Caspar Schoppe (27 May 1576 – 19 November 1649) was a German

catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

controversialist Polemic () is contentious rhetoric intended to support a specific position by forthright claims and to undermine the opposing position. The practice of such argumentation is called ''polemics'', which are seen in arguments on controversial topic ...

and

scholar A scholar is a person who pursues academic and intellectual activities, particularly academics who apply their intellectualism into expertise in an area of study. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or researc ...

Life

He was born at Neumarkt in the

upper Palatinate The Upper Palatinate (german: Oberpfalz, , ) is one of the seven administrative districts of Bavaria, Germany, and is located in the east of Bavaria. Geography The Upper Palatinate is a landscape with low mountains and numerous ponds and lakes ...

and studied at several German universities. He converted to Roman Catholicism in about 1599, after reading the ''

Annales Ecclesiastici ''Annales Ecclesiastici'' (full title ''Annales ecclesiastici a Christo nato ad annum 1198''; "Ecclesiastical annals from Christ's nativity to 1198"), consisting of twelve folio volumes, is a history of the first 12 centuries of the Christian Chu ...

'' of

Baronius Cesare Baronio (as an author also known as Caesar Baronius; 30 August 1538 – 30 June 1607) was an Italian cardinal and historian of the Catholic Church. His best-known works are his ''Annales Ecclesiastici'' ("Ecclesiastical Annals"), whi ...

. Schoppe obtained the favour of

Pope Clement VIII Pope Clement VIII ( la, Clemens VIII; it, Clemente VIII; 24 February 1536 – 3 March 1605), born Ippolito Aldobrandini, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 2 February 1592 to his death in March 1605. Born ...

, and distinguished himself by the virulence of his writings against the Protestants. He became involved in a controversy with

Joseph Justus Scaliger Joseph Justus Scaliger (; 5 August 1540 – 21 January 1609) was a French Calvinist religious leader and scholar, known for expanding the notion of classical history from Greek and Ancient Roman history to include Persian, Babylonian, Jewish a ...

, formerly his intimate friend, and others; wrote ''Ecclesiasticus auctoritati Jacobi regis oppositus'' (1611), an attack upon

James I of England James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625) was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until ...

; and in '' Classicum belli sacri'' (1619) urged the Catholic princes to wage war upon the Protestants. In about 1607, Schoppe entered the service of Ferdinand, archduke of Styria, afterwards Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor, who found him very useful in rebutting the arguments of the Protestants, and who sent him on several diplomatic errands. According to

Pierre Bayle Pierre Bayle (; 18 November 1647 – 28 December 1706) was a French philosopher, author, and lexicographer. A Huguenot, Bayle fled to the Dutch Republic in 1681 because of religious persecution in France. He is best known for his '' Histori ...

, he was almost killed by some Englishmen at

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...

in 1614, and again fearing for his life he left Germany for Italy in 1617, afterwards taking part in an attack upon the Jesuits. Anthony Grafton writes about Bayle and Scioppius: "We owe to him

ayle Ayle is a village in Northumberland, England, situated to the north of Alston. There are six residences in the hamlet. Governance Ayle is in the parliamentary A parliamentary system, or parliamentarian democracy, is a system of democr ...

the preservation of Caspar Scioppius' description of the sparrow he watched, from his student lodgings at Ingolstadt, having intercourse twenty times and then dying--as well as Scioppius' reflection, 'O unfair lot. Is this to be granted to sparrows and denied to men?'"

Anthony Grafton Anthony Thomas Grafton (born May 21, 1950) is an American historian of early modern Europe and the Henry Putnam University Professor of History at Princeton University, where he is also the Director the Program in European Cultural Studies. He i ...

. (1997) The footnote: A curious history. Harvard University Press, p. 197 Schoppe died at

Padua Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...

on 19 November 1649.

Works

In his ''Life of Sir

Henry Wotton Sir Henry Wotton (; 30 March 1568 – December 1639) was an English author, diplomat and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1614 and 1625. When on a mission to Augsburg, in 1604, he famously said, "An ambassador is an honest gentlema ...

'' Izaak Walton, calling him Jasper Scioppius, refers to Schoppe as "a man of a restless spirit and a malicious pen." More recent material appears in ''Wotton And His Worlds'' by Gerald Curzon (2004). Schoppe's major work is, perhaps, his ''Grammatica philosophica'' (Milan, 1628). He also wrote: *''De arte critica'' (1597) *''De Antichristo'' (1605) *''Pro auctoritate ecclesiae in decidendis fidei controversiis libellus'' *''Scaliger hypobolymaeus'' (1607), a virulent attack on Scaliger Anti-jesuitical Works: *''Flagellum Jesuiticum'' (1632) *''Mysteria patrum jesuitorum'' (1633) *''Arcana societatis Jesu'' (1635). For a fuller list of his writings see J. P. Nicéron ''Mémoires'', (1727–1745). See also C. Nisard, ''Les Gladiateurs de la république des lettres'' (Paris. 1860).

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Schoppe, Caspar 1576 births 1649 deaths Converts to Roman Catholicism German scholars German philologists German Catholics