CARACCI or CARRACCI, a family of painters, born at Bologna:  LUDOVICO, the founder of a new school of painting, the principle of which was eclecticism, in consequence of which it is known as the Eclectic School, or imitation of the styles of the best masters (1555-1619); ANNIBALE, cousin and pupil, did “St. Roche distributing Alms,” and his chief, “Three Marys weeping over Christ”; went to Rome and painted the celebrated Farnese gallery, a work which occupied him four years (1560-1609); AGOSTINO, brother of above, assisted him in the frescoes of the gallery, the “Communion of St. Jerome” his greatest work (1557-1602).

CARACTACUS, a British chief, king of the Silures, maintained a gallant struggle against the Romans for nine years, but was overthrown by Ostorius, 50 A.D., taken captive, and led in triumphal procession through Rome, when the Emperor Claudius was so struck with his dignified demeanour, that he set him and all his companions at liberty.

CARADOC, a knight of the Round Table, famous for his valour and the chastity and constancy of his wife.

CARAFFA, a distinguished Neapolitan family, which gave birth to a number of distinguished ecclesiastics, Paul IV. one of them.

CARAGLIO, an eminent Italian engraver, born at Verona, engraved on gems and medals as well as copper-plate, after the works of the great masters (1500-1570).

CARAVAGGIO, an Italian painter, disdained the ideal and the ideal style of art, and kept generally to crass reality, often in its grossest forms; a man of a violent temper, which hastened his end; a painting by him of “Christ and the Disciples at Emmaus” is in the National Gallery, London (1569-1609).

CARAVANSERAI, a large unfurnished inn, with a court in the middle for the accommodation of caravans and other travellers at night in the East.

CARBOHYDRATES, a class of substances such as the sugars, starch, &c., consisting of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, the latter in the proportion in which they exist in water.

CARBONARI (lit. charcoal burners), a secret society that, in the beginning of the 19th century, originated in Italy and extended itself into France, numbering hundreds of thousands, included Lord Byron, Silvio Pellico, and Mazzini among them, the object of which was the overthrow of despotic governments; they were broken up by Austria, and absorbed by the Young Italy party.

CARDAN, JEROME, Italian physician and mathematician, born at Pavia; was far-famed as a physician; studied and wrote on all manner of known subjects, made discoveries in algebra, believed in astrology, left a candid account of himself entitled “De Vita Propria”; was the author of “Cardan’s Formula” a formula for the solution of cubic equations; he is said to have starved himself to death so as to fulfil a prophecy he had made as to the term of his life (1501-1576).

CARDIFF (129), county town of Glamorganshire, S. Wales, on the river Taff, the sea outlet for the mineral wealth and products of the district, a town that has risen more rapidly than any other in the kingdom, having had at the beginning of the century only 2000 inhabitants; it has a university, a number of churches, few of them belonging to the Church of England, and has also three daily papers.