BURGOYNE, SIR JOHN FOX, Bart. (1782-1871), British field marshal, was an illegitimate son of General John Burgoyne (q.v.). He was educated at Eton and Woolwich, obtained his commission in 1798, and served in 1800 in the Mediterranean. In 1805, when serving on the staff of General Fox in Sicily, he was promoted second captain. He accompanied the unfortunate Egyptian expedition of 1807, and was with Sir John Moore in Sweden in 1808 and in Portugal in 1808-9. In the Corunna campaign Burgoyne held the very responsible position of chief of engineers with the rear-guard of the British army (see Peninsular War). He was with Wellesley at the Douro in 1809, and was promoted captain in the same year, after which he was engaged in the construction of the lines of Torres Vedras in 1810. He blew up Fort Concepcion on the river Turones, and was present at Busaco and Torres Vedras. In 1811 he was employed in the unsuccessful siege of Badajoz, and in 1812 he won successively the brevets of major and lieutenant-colonel, for his skilful performance of engineer duties at the historic sieges of Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz. He was present in the same year (1812) at the siege and battle of Salamanca, and after the battle of Vittoria in 1813 he became commanding engineer on Lord Wellington's staff. At the close of the war he received the C.B., a reward which, he justly considered, was not commensurate with his services. In 1814-1815 he served at New Orleans and Mobile. Burgoyne was largely employed, during the long peace which followed Waterloo, in other public duties as well as military work. He sat on numerous commissions, and served for fifteen years as chairman of the Irish board of public works. He became a major-general and K.C.B. in 1838, and inspector-general of fortifications in 1845. In 1851 he was promoted lieutenant-general, and in the following year received the G.C.B. When the Crimean War broke out he accompanied Lord Raglan's headquarters to the East, superintended the disembarkation at Old Fort, and was in effect the principal engineer adviser to the English commander during the first part of the siege of Sevastopol. He was recalled early in 1855, and though he was at first bitterly criticized by the public for his part in the earlier and unsuccessful operations against the fortress the wisdom of his advice was ultimately recognized. In 1856 he was created a baronet, and promoted to the full rank of general. In 1858 he was present at the second funeral of Napoleon I. as Queen Victoria's representative, and in 1865 he was made constable of the Tower of London. Three years later, on resigning his post as inspector-general of fortifications, he was made a field marshal. Parliament granted him, at the same time, a pension of £1500. He died on the 7th of October 1871, a year after the tragic death of his only son, Captain Hugh Talbot Burgoyne, V.C. (1833-1870), who was in command of H.M.S. "Captain" when that vessel went down in the Bay of Biscay (September 7, 1870).
See Life and Correspondence of F.M. Sir John Fox Burgoyne (edited by Lt.-Col. Hon. G. Wrottesley, R.E., London, 1873); Sir Francis Head, A Sketch of the Life and Death of F.M. Sir John Burgoyne (London, 1872); Military Opinions of General Sir John Burgoyne (ed. Wrottesley, London, 1859), a collection of the most important of Burgoyne's contributions to military literature.
BURGRAVE, the Eng. form, derived through the Fr., of the Ger. Burggraf and Flem. burg or burch-graeve (med. Lat. burcgravius or burgicomes), i.e. count of a castle or fortified town. The title is equivalent to that of castellan (Lat. castellanus) or châtelain (q.v.). In Germany, owing to the peculiar conditions of the Empire, though the office of burgrave had become a sinecure by the end of the 13th century, the title, as borne by feudal nobles having the status of princes of the Empire, obtained a quasi-royal significance. It is still included among the subsidiary titles of several sovereign princes; and the king of Prussia, whose ancestors were burgraves of Nuremberg for over 200 years, is still styled burgrave of Nuremberg.
BURGRED, king of Mercia, succeeded to the throne in 852, and in 852 or 853 called upon Æthelwulf of Wessex to aid him in subduing the North Welsh. The request was granted and the campaign proved successful, the alliance being sealed by the marriage of Burgred to Æthelswith, daughter of Æthelwulf. In 868 the Mercian king appealed to Æthelred and Alfred for assistance against the Danes, who were in possession of Nottingham. The armies of Wessex and Mercia did no serious fighting, and the Danes were allowed to remain through the winter. In 874 the march of the Danes from Lindsey to Repton drove Burgred from his kingdom. He retired to Rome and died there.
