Baldwin I known as Baldwin of Boulogne \bu-'lon-y9\ (b. 1058?—d. April 2, 1118, Al-Arish, Egypt) King of Jerusalem (1100-18). The son of a French count, he joined the First Crusade and created the first Crusader state when he gained control of Edessa (now in Turkey) in 1098. In 1100 his brother Godfrey died in Jerusalem, and Baldwin was summoned by the nobles to succeed him as king of the Crusader state and defender of the Holy Sepulchre. He expanded the kingdom by conquer¬ ing coastal cities such as Arsuf and Caesarea, built the important castle Krak de Montreal, and established an administration that served for 200 years as the basis for Frankish rule in Syria and Palestine.
Baldwin II known as Baldwin of Bourg \'biirk\ (d. August 1131, Jerusalem) King of Jerusalem (1118-31). A French nobleman, he joined the First Crusade and was made count of Edessa by his cousin Baldwin I in 1100. Captured by Seljuq Turks in 1104, he was ransomed four years later and reclaimed Edessa from the regent by force. He became king of Jerusalem in 1118 on the death of Baldwin I. He was held hostage by the Turks 1123-24. He later expanded his kingdom and attacked Damascus with the aid of the Knights of Malta and the Templars. He arranged the marriage of his daughter Melisend to Fulk V of Anjou and made them his successors.
Baldwin II Porphyrogenitus \,por-f3-ro-'jen-9t-9s\ (b. 1217, Constantinople—d. Oct. 1273, Foggia, Kingdom of Sicily) Fifth and last Latin emperor of Constantinople (1228-61). The son of the third Latin emperor (Porphyrogenitus means “born to the purple,” thus “of royal birth”), Baldwin inherited the throne on the death of his brother. Inva-
Bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus).
ALEXANDER SPRUNT, IV
Baldachin, St. Peter's, Vatican City, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1624-33
SCALA-ART RESOURCE/EB INC.
"Madonna and Child," oil on canvas by Alesso Baldovinetti, c. 1465; in the Louvre, Paris
GIRAUDON-ART RESOURCE/EB INC.
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Baldwin IV ► Balfour Declaration I 155
sions by Greeks and Bulgars reduced the empire to the area around Con¬ stantinople, and Baldwin’s empty treasury obliged him to travel twice to western Europe to ask for aid. He sold sacred relics to Louis IX of France and broke up parts of the imperial palace for firewood. He lost the throne in 1261 when Michael VIII Palaeologus captured Constantinople and restored Greek rule. Baldwin fled to Europe and later died in Sicily.
Baldwin IV known as Baldwin the Leper (b. 1161—d. March 1185, Jerusalem) King of Jerusalem (1174-85). He was crowned at age 13 on the death of his father, but the kingdom was ruled by a series of regents. Baldwin was afflicted with leprosy throughout his short life, which con¬ tributed to power struggles among the nobility. His defeat of Saladin in 1177 led to a two-year truce, but in 1183 Saladin captured Aleppo and completed the encirclement of Jerusalem. Baldwin crowned his nephew king in 1183.
Baldwin, James (Arthur) (b.
U.S.—d. Dec. 1, 1987, Saint-Paul,
France) U.S. essayist, novelist, and playwright. He grew up in poverty in the New York City district of Harlem and became a preacher while in his teens. After 1948 he lived alternately in France and the U.S. His semiau- tobiographical first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953), regarded as his finest, was followed by the essay collections Notes of a Native Son (1955) and Nobody Knows My Name (1961); the novels Giovanni’s Room (1956), a story of homosexual life, and Another Country (1962); the long polemical essay The Fire Next Time (1963), prophesying wide¬ spread racial violence; and the play Blues for Mister Charlie (produced 1964). His eloquence and passion on the subject of race made him for years perhaps the country’s most prominent black writer.
