Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/154

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NOTORIETY

Kelle, Oexch. tier deiU. Lit. 6i.i zur Mitte de.t It. Jahrhiudrrts, I (Berlin, 1892). 232-63; KOoel, Gfsch. der deul. Lit. bis zum .-lus- eang dfs MillKlatlers. I. 2 (StraaburR, 1S97). 598-026- Piper, Die Schriflen Notkers, I-III (Freiburg, 1882-3).

Klemens Loffler.

(3) NoTKER Physicus (sumamed Piperis Gra- kdm), physici.'in and painter, d. 12 Nov., 975. He re- ceived his surname on .'iccount of his strict discijiline. ConcerninK his life wo only know that in 9")!) or 9.57 he became cilliin'u.f, and in 9.") liosj)Uiiriu.-i at St. Clall. Ekkehard IV extols several of his paintings, and men- tions some antiphons and hymns of his composition (e. g. the hymn "Rector a-terni metuende secli"). He is probably identical with a "Notker notarius", who enjoyed ^reat consideration at the court of Otto I on account of his skill in medicine, and whose knowl- edge of medical books is celebrated by Ekkehard. In 940 this Notker wrote at Quedlinburg the confirmation of the immunity of St. Gall. This is in accord with the great partiality later shown by the Ottos towards the monk, for example when they visited St. Gall in 972.

Ekkehart (IV), r,f ,, ,s ,:,, /) i;>illi, ed. Meyer von Knonau in MiUeil. zur valrrlr ', si. Gall, 1877), cxxiii, cxlvii;

BuKQENER, /Wcc/iV; s ,11 I i h-i.-deln. 1860), 132 aq. ; SiRET,

Diet, des peirUres etr. m. a i I, I'.iri^. 1874), 640; Wattenb.ich, Deulsehlands Geschichl.^iiutllen. I (7th ed., Stuttgart, 1904), 354; Rahn, Gesch. der bildenden Kilnste in der Schweiz (Zurich, 1876), 139 sqq.

(4) Notker, nephew of Notker Physicus, d. 15 Dec, 975. We have no documentary information concerning him until his appointment as Abbot of St. Gall (971). Otherwise also the sources are silent con- cerning him, except that they call him "abba benig- nus" and laud his unaffected piety.

Ekkehart (IV), op. eit., cxxii; Mabillon, Acta SS. O.S.B., V (1685), 21.

(5) Notker, Provost of St. Gall and later Bishop of Liege, b. about 940; d. 10 April, 1008. This cel- ebrated monk is not mentioned by the otherwise pro- lix historians of St. Gall. He probably belonged to a noble Swabian family, and in 969 was appointed im- perial chaplain in Italy. From 969 to 1008 he was Bishop of Liege. Through him the influence of St. Gall was extended to wider circles. He laid the foun- dation of the great fame of the Liege Schools, to which studious youths soon flocked from all Christendom. By procuring the services of Leo the Calabrian and thus making possible the study of Greek, Notker gave notable extension to the Liege curriculum. Among Notker's pupils, who extended the influence of the Liege schools to ever wider circles, may be men- tioned Hubald, Gunther of Salzburg, Ruthard and Erlwin of Cambrai, Heimo of Verdun, Hesselo of Toul, and .\dalbald of Utrecht. A noteworthy architectural activity also manifested itself under Notker.

In Folcwin's opinion Notker's achievements surpass those of any of his predecessors: among the buildings erected by him may be mentioned St. .John's in Liege, after the model of the Aachen cathedral. Praise- worthy also were his services as a politician under Otto III and Henry II. He adhered faithfully to the cause of the romantic Otto, whom he accompanied to Rome. It was also he who brought back the corpse of the young emperor to Germany. The "Gesta episcoporum Leodiensium" have been frequently wrongly attributed to him, although he merely sug- gested its composition, and lent the work his name to secure it trniir r Miiliority.

