Descended from the nobles of Hochheim, a Dominican at Erfurt, E. studied at Strasbourg and Cologne. Between 1290 and 1298 he was prior and vicar in Thuringia, and wrote the *Rede der Unterscheidung*. After obtaining his mastership at the University of Paris (Master E.), he taught, disputed, and preached there. In 1303 he became the first provincial of the Saxon province, and in 1307 the General Chapter also appointed him vicar of Bohemia. Elected provincial of Germany in 1310 but not confirmed, he was sent back to Paris to teach (1311–1313). Though E. devoted his best years to administration, he never ceased writing (*Buch der göttlichen Tröstung* for the Queen of Hungary; *Quaestiones*, etc.) and preaching, which was his true vocation. In 1313 he was at Strasbourg. Many of his sermons survive in “reportationes” by auditors and hearers. His thought, formed in the school, shone forth in sermons of high quality addressed to clergy, people, orthodox beghards, and above all to religious communities, especially the Dominicans, who had seven monasteries in Strasbourg. He also traveled elsewhere.
(From F. Courby, *Sacrifici e Hecat. Religi. in bronce.*, Fondation E. Piet. Monumenti., XVIII, Paris 1914, tav. 6)
ECATTE — Sacrifice to E. Relief (3rd cent. B.C.) — Athens, Museum.
a negating realism is pessimistic, from which he later freed himself when reformist and reconstructive aspirations directed his concerns toward broader problems: thus in *O Crime do Padre Amaro* (1875), his first success, he studied the problem of clerical celibacy in the light of observation and experience, but in *O Primo Basílio* (1878) and more so in *Os Maias* (1888) his interest extends to the life of the capital, its morals, and its religion; the sharpness of observation and sometimes intense emotion are not diminished by caricatured exaggeration. The autobiographical motif of the slightly later *Os Maias*, tinged with the bitterness of life’s experience, becomes more pronounced in the *Correspondência de Fradique Mendes* (1889), that of a sensitive aesthete open to new ideas but incapable of realizing them.
*The Mandarin* (1880) presents in an exotic setting a diverting satire of Portuguese bureaucracy, while *A Relíquia*, a caricature of hypocritical bigotry, becomes an occasion for a splendid evocation of the Passion and the Holy Places. In a final phase, and especially in the novels *A Ilustre Casa de Ramires* and *A Cidade e as Serras* (*The City and the Mountains*), such a stance is overcome: his horizon widens and clears into serene optimism; freed from the canons of realistic art, he no longer lingers over minute details but, around a real theme, creates scenes of ideal beauty. *Os Contos* mark his ultimate peak. Among his minor works, the tale *A Catástrofe* assumes particular significance as an exaltation of that experience of suffering which alone can awaken the best energies of a people or an individual.