(ib., 1867), and Church Vestments (ib., 1868); M. Dreger, Künstlerische
Entwicklung der Weberei und Stickerei (Vienna, 1904);
Madame I. Errera, Collection de broderies anciennes (Brussels, 1905);
L. de Farcy, La Broderie (Paris, 1890); R. Forrer, Die Gräber und
Textilfunde von Achmim-Panopolis (Strassburg, 1891); F. R. Fowke,
The Bayeux Tapestry (London, 1898); Rev. C. H. Hartshorne, On
English Medieval Embroidery (ib., 1848); M. B. Huish, Samplers and
Tapestry Embroideries (ib., 1900); A. F. Kendrick, English Embroidery
(ib., 1905); English Embroidery executed prior to the Middle
of the 16th Century (Burlington Fine Arts Club Exhibition, 1905,
introduction by A. F. Kendrick); E. Lefebure, Embroideries and
Lace, translated by A. S. Cole, C.B. (London, 1888); F. Marshall,
Old English Embroidery (ib., 1894); E. M. Rogge, Moderne Kunst-Nadelarbeiten
(Amsterdam, 1905); South Kensington Museum,
Catalogue of Special Loan Exhibition of Decorative Art Needlework
(1874); W. G. P. Townshend, Embroidery (London, 1899). For
further examples of ecclesiastical embroidery see the articles
Chasuble, Cope, Dalmatic and Mitre. (A. F. K.; A. S. C.)
EMBRUN, a town in the department of the Hautes Alpes in
S.E. France. It is built at a height of 2854 ft. on a plateau
that rises above the right bank of the Durance. It is 2712 m.
by rail from Briançon and 24 m. from Gap. Its ramparts were
demolished in 1884. In 1906 the communal pop. (including
the garrison) was 3752. Besides the Tour Brune (11th century)
and the old archiepiscopal palace, now occupied by government
offices, barracks, &c., the chief object of interest in Embrun is its
splendid cathedral church, which dates from the second half
of the 12th century. Above its side door, called the Réal, there
existed till 1585 (when it was destroyed by the Huguenots) a
fresco, probably painted in the 13th century, representing the
Madonna: this was the object of a celebrated pilgrimage for
many centuries. Louis XI. habitually wore on his hat a leaden
image of this Madonna, for which he had a very great veneration,
since between 1440 and 1461, during the lifetime of his father,
he had been the dauphin, and as such ruler of this province.
Embrun was the Eburodunum or Ebredunum of the Romans, and the chief town of the province of the Maritime Alps. The episcopal see was founded in the 4th century, and became an archbishopric about 800. In 1147 the archbishops obtained from the emperor Conrad III. very extensive temporal rights, and the rank of princes of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1232 the county of the Embrunais passed by marriage to the dauphins of Viennois. In 1791 the archiepiscopal see was suppressed, the region being then transferred to the diocese of Gap, so that the once metropolitan cathedral church is now simply a parish church. The town was sacked in 1585 by the Huguenots and in 1692 by the duke of Savoy. Henri Arnaud (1641–1721), the Waldensian pastor and general, was born at Embrun.
See A. Albert, Histoire du diocèse d’Embrun (2 vols., Embrun, 1783); M. Fornier, Histoire générale des Alpes Maritimes ou Cottiennes et particulière de leur métropolitaine Embrun (written 1626–1643), published by the Abbé Paul Guillaume (3 vols., Paris and Gap, 1890–1891); A. Fabre, Recherches historiques sur le pèlerinage des rois de France à N. D. d’Embrun (Grenoble, 1859); A. Sauret, Essai historique sur la ville d’Embrun (Gap, 1860). (W. A. B. C.)
EMBRYOLOGY. The word embryo is derived from the Gr.
ἔμβρυον, which signified the fruit of the womb before birth.
In its strict sense, therefore, embryology is the study of the
intrauterine young or embryo, and can only be pursued in those
animals in which the offspring are retained in the uterus of the
mother until they have acquired, or nearly acquired, the form
of the parent. As a matter of fact, however, the word has a
much wider application than would be gathered from its derivation.
