ADRAR (

See also:

• BERBER

Berber for "uplands ")  , the name of various districts of the Saharan desert, Northern Africa . Adrar Suttuf is a hilly region forming the southern part of the Spanish protectorate of the Rio de Oro (q.v.) . Adrar or Adrar el Jebli, otherwise Adghagh, is a plateau north-east of Timbuktu . It is the headquarters of the Awellimiden Tuareg (see TUAREG and SAHARA) . Adrar n'Ahnet and Adrar Adhafar are smaller regions in the Ahnet country south of Insalah . Adrar Temur, the country usually referred to when Adrar is spoken of, is in the western Sahara, 300 M. north of the Senegal and separated on the north-west from Adrar Suttuf by wide valleys and sand dunes . Adrar is within the French sphere of influence . In general barren, the country contains several oases, with a total population of about 1o,000 . In 1900 the oasis of Atar, on the western borders of the territory, was reached by Paul Blanchet, previously known for his researches on ancient Berber remains in Algeria . (Blanchet died in Senegal on the 6th of October 1900, a few days after his return from Adrar.) Atar is inhabited by Arab and Berber tribes, and is described as a wretched spot . The other centres of population are Shingeti, Wadan and Ujeft, Shingeti being the chief commercial centre, whence caravans take to St Louis gold-dust, ostrich feathers and dates . A considerable trade ig also done in salt from the sebkha of Ijil, in the north-west .

Adrar occupies the most elevated part of a plateau which ends westwards in a steep escarpment and falls to the east in a

succession of steps . Adrar or Adgar is also the name sometimes given to the chief settlement in the oasis of Tuat in the Algerian Sahara . ADRASTUS, in Greek legend, was the son of Talaus, king of Argos, and Lysianassa, daughter of Polybus, king of Sicyon . Having been driven from Argos by Amphiaraus, Adrastus fled to Sicyon, where he became king on the death of Polybus . After a time he became reconciled to Amphiaraus, gave him his sister Eriphyle in marriage, and returned to Argos and occupied the throne . In consequence of an oracle which had commanded him to marry his daughters to a lion and a boar, he wedded them to Polyneices and Tydeus, two fugitives, clad in the skins of these animals or carrying shields with their figures on them, who claimed his hospitality . He was the instigator of the famous war against Thebes for the restoration of his son-in-law Polyneices, who had been deprived of his rights by his brother Eteocles . Adrastus, followed by Polyneices and Tydeus, his two sons-in-law, Amphiaraus, his brother-in-law, Capaneus, Hippomedon and Parthenopaeus, marched against the city of Thebes, and on his way is said to have founded the Nemean games . This is the expedition of the " Seven against Thebes," which the poets have made nearly as famous as the siege of Troy . As Amphiaraus had foretold, they all lost their lives in this war except Adrastus, who was saved by the speed of his horse Arion (Iliad, xxiii . 346) . Ten years later, at the instigation of Adrastus, the war was renewed by the sons of the chiefs who had fallen .

This expedition was called the war of the "

Epigoni " or descendants, and ended in the taking and destruction of Thebes . None of the followers of Adrastus perished except his son Aegialeus, and this affected him so greatly that he died of grief at Megara, as he was leadingwas famous in Aristotle's day for a special breed of fowls . Even at that period, however, the silt brought down by the rivers rendered access to the harbour difficult, and the historian Philistus excavated a canal to give free access to the sea . This was still open in the imperial period, and the town, which was a municipium, possessed its own gild of sailors; but its importance gradually decreased . Its remains lie from io to 20 ft. below the modern level . The Museo Civico and the Bocchi collection contain antiquities . See R . Schone, Le antichitd del Museo Bocchi di Adria (Rome, 1878) . (T . As.) ADRIAN, or HADRIAN (Lat . Hadrianus), the name of six popes . ADRIAN I., pope from 772 to 795, was the son of Theodore, a Roman nobleman .

Soon after his

accession the territory that had been bestowed on the popes by Pippin was invaded by Desiderius, king of the Lombards, and Adrian found it necessary to invoke the aid of Charlemagne, who entered Italy with a large army, besieged Desiderius in his capital of Pavia, took that town, banished the Lombard king to Corbie in France and united the Lombard kingdom with the other Frankish possessions . The pope, whose expectations had been aroused, had to content himself with some additions to the duchy of Rome, and to the Exarchate, and the Pentapolis . In his contest with the Greek empire and the Lombard princes of Benevento, Adrian remained faithful to the Frankish alliance, and the friendly relations between pope and emperor were not disturbed by the difference which arose between them on the question of the worship of images, to which Charlemagne and the Gallican Church were strongly opposed, while Adrian favoured the views of the Eastern Church, and approved the decree of the council of Nicaea (787), confirming the practice and excommunicating the iconoclasts . It was in connexion with this controversy that Charlemagne wrote the so-called Libri Carolini, to which Adrian replied by letter, anathematizing all who refused to worship the images of Christ, or the Virgin, or saints . Notwithstanding this, a synod, held at Frankfort in 794, anew condemned the practice, and the dispute remained unsettled at Adrian's death . An epitaph written by Charlemagne in verse, in which he styles Adrian " father," is still to be seen at the door of the Vatican basilica . Adrian restored the ancient aqueducts of Rome, and governed his little state with a firm and skilful hand .