BONNEVAL, an ancient illustrious house in the Limousin, founded by Giraud de Bonneval, who lived in 1055. Not a few heads of this house held important offices at the French court. One of them, Antoine, was councillor and chamberlain to three kings, Louis XI., Charles VIII., and Louis XII. Another, Germain, was killed at the battle of Pavia. A third, Cæsar-Phœbus, acquired great distinction in the wars of Louis XIV. The best known member of the family was:—
Claudius Alexander, third son of the marquis de Bonneval, a military adventurer, born in 1675. He entered the navy in 1686, but quitted it in 1698, in consequence of a duel with the count de Beaumont. He then entered the army, and served with distinction in the Italian wars under Catenat, Villeroi, and Vendome. His fiery temper, however, led him into several duels, and involved him in a quarrel with the minister of war, which ultimately caused him to quit the French service and to accept a commission in the Austrian army. He served under Prince Eugene against his native country, and afterwards against the Turks, and gained great distinction at the battles of Peterwarden and Belgrade, at the first of which he was severely wounded. As a reward for his services an important command in Sardinia and Sicily was bestowed upon him in 1719. His quarrelsome disposition, however, once more brought him into disgrace, and he was stripped of all his honours and expelled from the country. He then took refuge in Turkey in 1730 and embraced the Mussulman faith. He was appointed to a high office in the army under the name of Achmet Pacha, and instructed the Turkish troops in European tactics and the management of artillery. His military reforms, however, excited the enmity of the janissaries, and his political projects were regarded with dislike by the divan, and he was exiled into Asia in 1738-39. His last years were passed in intrigues and vain regrets. The pope offered him an asylum in Rome, and the king of the Two Sicilies a pension, but he died at the moment he was about to return to Christendom. A memoir of Bonneval was published by the prince de Ligny, 1 vol., 8vo, Paris, 1817. A work, purporting to be the autobiography of this remarkable adventurer was published in 1755, but its genuineness is doubtful.—J. T.
BONNEVILLE, Nicholas de, born at Evreux in 1760, is looked upon as one of the founders of the French school of communists. It seems not unlikely that his doctrines may have originated in those sufferings to which he, like many other ardent aspirants for literary fame and fortune, became exposed in that brilliant capital to which all youths of real or imaginary genius repair from the provinces. He has left on record, in a preface to a volume of early poems, a description of the miseries he underwent, and which worked upon his ardent imagination and susceptible temper, so as to excite anger against society at large. Yet he was, although a dreamer, a hard student, and mastered the German, English, and Italian languages and literature. He aided Le Tourner in his translation of Shakspeare, and wrote imitations of German stories with a success which procured him the patronage of Marie Antoinette. When the Revolution broke out, the excitable feelings of Bonneville caught the general enthusiasm, and he promulgated plans for insuring the permanent good of mankind, more benevolent in intention than practical or wise. Yet was he openly denounced by Marat as an aristocrat, for articles in his journal, the Bouche de Fer, denouncing all cruelties and excesses. Thrown into prison, he narrowly escaped the guillotine by the timely fate of Robespierre. When Bonaparte had risen to the imperial throne, Bonneville had the simplicity to write an article in his new journal, the Bien Informé, comparing the emperor with Cromwell, and was again thrown into prison, and when let out, subjected to close surveillance as long as the empire lasted. In his latter days he opened a bookshop in the Quartier Latin, which became the resort of the students and professors, who loved to hear Bonneville's animated and learned conversation. He was simple, credulous, enthusiastic, and imaginative, and withal remarkably well read. His death took place 9th November, 1828.—J. F. C.
