Lent, but was granted at all times, whenever the bishop thought the penitent qualified for it. In Borne the spectacle on this occasion is most ridiculous. Af- ter giving themselves up to all kinds of gayety and licentiousness during the Carnival, till twelve o'clock on Tuesday night, the people go on Ash-Wednes- day morning into the churches, when the officiating priests put ashes on their head, repeating the words, "Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." The day is kept in the English Church by proper col- lects and lessons, but without the ashes ceremony. — See Bingham, Orig. Eccl. bk. xviii, ch. ii, § 2 ; Procter, Common Prayer, p. 278 ; Burnet, Hist. ofEng. Ref ii, 94; Martene, de Ant. Eccl. Ritibus, lib. iv, cap. xvii. Treatises on this observance have been written by Gleich (Viteb. 1689), Mittwoch (Lips. 1G93), Schmid (Helmst. 1702), Siber (Lips. 1709). See Ashes.
Ashwell, George, born in 1612, became a fellow of Wadham College, and afterward rector of Hanwell, Oxfordshire, England. He died in 1G93, leaving the following works: 1. Fides Apistolica (Oxon.1653): — 2. Gcstus Eucharistrcus (Oxon. 16G3) : — 3. De Socino et So- cinianismo (Oxon. 1G80) :— 4. De Ecclesid (Oxon. 1688).
A'sia ('A<ria, referred by the Greeks to a person, Herod, iv, 45, but by moderns to an Eastern, usually Shemitic etymology, eomp. Bochart, Phaleg, iv, 33, p. 3379; Sicklcr, Alte Geogr. p. 89; Wahl, in the Hall. Encycl. vi, 76 sq. ; Forbiger, Alte Geogr. ii, 39; Hit- zig, J'lii/ist. p. 93), a geographical name which is em- ployed by the writers of antiquity to denote regions of very different extent, designating as early as the time of Herodotus (iv, 36) an entire continent, in contrast with Europe and Africa (eomp. Josephus, Ant. xiv, 10. 1), the boundaries of which have been clearly defined (Forbiger, Alte Geogr. ii, 39) since the descriptions of Strabo (i, 35) and Ptolemy (iv, 5) ; in the Roman pe- riod, however, it was generally applied only to a single district of Western Asia (Asia Minor). It is in the latter sense alone that the word occurs in the Apocrypha (1 Mace, viii, 6 ; xi, 13 ; xii, 39 ; xiii, 32 ; 2 Mace, iii, 3 ; x, 24) and New Test. (Acts H, 9 ; vi, 9 ; xvi, 6 ; xix, 10, 22, 26, 27 ; xx. 4, 16, 18 ; xxi, 27 ; xxvii, 2; Rom. xvi, 5 [where the true reading is 'Amag]; 1 Cor. xvi, 19; 2 Cor. i. 8 ; 2 Tim. i, 15; 1 Pet. i, 1 ; Rev. i, 4, 11).
1. Continent of Asia. — The ancient Hebrews were strangers to the division of the earth into parts or quarters, and hence we never find the word Asia in any Hebrew book. It occurs first in Biblical writ- ers in the books of the Maccabees, and there in a re- stricted sense. In its widest application, however, as designating in modern geography a leading division of the globe, it is of the deepest interest in sacred lit- erature. This part of the world is regarded as having been the most favored. Here the first man was cre- ated ; here the patriarchs lived ; here the law was given ; here the greatest and most celebrated monarch- ies were formed ; and from hence the first founders of cities and nations in other parts of the world conduct- ed their colonies. In Asia our blessed Redeemer ap- peared, wrought salvation for mankind, died, and rose again ; and from hence the light of the Gospel has been diffused over the world. Laws, arts, sciences, and religions almost all have had their origin in Asia. See Ethnology.
I. Geographical. Description. — Asia, which forms the eastern and northern portion of the great tra< t of land in the eastern hemisphere, is the oldest known portion of the globe, and is usually called the cradle of the hu- man race, of nations, and of arts. It is separated from Australia by the Indian and Pacific Oceans; from America on the north-east by Behring's Straits, and on the east by the great Eastern or Pacific Ocean; from Africa by the Arabian Sea (at the west by the Mediterranean Sea) and by the Arabian Gulf, or Red Sea, with the Straits of Babelmandeb ; from Europe by
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the Kaskaia Gulf (at the extreme north-west), by the ( aspian Sea and the Kiver Ural, by the Black Sea and the Bosphorus, by the Sea of Marmora and the Dar- danelles, and by the Grecian Archipelago. It is united with Africa by the desert Isthmus of Suez, and with Eu- rope by the lofty Caucasian Mountains and the long Ural range. The area is about 16,175,000 square miles.
The inhabitants of Asia (whose number is variously estimated atfrom 500,000,000 to 800,000,000) are divided into three great branches : The Tatar-Caucasian, in the Western Asia, exhibits the finest features of our race in the Circassian form ; the Mongolian race is spread through Eastern Asia ; the Malay in Southern Asia and the islands. The north is inhabited by the Samoiedes, Tchooktches, and others. The following tribes, of dif- ferent language and origin, may be distinguished, some of which are relics of scattered tribes of no- mades : Kamtschatdales, Ostiacs, Samoiedes, Koriacks, Kurilians, Aleutians, Coreans, Mongols, and Kal- mucks, Mantchoos (Tungoos, Daurians, and Mant- choos Proper), Finns, Circassians, Georgians, Greeks, Syrians and Armenians, Tatars and Turks, Persians and Afghans, Thibetans, Hindoos, Siamese, Malays, Annamites (in Cochin China and Tonquin), Burmese, Chinese and Japanese, besides the indigenous inhabit- ants of the East Indian islands, Jews and Europeans. The principal languages are the Arabian, Persian, Ar- menian, Turkish, Tatar, Hindoo, Malayan, Mongol, Mantchoo, Chinese, and Sanscrit. The principal re- ligions which prevail are Mohammedanism in the west- ern parts, the worship of the Lama of Thibet in the central region, Buddhism in the Burmese territory, and Hindooism or Brahminism in India. For farther de- tails and statistics of the Asiatic countries, see each in its alphabetical place, especially Turkey, Persia, Chi- na, and India.