non-living material. The refutation of abiogenesis has no further bearing on this possibility than to make it probable that if protoplasm ultimately be formed in the laboratory, it will be by a series of stages, the earlier steps being the formation of some substance, or substances, now unknown, which are not protoplasm. Such intermediate stages may have existed in the past, and the modern refutation of abiogenesis has no application to the possibility of these having been formed from inorganic matter at some past time. Perhaps the words archebiosis, or archegenesis, should be reserved for the theory that protoplasm in the remote past has been developed from not-living matter by a series of steps, and many of those, notably T. H. Huxley, who took a large share in the process of refuting contemporary abiogenesis, have stated their belief in a primordial archebiosis. (See Biogenesis and Life.) (P. C. M.)
ABIPONES, a tribe of South American Indians of Guaycuran stock recently inhabiting the territory lying between Santa Fé and St Iago. They originally occupied the Chaco district of Paraguay, but were driven thence by the hostility of the Spaniards. According to Martin Dobrizhoffer, a Jesuit missionary, who, towards the end of the 18th century, lived among them for a period of seven years, they then numbered not more than 5000. They were a well-formed, handsome people, with black eyes and aquiline noses, thick black hair, but no beards. The hair from the forehead to the crown of the head was pulled out, this constituting a tribal mark. The faces, breasts and arms of the women were covered with black figures of various designs made with thorns, the tattooing paint being a mixture of ashes and blood. The lips and ears of both sexes were pierced. The men were brave fighters, their chief weapons being the bow and spear. No child was without bow and arrows; the bow-strings were made of foxes’ entrails. In battle the Abipones wore an armour of tapir’s hide over which a jaguar’s skin was sewn. They were excellent swimmers and good horsemen. For five months in the year when the floods were out they lived on islands or even in shelters built in the trees. They seldom married before the age of thirty, and were singularly chaste. “With the Abipones,” says Darwin, “when a man chooses a wife, he bargains with the parents about the price. But it frequently happens that the girl rescinds what has been agreed upon between the parents and bridegroom, obstinately rejecting the very mention of marriage. She often runs away and hides herself, and thus eludes the bridegroom.” Infanticide was systematic, never more than two children being reared in one family, a custom doubtless originating in the difficulty of subsistence. The young were suckled for two years. The Abipones are now believed to be extinct as a tribe.
Martin Dobrizhoffer’s Latin Historia de Abiponibus (Vienna, 1784) was translated into English by Sara Coleridge, at the suggestion of Southey, in 1822, under the title of An Account of the Abipones (3 vols.).
ABITIBBI, a lake and river of Ontario, Canada. The lake, in 49° N., 80° W., is 60 m. long and studded with islands. It is shallow, and the shores in its vicinity are covered with small timber. It was formerly employed by the Hudson’s Bay Company as part of a canoe route to the fur lands of the north. The construction of the Grand Trunk Pacific railway through this district has made it of some importance. Its outlet is Abitibbi river, a rapid stream, which after a course of 200 m. joins the Moose river, flowing into James Bay.
ABJURATION (from Lat. abjurare, to forswear), a solemn repudiation or renunciation on oath. At common law, it signified the oath of a person who had taken sanctuary to leave the realm for ever; this was abolished in the reign of James I. The Oath of Abjuration, in English history, was a solemn disclaimer, taken by members of parliament, clergy and laymen against the right of the Stuarts to the crown, imposed by laws of William III., George I. and George III.; but its place has since been taken by the oath of allegiance.
ABKHASIA, or Abhasia, a tract of Russian Caucasia, government of Kutais. The Caucasus mountains on the N. and N.E. divide it from Circassia; on the S.E. it is bounded by Mingrelia; and on the S.W. by the Black Sea. Though the country is generally mountainous, with dense forests of oak and walnut, there are some deep, well-watered valleys, and the climate is mild. The soil is fertile, producing wheat, maize, grapes, figs, pomegranates and wine. Cattle and horses are bred. Honey is produced; and excellent arms are made. This country was subdued (c. 550) by the Emperor Justinian, who introduced Christianity. Native dynasties ruled from 735 to the 15th century, when the region was conquered by the Turks and became Mahommedan. The Russians acquired possession of it piecemeal between 1829 and 1842, but their power was not firmly established until after 1864. Area, 2800 sq. m. The principal town is Sukhum-kaleh. Pop. 43,000, of whom two-thirds are Mingrelians and one-third Abkhasians, a Cherkess or Circassian race. The total number of Abkhasians in the two governments of Kutais and Kuban was 72,103 in 1897; large numbers emigrated to the Turkish empire in 1864 and 1878.
ABLATION (from Lat. ablatus, carried away), the process of removing anything; a term used technically in geology of the wearing away of a rock or glacier, and in surgery for operative removal.
ABLATITIOUS (from Lat. ablatus, taken away), reducing or withdrawing; in astronomy a force which interferes between the moon and the earth to lessen the strength of gravitation is called “ablatitious,” just as it is called “addititious” when it increases that strength.
ABLATIVE (Lat. ablativus, sc. casus, from ablatum, taken away), in grammar, a case of the noun, the fundamental sense of which is direction from; in Latin, the principal language in which the case exists, this has been extended, with or without a preposition, to the instrument or agent of an act, and the place or time at, and manner in, which a thing is done. The case is also found in Sanskrit, Zend, Oscan and Umbrian, and traces remain in other languages. The “Ablative Absolute,” a grammatical construction in Latin, consists of a noun in the ablative case, with a participle, attribute or qualifying word agreeing with it, not depending on any other part of the sentence, to express the time, occasion or circumstance of a fact.
ABLUTION (Lat. ablutio, from abluere, “to wash off”), a washing, in its religious use, destined to secure that ceremonial or ritualistic purity which must not be confused with the physical or hygienic cleanliness of persons and things obtained by the use of soap and water.[1] Indeed the two states may contradict each other, as in the case of the 4th-century Christian pilgrim to Jerusalem who boasted that she had not washed her face for eighteen years for fear of removing therefrom the holy chrism of baptism. The purport, then, of ablutions is to remove, not dust and dirt, but the—to us imaginary—stains contracted by contact with the dead, with childbirth, with menstruous women, with murder whether wilful or involuntary, with almost any form of bloodshed, with persons of inferior caste, with dead animal refuse, e.g. leather or excrement, with leprosy, madness and any form of disease. Among all races in a certain grade of development such associations are vaguely felt to be dangerous and to impair vitality. In a later stage the taint is regarded as alive, as a demon or evil spirit alighting on and passing into the things and persons exposed to contamination. In general, water, cows’ urine and blood of swine are the materials used in ablutions. Of these water is the commonest, and its efficacy is enhanced if it be running, and still more if a magical or sacramental virtue has been imparted to it by ritual blessing or consecration. Some concrete examples will best illustrate the nature of such ablutions. In the Atharva-Veda, vii. 116, we have this allopathic remedy for fever. The patient’s skin burns, that of a frog is cold to the touch; therefore tie to the foot of the bed a frog, bound with red and black thread, and wash down the sick man so that the water of ablution falls
- ↑ In its technical ecclesiastical sense the ablution is the ritual washing of the chalice and of the priest’s fingers after the celebration of Holy Communion in the Catholic Church. The wine and water used for this purpose are themselves sometimes called “the ablution.”
