they are now regulated by statute (the Prescription Act, 2 and 3 Will. IV. c. 71). which dispenses with the old requirement of use and enjoyment from time immemorial and calls for an existence of only twenty years to create the easement. See Easement; Light, Easement of; Prescription. Consult: Gale and Whatley, Treatise on the Law of Easements (London, 1896), and Goddard, Treatise on the Law of Easements (fifth edition, London, 1896).
ANCIENT MAR'INER, The. A poem by Coleridge, published (1798) in the Lyrical Ballads by himself and Wordsworth. It is founded on the sailor's superstition of the sinfulness of killing an albatross, and rehearses the sufferings consequently undergone.
ANCIENT OF DAYS. A designation of God in Daniel vii:9, 13, 22. It represents him as "the aged," "the advanced in days," possibly in contrast with the new divinities Antiochus Epiphanes had sought to introduce among the Jews. In the Ethiopic Enoch it is represented by the more idiomatic expression, "head of days" (xlvi:2).
ANCIENT OR'DER OF HIBER'NIANS. See Hibernians, Ancient Order of.
ANCIENTS, Council of. The upper House of the Legislative Assembly in France, under the Directory, from 179.5 to 1799. The chief function of the Ancients was the approval or rejection of measures submitted by the lower House, the Council of Five Hundred.
ANCILLON, jiN'se'yoN',
Johann Peter Friedrich (1767-1837). A Prussian statesman and historian. He was born in Berlin, a descendant of David Ancillon (1617-92), a French Protestant, who emigrated from Metz after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and who became pastor of the French congregation in Berlin. Intermediate members of the same family occupied the same pastorate or were in the service of the Prussian Government. Friedrich studied theology, philosophy, and history, and in 1792 was appointed teacher of history in the Berlin Military Academy, as well as preacher to the French congregation. The publication of his Tableau des révolutions du système politique de l'Europe depuis le 15me siècle (4 volumes. 1803-05) secured him the appointment as royal historiographer as well as tutor of the Crown Prince. In 1832 he became minister of foreign affairs, and occupied that place until his death. He was a man of conservative views and a defender of the monarchy.
ANCKARSTRÖM, an'kar-strem,
Johan Jacob (1762-92). The assassin of King Gustavus III. of Sweden. He was a page at court and later an ensign in the Life-Guards, but in 1783 retired from military service with the rank of captain. Of haughty temper, angered at the policy of repression pursued by the crown toward the nobility, hewas frequently brought to trial for incendiary speeches. In 1791, with Count Horn, Count Ribbing, Lieutenant-Colonel Liliehorn, and others, he formed a conspiracy for the murder of the King. Chosen by lot to accomplish the deed, at a ball held in the Stockholm opera-house, he approached the King and mortally wounded him with a shot from a pistol (March 16, 1792). He was condemned to death and executed at Stockholm.
ANCONA, an-ko'na (The name alludes to its situation at the bend of the sea-coast; Gk. aymv, ankOn, angle, corner). The capital of the province of Ancona, in central Italy, in the division called the Marches, 132 miles northeast of Rome, lat. 43° 37' N. and long. 13° 31' E. It is an episcopal city, and, next to Venice, the most important Italian port on the Adriatic (Map:
Italy H. 4). It is beautifully situated in the form of an amphitheatre between two promontories. The harbor has been greatly improved by the Government in recent years, and is now deep enough for large vessels. It is defended from naval attack by forts, and from the violence of
the sea by two moles. The ancient mole was built by Trajan, and on it stands a triumphal arch of Parian marble designed by Apollodorus. The modern mole with the light-house was built by Clement XII., and its triumphal arch was designed by Vanvitelli. The cathedral of St. Cyriac, built in the eleventh and twelfth centuries on the site of the temple of Venus mentioned by Catullus
and Juvenal, contains ten of its columns, with a
very ancient dodecagonal dome. The town hall
was built in the thirteenth century, restored in the
fifteenth, and partially modernized in 1647. The
houses are in general mean and the streets nar-
row. The museum contains many valuable antiq-
uities and some valuable paintings. The princi-
pal industries are sugar refining, shipbuilding,
and the manufacture of paper, sail cloth, and
silk. The exports are small; the imports are
salt fish, coffee, iron and steel, wheat, raw sugar,
and coal. Regular steamship communication is
maintained with the principal Mediterranean
ports. The United States maintains there a con-
sular agency. The vessels leaving the port de-
creased from 2192, with a tonnage of 842,000, in
1888, to 1183, with a tonnage of 664,000, in 1889.
Ancona is supposed to have been founded by Syracusans who had fled from the tyranny of Dionysius the Elder. It was destroyed by the Goths, rebuilt by Narses, and again destroyed by the Saracens in the tenth century. It afterward became a republic, and was later annexed to the States of the Church. In 1798 it was taken by the French, who in 1799 surrendered it to the Russians and Austrians after a long and gallant defense. In 1832, when the Roman frontiers were in the possession of the Austrians, a French squadron appeared before the harbor and landed 1500 men, who took possession of the town. It remained in their hands until 1838, when both French and Austrians retired from the Papal States. In 1849 a revolutionary garrison in Ancona capitulated after enduring a siege by the Austrians of twenty-five days. Pop., in 1881, 48,000: in 1901, 57,000.
ANCONA, Alessanoro d' (1835—). A distinguished Italian critic, journalist, and professor at the University of Pisa. He was born in Pisa. During the days preceding the war of Italian independence he was active in politics, but after the peace of Villafranca he retired from political life, and for awhile edited the leading Florentine journal, La Nazione. Since 1860 he has filled the chair of literature at the university in his native city. His literary activity began at the age of eighteen, when he published a life and critical edition of the works of the Dominican philosopher Tommaso Campanella. Among the many volumes which he has since produced, special mention should be made of I precursori di Dante (1874),
