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MUNKACSY—MUNRO, R.

monuments” established at seven different points of the kingdom.


MUNKACSY, MICHAEL VON (1844–1900), Hungarian painter, whose real name was Michael (Miska) Leo Lieb, was the third son of Michael Lieb, a collector of salt-tax in Munkács, Hungary, and of Cäcilia Röck. He was born in that town on the 20th of February 1844. In 1848 his father was arrested at Miskolcz for complicity in the Hungarian revolution, and died shortly after his release; a little earlier he had also lost his mother, and became dependent upon the charity of relations, of whom an uncle, Röck, became mainly responsible for his maintenance and education. He was apprenticed to a carpenter, Langi, in 1855, but shortly afterwards made the acquaintance of the painters Fischer and Szamossy, whom he accompanied to Arad in 1858. From them he received his first real instruction in art. He worked mainly at Budapest during 1863–1865, and at this time first adopted, from patriotic motives, the name by which he is always known. In 1865 he visited Vienna, returning to Budapest in the following year, and went thence to Munich, where he contributed a few drawings to the Fliegende Blätter. About the end of 1867 he was working at Düsseldorf, where he was much influenced by Ludwig Knaus, and painted (1868–1869) his first picture of importance, “The Last Day of a Condemned Prisoner,” which was exhibited in the Paris Salon in 1870, and obtained for him a médaille unique and a very considerable reputation. He had already paid a short visit to Paris in 1867, but on the 25th of January 1872 he took up his permanent abode in that city, and remained there during the rest of his working life. Munkacsy’s other chief pictures are “Milton dictating Paradise Lost to his Daughters” (Paris Exhibition, 1878), “Christ before Pilate” (1881), “Golgotha” (1883), “The Death of Mozart” (1884),” “Arpad, chief of the Magyars, taking possession of Hungary,” painted for the new House of Parliament in Budapest, and exhibited at the Salon in 1893, and “Ecce Homo.” He had hardly completed the latter work when a malady of the brain overtook him, and he died on the 30th of April 1900, at Endenich, near Bonn. Just before his last illness he had been offered the directorship of the Hungarian State Gallery at Budapest. Munkacsy’s masterly characterization, force and power of dramatic composition secured him a great vogue for his works, but it is doubtful if his reputation will be maintained at the level it reached during his lifetime. “Christ before Pilate” and “Golgotha” were sold for £32,000 and £35,000 respectively to an American buyer. Munkacsy received the following awards for his work exhibited at Paris: Medal, 1870; Medal, 2nd class; Legion of Honour, 1877; Medal of Honour, 1878; Officer of the Legion, 1878; Grand Prix, Exhibition of 1889; Commander of the Legion, 1889.

See F. Walther Ilges. “M. von Munkacsy.” Künstler Monographien (1899); C. Sedelmeyer, Christ before Pilate (Paris, 1886); J. Beavington Atkinson, “Michael Munkacsy,” Magazine of Art (1881).  (E. F. S.) 


MÜNNICH, BURKHARD CHRISTOPH, Count (1683–1767), Russian soldier and statesman, was born at Neuenhuntorf, in Oldenburg, in 1683, and at an early age entered the French service. Thence he transferred successively to the armies of Hesse-Darmstadt and of Saxony, and finally, with the rank of general-in-chief and the title of count, he joined the army of Peter II. of Russia. In 1732 he became field-marshal and president of the council of war. In this post he did good service in the re-organization of the Russian army, and founded the cadet corps which was destined to supply the future generations of officers. In 1734 he took Danzig, and with 1736 began the Turkish campaigns which made Münnich’s reputation as a soldier. Working along the shores of the Black Sea from the Crimea, he took Ochakov after a celebrated siege in 1737, and in 1739 won the battle of Stavutschina, and took Khotin (or Choczim), and established himself firmly in Moldavia. Marshal Münnich now began to take an active part in political affairs, the particular tone of which was given by his rivalry with Biron, or Bieren, duke of Courland. But his activity was brought to a close by the revolution of 1741; he was arrested on his way to the frontier, and condemned to death. Brought out for execution, and withdrawn from the scaffold, he was later sent to Siberia, where he remained for several years, until the accession of Peter III. brought about his release in 1762. Catherine II., who soon displaced Peter, employed the old field-marshal as director-general of the Baltic ports. He died in 1767. Feldmarschall Münnich was a fine soldier of the professional type, and many future commanders, notably Loudon and Lacy, served their apprenticeship at Ochakov and Khotin. As a statesman he is regarded as the founder of Russian Philhellenism. He had the grade of count of the Holy Roman Empire. The Russian 37th Dragoons bear his name.

