POTT, AUGUST FRIEDRICH, eminent philologist, born in Hanover; wrote on the Indo-Germanic languages, a work which ranks next in importance to Bopp’s “Comparative Grammar”; he was the author of a number of philological papers which appeared in the learned journals of the day (1802-1887).

POTTER, JOHN, archbishop of Canterbury, born in Yorkshire, son of a draper, a distinguished scholar; author of “Archaeologia Graeca,” a work on the antiquities of Greece, and for long the authority on that subject (1674-1747).

POTTER, PAUL, a great Dutch animal-painter, lived chiefly at Amsterdam and The Hague; his most celebrated picture, life-size, is the “Young Bull,” now at The Hague (1625-1654).

POTTERIES, THE, a district in North Staffordshire, 9 m. long by 3 broad, the centre of the earthenware manufacture of England; it includes Hanley, Burslem, Stoke-upon-Trent, &c.

POT-WALLOPERS (i. e.  Pot-boilers), a popular name given prior to the Reform Bill of 1832 to a class of electors in a borough who claimed the right to vote on the ground of boiling a pot within its limits for six months.

POURPARLER, a diplomatic conference towards the framing of a treaty.

POUSSIN, NICOLAS, one of the most illustrious of French painters, born near Andelys, in Normandy; studied first in Paris and then at Rome, where he first attained celebrity, whence he was in 1640 invited to Paris by Louis XIII., who appointed him painter-in-ordinary, with a studio in the Tuileries, returning three years after to Rome, where he died; he is the author of numerous great works, among which may be mentioned the “Shepherds of Arcadia,” “The Deluge,” “Moses drawn out of the Water,” “The Flight into Egypt,” &c., all of which display simplicity of taste, nobility of character, and artistic talent of a high order (1594-1665).

POWELL, BADEN, physicist, rationalist in theology, born in London; was Savilian professor of Geometry at Oxford, wrote a number of treatises on physical subjects, and contributed to the famous “Essays and Reviews” an essay on the evidences of Christianity which gave no small offence to orthodox people (1796-1860).

POWELL, MAJOR, American geologist and ethnologist, born in New York State; served in the Civil War, explored the canon of Colorado, and became Director of the U.S.  Geological Survey; has written on geological and ethnological subjects; b. 1834.

POWERS, HIRAM, American sculptor, born in Vermont; began his career by modelling busts at Washington, in 1837 emigrated to Italy, and resided the rest of his life at Florence, where he produced his “Eve,” his “Greek Slave,” and other works (1807-1873).

POYNINGS’S LAW, an Act of Parliament held at Drogheda in 1495 in the reign of Henry VII., declaring that all statutes hitherto passed in England should be also in force in Ireland, so called from Sir Edward Poynings, the lieutenant of Ireland at the time.