of her poems. The volume was very successful, four editions being called for in the course of the year. In 1774 she married the Rev. Rochemont Barbauld, a Presbyterian minister, descended from a French Protestant family who had settled in England. He had been educated in the academy at Warrington, and had recently been appointed to a church at Palgrave, in Suffolk. There he began a private boarding-school, in the work of which he was most ably assisted by Mrs Barbauld, who superintended the younger pupils. Among those who passed through her hands, and who looked back with pleasure to the instruction given by her, were Sir William Gell, Lord Denman, and William Taylor of Norwich. The Hymns in Prose and the Early Lessons were written by her about this time for the use of her young charges, and proved admirably adapted for the purpose of instructing children. They have been frequently reprinted. In 1785 she left England for the Continent with her husband, whose health had been seriously impaired. On their return after a residence of about two years, Mr Barbauld was appointed to a church at Hampstead, where they resided till 1802. In 1792 Mrs Barbauld assisted her brother Dr Aikin in the composition of the popular series Evenings at Home, but, it is said, contributed only a few pieces, In 1795 she published an edition of Akenside s Pleasures of Imagination, with a critical essay ; and two years later, she edited in a similar manner Collins s Odes. In 1804, after their removal to Stoke Newington, she pub lished a selection of papers from the English Essayists, and a selection from Richardson s correspondence, with a biographical notice. The critical remarks prefixed to these publications have been much admired; they are generally judicious, in good taste, and well expressed. In 1810 she published a collection of the British Novelists, with biographical and critical notices. In the following year she published her longest poem, entitled Eighteen Hundred and Eleven, depicting the political and social events of the time, and giving rather a gloomy view of the existing state and future prospects of Britain. The poem is in many respects scarcely worthy of the author s reputation. Mrs Barbauld died on the 9th March 1825; she had been a widow from 1808. A collected edition of her works, with Memoir, was published by her niece, Miss Lucy Aikin, in 2 vols., 1826. (See A. *L. Le Breton, Memoir of Mrs Barbauld, 1874; G. A. Ellis, Memoir of Mrs A. L. Barbauld, 1874.)
BARBER, one whose occupation it is to shave or trim beards. In former times the barber s craft was dignified with the title of a profession, being conjoined with the art of surgery. In France the barber-surgeons were separated from the perruquiers, and incorporated as a distinct body in the reign of Louis XIV. In England barbers first received incorporation from Edward IV. in 1461. By 32 Henry VIII. c. 42, they were united with the company of surgeons, it being enacted that the barbers should con fine themselves to the minor operations of blood-letting and drawing teeth, while the surgeons were prohibited from " barbery or shaving." In 1 745 barbers and surgeons were separated into distinct corporations by 18 George II. c. 15. The barber s shop was a favourite resort of idle persons ; and in addition to its attraction as a focua of news, a lute, viol, or some such musical instrument, was always kept for the entertainment of waiting customers. The barber s sign consisted of a striped pole, from which was suspended a basin, symbols the use of which is still preserved. The fillet round the pole indicated the ribbon for bandaging the arm in bleeding, and the basin the vessel to receive the blood.
BARBERINI, the title of a powerful family, originally of Tuscan extraction, who settled in Florence during the early part of the 1 1th century. They acquired great wealth and influence, and in 1623 Maffeo Barberini was raised to the papal throne as Urban VIII. He made his brother, Antonio, and two nephews, cardinals, and gave to a third nephew. Taddeo, the principality of Paiestrina. Great jealousy of their increasing power was excited amongst the neighbouring princes, and Odoardo Farnese, duke of Parma, made war upon Taddeo and defeated the papal troops. After the death of Urban in 1644 his successor, Innocent X., showed hostility to the Barberini family. Taddeo fled to Paris, where he died in 1647; but the others after a short period returned to Italy and had their property restored. The principality of Paiestrina is still in the hands of the family ; and their magnificent palace and library at Rome give evidence of their wealth and magnificence.
of natural law, was the nephew of Charles Barbeyrac, a distinguished physician of Montpellier, and was born at Beziers in Lower Languedoc, in 1674. He removed, along with his family, into Switzerland after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and there studied jurisprudence. After spending some time at Geneva and Frankfurt-on-the- Main, he became professor of belles lettres in the French school of Berlin. Thence, in 1711, he was called to the professorship of history and civil law at Lausanne, and finally settled as professor of public law at Groningen. He died in 1744. His first published work of any extent was the curious Traits du Jeu, 1709, in which he defends the morality of games of chance. His fame rests chiefly on I the preface and notes to his translation of Puifendorf's celebrated treatise De Jure Naturae et Gentium. In fundamental principles he follows almost entirely Locke and Puffendorf ; but he works out with great skill the theory of moral obligation, referring it to the command or will of God He indicates the distinction, developed more fully by Thomasius and Kant, between the legal and the moral qualities of action The principles of international law he reduces to those of the law of nature, and combats, in so doing, many of the positions taken up by Grotius. He rejects the notion that sovereignty in any way resembles property, and makes even marriage a matter of civil con tract. Barbeyrac also translated Grotius s De Jure Belli ct
Pads, Cumberland s DC Legibus Naturae, and Puffendorf's