MS. the names Setinus Balbus are appended, whence it is probable that he was born at Setia in Campania. The sole notice of him found in classical authors is a short sentence of Quintilian (Inst., x. 1, 90), "Multum in Valerio Flacco nuper amisimus," whence we gather that he must have died before 90 A.D., though it does not follow, as is commonly stated, that he was cut off by an untimely death. If we turn for information to his only known work, the Argonautica, we learn from the dedication, which is addressed to Vespasian, that it was written during the siege or shortly after the fall of Jerusalem, 70 A.D. The Argonautica is an epic on the quest of the golden fleece. The poem is unfinished, the eighth book terminating abruptly with the request of Medea to accompany Jason on his homeward voyage. It is a free imitation and in parts a translation of the work of Apollonius of Rhodes, which had already been made familiar to the Romans by the popular version of Varro Atacinus. Various estimates have been formed of the genius of Flaccus, and some competent critics, such as Scaliger, Heinsius, and Weichart, have ranked him above his original. His diction is pure, his style correct, his versification smooth though monotonous, and he has some descriptive power, as is shown in the storm of the eighth book, and the picture of the dragon lulled to sleep by Medea's charms. On the other hand, he is wholly with out originality, and his poetry reads as if made to order. It is free from glaring defects, but is rendered all but worthless by its monotony, artificiality, and elaborate dulness. He deserves, no less than Silius Italicus, to be called the ape of Virgil. One instance will suffice to show how he has vulgarized the great poet. The desertion of Hypsipyle by Jason in the second book is closely modelled on the desertion of Dido by Æneas, but instead of "Si quis mihi parvulus aula luderet Æneas," we have "Per hunc utero quem linquis Iasona nostro"; instead of "Quem sese ore gerens," &c., "Tales humeros ea terga relinquit." The corruptions of the text, and the obscurity of the mythological and geographical allusions, have attracted commentators and critics, but few except professed scholars will care to read a second-rate copy of a second-rate poet.

Bibliography.-The Argonautica was unknown till the first three books and half of the fourth were discovered by Poggio at St Gall when attending the council of Constance. The editio princeps was published at Bologna, 1474, from the Vatican MS. 3277. Among other editions we may mention Burmann's Variorum, Leyden, 1724; J. A. Wagner's, Göttingen, 1805; G. Thilo's, Halle, 1863 (the first careful collation of the Vatican MS.); C. Schenkl's, Berlin, 1871; and the 8th book annotated by A. Weichert, Meissen, 1817. There are translations into French prose by J. J. A. Caussin de Perceval in the Bibliothèque Latine-Française; into French verse by Dureau de la Malle, Paris, 1811; and into Spanish verse by D. J. de Leon Bendicho y Quilty, Madrid, 1868; into Italian by Pindemonte, Verona, 1776; into German by Wunderlich, Erfurt, 1805. Warton speaks doubtfully of an English version: "We seem to have had a version of Valerius Flaccus in 1565; for in that year, I know not if in verse or prose, was entered to Purfoote 'The story of Jason, how he gotte the golden flece, and how he did begyle Media, out of Latin into Englische, by Nycholas Whyte.' The book is not recorded by Watt, nor is it in the British Museum. FLACIUS (in German VLACICH), MATTHIAS, surnamed Illyricus (1520-1575), a celebrated German theologian of the time of the Reformation, was born at Albona in Illyria in 1520. Having lost his father in early childhood, he owed his education almost wholly to his own unaided perseverance. At the age of seventeen he had resolved to enter a convent in order to devote his life to sacred learning; but on the advice of one of his relations, who had imbibed Reformation principles, he abandoned his intention, and pursued his studies successively at Basel, Tübingen, and Wittenberg. At Wittenberg he fell for a time into religious despondency, and sought the advice of Martin Luther, who was successful not only in removing his doubts, but in inspiring him with much of his own Refor

mation zeal. In 1544 he became professor of Old Testament literature at Wittenberg, and soon began to take an active and prominent part in the theological discussions of the time. He strenuously opposed the Augsburg Interim and also the compromise of Melanchthon, known as the Leipsic Interim, and was compelled on that account to resign his professorship. From Wittenberg he proceeded to Magdeburg, and in 1557 he was appointed professor of theology at Jena, but soon became involved in a controversy with his colleague Strigel on the power of the human will in conversion. Being a strong upholder of the doctrine of man's natural inability, he was induced by controversial straits to fall unwittingly into the Manichæan heresy of affirming that original sin was not an accident in human nature, but now belonged to its substance; and as he would not submit to ecclesiastical censure, he was compelled in 1562 to resign his office. After staying for five years in retirement at Ratisbon, he accepted the charge of a congregation in Antwerp, but was soon compelled by religious persecution to leave that city for Strasburg. Here his views regarding original sin again exposed him to ecclesiastical censure, and he went to Frankfort-on-the-Maine, in the hospital of which city he died in 1575, having spent the latter years of his life in great poverty. Though the keen and uncompromising controversial spirit of Flacius ultimately deprived him of the sympathy of almost all his friends, he is better known to posterity for his labours in hermeneutics and church history than as a controversialist. He may almost be called the founder of the science of hermeneutics, and in the department of church history he rendered important service by tracing to their source the legends and superstitious traditions by which, in the annals of the church, truth had in a great measure been either concealed or superseded. Among his numerous works may be mentioned his Clavis Scripturæ Sacræ, and the Catalogus Testium Veritatis, which he contributed to the Magdeburg Centuries.