Baldwin, Robert (b. May 12, 1804, York, Upper Canada—d. Dec. 9, 1858, Toronto) Canadian politician. Called to the bar in 1825, Baldwin began his political career as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada for York (1829-30). In 1 842—43 he and Louis Hippolyte LaFontaine formed the first Liberal Party administration; when the Liber¬ als returned to power in 1848, they were able to establish responsible, or cabinet, government. He resigned in 1851.
Baldwin, Roger (Nash) (b. Jan. 21, 1884, Wellesley, Mass., U.S.—d. Aug. 26, 1981, Ridgewood, N.J.) U.S. civil-rights leader. Born into an aristocratic Massachusetts family, Baldwin attended Harvard University and taught sociology at Washington University (1906-09) in St. Louis, where he also was chief probation officer of the city’s juvenile court and secretary of its Civic League. When the U.S. entered World War I, he became director of the pacifist American Union Against Militarism, the predecessor of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). As the ACLU’s director (1920-50) and national chairman (1950-55), he made civil rights, once a predomi¬ nantly leftist cause, a universal one.
Baldwin (of Bewdley), Stan¬ ley Baldwin, 1st Earl (b. Aug.
3, 1867, Bewdley, Worcestershire,
Eng.—d. Dec. 14, 1947, Astley Hall, near Stourport-on-Severn, Worces¬ tershire) British politician. After managing his family’s large indus¬ trial holdings, he became a Conser¬ vative member of the House of Commons (1908-37). He served as financial secretary of the treasury
(1917-21) and president of the Board of Trade (1921-22), then was appointed prime minister (1923-24, 1924-29, 1935-37). He proclaimed a state of emergency in the general strike of 1926 and later secured pas¬ sage of the antiunion Trade Disputes Act. As prime minister after 1935, he began to strengthen the British military while showing little public concern about the aggressive policies of Germany and Italy. He was criti¬ cized for not protesting the Italian conquest of Ethiopia. In 1936 he sat¬ isfied public opinion by procuring the abdication of Edward VIII, whose desire to marry divorcee Wallis Simpson, Baldwin believed, threatened the prestige of the monarchy.
Balearic Vba-le-'ar-ik\ Islands Spanish Islas Baleares Archipelago (pop., 2001: 841,669), western Mediterranean Sea, constituting an autono¬ mous community and province of Spain. It occupies an area of 1,927 sq mi (4,992 sq km); its capital is Palma. The most important islands are Majorca, Minorca, Ibiza, Formentera, and Cabrera. Long inhabited, the islands were ruled by Carthage in the 6th century bc, by Rome from c. 120 bc, and by the Byzantine Empire from ad 534. Raided by the Arabs, the area was conquered in the 10th century by the Umayyad dynasty at Cordoba. It was reconquered by the Spanish and united with the kingdom of Aragon in 1349. After territorial challenges in the 18th century by the British, the islands came under Spanish rule in 1802. The present-day economy is fueled by tourism.
baleen whale \bo-'len, 'ba-,len\ Any of about 13 species of cetaceans in the suborder Mysticeti. They are distinguished by a specialized feed¬ ing structure, the baleen, which strains plankton and small crustaceans from the water. It consists of two horny plates attached to the roof of the mouth. Each plate (as long as 12 ft, or 3.6 m, in the right whale) is com¬ posed of parallel slats with fringes that mat together to form a sieve. Other baleen whales are the blue, fin, gray, humpback, and sei whales and the rorqual. Baleen was once used for corset stays and is still used in some industrial brushes.
Balenciaga \bal-en-'thyag-3\, Cristobal (b. Jan. 21, 1895, Guetaria, Spain—d. March 23, 1972, Valencia) Spanish-French fashion designer. He studied dressmaking as a child and was inspired to become a coutu¬ rier by a visit to Paris. By age 20 he had his own firm in San Sebastian. Over the next 15 years Balenciaga became the leading couturier of Spain. In 1937, when the Spanish Civil War disrupted his business, he moved to Paris. For the next 30 years his collections featured sumptuously elegant dresses and suits. Balenciaga helped popularize the trend toward capes and flowing clothes without waistlines in the late 1950s as well as the use of plastic for rainwear in the mid 1960s. He retired in 1968.