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FRANKFORT-ON-ODER—FRANKINCENSE
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1801 that the last mouldering head of the Fettmilch company dropped unnoticed from the Rententurm, the old tower near the bridge. In the words of Dr Kriegk, Geschichte von Frankfurt, (1871), the insurrection completely destroyed the political power of the gilds, gave new strength to the supremacy of the patriciate, and brought no further advantage to the rest of the citizens than a few improvements in the organization and administration of the magistracy. The Jews, who had been attacked by the popular party, were solemnly reinstated by imperial command in all their previous privileges, and received full compensation for their losses.

During the Thirty Years’ War Frankfort did not escape. In 1631 Gustavus Adolphus garrisoned it with 600 men, who remained in possession till they were expelled four years later by the imperial general Lamboy. In 1792 the citizens had to pay 2,000,000 gulden to the French general Custine; and in 1796 Kléber exacted 8,000,000 francs. The independence of Frankfort was brought to an end in 1806, on the formation of the Confederation of the Rhine; and in 1810 it was made the capital of the grand-duchy of Frankfort, which had an area of 3215 sq. m. with 302,100 inhabitants, and was divided into the four districts of Frankfort, Aschaffenburg, Fulda and Hanau. On the reconstitution of Germany in 1815 it again became a free city, and in the following year it was declared the seat of the German Confederation. In April 1833 occurred what is known as the Frankfort Insurrection (Frankfurter Attentat), in which a number of insurgents led by Georg Bunsen attempted to break up the diet. The city joined the German Zollverein in 1836. During the revolutionary period of 1848 the people of Frankfort, where the united German parliament held its sessions, took a chief part in political movements, and the streets of the town were more than once the scene of conflict. In the war of 1866 they were on the Austrian side. On the 16th of July the Prussian troops, under General Vogel von Falkenstein, entered the town, and on the 18th of October it was formally incorporated with the Prussian state. A fine of 6,000,000 florins was exacted. In 1871 the treaty which concluded the Franco-German War was signed in the Swan Hotel by Prince Bismarck and Jules Favre, and it is consequently known as the peace of Frankfort.

Authorities.—F. Rittweger, Frankfurt im Jahre 1848 (1898); R. Jung, Das historische Archiv der Stadt Frankfurt (1897); A. Horne, Geschichte von Frankfurt (4th ed., 1903); H. Grotefend, Quellen zur Frankfürter Geschichte (Frankfort, 1884–1888); J. C. von Fichard, Die Entstehung der Reichsstadt Frankfurt (Frankfort, 1819); G. L. Kriegk, Geschichte von Frankfurt (Frankfort, 1871); J. F. Böhmer, Urkundenbuch der Reichsstadt Frankfurt (new ed., 1901); B. Weber, Zur Reformationsgeschichte der freien Reichsstadt Frankfurt (1895); O. Speyer, Die Frankfurter Revolution 1612–1616 (1883); and L. Woerl, Guide to Frankfort (Leipzig, 1898).

FRANKFORT-ON-ODER, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Brandenburg, 50 m. S.E. from Berlin on the main line of railway to Breslau and at the junction of lines to Cüstrin, Posen and Grossenhain. Pop. (1905) 64,943. The town proper lies on the left bank of the river Oder and is connected by a stone bridge (replacing the old historical wooden structure) 900 ft. long, with the suburb of Damm. The town is agreeably situated and has broad and handsome streets, among them the “Linden,” a spacious avenue. Above, on the western side, and partly lying on the site of the old ramparts, is the residential quarter, consisting mainly of villas and commanding a fine prospect of the Oder valley. Between this suburb and the town lies the park, in which is a monument to the poet Ewald Christian von Kleist, who died here of wounds received in the battle of Kunersdorf. Among the more important public buildings must be noticed the Evangelical Marienkirche (Oberkirche), a handsome brick edifice of the 13th century with five aisles, the Roman Catholic church, the Rathhaus dating from 1607, and bearing on its southern gable the device of a member of the Hanseatic League, the government offices and the theatre. The university of Frankfort, founded in 1506 by Joachim I., elector of Brandenburg, was removed to Breslau in 1811, and the academical buildings are now occupied by a school. To compensate it for the loss of its university, Frankfort-on-Oder was long the seat of the court of appeal for the province, but of this it was deprived in 1879. There are several handsome public monuments, notably that to Duke Leopold of Brunswick, who was drowned in the Oder while attempting to save life, on the 27th of April 1785. The town has a large garrison, consisting of nearly all arms. Its industries are considerable, including the manufacture of machinery, metal ware, chemicals, paper, leather and sugar. Situated on the high road from Berlin to Silesia, and having an extensive system of water communication by means of the Oder and its canals to the Vistula and the Elbe, and being an important railway centre, it has a lively export trade, which is further fostered by its three annual fairs, held respectively at Reminiscere (the second Sunday in Lent), St Margaret’s day and at Martinmas. In the neighbourhood are extensive coal fields.

