Arcadia
Arcadia names 4 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Arcadia a pastoral romance in prose and verse by Sir Philip Sidney
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a pastoral romance in prose and verse by Sir Philip Sidney. Tragic images, shipwrecks, attacks by pirates, fights, and abductions, are interwoven with scenes of piping shepherds, gaily dressed ladies in daisy-studded fields, masquerading princes, and songs and dances innumerable. Sidney himself said of it, "It is a trifle, my young head must be delivered." See Sidney; Sir Philip Live ever, sweete booke; the simple image of his gentle witt, and the golden pillar of his noble courage; and ever notify unto the world that thy writer was the secretary of eloquence, the breath of the muses, the honeybee of the daintyest flowers of witt and arte, the pith of morall and intellectual virtues, the arme of Belonna in the field, the tongue of Suada in the chamber, the sprite of Practise in esse, and the paragon of excellency in print.--Harvey's Pierce's Supererogation. Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, the immortality of which was so fondly predicted by his admirers, and which, in truth, is full of noble thoughts, delicate images, and graceful turns of language, is now scarcely ever mentioned.--Irving, The Sketch Book. FROM THE ARCADIA. They are termed shepherds,--a happy people wanting little because they desire not much. Provision is the foundation of hospitality, and thrift the jewell of magnificence. His word was ever led by his thought and followed by his deed. Who only sees the ill is worse than blind.
Arcadia ar-ka'di-a, a district of ancient Greece
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
ar-ka'di-a, a district of ancient Greece. It was situated in the heart of the Peloponnesus, and entirely surrounded by mountains. Arcadia was proverbial for the contentment and simple happiness of its people. The name, Arcadia, has come to be used figuratively for any scene of rural simplicity and peace. Arcadia in modern geography is a nomarchy, or county, of Greece. Arcady is an obsolete form of Arcadia, often used in poetry. The later Roman poets were wont to speak of Arcadia as a smiling land, where grassy vales, watered by gentle and pellucid streams, were inhabited by a race of primitive and picturesque shepherds and shepherdesses, who divided their time between tending their flocks and making love to one another in the most tender and romantic fashion. This idyllic conception of the country and the people is not to be traced in the old Hellenic poets, who were better acquainted with the actual facts of the case. The Arcadians were sufficiently primitive, but there was very little that was graceful or picturesque about their land or their lives.--C. H. Hanson, The Land of Greece. The history of the rise in modern literature of an ideal Arcadia--the home of piping shepherds and coy shepherdesses, where rustic simplicity and plenty satisfied the ambition of untutored hearts, and where ambition and its crimes were unknown--is a very curious one.--Mahaffy.
Arcadia the classical name of middle Peloponnesus
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the classical name of middle Peloponnesus, now forming the modern province of Arkadia, in the Morea, Greece. It occupies a high tableland having on the N., Achaia, E., Argolis, W., Elis, and, on the S., Laconia and Messenia. Area 1,600 square miles. It is intersected by mountain ranges, some of which are very lofty, and contains plains of some extent. Its principal river is the Roufia (Alpheus), the largest in the Morea. Lake Stymphalus, of classic mention, is found here. The inhabitants still retain their primitive mode of life as shepherds, pursuing a migratory existence. Chief towns, Tripolitza, Londari, Karitena, etc. Many interesting ruins are seen here, among them the remains of the cities of Phigaleia, Megalopolis, and Pallantium. Pop. about 175,000. From its first inhabitants, the Pelasgi, the land derived the name Pelasgia. In later times it was divided among the 50 sons of Lycaon into kingdoms, and received from Arcas the name Arcadia. In the course of time the small kingdoms made themselves free, and formed a confederacy. The principal were Mantinea, where Epaminondas obtained a victory and a tomb (now the village of Mondi), Tega (now Tripolitza), Orchomenus, Phenus, Psophis, and Megalopolis. Their chief deity was Pan; their chief business, the breeding of cattle and agriculture. This occasioned the pastoral poets to select Arcadia for the theater of their fables.
Arcadia A district of Peloponnesus
1000 Classical Characters (1900)
A district of Peloponnesus , which has been much extolled by the poets. It was famous for its mountains. The inhabitants were for the most part shepherds, who lived upon acorns. They were skillful warriors and able musicians. Pan lived chiefly among them.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's counted "about 175,000" people in Arkadia in 1921 and said the inhabitants "still retain their primitive mode of life as shepherds"; a century of emigration to Athens and abroad has cut the population of the modern regional unit to well under 100,000, and the seasonal droving of flocks has largely ended. Tripolitza is now plain Tripoli, the provincial capital, while Megalopolis — a ruin to Collier's — became the site of Greece's big lignite mines and power stations, now being wound down as the country quits coal. The temple of Apollo at Bassae, near the Phigaleia ruins mentioned in 1921, was made a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1986 and has since stood sheltered under a vast tent. On Sidney's romance, Washington Irving's remark that it is "now scarcely ever mentioned" no longer holds: the recovery of a manuscript of the earlier, complete "Old Arcadia" in 1907 gave scholars two distinct versions to edit and teach.
Written for this edition, 2026.