BONNIVARD, Francis de, celebrated in the annals of Geneva for his labours and sufferings in the cause of liberty, was born in 1496 of an influential Savoyard family. In 1510 his uncle resigned to him the priory of St. Victor, near Geneva, which had been previously held by several of his ancestors. A dispute was at that time raging between the Genevese and Bishop John, who attempted to cede his territory to the duke of Savoy, Bonnivard incurred the enmity both of the bishop and the duke, by his interference in behalf of a citizen whom the former had imprisoned and tortured, and in 1519 was betrayed into the hands of the duke, who imprisoned him for two years in the castle of Grolée. On his liberation he took a deep interest in the cause of the Reformation, which was now making progress, and showed himself a decided, yet prudent friend of protestant principles. He in consequence became peculiarly obnoxious to the enemies of liberty, and in 1530 he was taken prisoner and plundered by a band of robbers, who again delivered him up to the duke of Savoy. He was confined for six years in the castle of Chillon, and during the greater part of that time he occupied a dungeon hewn out of the rock below the surface of the neighbouring lake. He was liberated by the Genevese when they conquered the Waatland in 1536, and returned to Geneva, where he died in 1570. He was held in high honour by the citizens of that republic, and had a house assigned him and a liberal pension. He wrote a history of Geneva down to 1530, in compliance with a wish of the magistrates, as well as several other historical works, which are still preserved in manuscript in the library of that city. His own books, many of which were rare and valuable, he presented to the city in 1551. He was a man of great intellect and learning, combined with true nobility of character and singleness of purpose. The captivity of this upright patriot is the subject of Byron's celebrated poem, the Prisoner of Chillon.—J. T.
BONNYCASTLE, John, a very meritorious mathematician, the author of valuable elementary mathematical works. He died at Woolwich, where he was professor, in 1821. His most useful works are, the "Algebra," in two volumes, and his larger treatise on "Trigonometry." The progress of science has rendered these books somewhat antiquated; but it would be fortunate if all modern treatises were equally luminous.—J. P. N.
BONO, Giovanni Battista Agostino, an Italian canonist, professor in the university of Turin, and afterwards a noted partisan of the French directory, born at Verzuolo in 1738; died in 1799. He retired from his chair in 1792, after endeavouring to draw over his colleagues to the side of the French who had just occupied Savoy and the county of Nice. In 1798 he became, by the nomination of the French general, Joubert, president of the provisional government of Piedmont. In that capacity he urged strenuously on the directory the propriety of annexing Piedmont to the empire, but did not live to see his views carried out. His works treat of the line of separation between the civil and the ecclesiastical power.—J. S., G.
BONOMI, Giovanni Francesco, born of a patrician family at Cremona on the 6th of October, 1536. He studied at the university of his native place, and applied himself to the law in the universities of Bologna and Pavia, where he took his degree of LL.D. He was particularly befriended by the celebrated Saint Carlo Borromeo, archbishop of Milan, and was employed by him in many important negotiations. As a reward for his services, he was raised to the dignity of abbot of Nonantula; and having resigned his abbey, he was created bishop of Vercelli in 1572, and consecrated by his illustrious patron in the cathedral of Milan in 1573. Such was the esteem in which Bonomi was held by Carlo Borromeo, that at his death he bequeathed all his manuscripts to him. The popes, Gregory XIII. and Sixtus V., sent him as nuncio to Switzerland and Germany, and having been successful in all his missions, he was sent as an alter ego to Liege in Flanders, where he died on the 26th of February, 1587, leaving all his property to the poor of that city. This zealous prelate was well versed in history and Latin poetry. Besides many Latin works and pastorals connected with his sacred functions, he has left a life of Saint Carlo Borromeo, and an epic poem in four books, entitled "Borromacidos," published at Milan in 1589.—A. C. M.
BONONCINI or BUONONCINI, Giovanni Battista, a celebrated musician, the son of Giovanni Maria, and brother to Marc Antonio, two eminent composers of the same name, was born at Modena about 1672, and educated under his father. After his musical studies were finished, he went to Vienna, where, being an excellent performer on the violoncello, he was admitted into the band of the Emperor Leopold. Alessandro Scarlatti had gained great reputation by his operas, and Bononcini, desirous to emulate him, though at that time but eighteen years of age, composed one entitled "Camilla," which was performed at Vienna with greater applause than had before been given to any work of the kind. Nicolo Haym, one of the early conductors of
