GAIRLOCH (Gaelic geàrr, short), a sea loch, village and parish in the west of the county of Ross and Cromarty, Scotland. Pop. of parish (1901) 3797. The parish covers a large district on the coast, and stretches inland beyond the farther banks of Loch Maree, the whole of which lies within its bounds. It also includes the islands of Dry and Horisdale in the loch, and Ewe in Loch Ewe, and occupies a total area of 200,646 acres. The place and loch must not be confounded with Gareloch in Dumbartonshire. Formerly an appanage of the earldom of Ross, Gairloch has belonged to the Mackenzies since the end of the 15th century. Flowerdale, an 18th-century house in the pretty little glen of the same name, lying close to the village, is the chief seat of the Gairloch branch of the clan Mackenzie. William Ross (1762-1790), the Gaelic poet, who was schoolmaster of Gairloch, of which his mother was a native, was buried in the old kirkyard, where a monument commemorates him.
GAISERIC, or Genseric (c. 390-477), king of the Vandals, was a son of King Godegisel (d. 406), and was born about 390. Though lame and only of moderate stature, he won renown as a warrior, and became king on the death of his brother Gonderic in 428. In 428 or 429 he led a great host of Vandals from Spain into Roman Africa, and took possession of Mauretania. This step is said to have been taken at the instigation of Boniface, the Roman general in Africa; if true, Boniface soon repented of his action, and was found resisting the Vandals and defending Hippo Regius against them. At the end of fourteen months Gaiseric raised the siege of Hippo; but Boniface was forced to fly to Italy, and the city afterwards fell into the hands of the Vandals. Having pillaged and conquered almost the whole of Roman Africa, the Vandal king concluded a treaty with the emperor Valentinian III. in 435, by which he was allowed to retain his conquests; this peace, however, did not last long, and in October 439 he captured Carthage, which he made the capital of his kingdom. According to some authorities Gaiseric at this time first actually assumed the title of king. In religious matters he was an Arian, and persecuted the members of the orthodox church in Africa, although his religious policy varied with his relations to the Roman empire. Turning his attention in another direction he built a fleet, and the ravages of the Vandals soon made them known and feared along the shores of the Mediterranean. “Let us make,” said Gaiseric, “for the dwellings of the men with whom God is angry,” and he left the conduct of his marauding ships to wind and wave. In 455, however, he led an expedition to Rome, stormed the city, which for fourteen days his troops were permitted to plunder, and then returned to Africa laden with spoil. He also carried with him many captives, including the empress Eudoxia, who is said to have invited the Vandals into Italy. The Romans made two attempts to avenge themselves, one by the Western emperor, Majorianus, in 460, and the other by the Eastern emperor, Leo I., eight years later; but both enterprises failed, owing principally to the genius of Gaiseric. Continuing his course on the sea the king brought Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica and the Balearic Islands under his rule, and even extended his conquests into Thrace, Egypt and Asia Minor. Having made peace with the eastern emperor Zeno in 476, he died on the 25th of January 477. Gaiseric was a cruel and cunning man, possessing great military talents and superior mental gifts. Though the effect of his victories was afterwards neutralized by the successes of Belisarius, his name long remained the glory of the Vandals. The name Gaiseric is said to be derived from gais, a javelin, and reiks, a king.
See [Vandals]; also T. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, vol. ii. (London, 1892); E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (ed. J.B. Bury, 1896-1900); L. Schmidt, Geschichte der Vandalen (Leipzig, 1901); and F. Martroye, Genseric; La Conquête vandale en Afrique (Paris, 1907).
GAISFORD, THOMAS (1779-1855), English classical scholar, was born at Iford, Wiltshire, on the 22nd of December 1779. Proceeding to Oxford in 1797, he became successively student and tutor of Christ Church, and was in 1811 appointed regius professor of Greek in the university. Taking orders, he held (1815-1847) the college living of Westwell, in Oxfordshire, and other ecclesiastical preferments simultaneously with his professorship. From 1831 until his death on the 2nd of June 1855, he was dean of Christ Church. As curator of the Bodleian and principal delegate of the University Press he was instrumental in securing the co-operation of distinguished European scholars as collators, notably Bekker and Dindorf. Among his numerous contributions to Greek literature may be mentioned, Hephaestion’s Encheiridion (1810); Poëtae Graeci minores (1814-1820); Stobaeus’ Florilegium (1822); Herodotus, with variorum notes (1824); Suidas’ Lexicon (1834); Etymologicon magnum (1848); Eusebius’s Praeparatio (1843) and Demonstratio evangelica (1852). In 1856 the Gaisford prizes, for Greek composition, were founded at Oxford to perpetuate his memory.
GAIUS, a celebrated Roman jurist. Of his personal history very little is known. It is impossible to discover even his full name, Gaius or Caius being merely the personal name (praenomen) so common in Rome. From internal evidence in his works it may be gathered that he flourished in the reigns of the emperors Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Commodus. His works were thus composed between the years 130 and 180, at the time when the Roman empire was most prosperous, and its government the best. Most probably Gaius lived in some provincial town, and hence we find no contemporary notices of his life or works. After his death, however, his writings were recognized as of great authority, and the emperor Valentinian named him, along with Papinian, Ulpian, Modestinus and Paulus, as one of the five jurists whose opinions were to be followed by judicial officers in deciding cases. The works of these jurists accordingly became most important sources of Roman law.
Besides the Institutes, which are a complete exposition of the elements of Roman law, Gaius was the author of a treatise on the Edicts of the Magistrates, of Commentaries on the Twelve Tables, and on the important Lex Papia Poppaea, and several other works. His interest in the antiquities of Roman law is apparent, and for this reason his work is most valuable to the historian of early institutions. In the disputes between the two schools of Roman jurists he generally attached himself to that of the Sabinians, who were said to be followers of Ateius Capito, of whose life we have some account in the Annals of Tacitus, and to advocate a strict adherence as far as possible to ancient rules, and to resist innovation. Many quotations from the works of Gaius occur in the Digest of Justinian, and so acquired a permanent place in the system of Roman law; while a comparison of the Institutes of Justinian with those of Gaius shows that the whole method and arrangement of the later work were copied from that of the earlier, and very numerous passages are word for word the same. Probably, for the greater part of the period of three centuries which elapsed between Gaius and Justinian, the Institutes of the former had been the familiar textbook of all students of Roman law.