Babeuf \ba-'b3f\, Francois- Noel (b. Nov. 23, 1760, Saint- Quentin, France—d. May 27, 1797,
Vendome) French political journalist and agitator. During the era of the French Revolution he advocated an equal distribution of land and income. For his part in a conspiracy to overthrow the Directory and insti¬ tute a return to the Constitution of 1793, he was guillotined. His tacti¬ cal strategies provided a model for left-wing movements of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Babington, Anthony (b. Octo¬ ber 1561, Dethick, Derbyshire,
Eng.—d. Sept. 20, 1586, London)
English conspirator. Raised secretly as a Catholic, Babington was joined by the priest John Ballard in the
unsuccessful “Babington Plot” to assassinate Queen Elizabeth I and install her prisoner, Mary, Queen of Scots, on the English throne. The conspiracy included many Roman Catholics, and Philip II of Spain promised to provide immediate assistance after the assassination. Babington was imprisoned and executed after the interception of an exchange of letters with Mary explaining his plans. The letters were also used as evidence supporting the execution of Mary the following year.
Babism Vbab-.iz-omX Religion that developed in Iran around Mlrza 'All Muhammad’s claim (1844) to be the Bab. Its beliefs are set forth in the Bay an, a holy book written by the Bab, which proclaims a universal law in place of all existing religious legal codes. Babism originated as a messianic movement in Shi'ite Islam. In 1867 the movement split, with the AzalTs remaining faithful to the original teachings of the Bab and those of his suc¬ cessor Sobh-e Azal. Most Babis accepted the leadership of Sobh-e Azal’s half-brother Baha 5 Ullah, and under him the BahaI faith was developed.
baboon Any of five species of robust monkeys (genus Papio) of Arabia and sub-Saharan Africa. Baboons have a large head, cheek pouches, and a long, doglike muzzle. They walk on all fours, carrying the tail in a characteristic arch. They weigh 30-90 lbs (14-40 kg) and are about 20^15 in. (50-115 cm) long, exclud¬ ing the tail (18-28 in., or 45-70 cm, long). Found mainly in drier savanna and rocky areas, they feed on a vari¬ ety of plants and animals. Highly social and intelligent, they travel in large noisy troops, communicating by calls. They may destroy crops, and their enormous canine teeth and powerful limbs make them danger¬ ous opponents.
Babur Vba-borV orig. Zahlr al-DTn Muhammad (b. Feb. 15, 1483, principality of Fergana—d. Dec. 26, 1530, Agra, India) Emperor (1526— 30) and founder of the Mughal dynasty of India. A descendant of Genghis Khan and Timur, he came from a tribe of Mongol origin but was Turkish in language and upbringing. In his youth he tried for 10 years (1494- 1504) to gain control of Samarkand, Timur’s old capital. Those efforts ended in his losing his own principality in Fergana (modem Uzbekistan), but he consoled himself by seizing and holding Kabul (1504). After four failed attempts, he successfully occupied Delhi (1525). Surrounded by enemy states, Babur (the name means “Tiger”) persuaded his homesick troops to stand their ground, and over the next four years he defeated his foes. His grandson Akbar consolidated the new empire. Babur was also a gifted poet and a lover of nature who constructed gardens wherever he went. The Babur-ndmeh, his prose memoirs, has become a world classic of autobiography.
Babuyan \,ba-bu-'yan\ Islands Island group, northern Philippines. Lying north of Luzon, it consists of about 24 islands with a total area of 225 sq mi (583 sq km). The chief islands are Babuyan, Camiguin, Calayan, Fuga, and Dalupiri. Calayan is the largest town and only port.
baby boom In the U.S., increase in the birth rate between 1946 and 1964; also, the generation born in the U.S. during that period. The hard¬ ships and uncertainties of the Great Depression and World War II led many unmarried couples to delay marriage and many married couples to delay having children. The war’s end, followed by a sustained period of eco¬ nomic prosperity (the 1950s and early 1960s), was accompanied by a surge in population. The sheer size of the baby-boom generation (some 75 million) magnified its impact on society: the growth of families led to a migration from cities to suburbs in the postwar years, prompting a building boom in housing, schools, and shopping malls. As the “boomers” reached young adulthood in the 1960s and ’70s, their tastes in music and their hair and dress styles strongly influenced the national culture, and the political activism of some contributed to the unpopularity of the Vietnam War. As they aged and prospered in the 1980s and ’90s, their buying hab¬ its determined the course of many consumer industries, including auto¬ mobiles. The needs of baby boomers during their retirement years were expected to strain public resources.
