SERTORIUS, Roman statesman and general; joined the democratic party under MARIUS (q. v.) against Sulla; retired to Spain on the return of Sulla to Rome, where he sought to introduce Roman civilisation; was assassinated 73 B.C.

SERVETUS, MICHAEL, physician, born at Tudela, in Navarre; had a leaning to theology, and passing into Germany associated with the Reformers; adopted Socinianism, and came under ban of the orthodox, and was burnt alive at Geneva, after a trial of two months, under sanction, it is said, of Calvin (1511-1553).

SERVIA (2,227), a kingdom of Europe occupying a central position in the Balkan Peninsula between Austria (N.) and Turkey (S. and W.), with Roumania and Bulgaria on the E.; one-third the size of England and Wales; its surface is mountainous and in many parts thickly forested, but wide fertile valleys produce in great abundance wheat, maize, and other cereals, grapes and plums (an important export when dried), while immense herds of swine are reared on the outskirts of the oak-forests; is well watered by the Morava flowing through the centre and by the Save and Danube on the N.; climate varies considerably according to elevation; not much manufacturing is done, but minerals abound and are partially wrought; the Servians are of Slavonic stock, high-spirited and patriotic, clinging tenaciously to old-fashioned methods and ideas; have produced a notable national literature, rich in lyric poetry; a good system of national education exists; belong to the Greek Church; the monarchy is limited and hereditary; government is vested in the King, Senate, and National Assembly; originally emigrants in the 7th century from districts round the Carpathians, the Servians had by the 14th century established a kingdom considerably larger than their present domain; were conquered by the Turks in 1389, and held in subjection till 1815, when a national rising won them Home Rule, but remained tributary to Turkey until 1877, when they proclaimed their independence, which was confirmed by the Treaty of Berlin in 1878.

SERVIUS TULLIUS, the sixth king of Rome from 578 to 534 B.C., divided the Roman territory into 30 tribes, and the people into 5 classes, which were further divided into centuries.

SESOSTRIS, a legendary monarch of Egypt, alleged to have achieved universal empire at a very remote antiquity, and to have executed a variety of public works by means of the captives he brought home from his conquests.

SESTERTIUS, a Roman coin either bronze or silver one-fourth of a denarius, originally worth 21/2 asses but afterwards 4 asses, up to the time of Augustus was worth fully 2d., and subsequently one-eighth less; Sestertium, a Roman “money of account,” never a coin, equalled 1000 sestertii, and was valued at L8, 15s.

SETTLE, ELKANAH, a playwright who lives in the pages of Dryden’s satire “Absalom and Achitophel”; was an Oxford man and litterateur in London; enjoyed a brief season of popularity as author of “Cambyses,” and “The Empress of Morocco”; degenerated into a “city poet and a puppet-show keeper,” and died in the Charterhouse; was the object of Dryden’s and Pope’s scathing sarcasms (1648-1723).