paint, from the parti-coloured appearance of the bird. It is this “pied” or black and white look of the page that probably gave the name of pica, “pie” or “pye,” to the ordinal printed in black-letter (see Pie), and thence to a size of type in printing coming next to “ English ” (see Typography). The Gr. κίσσα and Lat. pica were used of a perverted craving for unnatural foods; and the word has been adopted in this sense in modern medical terminology.
PICARD, LOUIS JOSEPH ERNEST (1821–1877), French
politician, was born in Paris on the 24th of December 1821. After taking his doctorate in law in 1846 he joined the Parisian
bar. Elected to the corps législatif in 1858, he joined the group of
Emile Ollivier. But as Ollivier approximated to the government
standpoint, Picard, one of the members of the group known as
Les Cmq, weered more to the left. He founded in 1868 a weekly
iemocrafic journal, L’Electeur libre, and in 1869 was elected
both for Hérault and Paris, electing to sit for the former.
From the 4th of September 1870 he held the portfolio of finance
in the government of National Defence. In January 1871 he
accompanied Jules Favre to Versailles to arrange the capitulation
of Paris, and in the next month he became minister of the
interior in Thiers's cabinet. Attacked both by the Monarchist
and the Republican press, he resigned in May. Later in the year
he was sent as ambassador to Brussels, where he remained for
two years. On his return to Paris he resumed his seat in the
Left centre, and in 1875 became life senator. He died in Paris
on the 13th of May 1877.
PICARDY (La Picardie), one of the old provinces of France,
bounded on the N. by Hainaut and Artois, on the E. by Champagne,
on the S. by the Île de France, and on the W. by Normandy
and the English Channel. Its maritime frontier ran
from the mouth of the Aa to the cliffs of Caux, and it included
the whole of the basin of the Somme and part of that of the
Oise. The chief towns of Picardy were Amiens, Boulogne,
Abbeville, Laon, Soissons, Montreuil, Péronne, Beauvais,
lIontd1d1er, St Quentin and Noyon. Its principal rivers were
the Somme and the Oise. Picardy formed part of the archdiocese
of Reims, and its bishoprics were Amiens, Beauvais,
Senhs, Soissons, Noyon and Laon. In 1789 the province of
Picardy was covered by the three bishoprics of Amiens, Noyon
and Boulogne. It was one of the provinces of the five great
fermes, districts subject to the tariff of 1664, and in judicial
matters was under the authority of the parlement of Paris.
Its area now forms the department of the Somme and parts
of the departments of Pas de Calais, Aisne and Oise.
The name of Picardy does not appear until the 13th century, but was employed by Matthew Paris and was in general use in the I4ll1 century. In the 13th century the province was divided into the two bailliages of Amiens and Vermandois, but its regular organization as part of the kingdom of France only dates from the beginning of the 16th century. At this time it was divided into north and south Picardy. North Picardy, or Picardy proper, formed one of the great military governorships of the kingdom, while south Picardy was included in the Île de France. North Picardy was divided into upper and lower Picardy, the former being the interior part of the province and the latter the district along the coast. Upper Picardy comprised the districts of Amiénois, Santerre, Vermandois and Thiérache, and lower Picardy those of Ponthieu, Vimeu, Boulonnais and Calaisis, or the Pays reconquis; south Picardy included the districts of Beauvaisis, Laonnais and Soissonais.
Under the Romans Picardy was part of Belgica secunda; it was inhabited by the Morini, the Ambiani, the Veromandui, the Bellovaci and the Suessiones, whose names still appear in Amiens, Vermandois, Beauvais and Soissons. The Romans intersected the district with roads and built several castra to defend the valley of the Somme. In the 3rd century Christianity was preached here, and St Quentin and others were martyred. A little later abbeys were founded, among them Corbie, St Valéry and St Riquier. Early in the 5th century Picardy became the centre of Merovingian France, for, as the historian Michelet says, “l'histoire de l'antique France semble entassée en Picardie.” Clovis had his first capital at Soissons; Charlemagne had his at Noyon, and Laon was the capital and the refuge of the later and feebler Carolingian sovereigns.
During the later feudal period Picardy was the home of the counts of Vermandois, of Clermont and of Ponthieu, the sire of Coucy and others. The neighbouring dukes of Burgundy cast covetous eyes upon the province; in 1435, by the famous treaty of Arras, the royal towns and lands in the valley of the Somme were ceded by King Charles VII. to Burgundy. However, after the death of Charles the Bold in 1477 Picardy was finally united with the crown of France. The province was early an industrial district. Flemish immigrants brought with them the lucrative trade of weaving cloth, and the Somme towns were soon competing with those of Flanders. The Picard towns were noted for their love of independence, which often brought them into collision with the kings of France during the 13th century. At a later time the province received a number of Spanish immigrants. In the middle ages the Picards formed one of the four “ nations ” at the university of Paris. Picardy has a high place as a home of Gothic art, this being testified to by the superb cathedrals at Amiens and Noyon, while within its borders is the famous chateau of Coucy.
Picardy has a literature of its own, which was rich and popular in the 12th century. It suffered greatly from the ravages of the Normans, and later during the Hundred Years' War and the wars between France and Spain. Within it are the famous fields of Creçy, Agincourt and St Quentin, while it also includes places of conference like Guînes, Amiens and Picquigny. The Picard had a high reputation as a soldier, being sometimes called the " Gascon of the North,” and in 1558 Henry II. created the régiment de Picardie. Many anthropological remains have been found in the Somme valley.
See Labourt, Essai sur l'orgine des villes de Picardie (Amiens, 1840); Grenier, Introduction à l'histoire genérale de la province de Picardié (Amiens, 1856); and H. Carnoy, Littérature orale de la Picardie (1883).
PICARESQUE NOVEL, THE. This special form of the
roman d’aventures may be defined as the prose autobiography of a real or fictitious personage who describes his experiences as a social parasite, and who satirizes the society which he has exploited. The picaroon, or rogue type, is represented by Encolpos, Ascyltos and G1ton in the Satyricon which tradition
ascribes to Petronius; it persists in Lucian, in the Roman de Renart, in the fableaux, and in other works popular during the middle ages; and it is incarnated in real life by such men of genius as the Archpriest of Hita and François Villon. But in
its final form the picaresque novel may be regarded as a Spanish
invention. The word picaro is first used, apparently, in a letter
written by Eugenio de Salazar at Toledo on the 15th of April
1560; the etymology which derives picaro from picar (to pick up)
is unsatisfactory to philologists, but it suggests the picaroon's
chief business in life. In the Tesoro de la lerzgua castellana
(Madrid, 1611) Sebastian Covarrubias y Orozco, the best of
Spanish lexicographers, describes a picaro as a man of loose
character engaged in menial work and-by extension-a rascal
who attains his ends by skilful dissimulation; and the earliest
application of the expression picaro to a Character in fiction
occurs in Mateo Aleman's Guzman de Alfarache, the first part of
which was published in 1599. But a genuine novola picaresca
existed in Spain before the word picaro became generally
current.
The earliest specimen of the kind is La Vida de Lazarillo de Tormes y de sus fortunas y adversidades, an anonymous tale long attributed, on insufficient grounds, to Diego Hurtado de Mendoza (qw). The authorship of this brilliant book and the circumstances of its publication are obscure; however, it was certainly issued not later than 1554, and was thrice reprinted before 1559, when it was placed on the Index. Imitations of so successful a story were inevitable, and so early as 1555 there appeared at Antwerp La Segunda parte de Lazarillo de Tormes, an anonymous sequel which completely misinterpreted the irreverent wit of the original. The first part had been prohibited because of its attacks on the