See Ritter, Flacius's Leben und Tod, Frankfort, 1725; Twesten, Matth. Flacius Illyricus, Berlin, 1844; Preger, Matth. Flacius Illyricus und seine Zeit, 2 vols. Erlangen, 1859-61; and Mattia Flacio Istriano di Albone, notizie e documenti, Pola, 1869.

FLACOURT, ÉTIENNE DE (1607-1660), a French When he was named governor of Madagascar by the East governor of Madagascar, was born at Orleans in 1607. India Company in 1648, the French troops had mutinied against the former governor, and a large number of them had also been massacred by the natives. Flacourt soon restored order among the soldiers, but in his dealings with the natives he was less successful, and their intrigues and attacks kept him in continual harassment during all his term of office. As he was in uncertainty regarding the affairs of the company, he returned in 1655 to France. Not long after he was appointed director general of the company; but, having again returned to Madagascar, he was drowned on his voyage home, 10th June 1660. Several unknown districts of Madagascar and some small islands in its neighbourhood were explored by the orders of Flacourt, and he also in 1649 took possession of the island of Mascareigne, which he named Bourbon. He is the author of a Histoire de la grande isle Madagascar (1st edition 1658, 2d edition 1661), which is divided into two parts,-the first containing an account of the island, its inhabitants, and its natural history, and the second detailing the history of the events connected with its occupation by the French. Of this work the only portion of much value is the natural history section, which gives evidence of a considerable amount of minute and careful observation. He published also in 1658 a dictionary of the language of the island, which, however, is very incomplete and full of mistakes.

FLAG. It is probable that almost as soon as men began to collect together for common purposes some kind of conspicuous object was used, as the symbol of the common sentiment, as the rallying point of the common force. In military expeditions where any degree of organization and discipline prevailed, objects of such a kind would be necessary to mark out the lines and stations of encampment, and to keep in order the different bands when marching or in battle. And, in addition to all this, it cannot be doubted that flags or their equivalents have often served, by reminding men of past resolves, past deeds, past heroes, to rally to enthusiasm those sentiments of esprit de corps, of family pride and honour, of personal devotion, patriotism, or religion, upon which, as well as upon good leadership, discipline, and numerical force, success in warfare depends.

Among the remains of that people which has left the earliest traces of civilization, the records of the forms of objects used as ensigns are frequently to be found. From their carvings and paintings, supplemented by ancient writers, it appears that the several companies of the Egyptian army had their own particular standards. These were formed of such objects as there is reason to believe were associated in the minds of the men with feelings of awe and devotion. Sacred animals, boats, emblems, or figures, a tablet bearing a king's name, fan and feathershaped symbols, were raised on the end of a staff as standards, and the office of bearing them was looked upon as one of peculiar privilege and honour (fig. 1). Some

FIG. 1.-Egyptian Standards.

what similar seem to have been the customs of the Assyrians and Jews. Among the sculptures unearthed by Layard and others at Nineveh, only two different designs have been noticed for standards; one is of a figure drawing a bow and standing on a running bull, the other of two bulls running in opposite directions (fig. 2). These, says Layard, Mr Birch supposes may resemble the emblems of war and peace which were attached to the yoke of Darius's chariot. They are borne upon and attached to chariots, which method of bearing these objects was the custom also of the Persians, and prevailed during the Middle Ages. No representations of Egyptian or Assyrian naval standards have been found, but the sails of ships were embroidered and ornamented with devices, which was also a custom during the Middle Ages. In both Egyptian and Assyrian examples, the staff bearing the emblem is frequently ornamented immediately below with flag-like streamers. Rabbinical writers have assigned the different devices of the different Jewish tribes, but the authenticity

FIG. 2.-Assyrian Standards. ii. 2). "Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?" (Cant. vi. 10). See also Num. ii. 10, x. 14; Ps. xx. 5, lx. 4; Cant. ii. 4; Is. v. 26, x. 18, lix. 19; Jer. iv. 21.

The Persians bore an eagle fixed to the end of a lance, and also represented the sun, as their divinity, upon their standards, which appear to have been formed of some kind of textile, and were guarded with the greatest jealousy by the bravest men of the army. The Carian soldier who slew Cyrus, the brother of Artaxerxes, was allowed the honour of carrying a golden cock at the head of the army, it being the custom of the Carians to wear that bird as a crest on their helmets. The North American Indians carried poles fledged with feathers from the wings of eagles, and similar customs seem to have prevailed among other semi-savage peoples.

