NIDER, JOHANN. - Dominican, preacher, born at Isny (Württemberg) around 1380, died on 13 Aug. 1438 at Nuremberg. He taught at the University of Vienna from 1423 and was dean of the Faculty of Theology there in 1436-37. Prior of the Observants at Nuremberg (1425-29) and at Basel (1429-36), he became vicar general of the province of Germany (1429-38), which he largely reformed.
A preacher of the crusade against the Hussites from 1431, he strove for their union with the Church in Bohemia, as legate of the Council of Basel, at the Diet of Regensburg (1434) and at the Council itself. He also engaged in intense literary activity as a learned and edifying author.
His Formicarius of 1437, which had several editions (that of Helmstadt [1692] with some alterations), contains anecdotes and dialogues as preaching material and is a source for contemporary history. He proved himself a moralist in the Praseptorium divinae legis (17 editions before 1500 and one in 1611), in the Manuale confessorum (12 editions before 1500 and also in 1513 and 1514), in the Tractatus de contractibus mercatorum (8 editions before 1500 and also in 1514 and 1593), in the Consolatorium timoratae conscientiae (7 editions before 1500 and also in 1604), in the De morali lapra (6 editions before 1500); an ascetical writer in Vier und zwanzig gulden harpfen (9 editions before 1500), in De reformatione religiosorum (Paris 1511, Antwerp 1611); and a preacher in his sermons (8 editions up to 1500). He also wrote letters for union with the Bohemians.