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358 BASEL the bishop, whose see extended over other localities, and partly to nobles of the rural districts and to patrician families. The latter gradually became sole proprietors until they joined the Swiss confederation; the country nobility emigrated or were embodied among the patricians, and the bishop emigrated with his chapter to Solothurn, when after 1519 the city embraced with ardor the reformed faith. Thus the whole political sway was left with the patricians and trading corporations, who in time became omnipotent over the peasants, and reduced them and the poorer citizens to subjection, against which the latter often but in vain rebelled. The first French republic gave social equality to all classes, while a con- tribution of 11,000,000 francs was levied upon the city. The dissatisfaction with the restora- tion of the ancient prerogatives of the privi- leged city classes led in 1831 to several bloody battles between the soldiery of the city and the peasants, until the Swiss confederation in- tervened and in 1833 acknowledged the in- dependence of the rural canton. At Basel was signed the treaty of peace between the French republic and Prussia, April 5, and that between the French republic and Spain, July 22, 1795. The population of the city, which was much larger in the middle ages, was in the middle of the 14th century greatly reduced by the "death of Basel," or "black death." BASEL, Council of, one of the ecumenical councils of the Roman Catholic church. Prop- erly speaking, the councils of Basel, Ferrara, and Florence constitute but one council, of which several sessions were held in each of these cities, and which is usually called the council of Florence, because the most impor- tant questions were definitely settled and the council terminated at this latter city. The council during its sessions at Basel, until its transfer to Ferrara in 1437, was acknowledged as oecumenical by Eugenius IV., and its de- crees were confirmed by him, with the excep- tion of those which interfered with the pre- rogatives of the holy see. The principal reasons for assembling a general council at the period referred to were to effect the reconciliation of the Greek church, and to reform ecclesiasti- cal discipline. The council was summoned by Pope Martin V. to meet at Basel, March 3, 1431. Meanwhile he died, and Eugenius IV. was elected to succeed him on the very day of the indiction of the council, and immediately confirmed the acts of his predecessor convok- ing it. On the day appointed not a single bishop, and but one abbot, appeared at Basel. The last-mentioned person went through the form of declaring himself assembled in oecu- menical council. Five days afterward four deputies, together with the first-named abbot and a few clergymen of the city, opened the council solemnly a second time. In September Cardinal Julian Cesarini, the papal legate, ar- rived at Basel, and sent letters to different prelates exhorting them to come to the council. On Sept. 26 he held a session, at which it is said three bishops and seven abbots were pres- ent. The cardinal having sent an envoy to Rome to represent the state of things at Basel, Pope Eugenius IV., who desired to convoke the council in a place more convenient to the Greeks, sent a bull to his legate empowering him to dissolve the council and indicate a new one at Bologna. Cardinal Julian, who at first seemed disposed to dissolve the council, had however changed his mind, and was desirous to continue it. His principal reason appears to have been that he thought it would be a favorable opportunity for treating with the Hussites and reconciling them to the church. He himself had been lately in Bohemia on a legation from the holy see, and was more interested in this matter than in the affairs of the Greek church. This reason, however, made Eugenius still more desirous to transfer the council, as the affair of the Hussites had been once definitely settled at the council of Con- stance, and he did not wish it to be reopened. His legate, however, was determined if pos- sible to continue the council at Basel ; and when he had collected a sufficient number of prelates, the charge of provoking a schism de- terred the pope from pressing violently his own wishes. But on Dec. 11, 1431, the pope published a bull dissolving the council of Ba- sel. The cardinal legate obeyed, and declared that he could no longer act as president of the council. Nevertheless he exerted himself in the most energetic manner to induce the pope to revoke the bull, as did also the small number of prelates who were assembled. In these efforts they were supported by several sovereigns. After vainly endeavoring to effect an amicable transfer of the council, Eugenius IV. finally revoked his former bull, and on Feb. 14, 1433, published another, authorizing the continuance of the council at Basel. Mean- while, however, the prelates had not ceased to continue their sessions, and to style themselves an oecumenical council, although the approba- tion of the pope was withdrawn from them, and the cardinal legate had ceased to preside. In this they justified themselves by the act of the council of Constance declaring its suprem- acy over the pope (1415); an act, however, which canonists regard as only intended to apply to contending claimants of the papacy, and as not synodical because the council was only recognized at the time by a part of the church. During the period of the suspension of the council by Eugenius IV., the prelates, who after a time increased to the number of 80, framed several decrees, declaring the superiority of a general council to the pope, the want of power in the latter to dissolve or transfer it, citing Eugenius to appear within a certain time, &c. After the revocation of the bull of transfer, all these edicts were revoked by the council, and the legitimate ses- sions recommenced under the presidency of