**BLAMPIN, Thomas.** – Benedictine of Saint-Maur, professor of philosophy and theology, born at Noyon in 1640, died at Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire on 13 February 1710. He collaborated with other Maurists on the edition of the works of St Augustine, which provoked sharp controversy: the Order was accused of favouring Jansenism. The Holy Office condemned those anonymous pamphlets, and Clement XI praised the Order and the work accomplished in restoring the texts. Blampin’s edition remains to this day the best of the complete works.
---
**Blanda Julia.** – Ancient city of Magna Graecia, on the Tyrrhenian border of Calabria with Lucania. It was a Roman *oppidum*, mentioned by Livy and Pliny, who disagree on its location.
Mommsen and Lanzoni identified it with the port of Sapri, while Nocito, following Barrio, saw its successor in Belvedere Marittimo. Recent archaeological discoveries place it in north-western Calabria, between Pavia a Mare and Aieta, on the western slopes of Mount Ciavola, where Latin inscriptions from the late empire have been found. In Christian monuments, Blanda appears three times. An inscription from the first half of the 6th century mentions its bishop *Julianus*. Since it is not stated that this *Julianus* was the first bishop of Blanda, one may also deduce that the diocese dates from the late 3rd or early 4th century.
In 592 the Church of Blanda was without a shepherd, and St Gregory the Great entrusted its care to Felix, bishop of Agropoli. At the Lateran Synod of 649, a *Paschalis episcopus S. Ecclesiae Blandanae* also signed. After that year, it disappears from the record.
Blanda was destroyed at the end of the 7th century by Lombard raids or, more probably, by Saracens. The inhabitants abandoned the coast and withdrew to Tortora and Aieta.
Francesco Russo
---
**Blandina, Saint, Martyr:** V. LYON, MARTYRS OF.
---
**Blando, Jean.** – French Sulpician, immediate disciple of Olier, born at Bayeux in 1617, died in Paris in 1657.
Remaining, out of humility, a subdeacon, he is known for a posthumous, highly pious treatise, *L’Enfance chrétienne*, which is a participation in the spirit and grace of the divine *Fébus* (Paris 1665), often reprinted. It has recently been translated into Italian as *L’infanzia spirituale* (Milan 1940), with a biographical note.
---
**Blaess, Friedrich.** – Classical and New Testament philologist, born at Osnabrück on 22 January 1843, died at Halle on 5 March 1907. He became a privatdocent in classical philology at Königsberg in 1874, ordinary professor at Kiel from 1876 and at Halle from 1892. A most learned Hellenist, he illuminated Hellenistic oratory from Alexander to Augustus (Berlin 1865), then Attic oratory (3 vols., Leipzig 1868-80; 2nd ed. 1887-98). He published critical texts of many Attic orators and other Greek classics in the Teubner series (Leipzig). A keen but sometimes venturesome critic, his textual reconstructions are often arbitrary. He set out his principles in *Hermeneutik und Kritik, Paläographie, Buchwesen und Handschriftenkunde* (Handbuch der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, ed. I. M. Müller, I, Munich 1886; 2nd ed. 1892). He completed the first part (phonetics and morphology) of R. Kühner’s grammar (3rd ed. 1890-92).
Turning to the philological-critical elucidation of the New Testament, he offered an original but short-lived solution to the textual problem of Luke’s writings, arguing that they were issued in two authentic editions. He saw the first edition of the Acts in the Western text (“Roman form”), and in the canonical text a more concise and elegant reworking by Luke after his return to the East (*Acta Apostolorum sive Luce ad Theophilum liber alter: Editio philologica apparatu critico, commentario perpetuo, indice verborum illustrata*, Göttingen 1895; *Acta Apost. secundum formam, quae videtur, romanam*, Leipzig 1896). In the Third Gospel (*Evangelium sec. Lucam sive Luce ad Theophilum liber prior secundum editionem, quae videtur, romanam*, ibid. 1897), however, the Western text would be a reworking that Luke made in Rome. Blaess’s hypothesis on Luke’s writings was adopted, in whole or in part, by J. Dräseke, O. Zöckler, E. Nestle, J. Belser, J. Haussleiter, E. Grafe, Th. Zahn, H. Vogels, V. WEBER, MAX, F. C. Conybeare, G. Salmon, D. Plooij; but it was rejected by most critics, then and since.
In the Synoptic question, Blaess upheld the “mutual dependence” of Mark–Luke–Matthew (*Die Entstehung und der Charakter unserer Evangelien*, Leipzig 1907). He also constructed a theory on the rhythm of literary prose (*Die Rhythmem der attischen Kunstprosa*, ibid. 1901; *Die Rhythmem der asianischen und römischen Kunstprosa*, ibid. 1905), on the basis of which he elucidated the text of Hebrews (*Barnabas, Brief an die Hebräer*, Halle 1903) and various passages in the Pauline epistles. He published critical editions of the First and Fourth Gospels (*Evang. sec. Ioannem cum variae lectionis delect.*, Leipzig 1901; *Ev. sec. Matthaeum...*, ibid. 1902). His grammar of New Testament Greek (*Gottinga* 1896, 2nd ed. 1902) was expanded by A. Debrunner (ibid. 1921; 6th ed. 1931, 7th ed. 1943). A “conservative” Protestant, he opposed the “liberal” or rationalist tendency (*Die Heilige Schrift und die Evangelische Kirche*, Berlin 1900, 2nd ed. 1902).