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 burg was the home of one of the largest, richest, and most famous Dominican monasteries in Europe. It had been made famous by the lectures of Albertus Magnus, next to Thomas Aquinas the greatest of the mediæval scholastics. Though not formally a university, this had always been a celebrated school, and was still an important seat of learning. There were also two Benedictine abbeys: one originally founded by followers of Columban, and hence still known as the Schottenkirche; the other, St. Emmeram, founded in the seventh century, was also one of the oldest monastic establishments in Germany. These orders had for three centuries been the dominant religious force in Regensburg, and had for a still longer period been accustomed to absorb all the surplus wealth of the faithful. It was not to be reckoned that they would submit without a struggle to this sudden and startlingly successful rivalry of a new shrine and an upstart preacher belonging to none of the orders.

The great income of the chapel through the gifts of the pilgrims quickly roused the jealousy of the orders, especially of the Dominicans, and they began to attack the whole affair in their sermons.