He wrote an Ébauche pour donner une idée de la forme de l’empire de Russie (Leipzig, 1774), and his voluminous diaries have appeared in various publications—Herrmann, Beiträge zur Geschichte des russischen Reichs (Leipzig, 1843). See Hempel, Leben Münnichs (Bremen, 1742); Halem, Geschichte des F. M. Grafen Münnich (Oldenburg, 1803; 2nd ed., 1838); Kostomarov, Feldmarschall Münnich (Russische Geschichte in Biographien, v. 2).


MUNRO, SIR HECTOR (1726–1805), British general, son of Hugh Munro of Novar, in Cromarty, was born in 1726, and entered the army in 1749. He went to Bombay in 1761, in command of the 89th regiment, and in that year effected the surrender of Mahé from the French. Later, when in command of the Bengal army, he suppressed a mutiny of sepoys at Patna, and on the 23rd of October 1764 won the victory of Buxar against Shuja-ud-Dowlah, the nawab wazir of Oudh, and Mir Kasim, which ranks amongst the most decisive battles ever fought in India. Returning home, he became in 1768 M.P. for the Inverness Burghs, which he continued to represent in parliament for more than thirty years, though a considerable portion of this period was spent in India, whither he returned in 1778 to take command of the Madras army. In that year he took Pondicherry from the French, but in 1780 he was defeated by Hyder Ali near Conjeeveram, and forced to fall back on St Thomas’s Mount. There Sir Eyre Coote took over command of the army, and in 1781 won a signal victory against Hyder Ali at Porto Novo, where Munro was in command of the right division. Negapatam was taken by Munro in November of the same year; and in 1782 he returned to England. He died on the 27th of December 1805.


MUNRO, HUGH ANDREW JOHNSTONE (1819–1885), British scholar, was born at Elgin on the 19th of October 1819. He was educated at Shrewsbury school, where he was one of Kennedy’s first pupils, and proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1838. He became scholar of his college in 1840, second classic and first chancellor’s medallist in 1842, and fellow of his college in 1843. He became classical lecturer at Trinity College, and in 1869 was elected to the newly-founded chair of Latin at Cambridge, but resigned it in 1872. The great work on which his reputation is mainly based is his edition of Lucretius, the fruit of the labour of many years (text only, 1 vol., 1860; text, commentary and translation, 2 vols., 1864). As a textual critic his knowledge was profound and his judgment unrivalled; and he made close archaeological studies by frequent travels in Italy and Greece. In 1867 he published an improved text of Aetna with commentary, and in the following year a text of Horace with critical introduction, illustrated by specimens of ancient gems selected by C. W. King. His knowledge and taste are nowhere better shown than in his Criticisms and Elucidations of Catullus (1878). He was a master of the art of Greek and Latin verse composition. His contributions to the famous volume of Shrewsbury verse, Sabrinae corolla, are among the most remarkable of a remarkable collection. His Translations into Latin and Greek Verse were privately printed in 1884. Like his translations into English, they are characterized by minute fidelity to the original, but never cease to be idiomatic. He died at Rome on the 30th of March 1885.

See Memoir by J. D. Duff, prefixed to a re-issue of the trans. of Lucretius in “Bohn’s Classical Library” (1908).


MUNRO, Monro or Monroe, ROBERT (d. c. 1680), Scots general, was a member of a well-known family in Ross-shire, the Munroes of Foulis. With several of his kinsmen he served in the continental wars under Gustavus Adolphus; and he