Jacob Masen (28 March 1606 - 27 September 1681) was a German

Jesuit , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders ...

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particu ...

, historian, dramatist and

theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

. He is known as a prolific writer in Latin.James J. Mertz, John P. Murphy, ''Jesuit Latin Poets of the 17th and 18th Centuries: an anthology of neo-Latin poetry'' (1989), p.153.

Life

He was born at Dahlen in

Jülich Jülich (; in old spellings also known as ''Guelich'' or ''Gülich'', nl, Gulik, french: Juliers, Ripuarian: ''Jöllesch'') is a town in the district of Düren, in the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. As a border region betwe ...

, and studied in Cologne. Having entered the Order of Jesus in 1629, he taught poetry and rhetoric in the Lower Rhine region. After theological studies he was ordained

between 1639 and 1641. On the 3 May 1648 he took his

final vows Religious vows are the public vows made by the members of religious communities pertaining to their conduct, practices, and views. In the Buddhism tradition, in particular within the Mahayana and Vajrayana tradition, many different kinds of rel ...

in Cologne. where he also acted as a preacher. He also acted in

Paderborn Paderborn (; Westphalian: ''Patterbuorn'', also ''Paterboärn'') is a city in eastern North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, capital of the Paderborn district. The name of the city derives from the river Pader and ''Born'', an old German term for t ...

and

Trier Trier ( , ; lb, Tréier ), formerly known in English as Trèves ( ;) and Triers (see also names in other languages), is a city on the banks of the Moselle in Germany. It lies in a valley between low vine-covered hills of red sandstone in the ...

. He died, aged 75, in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

Works

He completed a substantial antiquarian work on Trier by Christoph Brouwer. His epic poem ''Sarcotis'' (1654) became notorious in the 18th century, after William Lauder alleged that

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

had plagiarised it in writing ''

Paradise Lost ''Paradise Lost'' is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton (1608–1674). The first version, published in 1667, consists of ten books with over ten thousand lines of verse (poetry), verse. A second edition fo ...

''. With Jacob Bidermann, he was one of the most important Jesuit dramatists influencing German drama.Leonard Foster, ''Neo-Latin Tradition and Vernacular Poetry'', p. 100, in Gerhart Hoffmeister (editor), ''German Baroque Literature: The European Perspective'' (1983).

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External links

* http://www.kirchenlexikon.de/m/masen_j.shtml {{DEFAULTSORT:Masen, Jacob 1606 births 1681 deaths 17th-century German Jesuits German poets German male poets German male dramatists and playwrights 17th-century German dramatists and playwrights 17th-century German male writers

Life

Works

Notes

Further reading

External links