The Greeks bore a piece of armour on a spear in early times; afterwards the several cities bore sacred emblems or letters chosen for their particular associations,-the Athenians the olive and. the owl, the Corinthians a pegasus, the Thebans a sphinx, in memory of Edipus, the Messenians their initial M, and the Lacedæmonians. A. A purple dress was placed on the end of a spear as the signal to advance. The Dacians carried a standard representing a contorted serpent, while the dragon was the military sign of many peoples,-of the Chinese, Dacians, and Parthians among others, and was probably first used by the Romans as the ensign of barbarian auxiliaries (see fig. 3).

The question of the signa militaria of the Romans is a wide and very important one, having direct bearing on the history of heraldry, and on the origin of national, family, and personal devices. With them the custom was reduced to system. "Each century, or at least each maniple," says Meyrick, "had its proper standard and standard-bearers." In the early days of the republic a handful of hay was borne on a pole, whence probably came the name manipulus. The forms of standards in later times were very various; sometimes a cross piece of wood was placed at the end of a spear and surmounted by the

figure of a hand in silver, below round or oval discs, with figures of Mars or Minerva, or in later times portraits of emperors or eminent generals (fig. 3). Figures of animals, as the wolf, horse, bear, and others, were borne, and it was not until after the time of Marius that the eagle became the special standard of the legion; the vexillum was a square piece of cloth fastened to a piece of wood fixed crosswise to the end of a spear, somewhat resembling the medieval gonfalon. The labarum of later emperors was similar in shape and fixing, and after Constantine bore the monogram of Christ (fig. 5, A). The Roman standards were guarded with religious veneration in the temples at Rome; and the reverence of this people for their ensigns was in proportion to their superiority to other nations in all that tends to success in war. It was not unusual for a general to order a standard to be cast into the ranks of the enemy, to add zeal to the onset of his soldiers by exciting them to recover what to them was perbaps the most sacred thing the earth possessed. The Roman soldier swore by his ensign.

Although in earlier times drapery was occasionally used for standards, and was often appended as ornament to those of other material, it was probably not until the Middle Ages that it became the special material of military and other

shields of the several bearers. The dragon standard which he is known to have borne is placed near Harold; but similar figures appear on the shields of Norman warriors, which fact has induced a writer in the Journal of the Archæological Association (vol. xiii. p. 113) to suppose

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ensigns; and perhaps not until the practice of heraldry had attained to definite nomenclature and laws does anything appear which is in the modern sense a flag.

The Bayeux tapestry, commemorating the Norman conquest of England, contains abundant representations of the flags of the period borne upon the lances of the knights of William's army. They appear small in size, and pointed, frequently indented into three points, and bearing pales, crosses, and roundels. One, a Saxon pennon, is triangular, and roundly indented into four points; one banner is of segmental shape and rayed, and bears the figure of a bird which has been supposed to represent the raven of the warflag of the Scandinavian vikings (fig. 4). These flags and their charges are probably not really significant of the people bearing them; for even admitting that personal devices were used at the time, the figures may have been placed without studied intention, and so give the general figure only of such flags as happened to have come under the observation of the artists. The figures are probably rather ornamental and symbolic than strictly heraldic, that is, personal devices, for the same insignia do not appear on the

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FIG 4.-Pennons and Standards from the Bayeux Tapestry. that, on the spears of the Saxons, they represent only trophies torn from the shields of the Normans, and that they are not ensigns at all. Standards in form much resembling these dragons appear on the arch of Titus and the Trajan column as the standards of barbarians.

At the battle of the Standard in 1138, the English standard was formed of the mast of a ship, having a silver pyx at the top, and bearing three sacred banners, dedicated severally to St Peter, St John of Beverley, and St Wilfred of Ripon, the whole being fastened to a wheeled vehicle. Representations of three-pointed, cross-bearing pennons are found on seals of as early date as the Norman era, and the warriors in the first crusade bore three-pointed pennons. It is possible that the three points with the three roundels and cross, which so often appear on these banners, have some reference to the faith of the bearers in the Trinity and in the crucifixion, for in contemporary representations of Christ's resurrection and descent into hell he bears a threepointed banner with cross above. The triple indentation so common on the flags of this period has been supposed to be the origin of one of the honourable ordinaries-the pile.

The powerful aid of religion seems ever to have been sought to give sanctity to national flags, and the origin of many can be traced to a sacred banner, as is notably the case with the oriflamme of France. The banner of William the Conqueror was sent to him by the pope, and the early English kings fought under the banners of Edward the Confessor and of St Edmund; while the clumsily blended crosses of St George, St Andrew, and St Patrick still form the national ensign of the three united kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, whose patron saints they severally were. More secular characters were, however, not uncommon. In 1244 Henry III. gave order for a "dragon to be made in fashion of a standard, of red silk sparkling all over with fine gold, the tongue of which should be made to resemble burning fire and appear to be continually moving, and the eyes of sapphires or other suitable stones." The Siege of Carlaverock, an Anglo-Norman poem of the 14th century, describes the heraldic bearings on the banners of