Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/153

 NOTITIA

125

NOTKER

phyrogenitus (about 940), of Tzimisces (about 980), of Alexius Comnenus (about 1084), of Nil Doxapatris (1143), of Manuel Comnenus (about 1170), of Isaac Angelus (end of twelfth century), of Michael VIII PaliEologus (about 1270), of Andronicus II Palxolo- gus (about 1299), andof Andnmicus HI (about 1330). All these Notitiae are published in ( Idzer, "Unge- druckte und ungentigend veroffentliclitc Texte der Notitise episcopatuum" (Munich, 1900); Gelzer, "Georgii Cyprii Descriptio orbis romani" (Leipzig, 1890); Gelzer, "Index lectionum lente" (Jena, 1892); Parthey, ' " Hieroclis Synecdemus" (Berlin, 1866). The later works are only more or less modified copies of the Notitia of Leo the Philosopher, and therefore do not present the true situation, which was profoundly changed by the Mussulman invasions. After the cap- ture of Constantinople by the Turks, another Notitia was written, portraying the real situation (Gelzer, "Ungedruckte Texte der Notitise episcopatuum", 613-37), and on it are bascfl nearly all those which have been since written. The term Synlagmation is now used by the Greeks for these documents.

B. We know of only one "Notitia episcopatuum" for the Church of .\ntioch, viz. that drawn up in the sixth century by Patriarch Anastasius (.see Vailhfi in"Echos d'Orient",X, pp. 90-101, 139-145, 363-8). Jerusalem has no such document, nor has Alexan- dria, although for the latter Cielzer has collected documents which may help to supply the deficiency (Byz. Zeitschrift, II, 23-40). De Rouge (Geogra- phie ancienne de la Basse-Egypte, Paris, 1891, 151- 61) has published a Coptic document which has not yet been studied. For the Bulgarian Church of Ach- rida, see Gelzer, "Byz. Zeitschrift", II, 40-66, and "Der Patriarchat von Achrida" (Leipzig, 1902). M. Gerland has just announced for 1913 a critical and definitive new edition of all the Notitiie episcopa- tuum of the Churches of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, Cyprus, Achrida, Ipek, Russia, and Georgia.

In addition to the works cited, a supplementary bibliography will be found in Krumbacher, Gesch. der byz. Litt. (Munich, 1897), 416. S. VAILHfi.

Notitia Provinciarum et Civitatum Africse

(LLstof thr I'r.ivin.v.sanilC'ilicsof AlVicni.alistof the bi.sho])s and tlicir.<ii'i's in the Latin pnivniccs of North Africa, arranged according to provinces in this order: Proconsularis, Numidia, Byzacena, Mauretania Cie- sariensis, Mauretania Sitifensis, Tripolitana, Sar- dinia. The cause of its preparation was the summon- ing of the episcopate to Carthage, 1 P^ebruary, 484, by the Arian King of the Vandals, Hunerich (477-84). It names also the exiled bishops and vacant sees, and is an important authority for the history of the African Church and the geography of these provinces. It is incorporated in the only extant manuscript to the his- tory of the Vandal persecution by Bishop Victor of Vita, and is printed in the editions of this work.

P. L., LVIII. 267 aqq.; Victoria de Vita Opera, ed. Halm in Man. Germ, hist.: Auct. antiq.. Ill (Berlin, 1879), 63 aq.: ed. Petscheniq in Corp. script, eccl. tat., VII (Vienna, 1881), xii, 117 sqq. J. P. KiRSCH.