Baby Yar \,ba-be-'yar\ Large ravine near Kiev, Ukraine, the site of a mass grave of some 100,000 people killed by German Nazi SS squads between 1941 and 1943. Most of the victims were Jews, but some were
Babeuf, engraving by an unknown art¬ ist, 18th century
COURTESY OF THE BIBUOTHEQUE NATIONALE, PARIS
Anubis, or olive, baboon (Papio anubis).
NORMAN MYERS/PHOTO RESEARCHERS
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Babylon ► Bach I 145
communist officials and Russian prisoners of war. After the initial mas¬ sacre of Jews, Baby Yar remained in use as an execution site for Soviet prisoners of war and for Roma (Gypsies) as well as for Jews. It became the symbol of the first stage of killing during the Holocaust and of the massacres by the Einsatzgruppen (German: “deployment groups”)—the mobile killing units. The site came to world attention after the 1961 pub¬ lication of Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poem Baby Yar. Though a small obelisk and memorial were erected in the 1960s and ’70s, not until 1991 was the identity of the Jewish victims recorded on the monument by the newly independent Ukrainian government.
Babylon Ancient Middle Eastern city. The city’s ruins are located about 55 mi (89 km) south of Baghdad, near the modern city of Al-Hillah, Iraq. Babylon was one of the most famous cities in antiquity. Probably first settled in the 3rd millennium bc, it came under the rule of the Amorite kings around 2000 bc. It became the capital of Babylonia and was the chief commercial city of the Tigris and Euphrates river system. Destroyed by Sennacherib in 689 bc, it was later rebuilt. It attained its greatest glory as capital of the Neo-Babylonian empire under Nebuchadrezzar II (r. 605-c. 561 bc). Alexander the Great, who took the city in 331 bc, died there. Evi¬ dence of its topography comes from excavations, cuneiform texts, and descriptions by the Greek historian Herodotus. Most of the ruins are from the city built by Nebuchadrezzar. The largest city in the world at the time, it contained many temples, including the great temple of Marduk with its associated ziggurat, which was apparently the basis for the story of the Tower of Babel. The Hanging Gardens, a simulated hill of vegetation-clad terracing, was one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
Babylonia Ancient cultural region of the Tigris and Euphrates river sys¬ tem. The area was divided into Sumer (southeast) and Akkad (northwest) when the first Babylonian line of Amorite kings took power after 2000 bc. Largely because of the efforts of Hammurabi (r. c. 1792-50 bc), Baby¬ lonia gained regional hegemony but declined after his death; the Kassites from the east eventually assumed power (c. 1595) and established a dynasty that lasted some four centuries. After Elam conquered Babylonia (c. 1157 bc), a series of wars established a new Babylonian dynasty whose outstanding member was Nebuchadrezzar I (r. c. 1124-1103 bc). Follow¬ ing his rule, a three-way struggle developed for control of Babylonia among Assyria, Aram (see Aramaeans), and Chaldea, in which the Assyr¬ ians ruled the area most frequently (9th-7th century bc). In the 7th-6th centuries bc the Chaldean Nebuchadrezzar II (605-562 bc) instituted the last and greatest period of Babylonian supremacy, conquering Syria and Palestine and rebuilding Babylon, the capital city. It was conquered in 539 bc by the Persian Achaemenian dynasty under Cyrus II and in 331 bc by Alexander the Great, after which the capital city was gradually abandoned.