HERZOGENBURG

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

Abbazia of the Canons Regular of the Lateran of St. Augustine, in Lower Austria, diocese of St. Pölten. It administers 16 incorporated parishes.

Bishop Ulrich I of Passau founded in 1112, in the vast forests of that time near the Traisen River, a monastery for Canons Regular under the title of St. George (now St. Georgen an der Traisen), chiefly to establish a center of religious and civil culture. Bishop Rudiger of Passau transferred the seat in 1244 to a more suitable location, H.; the original church was dedicated to St. George in 1267. During the Protestant Reformation the house was nearly extinct, but it recovered and flourished again. In the Baroque period grand works were undertaken at H.: the church was made Baroque by Fr. Munggenast and by Fischer V. Erlach, with frescoes by B. Altomonte. The convent was also partly rebuilt by the same Munggenast and by J. Prandtauer, but not completed. It has a grand festival hall and a fine library.

BIBL.: Fr. Riesenhuber, Die kirchlichen Kunstdenkmäler des Bistums St. Pölten, Vienna 1923, V. indice; Cottineau, I. col. 1412.

HESEBON (Hebrew Heßbön, Septuagint "Eoßoß")

A locality 12 km from Madaba in a northerly direction, in eastern Jordan. Capital of the Amorite kingdom of Sihon, it was occupied by the Israelites (Num. 21:25-34) and repopulated by the tribe of Reuben after the destruction (Num. 32:3, 37). Since it lay on the border of Gad (v.), it was taken by that tribe and assigned to the Levites (Josh. 21:37; 1 Chron. 6:81). In the time of Isaiah and Jeremiah it was in the hands of the Moabites and often appears in their oracles (Isa. 15:4; 16:8; Jer. 48:2, 34; 49:3).

Later it was taken by Alexander Jannaeus and held by Herod the Great. During the Jewish War it was plundered by the Jews. In 106, under the name of Esbus, it became part of the province of Arabia and flourished to the point of minting coins. After becoming Christian, it was an episcopal see dependent on Bostra. With the Arab occupation it lost all importance; today it is inhabited by a Muslim family. Although no excavations have been carried out there, a columned building, tombs, and a pool recalling Cant. 7:4 are still visible.

BIBL.: L. Musil, Moab, Vienna 1907, pp. 383-94, with a plan of the ruins; F.-M. Abel, Géographie de la Palestine, II, Paris 1938, pp. 348-49; S. J. Saller - B. Bagatti, The town of Nebo, Jerusalem 1949, pp. 147 and 226, for the Christian period.