HRABANUS MAUItUS MAGNENTIUS (776-856), archbishop of Mainz, and one of the most prominent teachers and writers of the Carolingian age, was born of noble parents at Mainz about the year 776. Less correct forms of his name are Rabanus and Rhabanus. At a very early age he was sent to Fulda, where he continued until, on attuning the canonical age, he received deacon's orders (801) ; in the following year, at the instance of Ratgar his superior, lie went along with Haimon (afterwards of Halbsretedt) to complete his studies at Tours under Alcuin, who in recognition of his diligence and purity gave hint the surname of Maurus, after St Maur the favourite disciple of Benelict. Returning after the lapse of two years to Fulda, he was entrusted with the principal charge of the school, which under his direction rose into a state of great efficiency for that age, and sent forth such pupils as Walafrid Strabo, Servatus Leptis of Ferri6res, and Otfrid of Weissenburg. At this period it is most probable that his Ercoptio from the grammar of Priscian, long so popular as a textbook during the Middle Ages, was compiled. In 814 he was ordained a priest ; hut shortly afterwards, apparently on account of disagreement with Ratgar, he was compelled to withdraw for a time from Fulda. This " banishment " is understood to have occasioned the pilgrimage to Palestine to which he alludes in his commentary on Joshua. Returning to Fulda on the election of a new aloha (Eigil) in 817, he himself five years afterwards (822) became superior. The duties of this office Ile discharged with efficiency and success until 842, when, in order to secure greater leisure for literature and for devotion, he resigned and retired to the neishboaring cloister of St Peter's. In 847 he was again constrained to enter public life by his election to succeed (New in the archbishopric of Mainz, which see he occuaiel for upw iris of eight years. The principal incidents of historical interest belonging to this period of his life were those which arose oat of his relations to Gottschalk ; they in ay be regarded as thoroughly typical of that cruel intolerance which he shared with all his contemporaries, and also of that ardent zeal which was peculiar to himself ; but they hardly da justice to the spirit of kindly benevolence which in less trying circumstances he was ever ready to display. He died at Winkel on the Rhine, February 4, 856. He is frequently referred to as St Rabanus, but incorrectly.

His voluminous works, many of which remain unpublished, corn-prize commentaries on a considerable number of the hooks both of canonical and of apocryphal Scripture (Genesis to Judges, Ruth, Kings, Chronicles, Judith, Esther, Canticles, Proverbs, Wisdom, Ecclesi astiens, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezeki el,Maccabees, Matthew, the Epistles of St Paul, including Hebrews); and various treatises relating to doctrinal and practical subjects, including more than one series of Homilies. Perhaps the most important is that Dc Institutione Clericorum, in three books, by which he did much to bring into prominence the views of Augustine and Gregory the Great as to the training which was requisite for a right discharge of the clerical function ; the most popular has been a compaiatively worthless tract De Landaus Sanetce Owls. Among the others may be mentioned that Dc Univers° Libri xxii., sire Elymologiarma Opus, a kind of dictionary or encyclopaedia, designed as a help towards the his- torical and mystical interpretation of Scripture, the De Sacris Ordiaibus, the De Diseiplina Ecelesiastica, and the Martyrologium. All of them are characterized by erudition (he knew even sonic Greek and Hebrew) rather than by originality of thought. The poems are of singularly little interest or value, except as including one form of the " Veld. Creato•." In the annals of German philology a special interest attaches to the Glossaria Latino- Pr corlisca. A mini!! ent ary, Super .Porphyrium, printed by Cousin in 1836 among the Ourragcs inedits d' bela•ti, and assigned both by that editor and by llaur6au to ilrabanus Maurus is now generally believed to have been the work of a disciple.

The first nominally complete million of the works of llrabanus Maurits WAS that of Colvoner (Cologne, 6 vols. fol., IUD. The Opera Omnia form vole of Migne's PAyeeoyim Curses Completus. The be Uniremt is the subject of Compendium der Nalurtrimnscha✓len an tier liebu'e ma Frdda im !X. Jahrhandert (Bo lin, 1880). Simons is the subject of monographs be 1cliNvitra (De fleabane Mauro prime Germnnice pracptoro, 1811). Kinistut in (ili,terOche ttlenographie ider Ilrabanns Alamuntia.t Madras, 1841), Spengler (Lebec rL.e heir. Ilhabrmus 411wi•eo.e, 18.56), and Kidder (Ilhabanus A/auros a. die haft, as Fulda, 1870). Lira by his disciple Ittelotplitts and by Joanne Trithemius ate primed in the Cologne elation of the Opera. See also Pertz. Montan. Germ. Hist., vols. i. and and Bahr, Gesell. d. rdtmsehen Lderaluz- int Raroling. Zeilalter, 1840.