Frankfort-on-the-Oder owes its origin and name to a settlement of Franconian merchants here, in the 13th century, on land conquered by the margrave of Brandenburg from the Wends. In 1253 it was raised to the rank of a town by the margrave John I. and borrowed from Berlin the Magdeburg civic constitution. In 1379 it received from King Sigismund, then margrave of Brandenburg, the right to free navigation of the Oder; and from 1368 to about 1450 it belonged to the Hanseatic League. The university, which is referred to above, was opened by the elector Joachim I. in 1506, was removed in 1516 to Kottbus and restored again to Frankfort in 1539, at which date the Reformation was introduced. It was dispersed during the Thirty Years’ War and again restored by the Great Elector, but finally transferred to Breslau in 1811.

Frankfort has suffered much from the vicissitudes of war. In the 15th century it successfully withstood sieges by the Hussites (1429 and 1432), by the Poles (1450) and by the duke of Sagan (1477). In the Thirty Years’ War it was successively taken by Gustavus Adolphus (1631), by Wallenstein (1633), by the elector of Brandenburg (1634), and again by the Swedes, who held it from 1640 to 1644. During the Seven Years’ War it was taken by the Russians (1759). In 1812 it was occupied by the French, who remained till March 1813, when the Russians marched in.

See K. R. Hausen, Geschichte der Universität und Stadt Frankfurt (1806), and Bieder und Gurnik, Bilder aus der Geschichte der Stadt Frankfurt-an-der-Oder (1898).

FRANKINCENSE,[1] or Olibanum[2] (Gr. λιβανωτός, later θύος; Lat., tus or thus; Heb., lebonah;[3] Ar., lubān;[4] Turk., ghyunluk; Hind., ganda-birosa[5]), a gum-resin obtained from certain species of trees of the genus Boswellia, and natural order Burseraceae. The members of the genus are possessed of the following characters:—Bark often papyraceous; leaves deciduous, compound, alternate and imparipinnate, with leaflets serrate or entire; flowers in racemes or panicles, white, green, yellowish or pink, having a small persistent, 5-dentate calyx, 5 petals, 10 stamens, a sessile 3 to 5-chambered ovary, a long style, and a 3-lobed stigma; fruit trigonal or pentagonal; and seed compressed. Sir George Birdwood (Trans. Lin. Soc. xxvii.,

  1. Stephen Skinner, M.D. (Etymologicon linguae Anglicanae, Lond., 1671), gives the derivation: “Frankincense, Thus, q.d. Incensum (i.e. Thus Libere) seu Liberaliter, ut in sacris officiis par est, adolendum.”
  2. “Sic olibanum dixere pro thure ex Graeco ὁ λίβανος” (Salmasius, C. S. Plinianae exercitationes, t. ii. p. 926, b. F., Traj. ad Rhen., 1689 fol.). So also Fuchs (Op. didact. pars. ii. p. 42, 1604 fol.), “Officinis non sine risu eruditorum, Graeco articulo adjecto, Olibanus vocatur.” The term olibano was used in ecclesiastical Latin as early as the pontificate of Benedict IX., in the 11th century. (See Ferd. Ughellus, Italia sacra, tom. i. 108, D., Ven., 1717 fol.)
  3. So designated from its whiteness (J. G. Stuckius, Sacror. et sacrific. gent. descrip., p. 79, Lugd. Bat., 1695, fol.; Kitto, Cycl. Bibl. Lit. ii. p. 806, 1870); cf. Laben, the Somali name for cream (R. F. Burton, First Footsteps in E. Africa, p. 178, 1856).
  4. Written Louan by Garcias da Horta (Aromat. et simpl. medicament. hist., C. Clusii Atrebatis Exoticorum lib. sept., p. 157, 1605, fol.), and stated to have been derived by the Arabs from the Greek name, the term less commonly used by them being Conder: cf. Sanskrit Kunda. According to Colebrooke (in Asiatick Res. ix. p. 379, 1807), the Hindu writers on Materia Medica use for the resin of Boswellia thurifera the designation Cunduru.
  5. A term applied also to the resinous exudation of Pinus longifolia (see Dr E. J. Waring, Pharmacopoeia of India, p. 52, Lond., 1868).