Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 12.djvu/585

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

PRUM


519


PRUSSIA


destination. Of great historical value is his con- tinuation of the "Armales Bertiniani" from 835-61, in which he presents a rehable history of that period of the Western Prankish Empire. He is also the author of "Vita Sanctae Maurae Virginis" (Acta SS. Sept. VI, 275-8) and some poems. At Troyes hia feast is celebrated on 6 April as that of a saint, though the Bollandists do not recognize his cult (Acta SS. Apr. I, 531). His works, with the exception of his poems, are printed in P. L., CXV, 971-1-158; his poems in Mon. Germ. Poetae Lat., II, 679 sq.

GlRGENSOHN, Prudentitis und die Bertiniani^chen Annalene (Riga, 1S75): Fretstedt, Ueber den Prddestinationsstreit in Zeilschrift far xrissenschafU. Theologie (1893), 315 sq.. 447 sq.; Breteb, Les vies de St. Prudence Eveque de Troyes, etdeSt. Maura, rierge (Troyes. 1725); Middeldorff. De Prudentio ei theologia Prudentiana commentatio in Zeitschrift jur histor, Theol., II (1832). 127-190.

Michael Ott.

Priini, a former Benedictineabbeyin Lorraine, now in the Diocese of Trier, founded by a Prankish widow Bertrada, and her son Charibert. 23 June, 720. The first head of the abbey was Angloardus. Bertrada'3 grand-daughter was Bertha, wife of King Pepin (751- 68), and Priim became the favourite monasterj' of the Carlo\-ingians and received large endowments and pri\-ileges. Pepin rebuilt the monaster)' and be- stowed great estates upon it, 13 August, 762. The king brought monks from JNIeaux under Abbot Assuerus to the monasterj'. The church, dedicated to theSa'S'iour (^Salvator), was not completed until the reign of Charlemagne, and was consecrated, 26 July, 799, by Pope Leo III. Charlemagne and succeeding emperors were liberal patrons of the abbey. Several of the Carlo^ngians entered the reUgious Ufe at Priim; among these was Lothair I, who became a monk in 855. His grave was rediscovered in 1860; in 1874 the Emperor WiOiam I erected a monument over it. In S82 and 892 the monasterj' was plundered and devastated by the Xormans, but it soon recovered. The landed possessions were so large that the abbej' developed into a principalitj-.

At times during the eleventh and twelfth centuries the monasterj' contained over three hundred monks. The period of its internal prosperity extends to the thirteenth centurj'. The monks were energetic cul- tivators of the land. About 836 Abbot Marquard founded a new monasterj-, Miinstereifel ; in 1017 Abbot Urald founded at Priim a collegiate foundation for twelve priests; in 1190 Abbot Gerhard founded a house for ladies of noble birth at XiederprUm. The monasterj' cared for the poor and sick. Learning was also cultivated. Among those who taught in the school of the monasterj' were Ado, later Archbishop of \ienne (860-75). Another head of the school, Wandelbert (813-70), was a distinguished poet. Abbot Regino (893-99) made a name for himself as historian and codifier of canon law. Caesarius of Heisterbach is onlj' brought into the list of authors of this monasterj' bj- being confounded with Abbot Caesarius of Priim (1212-16). In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the monasterj- decUned, partlj' from the oppression of its secular administrators, but more from internal decaj'. It reached such a pass that the monks di\'ided the revenues among them- selves and lived apart from one another. Conse- quentlj' the archbishops of Trier sought to incorporate the abbej' in the archdiocese. In 1376 Charles IV gave his consent to this, as did Boniface IX in 1379, but the pope's consent was recalled in 1398; Si.xtus IV about 1473 also gave his approval to the incorpora- tion. But the abbots refused to submit and even in 1511 carried on war again.st the archbishop. Fi- nallj', when the abbej' was near ruin, Gregorj' XIII issued the decree of incorporation 24 Aug., 1574, which was carried into effect in 1576 after the death of Abbot Christopher von Manderscheid. After this the archbishops of Trier were "perpetual administrators"


of the abbey. The abbej' was now brought into order within and without, and once more flourished to such a degree that the two archaeologists Martene and Durand, who \-isited the monasterj' in 1718, state in their "Voj-age litteraire" that of all the monas- teries in German J' Priim showed the best spirit, and studj' was zealously pursued. The monks made ef- forts even in the eighteenth century to shake oS the supremacj' of Trier.