Notker. — Among the various monks of St. Gall who bore this name, the following are the most important:

(1) Notker Balbulds (Stammerer), Blessed, monk and author, b. about 840, at .Jonswil, canton of St. Gall (Switzerland) ; d. 912. Of a distinguished family, he received his education with Tuotilo, originator of tropes, at St. Gall's, from Iso and the Irishman Moengall, teachers in the monastic school. He be- came a monk there and is mentioned as librarian (890), and as master of guests (892-94). He was chiefly active as teacher, and displayed refinement of taste as poet and author. He completed E^chanbert's chronicle (816), arranged a martyrology, and com- posed a metrical biography of St. Gall. It is practi-

cally accepted that he is the "monk of St. Gall" (moii- achus Sangallensis), author of the legends and anec- dotes "Gesta Caroli Magni". The number of works ascribed to liim is constantly increasing. He intro- duced the sequence, a new species of religious lyric, into Germany. It had been the custom to prolong the Alleluia in the Mass before the Gospel, modulating through a skilfully harmonized series of tones. Not- ker learned how to fit the separate syllables of a Latin text to the tones of this j ubilation ; this poem was called the sequence (q. v.). formerly called the "jubilation". (The reason for this name is uncertain.) Between 881-887 Notker dedicated a collection of such verses to Bishop Liutward of Vercelli, but it is not known which or how many are his. Ekkehard IV, the his- toriographer of St. Ciall, speaks of fifty sequences attributable to Notker. The hymn, "Media Vita", was erroneously attributed to him late in the Middle Ages. Ekkehard IV lauds him as "delicate of body but not of mind, stuttering of tongue but not of intel- lect, pushing boldly forward in things Divine, a vessel of the Holy Spirit without equal in his time ". Notker was beatified in 1512.

Chevalier, Bio-bibL, s. v.; Mever von Knonac in Realencyk, fur prot. TheoL. a. v.; Werner, Notkcr's Sequemen (Aarau, 1901); Blume, Analectahumnica. LIU (Leipzig, 1911).

(2) Notker Labeo, monk in St. Gall and author, b. about 950; d. 1022. He was descended from a noble family and nephew of Ekkehard I, the poet of Waltharius. "Labeo" means "the thick lipped", later he was named "the German" (Teutonicus) in recognition of his services to the language. He came to St. Gall when only a boy, and there acquired a vast and varied knowledge by omnivorous reading. His contemporaries admired him as a theologian, philo- logist, mathematician, astronomer, connoisseur of music, and poet. He tells of his studies and his liter- ary work in a letter to Bishop Hugo of Sitten (998- 1017), but was obliged to give Ujj the study of the liberal arts in order to devote himself to teaching. For the benefit of his pupils he had undertaken some- thing before unheard, namely translations from Latin into German. He mentions eleven of these transla- tions, but unfortunately only five are preserved: (1) Boethius, "De consolatione philo.sophia; " ; (2) Mar- cianus Capella, "De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii"; (3) Aristotle, "De categoriis"; (4) Aristotle, "De interpretatione"; (5) "The Psalter". Among those lost are: "The Book of Job", at which he worked for more than five years; "Disticha Catonis"; Vergil's "Bucolica"; and the "Andria" of Terenz. Of his own writings he mentions in the above letter a "New Rhetoric" and a "New Computus" and a few other smaller works in Latin. We still possess the Rhetoric, the Computus (a manual for calculating the dates of ecclesiastical celebrations, especially of Easter), the essay "De partibus logics", and the German essay on Music.

In Kegel's opinion Notker Labeo was one of the greatest stylists in German literature. "His achieve- ments in this respect seem almost marvellous." His style, where it becomes most brilliant, is essentially poetical; he observes with surprising exactitude the laws of the language. Latin and German he com- manded with equal fluency ; .and while he did not under- stand Greek, he was weak enough to pretend that he did. He put an enormous amount of learning and erudition into his commentaries on his translations. There everything may be found that w.as of interest in his time, philosophy, universal and literary history, natural science, astronomy. He frequently quotes the classics and the Fathers of the Church. It is charac- teristic of Notker that at his dying request the poor were fed, and that he asked to be buried in the clothes which he was wearing in order that none might see the heavy chain with which he had been in the habit of mortifying his body.