Ascle´pias, or Swallow-wort, a genus of plants, the type and the largest genus of the nat. ord. Asclepiadaceæ. Most of the species are North American herbs, having opposite, alternate, or verticillate leaves. Many of them possess powerful medicinal qualities. A. decumbens is diaphoretic and sudorific, and has the singular property of exciting general perspiration without increasing in any sensible degree the heat of the body; A. curassavica is emetic, and its roots are frequently sent to England as ipecacuanha; the roots of A. tuberōsa are famed for diaphoretic properties. Many other species are also used as medicines, and several are cultivated for the beauty of their flowers.
Asclepios. See Æsculapius.
As´coli, or Ascoli Piceno (ancient, Ascŭlum), a province in Central Italy.—The capital of the province, also called Ascoli Piceno, episcopal see of the Marches (the ancient Ascŭlum), is situated 90 miles north-east of Rome and contains, among several handsome new buildings, the remains of temples, an ancient theatre, &c. It has also many fine pre-Renaissance buildings, such as the Gothic Church S. Francesco and the Palazzo del Commune. At Castel Trosino, near Ascoli, a necropolis of the seventh century was discovered in 1895. Population of the town, 28,882; of the province, 261,835 (1915).
As´coli Satriano (ancient, Ascŭlum Apŭlum), a town of S. Italy, province Foggia. Pop. 9700.
Ascomyce´tes (-tēz), one of the main subdivisions of the Eumycetes or Higher Fungi, distinguished by their principal spores being produced in organs called asci. Typically, an ascus is a cylindrical or club-shaped structure containing at maturity eight ascospores, which are usually liberated explosively and thereafter dispersed by the wind. As a rule numerous asci are massed together in a layer or ascus-hymenium, which is variously disposed on a more or less massive fruit-body, according to the form and structure of which the group is further subdivided into a number of sections and families, the chief being Erysiphales, Plectascineæ, Pyrenomycetes, Discomycetes (q.v.).
Asco´nius (Quintus A. Pedianus), a Roman writer of the first century A.D., who wrote a life of Sallust, a reply to the detractors of Virgil, and commentaries on Cicero's orations, some of which are extant.
As´cot, an English race-course adjacent to the S.W. extremity of the great park of Windsor. The races, which take place in the second week in June, constitute, for value of stakes and quality
of horses, the best meeting of the year, as it is the most fashionable.
As´gard (literally, gods' yard, or the abode of the gods), in Scandinavian mythology the home of the gods or Æsir, rising, like the Greek Olympus, from midgard, or the middle world, that is, the earth. It was here that Odin and the rest of the gods, the twelve Æsir, dwelt—the gods in the mansion called Gladsheim, the goddesses dwelling in Vingulf. Walhalla, in which heroes slain in battle dwelt, was also here. Below the boughs of the ash tree Yggdrasill the gods assembled every day in council.
Asgill (as´gil), John, an eccentric English writer, a lawyer by profession, born 1659, died 1738. In 1699 he published a pamphlet to prove that Christians were not necessarily liable to death, death being the penalty imposed for Adam's sin and Christ having satisfied the law. Having crossed over to Ireland, he was beginning to get into a good practice, and was elected to the Irish House of Commons, when his pamphlet was ordered to be burned by the public hangman, and he himself was expelled the House. His whole subsequent life was passed in pecuniary and other troubles, mostly in the Fleet or within the rules of the King's Bench.