NIEBUHR, BARTHOLD GEORG. - Protestant, historian and diplomat, b. in Copenhagen on 27 Aug. 1776, d. in Bonn on 2 Jan. 1831. Founder of the philological-critical method in history, he studied Roman history down to the Punic Wars.
A scholar of broad horizons and greatly prepared by his experience and his political ideas, in his Römische Geschichte, of which he published two volumes (1811-12; 2nd ed. 1827-28; a third volume appeared posthumously in 1832), he is distinguished both for his criticism of Livy and for his happy intuition of the political and social conditions in the first centuries of the Roman State. N. was the first to appreciate the importance of tradition as a source for the study of Roman history and was thus able to reconstruct more than one historical event. Modern Romanist scholarship owes to him the most precious discovery of the Veronese palimpsest of the Institutiones of Gaius (v.).
Appointed in 1815 extraordinary envoy to the Holy See for the negotiations on the circumscription of the dioceses, he was able to begin them in 1820 and conclude them in 1821. Thus were constituted or reconstituted: two archbishoprics (Cologne and Gnesen-Posen) and six bishoprics (Trier, Münster, Paderborn, Kulm, Warmia and Breslau). From 1823 he held lectures on ancient history at Bonn until his death.
Bibliography4 worksA. Momigliano, s. v. in Enc. Ital., XXIV, pp. 799-801, with bibl.; H. Brück, Gesch. der kathol. Kirche in Deutschland im neunzehnten Jahrh.,
BIBL.: A. Momigliano, s. v. in Enc. Ital., XXIV, pp. 799-801, with bibl.; H. Brück, Gesch. der kathol. Kirche in Deutschland im neunzehnten Jahrh., II, Mainz 1889, especially pp. 46-75 (on the negotiations in Rome); E. Fueter, Storia della storiografia moderna, Italian trans., II, Naples 1944, pp. 138-64; H. von Srbik, Geist und Gesch. vom deutschen Humanismus bis zur Gegenwart, I, Munich-Salzburg 1950, pp. 210-19.
Furlani, Silvio. “Niebuhr, barthold georg.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. VIII, coll. 1869–1870. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1952. https://azioneromana.com/article/niebuhr-barthold-georg.
MLA
Furlani, Silvio. “Niebuhr, barthold georg.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. VIII, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1952, coll. 1869–1870. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/niebuhr-barthold-georg.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec8_niebuhr_barthold_georg,
author = {Furlani, Silvio},
title = {Niebuhr, barthold georg},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {VIII},
pages = {1869--1870},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1952},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/niebuhr-barthold-georg}
}
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