Ottmar Staff the Younger

Ottmar Stab der Younger (born January 9, 1543 in Sinsheim , † after 1610) has been recorded as Poeta laureatus since 1600 . There are only fragmentary records of his eventful life. From 1605 he was in Leipzig , where he still wrote at least ten mostly theological pamphlets. In a paper from 1608 he describes the appearance of Halley's Comet in 1607.

Life

He was the eldest son of the Sinsheim pastor Ottmar Stab († 1585). The father left handwritten notes on the date and time of his birth. The younger Ottmar himself later called himself von Sinsheim , which probably meant the place of birth. The father wrote to his two 7 and 6 year old sons Ottmar d. J. and Philipp Ottmar entered Heidelberg University in 1550 . A matriculation of two other underage brothers is documented there for 1558. In 1560 he had to leave Heidelberg with his father, who had fallen out of favor with the elector.

In 1577 a Magister Ottomanus Stabius appears in the register books of the University of Vienna . It is not known where he obtained his master's degree . Johannes Posthius , whom the staff later revered as his teacher, appears as a fellow student . An addendum in the matriculation book states that the staff will soon leave the university due to urgent matters. It could have been the father's remarriage in Kempten .

In 1579 he applied unsuccessfully for a position as procurator at the Carinthian state estates in Klagenfurt and probably stayed there for a while as he was awarded 3 guilders for consumption. The application requires a legal education. There is no news of any kind for the next two decades.

In October 1600 he wrote a wedding poem as Poeta laureatus for the cantor Konrad Saher and his wife Margareta Schultes in Hof . In the church registers of Hof it is noted on July 24th, 1601 that the housewife Barbara Stabius, who was probably Stabs wife due to the unique name, had died.

From a funeral poem written by Stab in June 1605 for the deceased protonotary of the Leipzig City Court, Ludwig Truben († October 4, 1604), it emerges that Stab had arrived in Leipzig shortly before as a poor wanderer. In 1606 he enrolled at the University of Leipzig . There he called himself poeta laureatus palatinus ("crowned poet from the Palatinate") and until his death after 1610 wrote at least ten publications, most of which were published by Lamberg in Leipzig. His writings mostly deal with theological issues, but two of the writings stand out because of their content.

In 1608 the text Elegia De Cometa appeared in Arcturo nuper flagrante eiusque Origine, Natura et Effectibus , which is theologically oriented, but has the appearance of Halley's comet in 1607 as its content. The description of the comet almost coincides in passages with the work by Johannes Kepler , which was also published by Erasmus Hynitz in Halle in the same year , so that it can be assumed that the writings are dependent on the writers and that the authors are acquainted.

In 1610 Stabs published Cygnaea cantio, in qua author carminis suam ipsius vitam jam morti proximus describit , in which he contemplates his life and imminent death in complicated neo-Latin verses. This autobiographical work shows that he saw Italy, was secretary to the Duke of Zweibrücken (probably Johann I , 1550-1604) and was a soldier in Hungary, lived temporarily in Styria , Dalmatia , Croatia , Illyria and Bohemia and later the Visited Roman Rota .

literature

• Ludwig H. Hildebrandt: Ottmar Stab from Wiesloch, reformer from Sinsheim, court preacher and pastor in Kempten and his family in the 16th century (Heimatverein Kraichgau eV, Kleine Reihe, booklet 1), Eppingen 2004