Rois, ed. A. Scheler (Brussels, 1874); Guibert d’Andrenas (13th
century); La Prise de Cordres (13th century); La Mort Aimeri de
Narbonne, ed. J. Couraye de Parc (Soc. des Anciens Textes français,
Paris, 1884); Foulque de Candie (ed. P. Tarbé, Reims, 1860); Le
Moniage Guillaume (12th century); Les Enfances Vivien (ed. C.
Wahlund and H. v. Feilitzen, Upsala and Paris, 1895); Chançun
de Willame (Chiswick Press, 1903), described by P. Meyer in Romania
(xxxiii. 597-618). The ninth branch of the Karlamagnus Saga (ed.
C. R. Unger, Christiania, 1860) deals with the geste of Guillaume.
I Nerbonesi is edited by J. G. Isola (Bologna, 1877, &c.).
See C. Révillout, Étude hist. et litt. sur la vita sancti Willelmi (Montpellier, 1876); W. J. A. Jonckbloet, Guillaume d’Orange (2 vols., 1854, The Hague); L. Clarus (ps. for W. Volk), Herzog Wilhelm von Aquitanien (Münster, 1865); P. Paris, in Hist. litt. de la France (vol. xxii., 1852); L. Gautier, Épopées françaises (vol. iv., 2nd ed., 1882); R. Weeks, The newly discovered Chançun de Willame (Chicago, 1904); A. Thomas, Études romanes (Paris, 1891), on Vivien; L. Saltet, “S. Vidian de Martres-Tolosanes” in Bull. de litt. ecclés. (Toulouse, 1902); P. Becker, Die altfrz. Wilhelmsage u. ihre Beziehung zu Wilhelm dem Heiligen (Halle, 1896), and Der südfranzösische Sagenkreis und seine Probleme (Halle, 1898); A. Jeanroy, “Études sur le cycle de Guillaume au court nez” (in Romania, vols. 25 and 26, 1896–1897); H. Suchier, “Recherches sur ... Guillaume d’Orange” (in Romania, vol. 32, 1903). The conclusions arrived at by earlier writers are combated by Joseph Bédier in the first volume, “Le Cycle de Guillaume d’Orange” (1908), of his Légendes épiques, in which he constructs a theory that the cycle of Guillaume d’Orange grew up round the various shrines on the pilgrim route to Saint Gilles of Provence and Saint James of Compostella—that the chansons de geste were, in fact, the product of 11th and 12th century trouvères, exploiting local ecclesiastical traditions, and were not developed from earlier poems dating back perhaps to the lifetime of Guillaume of Toulouse, the saint of Gellone.
GUILLEMOT (Fr. guillemot [1]), the name accepted by nearly
all modern authors for a sea-bird, the Colymbus troile of
Linnaeus and the Uria troile of Latham, which nowadays it
seems seldom if ever to bear among those who, from their vocation,
are most conversant with it, though, according to Willughby
and Ray his translator, it was in their time so called “by those
of Northumberland and Durham.” Around the coasts of Britain
it is variously known as the frowl, kiddaw or skiddaw, langy
(cf. Ice. Langvia), lavy, marrock, murre, scout (cf. Coot),
scuttock, strany, tinker or tinkershire and willock. In former
days the guillemot yearly frequented the cliffs on many parts
of the British coasts in countless multitudes, and this is still
the case in the northern parts of the United Kingdom; but
more to the southward nearly all its smaller settlements have
been rendered utterly desolate by the wanton and cruel destruction
of their tenants during the breeding season, and even the
inhabitants of those which were more crowded had become so
thinned that, but for the intervention of the Sea Birds Preservation
Act (32 & 33 Vict. cap. 17), which provided under penalty
for the safety of this and certain other species at the time of
year when they were most exposed to danger, they would unquestionably
by this time have been exterminated so far as
England is concerned.