See Saxon Chronicle (Earle and Plummer), years 852-853, 868, 874.
BURGUNDIO, sometimes erroneously styled Burgundius, an Italian jurist of the 12th century. He was a professor at the university of Paris, and assisted at the Lateran Council in 1179, dying at a very advanced age in 1194. He was a distinguished Greek scholar, and is believed on the authority of Odofredus to have translated into Latin, soon after the Pandects were brought to Bologna, the various Greek fragments which occur in them, with the exception of those in the 27th book, the translation of which has been attributed to Modestinus. The Latin translations ascribed to Burgundio were received at Bologna as an integral part of the text of the Pandects, and form part of that known as The Vulgate in distinction from the Florentine text.
BURGUNDY. The name of Burgundy (Fr. Bourgogne, Lat. Burgundia) has denoted very diverse political and geographical areas at different periods of history and as used by different writers. The name is derived from the Burgundians (Burgundi, Burgondiones), a people of Germanic origin, who at first settled between the Oder and the Vistula. In consequence of wars against the Alamanni, in which the latter had the advantage, the Burgundians, after having taken part in the great invasion of Radagaisus in 407, were obliged in 411 to take refuge in Gaul, under the leadership of their chief Gundicar. Under the title of allies of the Romans, they established themselves in certain cantons of the Sequani and of upper Germany, receiving a part of the lands, houses and serfs that belonged to the inhabitants. Thus was founded the first kingdom of Burgundy, the boundaries of which were widened at different times by Gundicar and his son
Gunderic; its chief towns being Vienne, Lyons, Besançon, Geneva, Autun and Mâcon. Gundibald (d. 516), grandson of Gunderic, is famous for his codification of the Burgundian law, known consequently as Lex Gundobada, in French Loi Gombette. His son Sigismund, who was canonized by the church, founded the abbey of St Maurice at Agaunum. But, incited thereto by Clotilda, the daughter of Chilperic (a brother of Gundibald, and assassinated by him), the Merovingian kings attacked Burgundy. An attempt made in 524 by Clodomer was unsuccessful; but in 534 Clotaire (Chlothachar) and his brothers possessed themselves of the lands of Gundimar, brother and successor of Sigismund, and divided them between them. In 561 the kingdom of Burgundy was reconstructed by Guntram, son of Clotaire I., and until 613 it formed a separate state under the government of a prince of the Merovingian family.
After 613 Burgundy was one of the provinces of the Frankish kingdom, but in the redistributions that followed the reign of Charlemagne the various parts of the ancient kingdom had different fortunes. In 843, by the treaty of Verdun, Autun, Chalon, Mâcon, Langres, &c., were apportioned to Charles the Bald, and Lyons with the country beyond the Saône to Lothair I. On the death of the latter the duchy of Lyons (Lyonnais and Viennois) was given to Charles of Provence, and the diocese of Besançon with the country beyond the Jura to Lothair, king of Lorraine. In 879 Boso founded the kingdom of Provence, wrongly called the kingdom of Cisjuran Burgundy, which extended to Lyons, and for a short time as far as Mâcon (see Provence).
In 888 the kingdom of Juran Burgundy was founded by Rudolph I., son of Conrad, count of Auxerre, and the German king Arnulf could not succeed in expelling the usurper, whose authority was recognized in the diocese of Besançon, Basel, Lausanne, Geneva and Sion. For a short time his son and successor Rudolph II. (912-937) disputed the crown of Italy with Hugh of Provence, but finally abandoned his claims in exchange for the ancient kingdom of Provence, i.e. the country bounded by the Rhône, the Alps and the Mediterranean. His successor, Conrad the Peaceful (93 7-993), whose sister Adelaide married Otto the Great, was hardly more than a vassal of the German kings. The last king of Burgundy, Rudolph III. (993-1032), being deprived of all but a shadow of power by the development of the secular and ecclesiastical aristocracy—especially by that of the powerful feudal houses of the counts of Burgundy (see Franche-Comté), Savoy and Provence—died without issue, bequeathing his lands to the emperor Conrad II. Such was the origin of the imperial rights over the kingdom designated after the 13th century as the kingdom of Arles, which extended over a part of what is now Switzerland (from the Jura to the Aar), and included Franche-Comté, Lyonnais, Dauphiné, Savoy and Provence.