ECORCHEURS (lit. flayers properly of dead bodies), armed bands who desolated France in the reign of Charles VII., stripping their victims of everything, often to their very clothes.

ECSTATIC DOCTOR, Jean Ruysbroek, a schoolman given to mysticism (1294-1381).

ECUADOR (1,271), a republic of S. America, of Spanish origin, created in 1822; derives its name from its position on the equator; lies between Columbia and Peru; is traversed by the Andes, several of the peaks of which are actively volcanic; the population consists of Peruvian Indians, negroes, Spanish Creoles; exports cocoa, coffee, hides, and medicinal plants; the administration is vested in a president, a vice-president, two ministers, a senate of 18, and a house of deputies of 30, elected by universal suffrage.

ECUMENICAL COUNCIL, an ecclesiastical council representative, or accepted as representative, of the Church universal or Catholic.  See COUNCILS.

ECZEMA, a common skin disease, which may be either chronic or acute; develops in a red rash of tiny vesicles, which usually burst and produce a characteristic scab; is not contagious, and leaves no scar.

EDDA (lit. grandmother), the name given to two collections of legends illustrative of the Scandinavian mythology:  the Elder, or Poetic, Edda, collected in the 11th century by Saemund Sigfusson, an early Christian priest, “with perhaps a lingering fondness for paganism,” and the Younger, or Prose, Edda, collected in the next century by Snorri Sturleson, an Icelandic gentleman (1178-1241), “educated by Saemund’s grandson, the latter a work constructed with great ingenuity and native talent, what one might call unconscious art, altogether a perspicuous, clear work, pleasant reading still.”

EDDYSTONE LIGHTHOUSE, situated on a low reef of rocks submerged at high tide, 14 m.  SW. of Plymouth; first built of wood by Winstanley, 1696; destroyed by a storm in 1703; rebuilt of wood on a stone base by Rudyard; burnt in 1755, and reconstructed by Smeaton of solid stone; the present edifice, on a different site, was completed by Sir James Douglas in 1882, is 133 ft. in height, and has a light visible 171/2 m. off.

EDELINCK, GERARD, a Flemish copper-plate engraver, born at Antwerp; invited to France by Colbert, and patronised by Louis XIV.; executed in a masterly manner many works from historical subjects (1640-1707).

EDEN (i. e. place of delight), Paradise, the original spot referred to by tradition wholly uncertain, though believed to have been in the Far East, identified in Moslem tradition with the moon.

EDESSA (40), an ancient city in Mesopotamia; figures in early Church history, and is reputed to have contained at one time 300 monasteries; it fell into the hands of the Turks in 1515; is regarded as the sacred city of Abraham by Orientals.

EDFU, a town in Upper Egypt, on the left bank of the Nile; has unique ruins of two temples, the larger founded by Ptolemy IV.  Philopater before 200 B.C.