All animals above the Protozoa undergo at the beginning
of their existence rapid growth and considerable changes of
form and structure. During these changes, which constitute
the development of the animal, the young organism may be
incapable of leading a free life and obtaining its own food. In
such cases it is either contained in the body of the parent or it
is protruded and lies quiescent within the egg membranes;
or it may be capable of leading an independent life, possessing
in a functional condition all the organs necessary for the maintenance
of its existence. In the former case the young organism
is called an embryo,[1] in the latter a larva. It might thus be
concluded that embryology would exclude the study of larvae,
in which the whole or the greater part of the development takes
place outside the parent and outside the egg. But this is not
the case; embryology includes not only a study of embryos
as just defined, but also a study of larvae. In this way the
scope of the subject is still further widened. As long as embryology
confines its attention to embryos, it is easy to fix its
limits, at any rate in the higher animals. The domain of embryology
ceases in the case of viviparous animals at birth, in
the case of oviparous animals at hatching; it ceases as soon as
the young form acquires the power of existing when separated
from the parent, or when removed from the protection of the egg
membranes. But as soon as post-embryonic developmental
changes are admitted within the scope of the subject, it becomes
on close consideration difficult to limit its range. It must include
all the developmental processes which take place as a result of
sexual reproduction. A man at birth, when he ceases to be an
embryo, has still many changes besides those of simple growth
to pass through. The same remark applies to a young frog
at the metamorphosis. A chick even, which can run about
and feed almost immediately after hatching, possesses a plumage
very different from that of the full-grown bird; a starfish at
the metamorphosis is in many of its features quite different
from the form with which we are familiar. It might be attempted
to meet this difficulty by limiting embryology to a study of all
those changes which occur in the organism before the attainment
of the adult state. But this merely shifts the difficulty to
another quarter, and makes it necessary to define what is meant
by the adult state. At first sight this may seem easy, and no
doubt it is not difficult when man and the higher animals alone
are in question, for in these the adult state may be defined
comparatively sharply as the stage of sexual maturity. After
that period, though changes in the organism still continue, they
are retrogressive changes, and as such might fairly be excluded
from any account of development, which clearly implies progression,
not retrogression. But, as so often happens in the study
of organisms, formulae which apply quite satisfactorily to one
group require modifications when others are considered. Does
sexual maturity always mark the attainment of the adult state?
Is the Axolotl adult when it acquires its reproductive organs?
Can a larval Ctenophore, which acquires functional reproductive
glands and still possesses the power of passing into the form
ordinarily described as adult in that group, be considered to have
reached the end of its development? Or—to take the case of
those animals, such as Amphioxus, Balanoglossus, and many
segmented worms in which important developmental processes
occur, e.g. formation of new gill slits, of gonadial sacs, or even of
whole segments of the body, long after the power of reproduction
has been acquired—how is the attainment of the adult state
to be defined, for it is clear that in them the attainment of sexual
maturity does not correspond with the end of growth and
development? If, then, embryology is to be regarded as including
not only the study of embryos, but also that of larvae, i.e.
if it includes the study of the whole developmental history of
the individual—and it is impossible to treat the subject rationally
unless it is so regarded—it becomes exceeding difficult to fix
any definite limit to the period of life with which embryology
concerns itself. The beginning of this period can be fixed, but
not the end, unless it be the end of life itself, i.e. death. The
science of embryology, then, is the science of individual development,
and includes within its purview all those changes of form
and structure, whether embryonic, larval or post-larval, which
characterize the life of the individual. The beginning of this
period is precise and definite—it is the completion of the fertilization
of the ovum, in which the life of the individual has its start.
The end, on the other hand, is vague and cannot be precisely
defined, unless it be death, in which case the period of life with
which embryology concerns itself is coincident with the life of
the individual. To use the words of Huxley (“Cell Theory,”
Collected Works, vol. i. p. 267): “Development, therefore, and
life are, strictly speaking, one thing, though we are accustomed
to limit the former to the progressive half of life merely, and to
- ↑ In the mammalia the word foetus is often employed in the same signification as embryo; it is especially applied to the embryo in the later stages of uterine development.
