Shakespeare,
Macbeth
, act i. sc. 3 (1606).
(Historically no such person as Banquo ever existed, and therefore Fleance was not the ancestor of the house of Stuart.)
Ban´shee, a tutelary female spirit. Every chief family of Ireland has its banshee, who is supposed to give it warning of approaching death or danger.
Bantam (Angela Cyrus), grand-master of the ceremonies at "Ba-ath," and a very mighty personage in the opinion of the élite of Bath.—C. Dickens, The Pickwick Papers (1836).
Bap, a contraction of Bap'liomet, i.e. Mahomet. An imaginary idol or symbol which the Templars were accused of employing in their mysterious religious rites. It was a small human figure cut in stone, with two heads, one male and the other female, but all the rest of the figure was female. Specimens still exist.
Bap'tes (2 syl.), priests of the goddess Cotytto, whose midnight orgies were so obscene as to disgust even the very goddess of obscenity. (Greek, bapto, "to baptize," because these priests bathed themselves in the most effeminate manner.)
Baptis'ta, a rich gentleman of Padua, father of Kathari'na "the shrew," and Bianca.—Shakespeare, Taming of the Shrew (1594).
Baptisti Damiotti, a Paduan quack, who shows in the enchanted mirror a picture representing the clandestine marriage and infidelity of sir Philip Forester.—Sir W. Scott, Aunt Margaret's Mirror (time, William III.).