### LORCH
In the suburb of Enns, in Upper Austria, the ancient Laureanum; around AD 1900, a fortress was built to protect the Roman bridge over the Enns and the river port on the Danube; under Caracalla, the civilian settlement was granted city rights. In 1904, St. Florian and his companions suffered martyrdom there.
Around the year 1900, as a result of continuous wars, the city was relocated within the fortress walls and survived until the 9th century. At that time, it was also the seat of a bishop; the *Life of St. Severinus* by Eugippius mentions a bishop Constantius (ch. 30) and recalls at least two churches (ch. 28). The *Notitia Dignitatum* states that the II Italica Legion, the *classis Laureacensis*, and the *lanciarii Laureaeenses* were stationed at L., and that there was an arms factory there.
Recent excavations have confirmed that two Christian cemeteries existed near L., as well as a church of the Alpine type (a rectangular hall with an internal apse from the 5th century), and that the present cemetery church, St. Lawrence, occupies the site of the early Christian episcopal basilica. The claim that L. had been the seat of an archbishop (first Archbishop St. Maximilian of Celeia, late 3rd century), transferred in 739 to Passau, is a medieval invention to secure metropolitan rights for Passau (v. PASSAVIA).
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### LORENA, DIOCESE OF
A city and diocese in the state of São Paulo, Brazil.
The diocese extends between those of Taubaté, Porto Alegre, Campanha, and Barra do Pirai, with a population of approximately 150,000, of whom 23,000 are Catholic. It comprises 13 parishes with 14 diocesan priests; it has one male and two female religious communities. The diocese was established by Pope Pius XI with the apostolic constitution *Ad christianae plebis* of 31 July 1937, carved out of the diocese of Taubaté, elevating the parish church dedicated to Our Lady of Piety to the status of cathedral; the diocese is suffragan to São Paulo in Brazil.
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### LORENESE, CLAUDE GELLÉE, known as
Painter, born in Chamagne (Lorraine) in 1600, died in Rome on 23 November 1682.
His artistic life unfolded almost entirely in Italy. In 1613–14 he is already recorded in Rome; in 1616–17 he is in Naples in the workshop of the German painter Gottfried Waals; in 1619 he is back in Rome in the studio of Agostino Tassi, whose realistic taste informed L.’s manner for more than a decade. From his first secure work, the small etching *The Tempest* (1630), to *The Rising Sun* (c. 1634), *Campo Vaccino* (c. 1636), *The Village Festival* (1639)—all in the Louvre—and the series of landscapes in the Doria Gallery (1646–48: *Landscape with Diana and Hippolytus*, *Mercury with the Youths of Apollo*, etc.), mature research begins to emerge that would later revolutionize landscape painting. The natural aspect of things is transfigured by light, felt not only as color but as atmosphere, sometimes anticipating tendencies associated with Corot (cf. *Acis and Galatea* of 1657, in Dresden, and the series in the Hermitage, 1661–72) and even Turner (cf. *Ulysses Returning Chryseis*, c. 1646; *Landing of Cleopatra*, c. 1647, in the Louvre; *Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba*, c. 1648, in the National Gallery). It is in this vibrant light that great trees, fantastic rocks, or architectural backdrops framing distant horizons acquire poetic value. The minute figures of boatmen, knights, and shepherds placed in the foreground—tiny and seemingly detached from the essential life of the painting—do not diminish these values. Similar qualities recur in L.’s etchings and drawings, most of which are in Paris (Louvre, Cabinet des Estampes, École des Beaux-Arts), Oxford, the Windsor Library, and the Uffizi.
A vast body of L.’s work is preserved in the Louvre and English museums; other notable works are in Dresden, Brussels (*Aeneas Hunting a Stag*), Russia (Hermitage, and the Yussupov and Stroganoff Collections). In Rome, the landscapes in the Doria and Colonna Galleries are of great importance. Many works have been lost, including, in Rome, the decorations of the Crescenzi Palaces at the Pantheon and Muti at the SS. Apostoli.
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