In 1801 Priim fell to Prance, was secularized, and its estates sold. Xapoleon gave its buildings to the citj'. Since 1815 Priim has belonged to Prussia. The church, built in 1721 bj' the Elector Louis, is now a parish church. The monastic buildings are now used for the district court and the high-school. The sandals of Christ are considered to be the most notable of the manj' reUcs of the church; they are mentioned bj- Pepin in the deed of 762. He is said to have re- ceived them from Rome as a gift of Pope Zachariaa or Pope Stephen.

M.iRx, Geach. des Erzstifts Trier, 11 (Trier, 1860), i, 271-322; WiLLEUs, Prum u. seine HeiliglhUmer (Trier, 1896) ; Frexz, Die letze Chronik v. Prum in Slud. u. Mitteil. aus dem Benediktiner- und Zistercienscrorden, XXVIII (1907), 609-42.

Klemexs Loffler. Prusa. See Brcs.4.

Pnisias ad Hypium, titular see, suffragan of Clau- diopolis in the Honoriad. Memnon, the historian, saj's that Prusiiis I, King of Bithynia (237-192 b. c), captured from the Heracleans the town of ffieros, united it to his dominions and changed its name to Prusias ("Frag, histor. Grace", coll. Didot, frag. 27 and 47; fragment 41 treats of Kios or Guemlek, also called Prusias, and not of Kieros, as the copj-ist has ■written; this has given rise to numerous confusions). Phny (Hist, nat., V, 43) and Ptolemy (V, i, 13) merely mention it, one below Mt. Hypius, the other neaj- the River Hj'pius or MUan-Sou. Several of its bishops are known: George (not Hesj'chius, as Le Quien says), 325; Oh'mpius in 451; Dometius in 681; Theophilus in 787; Constantine in 869; Leo in 879; St. Paul, martyred by the Iconoclasts in the ninth centurj' (Le Quien, "Oriens christ.", I, 579). It is not known when this see disappeared, which still existed in the tenth century (Gelzer, "Ungedruckte . . . Texte der Xotitiae episcopatuum", .5,54). The ruins of Prusias are found to-daj' at the httle Mussulman \'iUage of Eski Bagh or rather L'skub in the caza of Duzdje and the vilaj-et of Castamouni. The region is verj' rich, especiallj' in fruit trees. Ruins are still seen of the walls and the Roman theatre forty-six miles in cir- cumference.

De Hell. Voyage en Turquie ei Perse, IV, 334-38, 353-73; Texjer, Asie Mineure, 85; Le Bas, Voyage arckeologique, 1174- 82 : Perrot, Ejpedition archeologique de la Galatie etdehi Bithynie (Paris. 1872), 20-42,

S. Vailhe.

Prussia. — The Kingdom of Prussia at the present time covers 134,616 square miles and includes about 64-8 per cent of the area of the German Empire. It includes the greater part of the plain of northern Germanj' and of the central mountain chain of Ger- manj'. With exception of the small Hohenzollern district, the original domain of the Prussian roj'al familj', it does not extend bej'ond the Main. How- ever, in a south-westerlj' direction west of the Rhine it includes a considerable portion of the basin of the Saar and of the plateau of Lorraine. All the large German rivers flow through it, and it contains the greater part of the mineral wealth of Germany, coal, iron, salt, and potash. Of the area devoted to agriculture over 2-5 per cent are used for the cultivation of grain as follows: 25-91 per cent for rve, 15-37 per cent oats, 6-86 per cent wheat. In 1905 the population was 37,282,935, that is 61o per cent of the population of the German Empire. The annual increase of the population is about 1-5 per