AMYLACEOUS—ANABAPTISTS. 
  
  
  
heat which formed the cells. Empty cells often 
occur amongst those which are filled with minerals. 
The name A. is sometimes extended to rocks of the 
same character, although the basis be not of trap. 
AMYLA'CEOUS (from amylum, starch), a term 
used in Chemistry and Botany, and equivalent to 
starchy.—A. food is food consisting at least in great 
part of some kind of starch, as arrow-root, sago, &c.— 
A compound radical, called amyle, is formed by the 
decomposition of starch in a peculiar fermentation— 
the amylic fermentation—but to it the term A. has 
no reference. 
AMYLIC ALCOHOL. See FusiL OiL. 
AMYOT, or AMIOT, JAcQuUES, a French writer, 
well known by his excellent translations of the 
Greek classics, was born in 1513, and died in 1593. 
Racine highly esteemed the translations by A., of 
which the version of Plutarch is one of the best, and 
has passed through several editions.—Awror, Joseph, 
a celebrated Jesuit and oriental scholar, was born at 
Toulon in 1718, and lived as a missionary in China 
from 1750 to the time of his death, in 1794. His 
knowledge of the Chinese and Tatar languages 
enabled him to collect many valuable notices of 
antiquities, history, language, and arts, in China. 
Many of his writings may be found in the Mémoires 
concernants U Histovre, les Sciences et les Arts des 
Chinois (15 vols. Paris, 1776—1791). His Diction- 
naire  Tatar- Mantchou- Frangais was edited by 
Langlés in 1789. 
AMYRIDA'CEZA, a natural order of dicotyle- 
donous or exogenous plants, consisting of trees and 
shrubs, natives of tropical countries, remarkable for 
the abundance of their fragrant balsamic or resinous 
juice. They have compound leaves, occasionally 
with stipules and pellucid dots. The flowers are in 
racemes or panicles ; the calyx persistent, with 2—5 
divisions ; the petals are 3—5; wstivation valvate 
or imbricated. The stamens are twice or four times 
as many as the petals. The ovary is superior, sessile, 
1—>5-celled, inserted in a large disk ; the style soli- 
tary and compound, or wanting ; the stigmas as 
many as the cells of the ovary; the ovules in pairs, 
anatropal. The fruit is hard and dry, 1—5 celled, 
its outer rind often splitting into valves. The seeds 
are exalbuminous. About forty or fifty species are 
referred to the order; but many of them are still 
very imperfectly known. Some species afford valu- 
able timber ; but the principal products of the order 
are fragrant resins and balsams, as MYRRH (q.V.), 
and differentkinds of FRANKINCENSE (q.v.), OLIBANUM 
(q.v.), BLEMI (q.V.), BpELLIUM (q.V.), TACAMAHAC 
(q.v.), Batsam oF GILEAD (q.v.), &. Among the 
more important genera of the order may be named 
Amyris, Balsamodendron, Boswellia, and Icica.— 
Canarium commune, a native of Java, which yields 
a gum similar in its properties to the Barsam 
orF CoPATVA (q.v.), produces also triangular nuts, 
which are eaten both raw and dressed, and from 
which an oil is extracted for the table and for burn- 
ing. Balanites Egyptiaca is cultivated in Egypt for 
its fruit, a drupe, which is eaten, and from the seeds 
of which a fat oil is expressed, called Zackun. 
A'NA, a termination added to the names of remark- 
able men, to designate collections of their sayings, 
anecdotes, &c. ; as in the works entitled Baconiana, 
Johnsoniana. Such titles were first used in France, 
where they became common after the publication of 
Scaligerana by the brothers Dupuy (Hague, 1666). 
In English literature, there are many works of this 
kind. America, also, has its Washingtoniana. A 
tolerably complete catalogue of works with such 
titles may be found in Namur's Bibliographie des 
Ouwrages publiés sous le Nom d Ana (Brussels, 
1839).1 
218 
  
ANABA'PTISTS, a term applied generally to 
those Christians who reject infant baptism, and 
administer the rite only to adults; so that when a 
new member joins them, he or she is baptised a 
second time, the first being considered no baptism. 
The name (Gr. to baptise again) is thus owing to an 
accidental circumstance, and is disclaimed by the 
more recent opponents of infant baptism, both on 
the continent and in Great Britain. 
The origin of the sect cannot be distinctly traced ; 
but it is manifestly connected with the controversy 
about infant baptism carried on in the early church. 
Opposition to this doctrine was kept alive in the 
various so-called heretical sects that went by 
the general name of Cathari (i.e., purists), such as 
the Waldenses, Albigenses, &c. Shortly after the 
beginning of the Reformation, the opposition to 
infant baptism appeared anew, especially among a 
set of fanatical enthusiasts called the Prophets of 
Zwickau, in Saxony, at whose head were Thomas 
Miinzer (q.v.) (1520) and others. Miinzer went to 
Waldshut, on the borders of Switzerland, which soon 
became a chief seat of anabaptism, and a centre 
whence visionaries and fanatics spread over Switzer- 
land. They pretended to new revelations, dreamed 
of the establishment of the kingdom of heaven on 
earth, and summoned princes to join them, on pain 
of losing their temporal power. They rejected infant 
baptism, and taught that those who joined them must 
‘be baptised anew with the baptism of the Spirit; they 
also proclaimed the community of goods, and the 
equality of all Christians. These doctrines naturally 
fell in with and supported the ¢ Peasant War’ (q. v.) 
that had about that time (1525) broken out from 
real causes of oppression. The sect spread rapidly 
through Westphalia, Holstein, and the Netherlands, 
in spite of the severest persecutions. The battle of 
Frankenhausen (see MUNzER) crushed their progress 
in Saxony and Franconia. Still, scattered adherents 
of the doctrines continued, and were again brought 
together in various places by travelling preachers. 
In this capacity, one Melchior Hoffmann, a furrier of 
Swabia, distinguished himself, who appeared as a 
visionary preacher in Kiel in 1527, and in Emden in 
1528. In the last town he installed a baker, John 
Matthiesen, of Haarlem, as bishop, and then went to 
Strasburg, where he died in prison. Matthiesen 
began to send out apostles of the new doctrine. Two 
of these went to Miinster, where they found fanatical 
coadjutors in the Protestant minister Rothmann, 
and the burghers Knipperdolling and Krechting, 
and were shortly joined by the tailor Bockhold of 
Leyden, and Gerrit Kippenbrock of Amsterdam, a 
bookbinder, and at last by Matthiesen himself. 
With their adherents, they soon made themselves 
masters of the city ; Matthiesen set up as a prophet, 
and when he lost his life in a sally against the Bishop 
of Miinster, who was besieging the town, Bockhold 
and Kbnipperdolling took his place. The churches 
were now destroyed, and twelve judges were ap- 
pointed over the tribes, as among the Israelites; 
and Bockhold (1534) had himself crowned king of 
the ‘New Sion,” under the name of John of Leyden. 
The anabaptist madness in Miinster now went 
beyond all bounds. The city became the scene of 
the wildest licentiousness ; until several Protestant 
princes, uniting with the bishop, took the city, and 
by executing the leaders, put an end to the new 
kingdom (1535). 
But the principles disseminated by the A. were not 
so easily crushed. As early as 1533 the adherents of 
the sect had been driven from Emden, and taken 
refuge in the Netherlands ; and in Amsterdam the 
doctrine took root and spread. Bockhold also had 
sent out apostles, some of whom had given up the 
wild fanaticism of their master ; they let alone the 
  
  
  
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