Part of the guillemot’s history is still little understood. We know that it arrives at its wonted breeding stations on its accustomed day in spring, that it remains there till, towards the end of the summer, its young are hatched and able, as they soon are, to encounter the perils of a seafaring life, when away go all, parents and progeny. After that time it commonly happens that a few examples are occasionally met with in bays and shallow waters. Tempestuous weather will drive ashore a large number in a state of utter destitution—many of them indeed are not unfrequently washed up dead—but what becomes of the bulk of the birds, not merely the comparatively few thousands that are natives of Britain, but the tens and hundreds of thousands, not to say millions, that are in summer denizens of more northern latitudes, no one can say. This mystery is not peculiar to the guillemot, but is shared by all the Alcidae that inhabit the Atlantic Ocean. Examples stray every season across the Bay of Biscay, are found off the coasts of Spain and Portugal, enter the Mediterranean and reach Italian waters, or, keeping farther south, may even touch the Madeiras, Canaries or Azores; but these bear no proportion whatever to the mighty hosts of whom they are literally the “scouts,” and whose position and movements they no more reveal than do the vedettes of a well-appointed army. The common guillemot of both sides of the Atlantic is replaced farther northward by a species with a stouter bill, the U. arra or U. bruennichi of ornithologists, and on the west coast of North America by the U. californica. The habits of all these are essentially the same, and the structural resemblance between all of them and the Auks is so great that several systematists have relegated them to the genus Alca, confining the genus Uria to the guillemots of another group, of which the type is the U. grylla, the black guillemot of British authors, the dovekey or Greenland dove of sailors, the tysty of Shetlanders. This bird assumes in summer an entirely black plumage with the exception of a white patch on each wing, while in winter it is beautifully marbled with white and black. Allied to it as species or geographical races are the U. mandti, U. columba and U. carbo. All these differ from the larger guillemots by laying two or three eggs, which are generally placed in some secure niche, while the members of the other group lay but a single egg, which is invariably exposed on a bare ledge. (A. N.)
GUILLOCHE, a French word for an ornament, either painted
or carved, which was one of the principal decorative bands
employed by the Greeks in their temples or on their vases.
Guilloches are single, double or triple; they consist of a series
of circles equidistant one from the other and enclosed in a band
which winds round them and interlaces. This guilloche is
of Asiatic origin and was largely employed in the decoration of the
Assyrian palaces, where it was probably copied from Chaldaean
work, as there is an early example at Erech which dates from the
time of Gudea (2294 B.C.). The ornament as painted by the
Greeks has almost entirely disappeared, but traces are found in
the temple of Nemesis at Rhamnus; and on the terra-cotta slabs
by which the timber roofs of Greek temples were protected, it is
painted in colours which are almost as brilliant as when first
produced, those of the Treasury of Gela at Olympia being of great
beauty. These examples are double guilloches, with two rows of
circles, each with an independent interlacing band and united
by a small arc with palmette inside; in both the single and double
guilloches of Greek work there is a flower in the centre of the
circles. In the triple guilloche, the centre row of circles comes
half-way between the others, and the enclosing band crosses
diagonally both ways, interlacing alternately. The best example
of the triple guilloche is that which is carved on the torus moulding
of the base and on the small convex moulding above the
echinus of the capitals of the columns of the Erechtheum at
Athens. It was largely employed in Roman work, and the single
guilloche is found almost universally as a border in mosaic
pavements, not only in Italy but throughout Europe. In the
Renaissance in Italy it was also a favourite enrichment for
borders and occasionally in France and England.
GUILLON, MARIE NICOLAS SYLVESTRE (1760–1847),
French ecclesiastic, was born in Paris on the 1st of January 1760. He was librarian and almoner in the household of the princess de Lamballe, and when in 1792 she was executed, he fled to the provinces, where under the name of Pastel he practised medicine. A man of facile conscience, he afterwards served in turn under Napoleon, the Bourbons and the Orleanists, and became canon of St Denis, bishop of Morocco and dean of the Sorbonne.
Among his many literary works are a Collection des brefs du pape Pie VI (1798), Bibliothèque choisie des pères grecs et latins (1822, 26 vols.) and a French translation of Cyprian with notes (1837, 2 vols.).
GUILLOTINE, the instrument for inflicting capital punishment by decapitation, introduced into France at the period of the Revolution. It consists of two upright posts surmounted by a cross beam, and grooved so as to guide an oblique-edged knife, the back of which is heavily weighted to make it fall swiftly and with force when the cord by which it is held aloft is let go. Some
- ↑ The word, however, seems to be cognate with or derived from the Welsh and Manx Guillem, or Gwilym as Pennant spells it. The association may have no real meaning, but one cannot help comparing the resemblance between the French guillemot and Guillaume with that between the English willock (another name for the bird) and William.
