Heribert Rosweyde

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Title page of Heribert Rosweydes "Vitae Patrum"

Heribert Rosweyde (born January 20, 1569 in Utrecht , † October 4, 1629 in Antwerp ) was a Dutch Jesuit , theological writer and hagiographer . He is considered the founder or initiator of the so-called Bollandists who published the Acta Sanctorum .

Life

Rosweyde entered the Jesuit order on May 21, 1588. He spent his novitiate in Tournai .

In 1591 he made his master's degree from the University of Douai ; In 1599 he was ordained a priest. Heribert Rosweyde taught logic in Douai and then worked as a professor of philosophy at the Jesuit college in Saint-Omer (Pas-de-Calais) , then in Antwerp, where he also worked as prefect of studies.

In Antwerp he became infected with a deadly germ while nursing and died of it.

Act

Rosweyde gained lasting importance through his hagiographic studies and the idea of ​​systematically collecting, checking and publishing reports of saints. This resulted in the Acta Sanctorum , which continued into the 20th century , with around 70 volumes and the group of so-called Bollandists that still exists today and who publish it or continue to collect hagiographic material for publication.

In 1607 Rosweyde originally planned the source-critical text edition of all the lives of saints handed down in Belgian manuscripts, in 18 volumes (3 volumes on Christ, Mary and the history of the feast days of the saints, 12 volumes saints' lives according to the order of the church calendar and a further 3 volumes with martyrologies, historical dates and Tables of Contents). As the first outflow of his collecting activity, he published the highly regarded " Vitae patrum " in 1615 , a compilation of descriptions of the lives of early Christian monk fathers . They became the forerunners of the later Acta Sanctorum , the publication of which the Jesuit did not live to see, even though he had worked practically exclusively on this project since 1606.

At his death in 1629 he had collected very extensive hagiographic material, and the Jesuit order commissioned Father Jean Bolland (1596–1665) to complete the work that had been started. The latter gave its name to the entire group and its activities, the so-called Bollandists . The Acta Sanctorum should now contain the holy lives worldwide and be arranged according to the calendar according to the holy days. In 1635, Father Bolland received Godefridus Henschenius SJ (1600–1682) as his scientific assistant, and both published the first volume of the compilation in Antwerp in 1643.

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personal data
SURNAME Rosweyde, Heribert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Jesuit and historian
DATE OF BIRTH January 20, 1569
PLACE OF BIRTH Utrecht
DATE OF DEATH October 4, 1629
Place of death Antwerp