Wattknii' : h ' 'II, h GeschichlsQuellen im Mittetalter, I (7thed.. StM! .'1 1.'.-) sqq. A Vila Notkeri (I2th ceat.)

is partly pr--- r. ' I 1. i '.ii>ir8 of Orval; cf. Kurth, Biogr.de I'evigue Notf/rr (lu XII' .S'. in Bull, de la Comm. royale d'hisl. de BeloiQue, 4th series, XVII (1891). n. 4.; Biogr. de VHtque N. au XII- a. in Revue bl-nididine. VIII (1891), 309 sqq.

Franz Kampers.

Noto, Diocese of (Neten), the ancient Netum and after the Saracen conquest the capital of one of the three divisions of Sicily, was among the last cities to

surrender to the Normans. Di'stroyed by an earth- quake ill 1(>9H, it was rebuilt iic.-irly five miles from its primitive site. It cdutaiiis line churches, like that of St. Nicholas, an arcluedlonical museum with a col- lection of Syracusan, Homan, and Saracen coins, and a library. Noto is tli<' birthplace of the humanist John Aurispa, secretary of Kugciic I\' and .Nicholas V. In the cathedral is the tomb of Hlisscd Cimrad of Piacenza. The diocese was separated in ISM from the Archdiocese of Syracuse, of which Noto issulTmgan; the first bishop w.as Joseph Meiiditto. It has 19 par- ishes; 148,400 inhabitants; 1 1 religious houses of men, and 14 of women; a scliool for bojs and tlirec for girls; and a home for invalids.

CAPPELhETTt, Le Chiese d' Italia, XXI. U. BeNIGNI.

Notoriety, Notorious (Lat. Notorielas, nolnrium, from noliis, known). — Notoriety is the finality or the state of things that arc notorious; whatever is so fully or officially proved, that it may and ought to be held as certain without further investifiation, is no- torious. It is difficult to express exact ly what is meant by notoriety, and, as the Gloss says (in can. Manifesta, 15, C. ii, q. 1), "we are constantly using the word notorious and are ignorant of its meaning". Ordi- narily it is eciiiivalent to public, manifest, evident, known; all these terms have something in common, they signify that a thing, far from being secret, may be easily known by many. Notoriety, in addition to this common idea, involves the idea of indis])utable proof, so that what is notorious is held as pro\eil and serves as a basis for the conclusions and acts of those in au- thority, especially judges. To be as precise as is pos- sible, "pubhc" means what any one may easily prove or ascertain, what is done openly; what many persons know and hold as certain, is "manifest"; what a greater or less number of persons have learnt, no mat- ter how, is "known"; what is to be held as certain and may no longer be called in question is "notorious".

Authorities distinguish between notoriety of fact, notoriety of law, and presumptive notoriety, though the last is often considered a subdivision of the second. Whatever is easily shown and is known by a sufficient number of persons to be free from reasonable doubt is notorious in fact. This Idnd of notoriety may refer either to a transitory fact, e. g., Caius was assassi- nated; or permanent facts, e. g., Titius is parish priest of this parish; or recurring facts, e. g., Sempronius en- gages in usurious transactions. Whatever has been judicially ascertained, viz., judicial admissions, an af- fair fully proved, and the judgment rendered in a law- suit, is notorious in law; the judge accepts the fact as certain without investigation; nor will he allow, except in certain well-specified cases, the matter to be called in question. ' ' Notorious " is then used as more or less synonymous with "official". Such also are facts re- corded in official documents, as civil or ecclesiastical registries of births, deaths, or marriages, notarial rec- ords. Lastly, whatever arises from a rule of law based on a "violent" presumption, for instance, paternity and filiation in case of a legitimate marriage, is pre- sumptively notorious.

When a fact is admitted as notorious by the judge, and in general by a competent authority, no proof of it is required, but it is often necessary to show that it is notorious, as the judge is not expected to know every notorious fact. The notoriety has to be proved, like any other fact alleged in a trial, by witnesses or "in- struments", that is, written documents. The wit- nesses swear that the fact in question is publicly known and .admitted beyond dispute in their locality or circle. The documents consist especially in ex- tracts from the official registries, in the copies of au- thentic judicial papers, for instance, a judgment, or of notarial papers, known as "notarial acts", drawn up by public notaries on the conscientious declarations of well-informed witnesses.